I was recently reminded of

[conuly]

one of my favorite poems. Enjoy!

**************

Crystal Clear Pumpkin Pie!? The Holiday Classic Gets a Magical Makeover

Photographer Spends Eternity Waiting For Museum Visitors To Match Artworks And The Result Is Worth The Wait (Still doesn't beat the guy who hung out at the Met and signed autographs as "King Philip IV". That is one uncanny resemblance!)

The History of Five Uniquely American Sandwiches

Corn Walls And Rice Bricks: Tomorrow’s Cities Will Be Built From Crops

c. 1884-1904: New York in motion (Lots of photos of people jumping, probably to emphasize that the quick shutter and short exposure time meant you could photograph people jumping.)

Africa's first female president set new course for Liberia. But what about for its women?

Scientists find key to unwanted thoughts

Sex, spies, and the national anthem: The BSO scandal you’ve never heard of

The Fries Test: On Disability Representation in Our Culture (And on that note, beatrice_otter kindly compiled her favorites from a set of essays on disability in sci-fi. You should read her selections, and then the rest from the whole issue.)

Blind Runner’s Wearable Technology Gets Off to Complicated Start

Catalan ex-president released by Belgian judge

The lonely death of Delhi's jungle prince

The Unforgiving Math That Stops Epidemics

The Quiet Religious-Freedom Fight That Is Remaking America

The Tech Industry Is Clueless About People. Let’s Debug It.

Heart disease death rate plummets, but overdose death rate rises, CDC says

One family’s divergent views of the Bolshevik revolution tell a tale of Russia’s complicated past – and present

GOP Tax Plan Ends Deductions For Teachers Buying School Supplies (But it's not that they hate education! The Republican tax plan would help rich families send their children to private school! So worth it!)

Homeless explosion on West Coast pushing cities to the brink

The Paradise Papers leak is about one thing: growing inequality (More)

Maria will fundamentally change US policy toward Puerto Rico

President Trump Committed Another Impeachable Offense on Friday

Pentagon: only ground invasion can destroy North Korean nuclear program

Water shortages parch Moroccan towns, prompt protests

Comments

[dine]

oh man, that's an awesome poem! I'm so thankful you shared it - what a treat

[conuly]

:)

[supergee]

The Tech Industry post links back to my reading page.

[conuly]

Fixed, thanks: http://bit.ly/2zih5wl

[author_by_night]

Or people just liked really jumping in the late 1800s. ;)

I really I like the fact that these are very day in the life, as opposed to more formal portraits. It's also an interesting look at fashion. It's also nice to see people being playful, since typically they're shown as more serious. Not that I doubted people still had a sense of humor back then, it's just fun to see it.

[conuly]

Or people just liked really jumping in the late 1800s. ;)

Possible!

It's also nice to see people being playful, since typically they're shown as more serious.

Long exposures will have that effect, plus, apparently there was a cultural preference towards looking serious in portraits and photographs.

Paris, AD 1838

[nodrog]

Have you ever seen

http://mashable.com/2014/11/05/first-photograph-of-a-human/#k8x9QWyamgq9

the first known photograph of a human being?

AD 1838

“The exposure time for the image was around seven minutes, and although the
street would have been busy with traffic and pedestrians, it appears
deserted. Everything moving was too fast to register on the plate.

“The exception is the man at the lower-left who [stood] still long enough to
appear in the photograph. The person cleaning his boots is also visible,
although not as distinctly…”


-------------------------------------------

We’ll never know his name, but he holds the title.

Re: Paris, AD 1838

[conuly]

I did once before, thanks!

[nodrog]

there was a cultural preference towards looking serious

Where this survived to the present day was Russia, which in 1991 time-warped suddenly forward from approximately AD 1960.  The mail-order bride business boomed - but the girls were all as unsmiling as mug shots.  As in the 19th century - where, as you say, long exposure times were also a factor - this was information, not entertainment:  “This is me.  Any questions?”

Nowadays they wear big magazine smiles and pose in bikinis &c., and a certain essential charm has been lost.

Speaking of which:

[nodrog]

Fitzroy MaClean was right. An ordinary visitor could see a surprising amount if he kept his eyes and
ears open. And a few days in [Moscow] were enough to tell you something was seriously wrong with
Soviet society. There were swarms of police and soldiers all over the city. Restaurants often closed
at lunchtime and a curious warning was displayed in my hotel: ‘Dear guests. It is not permissible to
keep explosives in your room.’

https://flashbak.com/the-last-days-of-soviet-moscow-1986-87-386302/


[Be warned:  That site will kill you.  Yes.  You'll be found sitting in front of yuour computer, starved to death.]

Re: Speaking of which:

[conuly]

Is it more like cracked.com insane or more like tvtropes insane?

Re: Speaking of which:

[nodrog]

Oh, it's not humorous per se, tho' there is humor to be found.  TV Tropes, I'd say - you just keep going, and going…

https://www.xkcd.com/609/

[conuly]

Possibly, but the sensible, unsmiling faces probably can't compete anymore.

[elainegrey]

Re unwanted thoughts -- this episode of This American Life has an interview with the GABA researchers and the letters they received when they first published. https://www.thisamericanlife.org/tv-archives/season-one/pandoras-box

[conuly]

Does it have a transcript?

[elainegrey]

Not sure.

[archersangel]

the sandwich thing was interesting.

[nodrog]

I had a little bird
Her name was Enza
I opened the window
And in flew Enza…

- 1918 jump-rope rhyme


That epidemiology article is fascinating.  I have a tag for /influenza/, but it's interesting that she says “the measles virus is possibly the most contagious known organism,” because in George R. Stewart's seminal 1949 post-apocalyptic science fiction novel Earth Abides, the die-off agent is a “super-measles” - obviously he knew this too!

But if anything is going to start laying people out in rows it's most likely going to be influenza.

                https://youtu.be/DdFCx8jbesQ

[conuly]

Not only is measles extremely contagious, but apparently getting it "resets" your immunity for a lot of other diseases, so you run the risk of getting, say, chickenpox or mumps a second time.