"College isn't the place to go for ideas." -- Helen Keller
|W|P|111567121720772958|W|P|Unquote|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comFrom Edward Lear's "Nonsense Botany" (1871):
Bottlephorkia Spoonifolia.
Manypeeplia Upsidownia.
Phattfacia Stupenda.
Piggiwiggia Pyramidalis.
"I was much distressed by next door people who had twin babies and played the violin," he once wrote. "But one of the twins died, and the other has eaten the fiddle -- so all is peace."
|W|P|111705450981481166|W|P|Nonsense Botany|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com- "They were doing a full back shot of me in a swimsuit and I thought, Oh my God, I have to be so brave. See, every woman hates herself from behind." -- Cindy Crawford
- "I think, If my butt's not too big for them to be photographing it, then it shouldn't be too big for me." -- Christy Turlington
- "I wish my butt did not go sideways, but I guess I have to face that." -- Christie Brinkley
- "Everywhere I went, my cleavage followed. But I learned I am not my cleavage." -- Carole Mallory
- "Because modeling is lucrative, I'm able to save up and be more particular about the acting roles I take." -- Kathy Ireland, star of Alien From L.A. and Danger Island
- "I haven't seen the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, the Louvre. I haven't seen anything. I don't really care." -- Tyra Banks
- "My husband was just OK looking. I was in labor and I said to him, 'What if she's ugly? You're ugly.'" -- Beverly Johnson
- "I don't wake up for less than $10,000 a day." -- Linda Evangelista
Evangelista also said, "I can do anything you want me to do so long as I don't have to speak."
|W|P|111696302100419835|W|P|Smile!|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comgrowl�er�y
A retreat for times of ill humor
First Decadent: "After all, Smythe, what would life be without coffee?"
Second Decadent: "True, Jeohnes, true! And yet, after all, what is life with coffee?"
-- Punch, Oct. 15, 1892
|W|P|111652778246265145|W|P|"Post-Prandial Pessimists"|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comA farewell letter from kamikaze pilot Masahisa Uemura to his daughter:
Motoko,
You often looked and smiled at my face. You also slept in my arms, and we took baths together. When you grow up and want to know about me, ask your mother and Aunt Kayo.
My photo album has been left for you at home. I gave you the name Motoko, hoping you would be a gentle, tender-hearted, and caring person.
I want to make sure you are happy when you grow up and become a splendid bride, and even though I die without you knowing me, you must never feel sad.
When you grow up and want to meet me, please come to Kudan [a national shrine for fallen soldiers]. And if you pray deeply, surely your father's face will show itself within your heart. I believe you are happy. Since your birth you started to show a close resemblance to me, and other people would often say that when they saw little Motoko they felt like they were meeting me. Your uncle and aunt will take good care of you with you being their only hope, and your mother will only survive by keeping in mind your happiness throughout your entire lifetime. Even though something happens to me, you must certainly not think of yourself as a child without a father. I am always protecting you. Please be a person who takes loving care of others.
When you grow up and begin to think about me, please read this letter.
Father
He added a postscript: "P.S. In my airplane, I keep as a charm a doll you had as a toy when you were born. So it means Motoko was together with Father. I tell you this because you being here without knowing makes my heart ache."
|W|P|111635594262875192|W|P|A Farewell Letter|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comOh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
A medley of extemporanea,
And love is a thing that can never go wrong,
And I am Marie of Roumania.
-- Dorothy Parker
|W|P|111666967316445580|W|P|Poem|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
Pirates get a bad rap. Their trade was often the only course open to a poor person in the 17th century, and as an institution it treated its people uncommonly well, if you overlook the pillaging and murder.
On the Spanish Main, most pirate ships were democracies. You elected your captain, and you could vote to replace him. Spoils were divided evenly. Morale was generally high, so much so that pirates often overwhelmed trade vessels by force of numbers. And there was even a social insurance system, so a wounded pirate would be guaranteed money or gold at a certain scale.
Best of all, buccaneers were egalitarian. If they took a slave ship, they freed the slaves. Occasionally they'd force carpenters or other specialists to sail with them, but they'd free them afterward, and they could join the crew if they chose. That's more noble, in its way, than a lot of lawful enterprises.
|W|P|111644577965396520|W|P|Har, Jim Lad|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
|W|P|Here here, mate! Wonderful!Highest-grossing films worldwide, to date:
- Titanic (1997)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
- Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (2001)
- Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
- Jurassic Park (1993)
- Shrek 2 (2004)
- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)
- Finding Nemo (2003)
- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
At first that looks like a triumph of modern marketing -- all of these films were made in the last 12 years. But here are the top ten when receipts are adjusted for inflation:
- Gone With the Wind (1939)
- Star Wars (1977)
- The Sound of Music (1965)
- E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
- The Ten Commandments (1956)
- Titanic (1997)
- Jaws (1975)
- Doctor Zhivago (1965)
- The Exorcist (1973)
- Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
Titanic has made $1.8 billion worldwide to date, and it's only number 6 on the all-time list. Gone With the Wind has made $3.8 billion, more than twice as much.
|W|P|111660708205941145|W|P|Highest-Grossing Films|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comTo make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee, --
One clover, and a bee,
And revery.
The revery alone will do
If bees are few.
-- Emily Dickinson
|W|P|111620219616516772|W|P|To Make a Prairie|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
Yup, that's a brick.
It's sitting on Aerogel, "frozen smoke," the world's lowest-density solid. The stuff is 99.8% air but can support 2,000 times its own weight, and it holds 15 entries in the Guinness Book of Records.
Most amazingly, it was first created in 1931.
|W|P|111608482206733046|W|P|Aerogel|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comThe shortest word containing six unique vowels in alphabetical order is facetiously.
Subcontinental has them in reverse order.
|W|P|111653426301622250|W|P|Also Abstemiously|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"I hate quotations." -- Emerson
|W|P|111578082773062617|W|P|Unquote|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
Mount Everest has lost a lot of its intrigue since Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit in 1953. Indeed, it's become a big business in Nepal: Between 1998 and 2001, 560 people reached the "top of the world"; last year Pemba Dorjie Sherpa set a new record by making the climb -- five miles straight up -- in 8 hours and 10 minutes.
Still, it's perilous, particularly in the "death zone" above 26,000 feet. Hundreds have died, and most of the corpses remain where they fell, frozen solid.
One of those bodies may hold some astounding evidence -- proof that the summit was reached 29 years before Hillary's achievement.
In June 1924, two British climbers, George Mallory and Andrew Irvine, had climbed to within a few hours of the top. They were using oxygen, which doubled their speed; their geologist reported seeing them climbing "with great alacrity ... near the base of the final pyramid" shortly after noon. But the climbers were obscured by mist, and vanished. Had they succeeded?
In 1933 one of their ice axes was found above a large snow terrace. This narrowed the search. If the bodies could be found, Eastman Kodak thought it could retrieve "fully printable images" from their cameras, which would presumably show the summit if they'd reached it. (Irvine was an avid photographer.)
At first the mystery only deepened. A Chinese porter told of finding an "English dead" near the terrace in 1975, but he died in an avalanche before he could reveal any details. Then, in 1999, Eric Simonson found Mallory's body, with rope trauma indicating that the two climbers had fallen together. But there were no cameras, and still no sign of Irvine's body.
That's where the mystery stands now. Last year a new effort began to recover Irvine's body -- details are at Mallory & Irvine: The Final Chapter. So far they've retrieved some puzzling artifacts, but no clear answer. Stay tuned.
|W|P|111644555341668388|W|P|Who's On First?|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comI'm 40. At my age,
- John Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth.
- Joan Ganz Cooney founded the Children's Television Workshop.
- William Sturgeon created the first electromagnet.
- Hank Aaron hit his 715th home run.
- Harriet Beecher Stowe published Uncle Tom's Cabin.
On the other hand, Asa Long became a checkers champ at 79, and Marc Chagall didn't hit the Louvre till 90. "It is a mistake to regard age as a downhill grade toward dissolution," wrote George Sand. "The reverse is true. As one grows older, one climbs with surprising strides."
|W|P|111608927134245557|W|P|Late Bloomers|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comCities with dubious epithets:
- Eau Claire, Mich.: Cherry Pit Spitting Capital of the World
- Burlington, Iowa: Loader/Backhoe Capital of the World
- Sturgis, Mich.: Curtain Rod Capital of the World
- Beaver, Okla.: Cow Chip Throwing Capital of the World
- La Crosse, Kan.: Barbed Wire Capital of the World
- Clearwater, Fla.: Lightning Capital of the World
- Gallup, N.M.: Drunk Driving Capital of the World
Wichita, Kan., calls itself the "Air Capital of the World." Touch�.
|W|P|111584481298123819|W|P|"The Flour City"|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
The rain it raineth on the just
And also on the unjust fella
But chiefly on the just, because
The unjust steals the just's umbrella.
-- Lord Bowen
|W|P|111620230205974909|W|P|The Rain It Raineth|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comul�tra�cre�pi�date
v. to criticize beyond sphere of one's knowledge
Only nine people have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony award:
- Mel Brooks
- John Gielgud
- Marvin Hamlisch
- Helen Hayes
- Audrey Hepburn
- Rita Moreno
- Mike Nichols
- Jonathan Tunick
- Richard Rodgers
If you count honorary awards, then Barbra Streisand and Liza Minnelli also qualify. If you count "daytime Emmys," then so does Whoopi Goldberg.
|W|P|111607297132917191|W|P|Showoffs|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comFrom the Hall of Technical Documentation Weirdness:
"Wear a bad sweater dress, suffer the consequences."
|W|P|111608903575494844|W|P|Hall of Technical Documentation Weirdness|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comExcerpts from the Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue: A Dictionary of Buckish Slang, University Wit, and Pickpocket Eloquence, by Captain Grose (1811):
- ADMIRAL OF THE NARROW SEAS. One who from drunkenness vomits into the lap of the person sitting opposite to him.
- ANGLING FOR FARTHINGS. Begging out of a prison window with a cap, or box, let down at the end of a long string.
- APPLE DUMPLIN SHOP. A woman's bosom.
- BACK GAMMON PLAYER. A sodomite.
- DUCK F-CK-R. The man who has the care of the poultry on board a ship of war.
- GREEN GOWN. To give a girl a green gown; to tumble her on the grass.
- HEMPEN WIDOW. One whose husband was hanged.
- HISTORY OF THE FOUR KINGS, or CHILD'S BEST GUIDE TO THE GALLOWS. A pack of cards.
- MANOEUVRING THE APOSTLES. Robbing Peter to pay Paul, i.e. borrowing of one man to pay another.
- PISS PROPHET. A physician who judges of the diseases of his patients solely by the inspection of their urine.
- SON OF PRATTLEMENT. A lawyer.
And a THOROUGH-GOOD-NATURED WENCH is "one who being asked to sit down, will lie down."
|W|P|111593077734625742|W|P|Lexicon Balatronicum|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comFamous members of Mensa:
- Isaac Asimov, writer
- Jean Auel, author
- Scott Adams, cartoonist (Dilbert)
- Richard Bolles, author of What Color is Your Parachute?
- Asia Carrera, adult film star
- Geena Davis, actress
- Jodie Foster, actress
- Mell Lazarus, cartoonist (Miss Peach, Momma)
An alternative society is open to the stupidest 2 percent of the population. It's called Densa.
|W|P|111607515666959266|W|P|Densa|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
"Flirting and Its Dangers," circa 1920:
- No Excuse.�In this country there is no excuse for the young man who seeks the society of the loose and the dissolute. There is at all times and everywhere open to him a society of persons of the opposite sex of his own age and of pure thoughts and lives, whose conversation will refine him and drive from his bosom ignoble and impure thoughts.
- The Dangers.�The young man who may take pleasure in the fact that he is the hero of half a dozen or more engagements and love episodes, little realizes that such constant excitement often causes not only dangerously frequent and long-continued nocturnal emissions, but most painful affections of the testicles. Those who show too great familiarity with the other sex, who entertain lascivious thoughts, continually exciting the sexual desires, always suffer a weakening of power and sometimes the actual diseases of degeneration, chronic inflammation of the gland, spermatorrhoea, impotence, and the like.�Young man, beware; your punishment for trifling with the affections of others may cost you a life of affliction.
- Remedy.�Do not violate the social laws. Do not trifle with the affections of your nature. Do not give others countless anguish, and also do not run the chances of injuring yourself and others for life. The society of refined and pure women is one of the strongest safeguards a young man can have, and he who seeks it will not only find satisfaction, but happiness. Simple friendship and kind affections for each other will ennoble and benefit.
- The Time for Marriage.�When a young man's means permit him to marry, he should then look intelligently for her with whom he expects to pass the remainder of his life in perfect loyalty, and in sincerity and singleness of heart. Seek her to whom he is ready to swear to be ever true.
- Breach of Confidence.�Nothing is more certain, says Dr. Naphey, to undermine domestic felicity, and sap the foundation of marital happiness, than marital infidelity. The risks of disease which a married man runs in impure intercourse are far more serious, because they not only involve himself, but his wife and his children. He should know that there is nothing which a woman will not forgive sooner than such a breach of confidence. He is exposed to the plots and is pretty certain sooner or later to fall into the snares of those atrocious parties who subsist on black-mail. And should he escape these complications, he still must lose self-respect, and carry about with him the burden of a guilty conscience and a broken vow.
- Society Rules and Customs.�A young man can enjoy the society of ladies without being a "flirt." He can escort ladies to parties, public places of interest, social gatherings, etc., without showing special devotion to any one special young lady. When he finds the choice of his heart, then he will be justified to manifest it, and publicly proclaim it by paying her the compliment, exclusive attention. To keep a lady's company six months is a public announcement of an engagement.
From Searchlights on Health -- The Science of Eugenics: A Guide to Purity and Physical Manhood; Advice to Maiden, Wife and Mother; Love, Courtship, and Marriage, by Prof. B.G. Jefferis, M.D., Ph.D., and J.L. Nicols, A.M.
|W|P|111593100477399772|W|P|Flirting and Its Dangers|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comAt Future Me you can send e-mail to your future self -- and read what others have sent:
I hope you're happy now. I hope you have a Valentine this year. I know you didn't last year. I hope you've done something positive with your life, but that's unlikely. You're ugly. Everyone hates ugly people. You'll never get laid. You'll never have another girlfriend. Girls hate ugly people. (written Sun Feb 13, 2005, to be delivered Tue Feb 14, 2006)|W|P|111592899911464444|W|P|Dear Prudence|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
"To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk." -- Thomas Edison
|W|P|111567105656911972|W|P|Unquote|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
From Hand Shadows to Be Thrown Upon the Wall, by Henry Bursill (1859).
|W|P|111593106053243223|W|P|Ouch|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comA letter written by physicist Richard Feynman to his dead wife, Arline, Oct. 17, 1946:
D'Arline,
I adore you, sweetheart ... It is such a terribly long time since I last wrote to you � almost two years but I know you'll excuse me because you understand how I am, stubborn and realistic; and I thought there was no sense to writing. But now I know my darling wife that it is right to do what I have delayed in doing, and what I have done so much in the past. I want to tell you I love you.
I find it hard to understand in my mind what it means to love you after you are dead � but I still want to comfort and take care of you � and I want you to love me and care for me. I want to have problems to discuss with you � I want to do little projects with you. I never thought until just now that we can do that. What should we do. We started to learn to make clothes together � or learn Chinese � or getting a movie projector.
Can't I do something now? No. I am alone without you and you were the "idea-woman" and general instigator of all our wild adventures. When you were sick you worried because you could not give me something that you wanted to and thought I needed. You needn't have worried.
Just as I told you then there was no real need because I loved you in so many ways so much. And now it is clearly even more true � you can give me nothing now yet I love you so that you stand in my way of loving anyone else � but I want to stand there.
I'll bet that you are surprised that I don't even have a girlfriend after two years. But you can't help it, darling, nor can I � I don't understand it, for I have met many girls ... and I don't want to remain alone � but in two or three meetings they all seem ashes. You only are left to me. You are real.
My darling wife, I do adore you. I love my wife. My wife is dead,
Rich.
At the end he wrote, "PS Please excuse my not mailing this � but I don't know your new address."
|W|P|111594372040496478|W|P|"I Am Alone Without You"|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.commump�si�mus
n. a view stubbornly held even when shown to be wrong
One more reason to eat your vegetables: vampire watermelons.
According to a Balkan gypsy folk legend, if you keep a melon (or a pumpkin) for more than 10 days, it will start fighting with the other melons, shaking and making "a sound like 'brrrl, brrrl, brrrl!'"
Well, sure, we've all seen that. But keep neglecting your wayward melon and a trace of blood may appear on its skin. Now you've got yourself a full-blown vampire! A snack-o-lantern! A seedless greedy!
Okay, let's not overreact. Not having teeth, vampire watermelons are not actually very dangerous. Reportedly they spend most of their time rolling around the house and growling, not unlike my brother Doug.
But Doug doesn't have an unhallowed thirst for human souls, or a delicious fruity center. Fortunately for civilization, the gypsies have found a fitting coup de gr�ce for these edgy vegetables, these ovoid Draculas, this mean greenery: They boil them and scrub them with brooms, which are then burned.
Take that, Satan! Score one for the scientific method.
|W|P|111592526685847268|W|P|Melons of Doom|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comGreat reviews of bad movies:
- Freddy Got Fingered (2001): "This movie doesn't scrape the bottom of the barrel. This movie isn't the bottom of the barrel. This movie isn't below the bottom of the barrel. This movie doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence with barrels. ... The day may come when Freddy Got Fingered is seen as a milestone of neo-surrealism. The day may never come when it is seen as funny."
- Frogs for Snakes (1999): "I was reminded of Mad Dog Time (1996), another movie in which well-known actors engaged in laughable dialogue while shooting one another. Of that one, I wrote: 'Mad Dog Time is the first movie I have seen that does not improve on the sight of a blank screen viewed for the same length of time.' Now comes Frogs for Snakes, the first movie I have seen that does not improve on the sight of Mad Dog Time."
- Batman & Robin (1997): "For those of you who were scared away by the abysmal reviews of Batman & Robin, let me lay to rest some of the prejudices you might have about the film. It's not the worst movie ever. No, indeed. It's the worst thing ever. Yes, it's the single worst thing that we as human beings have ever produced in recorded history."
Of North (1994), Roger Ebert wrote: "I hated this movie. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. Hated it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it ... one of the worst movies ever made."
|W|P|111584476532324806|W|P|Screen Gems|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comShort actors:
- Sylvester Stallone: 5'7"
- Tom Cruise: 5'7"
- Al Pacino: 5'7"
- Richard Dreyfus: 5'5"
- Dustin Hoffman: 5'5"
- Danny DeVito: 5'0"
- Linda Hunt: 4'9"
Stature doesn't equal talent. Asked for advice on acting, John Wayne (6'4") said, "Talk low, talk slow, and don't talk too much."
|W|P|111584487233571946|W|P|Bit Players|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
Desperate times can yield some pretty freaky measures, and wartime can generate some of the most inspired -- and the most bizarre -- proposals. One of World War II's strangest ideas arose when the British were casting about for a way to reach German U-boats in the mid-Atlantic, where land-based planes couldn't reach them.
Lord Mountbatten and Geoffrey Pyke approached Winston Churchill with a novel plan: build an aircraft carrier out of solid ice.
Sounds crazy today, but if they'd gone through with it Project Habbakuk might well have lived up to its biblical billing ("be utterly amazed, for I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe, even if you were told"). Mountbatten and Pike planned to assemble 280,000 blocks of ice into a ship 600 meters long, with a displacement of 2 million tons (today's Nimitz-class carriers are 333 meters long and displace 100,000 tons). It would carry electric motors, anti-aircraft guns, an airstrip, and a refrigeration unit to keep everything from melting.
Pros: It would be practically unsinkable.
Cons: It would take 8,000 people eight months to build it, at a cost of $70 million.
In the end they made a little prototype in Alberta, but the project never got any further. Still, it's a credit to Churchill that he even considered such an outlandish idea. "Personally I'm always ready to learn," he once said, "although I do not always like being taught."
|W|P|111586158915074332|W|P|Project Habbakuk|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comSome of the busiest people in show business don't exist:
- The name George Spelvin is traditionally used in American theater programs when an actor's name would otherwise appear twice.
- In the London theater, Walter Plinge gets the credit when a part has not been cast.
- On BBC television dramas in the 1970s, David Agnew was credited when contractual reasons prevented a writer's name from being used.
- When a Hollywood director no longer wants credit for a film, the name Alan Smithee is used.
That last one is such an open secret -- "Smithee" even directed a Whitney Houston video -- that the Directors Guild finally abandoned it in favor of random pseudonyms, starting with the 2000 James Spader bomb Supernova, directed by "Thomas Lee" (Walter Hill).
|W|P|111550602900676907|W|P|A Player to Be Named Later|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comEuphemisms for vomiting:
- Un-eating
- Number three
- Vector-spewing
- Launching lunch
- Jackson Pollock
- Eating backwards
- Parking the tiger
- Making a crustless pizza
- Bringing it up for a vote
- Cooking up a pavement pizza
- Driving the Buick to Europe
- Alan's psychedelic breakfast
- Yawning for the hearing impaired
- Yodelling to the porcelain megaphone
- Talking to God on the big white telephone
- Paying homage to the Irishman Huey O'Rourke
- Calling Huey (or Ralph) on the commode-a-phone
Also: horking, yakking, yarfing, yorxing. "Grasp the subject," wrote Cato, "the words will follow."
|W|P|111505943626705827|W|P|Screaming at the Ants|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
One by one, the simple amusements of my youth are being co-opted by geeks and refined into punishing sciences.
Only purists, for example, still build sand castles with shovels and hand packing. The vanguard have recruited all the tools of modern engineering, including building forms and heavy machinery.
Guinness started recording the world's longest sand sculptures in 1987, and that spawned even greater creativity -- and competitiveness. In 1998 Dave Henderson built a 33-foot castle at the New York State Fairgrounds that weighed 412 tons. Not to be outdone, other artists started turning out likenesses of Einstein, life-size pickup trucks, and a rather creditable Eeyore.
Today, at a championship competition, you might find works inspired by Picasso and dream imagery.
Where will it end? With a giant bucket and enough water, we could build a giant ziggurat in the Sahara. And there's no danger from high tide ...
|W|P|111565711215858499|W|P|Sand Castle|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake." -- Napoleon
|W|P|111187520644964905|W|P|Unquote|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comSome secret identities:
- The Scarlet Pimpernel: Sir Percy Blakeney
- Zorro: Don Diego De La Vega
- The Lone Ranger: John Reid
- The Phantom: Kit Walker
- Captain Marvel: Billy Batson
It's been pointed out that Superman pretends to be Clark Kent, but Peter Parker pretends to be Spider-Man. If you have two identities, either one can be "secret."
|W|P|111550281773898743|W|P|The Shadow Knows|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
"Anyone can get old," said Groucho. "All you have to do is live long enough."
That's true, but what counts as old? That depends on how you reckon age. According to Redate, "the creative anniversary calculator," I've been alive for 1,267,587,960 seconds, which makes me sound decrepit. But if I lived on Saturn I'd be barely one year old.
Maybe that's too abstract. In my lifetime I've blinked about 211 million times. While I've been doing that, the world population has increased by about 3 billion people. (That's 14 people per blink.) If I'd left them uncut, my fingernails would be about 40 inches long now. And a human sperm cell could have swum nearly four miles during my life.
That makes me sound pretty damn old. What do I have to look forward to? I'll be 2,100 weeks old on June 7. And I can celebrate my 66th Venusian birthday on Nov. 4.
In the end I suppose you're only as old as you feel. "Sure I'm for helping the elderly," said Lillian Carter, in her 80s. "I'm going to be old myself someday."
|W|P|111566831415865414|W|P|Out, Brief Candle|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
snob�og�ra�pher
n. one who describes or writes about snobs
The Anagrammy Awards is a monthly anagram competition. March winners:
- THE CRIME INVESTIGATOR = HE INTERROGATES VICTIM
- A TRAINED SUSHI CHEF = HE'S A TUNA-FISH DICER
- ASTEROID THREATS = DISASTER TO EARTH
My favorite from the hall of fame -- this:
TO BE OR NOT TO BE: THAT IS THE QUESTION; WHETHER 'TIS NOBLER IN THE MIND TO SUFFER THE SLINGS AND ARROWS OF OUTRAGEOUS FORTUNE
can be rearranged to spell
IN ONE OF THE BARD'S BEST-THOUGHT-OF TRAGEDIES, OUR INSISTENT HERO, HAMLET, QUERIES ON TWO FRONTS ABOUT HOW LIFE TURNS ROTTEN.
Can't beat that.
|W|P|111394095936321350|W|P|The Anagrammy Awards|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
"Without having seen the Sistine Chapel one can form no appreciable idea of what one man is capable of achieving." Goethe's remark is kind but romantic -- Michelangelo's frescoes ennoble the human spirit, but they also illustrate the dangers of scope creep.
The painter signed on in 1508 to repaint the ceiling, at first with simple golden stars on a blue sky. Lacking a project manager, he agreed to add 12 figures, and the slide began. Before he was done there would be more than 300 figures, in scenes depicting the Creation, Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and the Last Judgment.
As the scale grew, problems multiplied. The Judgment drew objections from Cardinal Carafa, who was scandalized because now a fresco was showing human genitals inside the Vatican. And the artist was forced to make do with male models, because females were too rare and costly.
In short, the Renaissance was plagued by all the same devils that dog modern projects. At least Michelangelo met them philosophically and saw the project through. "If people only knew how hard I work to gain my mastery," he said, "it wouldn't seem so wonderful at all."
|W|P|111542181207041519|W|P|The Sistine Chapel|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"When in doubt, have two guys come through the door with guns." -- Raymond Chandler
|W|P|111515722362671142|W|P|Unquote|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comSuppose I show you an emerald and ask whether it's green or grue. It's "grue" if it's green today but will turn blue next Halloween.
Which is it? That's the "new problem of induction," according to philosopher of science Nelson Goodman. It's a big problem: Scientists basically assume that the universe behaves consistently over time, but there's no reason to think so.
A more immediate usage: "Yed" is the color of a traffic signal when the last legal driver manages to get through the intersection. "The existence of the color yed is hotly debated in philosophy, and opposing viewpoints are often taken by traffic cops and vehicle operators."
|W|P|111522504541413402|W|P|Yed, Bleen, Grue|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
A NOAA photo of the World Trade Center after the attacks of 9/11. The towers' designers actually built them to withstand impact by a Boeing 707, the largest airliner of the 1960s. Unfortunately, today's 767s proved to have a kinetic energy more than seven times as great.
|W|P|111531626515228894|W|P|World Trade Center After Attacks|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
ug�ly�o�graph�y
n. bad handwriting; poor spelling
Everyone knows Richard the Lion-Hearted and William and Conqueror. Here's a list of less auspicous royal nicknames:
- "Charles the Bad" (Charles II of Navarre)
- "William the Bastard" (William I of England)
- "Coloman the Bookish" (Coloman of Hungary)
- "Alfonso the Chaste" (Alfonso II of Aragon)
- "Peter the Ceremonious" (Peter IV of Aragon
- "Edmund the Deed-Doer" (Edmund I of England)
- "Henry the Fat" (Henry III of Champagne)
- "Louis the Indolent" (Louis V of France)
- "Edgar the Outlaw" (Edgar Atheling)
- "Constantius the Pale" (Constantius Chlorus)
- "Louis the Sluggard" (Louis V of France)
- "Garcia the Trembler" (Garcia II of Navarre)
Worst of all: "Constantine the Dung-Named," Byzantine emperor from 741 to 775. Supposedly he defecated in his baptismal font in 718. Nice going.
|W|P|111505925003157705|W|P|Unfortunate Royal Nicknames|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
There are a number of ways to solve a simple maze like the one above, by following a wall, for instance, or counting turns. But these don't always work in high-dimensional mazes, and some require a compass or other orienteering knowledge. Suppose you find yourself in the nine-dimensional Arcturan Insanity Labyrinth, haunted by the six-souled Fury Demon of Ragnab Zeta? What then?
Your best hope is Tremaux's algorithm, which works in all mazes with well-defined passages. Draw a line on the floor. When you reach a junction, turn around if you've been there before; otherwise pick any direction. If you revisit a passage that's already marked, draw a second line (you'll never need to take a passage more than twice) and at the next junction take an unmarked passage if you can.
That's it. If there's an exit, you'll find it. If there isn't, you'll find yourself back at the start. Good luck with that demon.
|W|P|111394059283963236|W|P|Maze Help|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com- cooking for the Kennedys
- donating the liver pat�
- face-planting the meringue
- fettucine al dead-o
- filleting the soul
- has reservations at the Chateau Eternity
- peasant under grass
- promoted to subterranean truffle inspector
- pushin' up parsley
- sleeping with the quiches
- slowly cooling to room temperature
My favorite: "sampling the French onion soup with a salmonella spoon."
|W|P|111506155936003179|W|P|Basting the Formaldehyde Turkey|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com"If Christ were here now, there is one thing he would not be -- a Christian." -- Mark Twain
|W|P|111265465304034499|W|P|Unquote|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com
You know there are too many academics in the world when Little Red Riding Hood gets reinvented as The Minikin Incarnadine Cowl-Titivated Gamine.
Fairy Tales for the Erudite recasts the Grimms' tale into prose worthy of a Pentagon requisition:
"Anomalastic primogenitor, what prodigious ocular orbs goggle from your physiognomy," she averred.
"The more efficiently to descry your homuncular form with punctilious exactitude, my minion," he enucleated.
Also offered are The Frog Prince ("The Basilic Paludal Denizen") and The Elves and the Shoemaker. ("The following matinal period the operose moiler cognized a brace of consummate mules posited upon the trestle.")
|W|P|111402604453843543|W|P|Fairy Tales for the Erudite|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comStudy The Official Rock Paper Scissors Strategy Guide before you take on Stanford's Roshambot.
|W|P|111281926227319857|W|P|Paper Covers Rock|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.comLow on fuel? Paul Freeman's Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields lists 1,265 sites, in all 50 states.
|W|P|111402688988823181|W|P|Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields|W|P|greg.ross@gmail.com