Dec 7 2023 - The Hat Trick Continued

 

The hat trick in different sports - in cricket where it originated, the same player has to take three consecutive wickets.  In hockey it is three goals by a player at any point in the game.  If the goals were made one after the other it is a natural hat trick.  Hockey has a good track record at hat tricks.  Supposedly the origin in hockey, according to SportsAspire is that... "in the 1940s, Alex Kaleta of the Chicago Blackhawks was walking around in Toronto, prior to his match against the Toronto Maple Leafs. He was searching for a hat and found a man by the name of Sammy Taft. So he sees this swanky gray fedora with a gray trim, and he really digs it, but he didn’t have enough paper to buy it. So Taft makes an offer to Kaleta, telling him that if he were to score three goals in the upcoming match, the former would gift him the hat free of charge. As it turned out, Kaleta took it seriously, scored four goals, and Taft kept his word. Enter, the hat trick in hockey." This is the accepted narrative in the NHL Hall of Fame, and hockey fans reward such an accomplishment by throwing their hats into the arena. That's what I was told yesterday, so I am going with it. Compare the sports here.  There are lots of differences.    This was a model at this year's convention in Denver.

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Nov 16 2023 - Bimbo, Himbo and Thembo

 

A Bimbo is ... disparaging ... an attractive but unintelligent, foolish or inept young woman Then a Himbo is ... disparaging to a young man And a Thembo is ... disparaging to a non-binary person The definitions leave out the sexualized descriptor for Bimbo.  The term was first used to describe men, and the first officially recorded female dumb blonde was Rosalie Duthe 1748 - 1830.  And what is this all about?  A movement began in 2017 led by Alicia Amira who self-proclaimed herself a bimbo to "empower women to be proud to embrace their femininity."  The BimboTok community on the social media platform TikTok, is where users engage in stereotypical hyper-femininity to satirize consumerism, capitalism, and misogyny. And who has been accused of being a bimbo in the original sense - men were originally the bimbos.  It is none other than Donald Trump. Journalist Stephen Richter accused him of being an unintelligent or brutish male.  This was in response to Donald Trump's  tweet that the moderator of a debate he was in was a bimbo.

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Nov 3 2023 - Thrice

 

It is the beginning of November.  It is November the 3rd - it can never be November the thrice.  What is that word thrice?  It means three times as much or as many, triply, greatly, highly.  It can never be the Thrice of November.  And that's even if we get  the huge snowstorm that is three times bigger than the great Snowvember storm of 2014.  But that is later in November. So while we still say once and twice, we no longer say thrice.  There are many other things to notice about three. Look at this handy chart in Wikipedia:  Cardinal: three     Ordinal: third     Latinate ordinal: tertiary     Adverbial: three times, thrice     Multiplier: threefold     Latinate multiplier: triple     Distributive: triply     Collective: trio, threesome     Multiuse collective: triplet     Greek or Latinate collective: triad     Greek collective prefix: tri-     Latinate collective prefix: tri-     Fractional: third     Latinate fractional prefix: trient-     Elemental: thrin, triplet     Greek prefix: trito-     Number of musicians: trio, triplet     Number of years: triennium And on to jokes with the number 3.Mostly they are bad jokes or not really jokes.  Here's one that includes the number 3 or maybe the number 3 is the punchline.  Conjecture: All odd numbers are prime. Mathematician's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. By induction, all odd numbers are prime. Physicist's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. 9 is experimental error. 11 is prime. 13 is prime... Engineer's Proof: 3 is prime. 5 is prime. 7 is prime. 9 is prime. 11 is prime. 13 is prime ... Computer Scientists's Proof: 3 is prime. 3 is prime. 3 is prime. 3 is prime...

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Oct 17 2023 - Art vs Craft

 

Crafts vs art.  What is the difference? The definition seem to derive from art being painting/drawing and sculpture and craft is the other stuff.   So much confidence in these definitions: "Art and craft have always been closely linked and entwined. We often speak of ‘arts and crafts’ as one discipline or activity." "A craft or trade is traditionally a hobby or an occupation that requires skilled workers to produce an item. Crafts can include weaving, carving, pottery, embroidery, macrame, beading, sewing, quilting, and many other forms." "Crafting always results in a tangible output or item, for example, molding, carving, or sewing. Historically, craft was considered to be a lower form of creativity than arts such as painting or sculpture." Explanations go on to distinguish between the "High arts" and the rest are called the "low arts".  Then things got all mixed up:  Fine artists like Judy Chicago used crafts skills to make artwork that used ceramics, metalwork, and needlework. Chicago’s mixed-media installation artwork “The Dinner Table” is one of the best examples of the use of craft in fine art.  All this is very academic and seems very ernest.   I wondered about it because of all the Pinterest articles on how to paint abstracts using weird objects like window cleaners, pot scrubbers, or balloons.  Here are two examples - aren't they tantalizing.  What is the end result? Who would guess art would go down this path of do-it-yourself fun and games, making a mock of "high art".  And here's a wonderful railroad model.

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Oct 4 2023 - The King of Spades

 

The king card is the oldest and most universal court card. It most likely originated in Persian Ganjifeh where kings are depicted as seated on thrones and outranking the viceroy cards which are mounted on horses.  High card by suit and low card by suit refer to assigning relative values to playing cards of equal rank based on their suit. When suit ranking is applied, the most common conventions from lowest to highest are: ♣♦♥♠ English alphabetical order. clubs, followed by diamonds, hearts, and spades.   That makes the King of Spades the highest ranking King: a wealthy king who carries a scepter and an orb. It is a symbol of power and authority. . The kings were associated with historical figures, although this tradition was dropped over time: The King of Spades is thought to be David, King of Israel from the Old Testament. King of Clubs: Alexander the Great, King of Macedonia, who conquered a vast region and lived from 356 to 323 BCE. The King of Hearts is the only king without a moustache.  He is Charlemagne, King of France and the first Holy Roman Emperor, who lived from 747 to 814 AD. King of Diamonds is Roman Caesar Augustus. Some sources say the king of diamonds is Julius Caesar, not Augustus. Some jokes are very lengthy and get to a punchline eventually.  Deck of card jokes are pretty short: What doctor also specializes in card games? The cardiologist. Why did a husband give his wife a deck of cards?  She wanted something with diamonds. What does Batman keep losing when playing card games?  He keeps attracting the Joker Why did the Kings, Queens, and Jacks stand before a judge? They’re court cards. My doctor tells me that a healthy serving of red meat is the size of a deck of cards.  Tonight I ate 52 slices of roast beef. A patient bursts into a doctor’s office, "Doctor, I believe I'm a deck of cards!"  Doctor : "Sit down, I'll deal with you later" Today we have a nice model railroad layout scene.

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Jan 7 2022 - Calendars All Around

 

There are a few different calendars to consider - lunisolar, solar, lunar and seasonal. And then there's the standard calendar - with  years of fixed length, and various public/religious holidays specific to our country/region.  It is called a civil calendar - used within a country for civil, official and administrative purposes.  Don't you wonder sometimes about the holidays that are represented?  There are two St. Patrick's Day celebrations this year - on March the 14th and the 17th.  And how is it that St. George's Day is acknowledged in our calendar as a celebration in Canada?   Someone somewhere in Canada must be celebrating it as a day off.   I realized that we don't think about the calendar because of "western" orientation of the Gregorian calendar. It is considered the de facto international standard.  168 of the 195 countries in the world use the Gregorian calendar.   Four countries have not adopted the Gregorian calendar at all. Afghanistan and Iran use the Solar Hirjri calendar, Ethiopia the Ethiopian calendar and Nepal the Vikram Samvat and Nepal Sambat calendars. There are other variations of calendar standards  - most common are Gregorian, Islamic, and Chinese calendars in current use around the world.   Are we all in a new year now?  Whatever its number? Not at all. Some countries use calendars that begin the year on dates in entirely different seasons, and some countries celebrate both Jan. 1 and a traditional new year.   Iran and Afghanistan have used similar versions of the solar hejrī calendar for nearly a century, according to Encyclopedia Iranica. Next March, both countries will enter the year 1401. Their new year begins on the first day of spring — March 21 in most years — on the first day of the month Farvardin in Iran, according to the Iranian government.  That would be strange to me to be in a different calendar compared to other places.  The global village isn't quite complete somehow.   This is an evening and then day image of the Mount Albert Brewery on Gerry's model layout.  His friend, Jeff, took these pictures yesterday, preparing for an overview presentation of Gerry's layout.

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Dec 4 2021 - Christmas Slime - the Perfect Gift

 

Why do people love slime?  Here's the answer: "Other than the sheer fun of learning science, slime is popular for several reasons. Some find it satisfying to watch slime turn from a solid to a liquid and back again.   Squishing it between your fingers can also be a great way to relieve stress. And some people just like it because it's gooey and fun to stretch.   Personally, I find it fascinating watching basic ingredients turn into something completely different with just a few minutes of stirring. I also use a special type of slime to clean electronics."  ~ from cnet.com   Slime can be made in many different varieties. Here's a sample of some of the most popular. Each of these links will take you to a video that shows how to make it.  This is an excellent Christmas activity - just like making cookies. Glitter slime or unicorn slime: Just a basic slime recipe with glitter mixed in.  Cleaning slime: This is a thicker slime that works almost like a lint brush to get crud out of your keyboard and other electronics. Fluffy slime: This slime feels like a soft marshmallow when you squish it. Popping slime: Styrofoam pellets or other beads mixed in with regular slime make this one a sensory delight.  Borax-free slime: Some people who are concerned about how harsh borax (a cleaning agent) can be on the skin opt for slime recipes without it. Glow-in-the-dark slime: Yes, it really does glow in the dark and it can be made at home with nontoxic items. Slime grew in reputation since its introduction in 1976. The movie Ghostbusters in 1984 showcased slime with a recipe that remains secret and was said to be edible.   As special effects supervisor Chuck Gaspar told Cinefex, they used a mixture of water, food coloring, and two thickeners called methocel and separan. “It would not have any taste, but you could eat it,” he said. “The grade of methocel we used is also used in pie thickeners and salad dressings.” Now that explains my rejection of commercial salad dressings. Two scenes on models at the railroad conventions of the past.

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Jan 18 2021 - What's in a Name - Martin Luther King

 

Growing up a Lutheran, you can imagine that Martin Luther King got my attention.  Couldn't that be equivalent to naming someone Pope Paul or Saint Peter in the Roman Catholic faith? I wondered about how he got named after such a religious figure. This curiosity is easily answered: "Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birth name was not “Martin,” but “Michael.” Dr. King’s father traveled to Germany and became inspired by Protestant reformer Martin Luther and thus changed his name while also changing the name of his then 5-year-old-son." But that isn't the answer - it is a statement of what happened when.  It gives no reason why - there is no explanation by King Sr or others.  As is typical of the articles on social media, the same phrases are repeated in the articles.   Here's the Wikipedia entry: That year, (1934) he also changed his name (and that of his eldest son) from Michael King to Martin Luther King after a period of gradual transition on his own part. He was inspired during a trip to Germany for that year's meeting of the Baptist World Alliance (BWA). While visiting sites associated with reformation leader Martin Luther, attendees also witnessed the rise of Nazism. The BWA conference issued a resolution condemning antisemitism, and the senior King gained deepened appreciation for the power of Luther's protest. I don't remember our Lutheran church promoting Martin Luther.  I saw a special on him on the 500th anniversary in 2017.  I found out he was the greatest and most influential social media personality of his time.  He didn't mean to, he wanted the 95 Theses to be discussion points.  Instead, he started the protestant revolution.  Printed copies of the 95 Theses spread throughout Germany within two weeks, and Europe within two months. Martin Luther King Sr. was an activist similar to Martin Luther, pointing to freedom and dignity, and away from corruption and violence.  I wonder what the other connections are.   Model layouts are about clarity - no multiple exposures here. Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Live Music

How did we get to thinking recorded music is the same as live music?  That listening in a one-way receiving relationship through streaming, radio, television is the same experience as being present to living music through all the senses? It is easy to ask that after experiencing Kurt Elling live last night at the Performing Arts Centre in St. Catharines.  Big presence, big voice in a shiny silk suit.  Bringing us the earlier days of Jazz and today's music.  His facial features have some similarities to Richard Nixon's - as we wanted Richard Nixon to be.   I looked up the concert tour, as he made a point of describing it as packed - upcoming concerts in the 2020-2021 tour zig zag all over the place.  Next week he's in Miami, the week after in Palm Desert,  then Indiana, Pittsburg, and back to Markham in April. His concert tour will switch over in April - to the new recording "Secrets Are The Best Stories" with pianist Danilo Perez.  I expect this will be a change from what we enjoyed - lots of scat singing,  some Swingle Singers styling, crooning like Frank Sinatra, and revising lyrics liberally (Pennies from Heaven became Benny's from Heaven - based on the intro of a war veteran who returns home to find his wife with Baby Benny, and when he asks where is Benny from?  She says: From Heaven...Benny's From Heaven).  The finale was an extended version of Nature Boy - a mesmerizing interpretation of this already haunting song and lyrics. I checked around to find out what writers put in print about his singing and style.  Only a few brave writers put words to paper - the less brave give background facts from his website (if you ask me):  - Renowned for his singular combination of robust swing and poetic insight - Elling’s rich, chewy baritone – and his easy-swinging, ring-a-ding-ding delivery on the Great American Songbook - it’s about the groove he creates on stage I mention the live performance experience - Elling has something to say about this: I was lucky enough to go to the clubs. I realised, oh my goodness, there’s a whole culture around this: men and women living this life. That’s when I found out it was a living entity. I noted his comments on travel -  here is a Huffington Post article The Jazz Singer Off Road:  Kurt Elling.  Barry Singer points out this travel bug:  "Kurt Elling takes the jazz singer’s travel truism to a longitudinal and latitudinal extreme. Where most jazz singers tour, Elling traverses the globe." So I guess the lesson from yesterday is straight-forward:  spend more time at live events.  Here's a pretty scene from the Sundance Layout.

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The Urban Legend of the Cigar Arsonist...

Snopes has a repository of Lost Legends.  The acronym that Snopes uses for this is T.R.O.L.L. a reference to the early 1990s definition of the word troll, meaning an internet prank.  Urban legends is the term for modern folklore - usually fictional stories, presented as real, with macabre or humorous elements, rooted in our social, everyday lives.The tales are too appealing not to tell. I read through some of the urban legends.  There are the creepy ones - you will remember the couple with the broken-down car and the scratching on the roof, or perhaps the baby sitter with the clown statue in the bedroom. Wikipedia has a list HERE.  A pop music urban legend of the 1960's - "Paul is dead".   There is a macabre element in every story.  This is what makes them creepy in some manner, and at the same time enthusiastically passed on to the next person.  I found a list of 'funny' ones  at ThoughtCo.com - this is the site with the most urban legend stories. I wouldn't give them the heading funny, but certainly want to retell them, so they must fit the urban legend template: The Cigar Arsonist A Charlotte, North Carolina man, having purchased a case of rare, very expensive cigars, went to an insurance company to have them insured against fire. Within a month, having smoked his entire stockpile of fabulous cigars, and having yet to make a single premium payment on the policy, the man filed a claim against the insurance company. In his claim, the man stated that he had lost the cigars "in a series of small fires." The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason that the man had consumed the cigars in a normal fashion. The man sued—and won! In delivering his ruling, the judge stated that since the man held a policy from the company in which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that the cigars would be insured against fire, without defining what it considered to be unacceptable fire, it was obligated to compensate the insured for his loss. Rather than endure a lengthy and costly appeal process, the insurance company grudgingly accepted the judge's ruling and paid the man $15,000 for the rare cigars he lost in the fires. After the man cashed his check, however, the insurance company had him arrested on 24 counts of arson. With his own insurance claim and testimony from the previous case being used as evidence against him, the man was convicted of intentionally burning the rare cigars and sentenced to 24 consecutive one-year terms. And this one:  The Zoo Parking Attendant Outside the Bristol Zoo, in England, there is a parking lot for 150 cars and 8 coaches, or buses. As the story goes, the lot was manned by a very pleasant attendant with a ticket machine charging cars 1 pound (about $1.40) and coaches 5 pounds (about $7). This parking attendant worked there for all of 25 years. Then, one day, he just didn't turn up for work. "Oh well," said Bristol Zoo Management, "we'd better phone up the City Council and get them to send a new parking attendant." "Er... no," said the Council, "that parking lot is your responsibility." "Er... no," said Bristol Zoo management, "the attendant was employed by the City Council, wasn't he?" "Er... no," insisted the Council. Sitting in his villa somewhere on the coast of Spain, is a man who had been taking the parking lot fees, estimated at 400 pounds (about $560) per day at Bristol Zoo for the last 25 years. Assuming 7 days a week, this amounts to just over 3.6 million pounds ($7 million). Today's first picture is a colourized abstract from the bottom of a boat in Port Dalhousie's parking lot for boats in winter. And the second is a model from the show this year - complete with dog on the platform at the front.

Dec 29 - How to Bet Trump

Canadian politics was dominated by Donald Trump news this past year.  And 2018 was the year of Trump impeachment predictions.  Scholar Allan Lichtman has predicted that Donald Trump will be impeached in 2019.  He has successfully predicted 30 years of presidential elections, and predicted Trump's win in the 2016 presidential election, so people are paying attention.   Lichtman created a model with Russian Seismologist Vladimir Keilis-Borok.  It is known as the Keys to the White House.  His prediction on timing is that it will be in the spring.  He is promoting his book extensively on his Twitter site. What does Wikipedia have to say about impeachment?  Wikipedia's entry is 'Efforts to impeach Donald Trump'.  It has extensive coverage, and includes the results of polls showing what percentage of Americans want Trump impeached. There are several 'impeach 'o-meters' keeping track of this.  I listen to CBC's Day 6 Program on Saturday mornings and they give the latest 'reading' by a political expert who estimates the odds. Odds were better last Saturday than the week before.   Since betting is a human activity, there is always somewhere to find out the odds of things.  One place is Paddy Power who are reported to be saying the current odds are 6-4 that he will not stay in office through 2020 - that's a 40 percent chance. Website Predictit.org says the latest Yes Price is 50 cents.  Their odds are 43 percent up from 37 percent at the end of May. The website odd shark.com shows the odds to be 'even money'. They considered this bad news.   The website oddschecker.com (comparison site) says impeached in 2019 5/4 and in 2020 5/2.  Their chart shows almost 30 betting places to compare.   It makes me aware of how many people bet - supposedly 30 to 40 percent of the population. What's ahead in 2019?  Will we see this play out?  The next few days and weeks will tell us what the experts have to say on this. Today our pictures show some of the Sundance Layout in Florida.

The End of the Line ... Dessert

The question is:  How did we get to eating dessert at the end of a meal?  Our expert is Michael Krondl.  He wrote Sweet Invention:  A History of Dessert in 2011.   Krondl’s book chronicles the evolution of the sweet course by visiting six regions that roughly reflect sugarcane’s spread across the world: India, the Middle East, Italy, France, Austria and the United States.  Although science has established that our love of sweet things is rooted in evolution, ­Krondl posits that “dessert is a purely cultural phenomenon.” Thus the Sacher torte, “an edible manifestation of an urban, cosmopolitan Vienna, as smooth and fitted as a little black cocktail dress,” embodies Austria’s tradition of skilled artisanal pastry cooks. Contrast this with America’s “rural and profoundly unaristocratic” apple pie, an expression of our nation’s “almost religious attitude about home baking.” Medieval European cooks added a lot of sugar to their savory dishes, and at a documented Italian meal in 1529 the eel in marzipan was featured. Krondl reports that anchovy salad was served alongside sugar-dusted cream pies.  By the mid-17th century when La Varenne wrote “Le Cuisinier François,” a line had been established between sweet and savory. Sugar was banned from salty dishes, but sweet foods were still served concurrently with meats and fish. Service was eventually sequenced over time and 150 years later, dessert was at the end of the meal.   And what about cheese?  Where does that fit in? That's for tomorrow. We see a wonderful model at the Minneapolis convention.

Headlines Like This

There's only one headline like it: Headless Body in Topless Bar One can read the story of this famous headline in wikipedia.  Here is the 'film synopsis' loosely based on the true story of the headline, which had its own story. "A nameless gunman (Raymond Barry) robs a shabby downtown strip club, but in his nervousness and haste, he accidentally kills someone. Taking the rest of the bar's few patrons hostage, the disturbed man leads the group -- including street-hardened stripper Candy (Jennifer MacDonald), her lesbian lover (April Grace), creepy businessman Bradford (David Selby) and wheelchair-bound loner Carl (Paul Williams) -- in a violent and perverse variation on the parlor game Truth or Dare". There are more crazy headlines: Super Caley Go Ballistic Celtic are Atrocious Axis of Weasel Midget sues grocer, cites belittling remarks Threat disrupts plans to meet about threats Marijuana issue sent to a joint committee There are even more at thoughtcatalog.com HERE or at boredomtherapy.com HERE.  Here are some images of the models in the competition room at the Denver Train Convention.