Today my friend will drop 10,000 biodegradable poppies from a classic aeroplane, a de Havilland Rapide. Here's a photo from a previous occasion.
Personal Blogs
going
going
gone
I’ve been working as a tailor, specialising in the top half of men’s suits. But I’ve decided to jack it in.
I took the same snow scene as in my blogpost of 20 October and put it through the Deep Dream generator, but this time the transfornation was not based on a style image but instead on patterms the AI software has been trained to recognise. Here's the result, bizarre and vaguely disturbing, but very interesting.
My friend designs castles. He’s very introverted though. Most of the time he’s away with his forts.
Piston: Went out in the rain.
Expectorant
Ant that wore a ghost costume for Halloween but is dressed normally again today.
I’d never heard this before today but stumbled across it.
It originates with the Latin poet Horace, but was taken up by Immanuel Kant in response to the challenge: “What is the Enlightenment?” Usually it’s translated as “Dare to know”; the sapere part means “To know” (think sapient pearwood in Terry Pratchett) and aude as in “audacity”). In Latin word order didn’t matter (much); which is why it (misleadingly) looks like “To dare, know” in English.
There’s the background. What do you think? Should we dare to know? What is the alternative?
Trepanning is an ancient (back to Bronze Age) surgical procedure (the earliest attested) that involves cutting a one inch or so circular hole through a person's cranium, to relieve pressure from a brain bleed, or perhaps to vent evil spirits, or for other for other ritual reasons. There’s a substantial body of archeological evidence for the practice,
But I can’t help thinking the patients (subjects?) would have found it tedious. They must have been bored out of their skulls.
I’ve just opened a clock shop. It’s not doing great, but it’s tIcking over.
I applied to join a support group for people with bladder infections. They came straight back, “You’re in.”
It’s really easy to eat a slice of pecan pie. In fact, it’s a piece of cake.
Gold leaf. It takes a lot of beating.
Poison cornflakes. Now there’s a cereal killer.
At the beginning of the pandemic, the advice about hand sanitisers based on ethyl alcohol was an alcohol content as high as 85%. But now we have settled down and 70% or even 60% are considered enough. This suggests that lacking hand sanitiser you could in an emergency use Woods Old Navy Rum, 57% ABV.
So the legend that, after the battle of Trafalgar Nelson’s body was brought home preserved in rum, or possibly brandy, is more believable than I always imagined. But according to Wikipedia the Admiralty records refer just, somewhat coyly, to “Refined Spirits”. So we cannot ever know exactly what was used.
A. Have you heard of Samson?
B. What, the mobile phone company?
If you cross your fingers and touch a small object (such as the tip of your nose), there will seem to be two of whatever it is. Not being able to see the object strengthens the illusion, and because you can’t see the end of your nose very well it is a suitable tactile target. Besides, using your nose is amusing.
This illusion has been known for at least two thousand years. Aristotle wrote (Metaphysics Book 4):
“… touch says there are two objects when we cross our fingers, while sight says there is one”
It’s an example of a tactile illusion.
Lots of optical (alias visual) illusions are known. They startle and intrigue: some seem almost incredible. Some have been discovered or invented in the last decade, others go back centuries. They all cast light on visual perception, and are all, even the most well known, still the subject of research and often controversy as well.
Tactile illusions are less well known and most people are only aware of the crossed fingers one. But many have been discovered and written about, and new ones emerge quite regularly. There is an excellent survey here.
One I particularly like is the ‘salad bowl after effect’. Take a smoothly concave bowl (like a salad bowl) and press three fingers – there is no need for it to be hard – against the inside curve of the bowl for a few seconds – perhaps 10 – and then touch them on a flat surface. If you are like me it will feel convex, as though a bump has risen up! This strange (and to my mind eerie) feeling only last a short time but for me at least its is quite strong. I’ve even found I can make it work with the inside of my glasses case.
(Written some years ago for the Partialinsight blog.)I really enjoyed this gem from today’s puzzle!
No privacy here for swimmers? (8, 4)
Why did the chicken cross the ice rink? To get to the other glide! ⛸️
Who tried to teach mice how to talk.
But after a week
They could only say “Squeak”,
So he gave up and went went down the pub.
I heard
Someone say
Autumn
So
I
Felt
Cold
See
https://learn1.open.ac.uk/mod/oublog/viewpost.php?post=239803We had chicken breasts wrapped in prosciutto, drenched in marinara sauce, garnished with fresh basil, with grilled vegetable sides: green capsicum, fine beans, sweet potato, mushrooms.
Marinara sauce: cook finely chopped onions in olive oil until translucent, then finely chopped garlic until smell wafts off.
Add tinned plum tomatoes, then dried oregano and chopped fresh basil. And a chilli. The latter is hard to gauge, my sauce needed to be hotter, but I feared overshooting. Best idea (from my co-cook) is use a whole chilli with a slash in it, taste the sauce at half time, then fish the chilli out and either a. bung it or b. chop it up and put it back.
Verdict: Super but some way to go. 4 stars.
Joke: How would you rate the Solar System? Only one star.
[Not my joke, I don’t know its origins.]
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