Trump style makes me think of its antecedents, which makes me think of Napoleon III, which makes me think of Flaubert, which makes me think of this from Julian Barnes in the new LRB

Cyclists pedalling through 't Groen Kwartier - an old military hospital in Antwerp converted into flats and houses, with lots of green spaces and top end restaurants. The sky is stormy; there's a bloody great rainbow.

't Groen Kwartier (2025) photograph by Anne Billson

Playmobil Gauls manhandling a standing stone trilithon for the end of British Summer Time.

It’s that night of the year when Obelix visits every stone circle to synchronise the clocks. Busy night! Fall back, people!
With apologies to @danherb10.bsky.social
#DontBlockMe
#ClocksGoBack
#TheTimesTheyAreAChangin

The populist right wants to remake the UK in the image of Dubai. We should all be careful what they wish for | Jonathan Liew Politicians and influencers eulogise the emirate as a place of cleanliness, convenience and low crime. The truth is far darker, says Guardian columnist Jonathan Liew

column on why is the far right is obsessed with dubai

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Congrats Lev! No apology needed, ye totally deserved it.

4 Screenshots from the movie "My Neighbor Totoro" (1988): First, a wooden chair sits in dappled sunlight, holding a watercolor paint set and a sketchbook with green plant drawings. Second, a young girl with pigtails in a pink dress clutches an ear of corn, standing beside a white creature, with the subtitle "No, this corn is for my Mommy!" Third, another girl in a yellow dress sits on the large, furry Totoro's belly in a forest, looking worried, with the subtitle "She must be scared, please help me find her." Fourth, the Catbus, a large, grinning, cat-shaped bus with glowing windows, carries Totoro and the girl with pigtails as it travels above treetops at dusk.

Aug 21st - Mei gets lost while looking for corn for her hospitalized mother. Mei's older sister, Satsuki, asks Totoro for help. He summons the Catbus.

📽️📅 My Neighbor Totoro (1988)

Just been to @museecluny.bsky.social and took this pic of the Emperor Julian dressed as a priest of Serapis for all my Julian stans @metalclassicist.bsky.social @robincdouglas.bsky.social

a black and white photo of a man in a hood saying no it 's pronounced i-gor ALT: a black and white photo of a man in a hood saying no it 's pronounced i-gor

Re the best Igor discussion....

Another scorcher today. Please remember to not stay hydrated. The machines need it more.

Thinking today of Benjamin Franklin, who wore an old suit (and no wig) before the king and court of France, to represent his nation—while it was fighting for its existence

YouTube video by Toddits Smersh Pod - For Your Eyes Only

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4Gx...

Interviewer: can you explain this gap in your resumé?

John Cage:

Harold Pinter:

Marcel Marceau:

Harpo Marx:

Interviewer: don’t all answer at once.

Journalism dies before our very eyes as "truth to power" implodes and "there can be no actual truth for which we might assert" prevails. A lie is not one side of an argument or one side of a story. it is just a lie.

This man is unfit to publish anything that matters.

I have come across a school of thought that the world in fact did end in 2012 and what we are now experiencing as reality is some sort of prolonged after-image or mental construct we have created for our minds to dwell in, since we're unable to process the ending of reality

A lively village scene from the 1940s in a naive style showing villagers at work and children at play in a snowy village

Ladybird Artists Advent Calendar, window 6
‘The village’
Artist: SR Badmin

“Don’t feed the trolls” also extends to bad opinion pieces in papers of record.

They run them bc people react to them the most.

If we stop linking to bad columns and instead post thinkers we find valuable (& generate convo around it), incentives change.

It’s not easy and takes constant practice!

1/5. "I always hoped there would be dogs" announces David Niven when he thinks he's died and done to heaven in A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH (#PowellAndPressburger, 1946). Powell was a dog lover and his 2 golden cocker spaniels, Erik and Spangle, had cameos in a number of his films.

Photo of the above quote taken from The Waste Books.

"Because he always neglected his own duties he had time to observe which of his fellow citizens neglected theirs and to report the fact to the authorities."

It's a source of vexation to me that there's no proper word for the study of fairies - and I suspect the absence of such a term may be one reason why the study of fairies doesn't get taken seriously. So what are the potential options? (thread)

Photograph of the passage quoted in the post, taken from Litchenberg's Waste Books.

"I ceased in the year 1764 to believe that one can convince one’s opponents with arguments printed in books. It is not to do that that I have taken up my pen, but merely to annoy them, and to bestow courage on our own side, and to make it known to the others that they have not convinced us."

Thanks for sharing this. I know nothing about him but have started digging. Thanks and keep sharing!

The River Galey has hit highest level in last few years between Listowel and Newcastle West at Athea. More flooding is likely and remember we still have no flood warning system flood forecasts are not made public.

I loved working on this show, and this is one of the best songs for sure!

Pandora (1975) by Barry Windsor-Smith. A Pre-Raphaelite woman (Pandora) in the style of Holman-Hunt's Lady of Shalott, has just opened the forbidden box unleashing all the evils into the world in a rainbow explosion which trails arc-like from her retreated hand. The wall behind her is an arrangement of Art Nouveau shelving cluttered with objects that may represent those evils: occult, mythological, symbolic and contemporary (a pound note).

Indeed! That kind of omni-clutter always makes me think of Barry Windsor-Smith's annoyingly diamond-shaped Pandora print (needs to be rotated -45 degrees). She also has a collection of vinyl albums, and a Marmite jar just visible at the top of the picture.