Specialization
From “The Little Kingdom of J. Franklin Payne.”
Orange Crate Art
Arbor Day
Should we sing a song about the trees on Arbor Day? Should we sing a song about the trees that proudly sway? Should we be so simple and as sweet a story tell? No, we yell! What’s there to tell?
Illusions and inventions
From “Eisenheim the Illusionist.“
Have I heard that song before?
In The New York Times: songs from seven copyright cases. I’m adding Jimmy Forrest’s “Night Train.”
Mats and mattresses
Going to the mat, going to the mattresses: what’s the difference?
1940s NYC
Julien Boilen’s 1940s NYC, which links points on a map to their WPA tax photographs in the New York City Municipal Archives, now accepts stories about NYC addresses from readers.
Supreme count
(6 - 2) + (3 + 2) = 9.
Headaches
A passage from Steven Millhauser’s “The Invention of Robert Herendeen.“
Eleven at ninety
“I feel like I’m eleven!” says Carol Burnett, who turns ninety tomorrow.
Acorn Truckles out
Replaced by “a state-of-the-art lying Chatbot.”
Backstayges and Roys
I finally realized what the group trips of Succession remind me of: the group trips of Mary Backstayge, Noble Wife, the Bob and Ray radio-serial spoof.
Harold and Mel
Bloom accuses former grad student Tormé of murder.
TV nostalgia
Nostalgia for limited choices, with commericals.
Sam’s, not Sam’s
An Italian-American grocery store.
Today’s Saturday Stumper
“Is out and about.”
“Early American”?
An Atlantic crossword calls a 1940s comedian and musician “early American.”
AppleScript, defying intelligence
David Sparks, in an episode of the Mac Power Users podcast: “My test for these AI engines that say they can program is asking them to make an AppleScript, because I’m convinced that AppleScript is the hardest language for a computer to learn how to program. And they routinely fail at it.”
Mystery actor
It’s her movie debut.
A recycling quiz
From The Washington Post.
NYT, sheesh
“She has also been suffering from a deterioration in her short-term memory and her ability to hold conversations for more than a year.”
“One fluke visible”
From Steven Millhauser’s “Klassik Komix #1.“
The stuff bots are made of
The Washington Post analyzed Google’s C4 data set, “a massive snapshot of the contents of 15 million websites that have been used to instruct some high-profile English-language AIs.” The data set includes half a million blogs. Including this one.
An EXchange name sighting
BRadshaw. From the 1960 movie Strangers When We Meet.
Overheard
“Do you want to come over to my house? It is gorgeous.”
Notebook sighting
In the 1932 movie If I Had a Million.
Figs and wasps
I’m not sure what I’d rather believe: that I didn’t eat a cookie with wasp parts, or that I did.
Eleven movies, one partial series
EO and others.
Reading as a civil-rights issue
From The New York Times: “Fed up parents, civil rights activists, newly awakened educators and lawmakers are crusading for ‘the science of reading.‘ Can they get results?” With news about a new documentary, The Right to Read. From the trailer: “This is a civil-rights issue.” LeVar Burton is the executive producer.
Daylight and shadows
The Daylight Cafeteria, at New Utrecht and 62nd. This photograph is here because I like the cafeteria’s name, and because the arrangement of lines and surfaces makes me think of the paintings of Charles Sheeler.
Edward Koren (1935–2023)
Cartoonist extraordinaire.