Archive for November 2013
It’s said that everyone has one…
Fascinated with the idea that two totally unrelated people can look like twins, photographer Francois Brunelle set out to take portraits of 200 doppelgangers. This beautiful black and white series began when he photographed a pair of friends who looked as though they were identical twins that had been separated at birth. Although most of his photos so far have been taken in North America, Brunelle is now taking his I’m Not a Look-Alike! project around the globe to create a book and international exhibit…
Read more of Brunelle’s story at Visual News. Then see more doppelganger portraits (and follow Brunelle approaches his goal of photographing 200 pairs) on his website and Facebook. And follow Sophie Robhemed, a journalist on the hunt for her doppelganger, as she seeks her double.
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As we stare into the mirror, we might recall that it was on this date in 1954, in Oak Grove, Alabama, near Sylacauga, that a meteorite crashed down through the roof of Ann Hodges’ home and struck her– the first documented extraterrestrial object to have injured a human being in the U.S. The grapefruit-sized fragment crashed through the roof of her frame house, bounced off a large wooden console radio, and hit Hodges as she napped on a couch. The 31-year-old woman was badly bruised on one side of her body but able to walk.
Ann with authorities; the meteorite; her home
A Man, A Plan– Karakalpakstan!
Karakalpakstan. The name sounds made up, but it’s a real place. And it could have been the 13th member of an exclusive club: nations which have only a’s for vowels in their name. The others being the Bahamas, Canada, Chad, Ghana, Japan, Kazakhstan, Madagascar, Malta, Myanmar, Panama, Qatar and Rwanda. As the only country in the world scoring five a’s in a row, it would have ruled this particular roost.
Perhaps the God of Geography decided in his wisdom that this would just have been too much of an accolade for what is, essentially, a forlorn, windswept, ecodisaster-ridden corner of Central Asia. So Karakalpakstan (the name is Turkic for ‘Black Hat Land’, a toponym that also only has a’s for vowels – how weird is that?) continues its twilight existence, forever on the brink of brighter days (or darker nights) as both Uzbekistan’s geographically eccentric western outpost, and the only ‘autonomous republic’ of a medium-sized post-Soviet autocracy… This is but one example of the frustratingly complex borders designed just so for Central Asia (for the entire former Soviet Union, in fact) as an extra adhesive for the multi-ethnic communist state…
Read this twisted tale in its entirety at Strange Maps.
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As we head for the hills, we might recall that in was on this date in 1909 that Alexei Maximovich Peshkov– better known by his pen name Maxim Gorky– was tossed out of the Communist Party for criticisms that later proved prophetic: “Lenin and his associates,” he later wrote, recapping his critique, “consider it possible to commit all kinds of crimes …the abolition of free speech and senseless arrests….” {Lenin is] a cold-blooded trickster who spares neither the honor nor the life of the proletariat.”
The father of “Socialist Realism,” Gorky was ultimately re-embraced by the Soviets, who later named a Moscow park and a war plane, the Tupolev ANT-20, for him.
And finally, on the occasion of Black Friday, an alternate notion:
Never the Twain shall meet (a turkey)…
Pencil sketch of Mark Twain
by Samuel Johnson Woolf, 1906.
With an eye to the digestive challenges that many readers will likely be facing tomorrow, (R)D will be on holiday hiatus, to resume on Black Friday… In the meantime, a Thanksgiving gift: Mark Twain’s “Hunting the Deceitful Turkey.”
When I was a boy my uncle and his big boys hunted with the rifle, the youngest boy Fred and I with a shotgun—a small single-barrelled shotgun which was properly suited to our size and strength; it was not much heavier than a broom. We carried it turn about, half an hour at a time…
Readers will find links here to download the full story (as a pdf) or to read online at the Library of America’s site… and will realize that the real gift here is the link on that page to subscribe to their wonderful “Story of the Week” list— a free, downloadable short story, like this one, selected each week from the extraordinary trove of treasures in their stock. The perfect post-prandial pleasure!
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As we prepare to loosen our belts, we might send safe and satisfied birthday greetings to Jesse Ernest Wilkins, Jr.; he was born on this date in 1923. The youngest ever undergraduate at the University of Chicago when he was admitted at the age of 13, he went on to earn his doctorate there, and thus to become the first African-American PhD in mathematics. He went on to earn both Masters and PhD degrees in mechanical engineering at NYU.
Wilkins was involved in the Manhattan Project during World War II, then developed mathematical models to calculate the amount of gamma radiation absorbed by any given material (a technique of calculating radiative absorption still widely used among researcher in space and nuclear science). He then developed the radiation shielding used against the gamma radiation emitted during electron decay of the Sun and other nuclear sources.
Your correspondent, for one, will be using that shielding in his oven tomorrow.
“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe…”*
Well, maybe not. This handy reference– a pie for each month, accompanied by recipes for each, aims to simplify:
Each recipe highlights an in-season ingredient – no fancy extras needed – and is paired with one of four crust options, depending on the filling…
Check ’em out at “The Modern Farmer Pie Chart of Pies.”
* Carl Sagan
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As we pre-heat, we might recall that it was in 1789 that President George Washington issued a proclamation naming this date as an official holiday of “sincere and humble thanks”– on which the United States celebrated its first Thanksgiving under its new Constitution.
The Walking Dead…
From the 1990s, web sites long past relevance– but still “live”…
Click down memory lane at “17 Ancient Abandoned Websites That Still Work.”
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As we unpack the undead, we might recall that it was on this date in 1952 that that Agatha Christie’s mystery play The Mousetrap opened in London’s West End– where it has shown, without interruption, since. At over 25,000 performances (and counting), it is the longest running show (of any type) in the modern era.
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