Friday, July 24 2015 — My Neighbourhood in 1968

Posted by on July 24, 2015 No comments

Here are four pho­tos tak­en in my neigh­bour­hood in Toron­to, in the 1960s. The three pho­tos of kids are all from 1968. The pic­ture of Sher­bourne sub­way sta­tion is from a few years ear­li­er — the women still have the bizarre bouf­fant hair­dos of the ear­ly six­ties, and the men are still wear­ing hats. Notice the pious, rev­er­ent, obe­di­ent man­ners of the kids (*NOT*).

15-07-24 BLOG Toronto1968-1

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Image of the month: World Day for the Legalization of Marijuana in Montevideo, Uruguay

Posted by on July 1, 2015 No comments

A youngster smokes marijuana during the World Day for the Legalization of Marijuana on May 3, 2014 in Montevideo. Uruguay Friday said that consumers can purchase up to 10 grams of marijuana per week at less than $1 per gram, as the country embarks on a unique experiment in drug regulation. AFP PHOTO / Miguel ROJO (Photo credit should read MIGUEL ROJO/AFP/Getty Images)

FILMS — JUNE 2015

Posted by on June 30, 2015 No comments

(Hoar 2013) Shet­land: Ep.1 ― Red Bones, Part 1
(Hoar 2013) Shet­land: Ep.2 ― Red Bones, Part 2
(Palmer 2009) Agatha Christie’s Marple: Ep.13 ― A Pock­et­ful Of Rye
(Marks 1963) Per­ry Mason: Ep.182 ― The Case of the Neb­u­lous Nephew
(McNaughton 1969) Mon­ty Python’s Fly­ing Cir­cus: Ep.10 ― Untitled
(Bruce 1984) The Adven­tures of Sher­lock Holmes: Ep.2 ― The Danc­ing Men
(Marks 1963) Per­ry Mason: Ep.183 ― The Case of the Shifty Shoebox
(Hibbs 1963) Per­ry Mason: Ep.184 ― The Case of the Drowsy Mosquito
(Hibbs 1963) Per­ry Mason: Ep.185 ― The Case of the Dead­ly Verdict
(Lynch 1984) Dune [Riff­Trax ver­sion] Read more »

First-time listening for June 2015

Posted by on June 30, 2015 No comments

23285. (Henk Bad­ings) Sym­pho­ny #3
23286. (Wu-Tang Clan) Enter the Wu-Tang
23287. (Real Estate) Days
23288. (Tarun Bhat­tacharya) Hyp­not­ic Santoor
 Read more »

READING – JUNE 2015

Posted by on June 30, 2015 No comments

22521. (Stephen L. Dyson & Robert J. Row­land Jr.) Archae­ol­o­gy and His­to­ry in Sardinia: 
. . . . . Shep­herds, Sailors, & Conquerors
(Clif­ford D. Simak) Une Chas­se Dangereuse:
. . . . 22522. (Clif­ford D. Simak) Une chas­se dan­gereuse [= The World That Couldn’t Be]
. . . . 22523. (Clif­ford D. Simak) Pour sauver la guerre [= The Civ­i­liza­tion Game]
Read more »

Two Rediscovered Early Books by Conan Doyle

Posted by on June 23, 2015 No comments

I’ve been read­ing some ear­ly works by Arthur Conan Doyle. Some of this mate­r­i­al was only redis­cov­ered in recent years.

At the age of twen­ty, while still in med­ical school in Edin­burgh, he shipped out on a whal­ing ship for six months. The ship went to the remote arc­tic islands of Spitzber­gen [Sval­bard] and Jan Mayen, and Doyle had his twen­ty-first birth­day on the rim of the polar icepack. This was no tame adven­ture. It was 1880, and Doyle’s ship reached with­in three degrees of the record point that the British Arc­tic Expe­di­tion had turned back from in 1876. A year lat­er, George DeLong’s Amer­i­can expe­di­tion would per­ish at a sim­i­lar lat­i­tude. The pole would not be reached with cer­tain­ty until 1926, when Doyle was an old man. Peary and Hen­son, often cred­it­ed with reach­ing the pole in 1909, are now con­sid­ered doubt­ful. Doyle’s voy­age was on a com­mer­cial whaler and seal­er, dri­ven by prof­it, not glo­ry, but it was cer­tain­ly a dan­ger­ous and spec­tac­u­lar adven­ture for a book­ish young Scott, and he lat­er wrote that he left as a boy and came back as a man. He kept a diary, quite well writ­ten, but rather terse, and dec­o­rat­ed with his draw­ings. On his return, he became caught up with his exams and his first attempts to build a med­ical prac­tice, and so the diary was for­got­ten. It was not pub­lished until 2012, when it appeared as Dan­ger­ous Work: Diary of an Arc­tic Adven­ture. Read more »

Sunday, June 14, 2015 — Yes, We Have No Savannah

Posted by on June 14, 2015 No comments

Did ear­ly hominins evolve on the savan­nah? Almost any­one who reads works on pale­oan­thro­pol­o­gy would say “yes.” I would like to explain why I’m tempt­ed to say “no.”

A long time ago, I was chat­ting with an ornithol­o­gist. We were dis­cussing the Cana­di­an province of Saskatchewan, the south­ern third of which con­sists of the clas­sic North Amer­i­can prairie land­scape. I casu­al­ly referred to some “prairie birds”, includ­ing among them the wil­lett and the killdeer. My friend cor­rect­ed me. “Those aren’t prairie birds at all,” he said. “They live on the river­banks. That’s a total­ly dif­fer­ent ecosys­tem. It doesn’t mat­ter that it’s only a few hun­dred yards wide and six hun­dred miles long, it’s not the prairie. Dif­fer­ent plants and ani­mals, liv­ing a dif­fer­ent lifestyle.” This was some­thing I hadn’t grasped. The prairies of Saskatchewan sup­port species like the lark bunting, the bobolink, the west­ern mead­owlark, and the sharp-tailed grouse, which all nest, feed and frol­ic on the grass­lands, and are all bona fide “prairie birds”. Fur­ther to the north, in the great Cana­di­an for­est, you will find wood­land species like the black­poll and Ten­nessee war­bler, the pine siskin, and the nuthatch. But the wil­lett and the killdeer live and work in a ripar­i­an niche, the com­plex ecosys­tem of river­banks and lake­sides, which is fun­da­men­tal­ly dif­fer­ent from the grass­lands that sur­round them. Read more »

Image of the month: otter terror

Posted by on June 1, 2015 No comments

2015 JUN

FILMS — MAY 2015

Posted by on May 31, 2015 No comments

(Carey-Hill 2007) Futu­ra­ma: Bender’s Big Score
(Losey 1954) The Sleep­ing Tiger
(Park­er 1964) Teen-Age Stran­gler [Mys­tery Sci­ence The­atre version]
(Tay­lor 2012) Game of Thrones: Ep.12 ― The Night Lands
(Marks 1962) Per­ry Mason: Ep.159 ― The Case of the Dodg­ing Domino
(Simón 1979) Super­son­ic Man [Riff­Trax version]
(Sakharov 2012) Game of Thrones: Ep.13 ― What Is Dead May Nev­er Die
(Lyon 1962) Per­ry Mason: Ep.160 ― The Case of the Unsuit­able Uncle
(Min­er 1962) Per­ry Mason: Ep.161 ― The Case of the Stand-In Sister
(Gelb 2011) Jiro Dreams of Sushi Read more »

First-time listening for May 2015

Posted by on May 31, 2015 No comments

23200. (Sergei Rach­mani­nov) Litur­gy of St. John Chrysistom
23201. (Cocteau Twins & Harold Budd) The Moon and the Melodies
23202. (Bohuslav Mar­t­inů) Con­cer­to #1 for Cel­lo and Orchestra
23203. (Kendrick Lamar [as K‑dot] & Jay Rock) Train­ing Day [mix­tape]
23204. (Suede) Suede
23205. (7oi) Lost Under a Pile
23206. (Jhené Aiko) Sail­ing Soul(s)
23207. (Jef­fer­son Air­plane) Takes Off [2003 remaster]
23208. (Mini Man­sions) The Great Pretenders
23209. (Kendrick Lamar) Over­ly Ded­i­cat­ed [mix­tape]
23210. (Run the Jew­els) Run the Jewels
23211. (Veld­huis & Kem­per) We Moeten Praten
23212. (La Rue Kétanou) Live at Furia Sound Festival
23213. (Char­lie Park­er) The Com­plete Verve Years CD2 1950–1952
23214. (Anthrax) Armed and Dangerous
23215. (Jef­fer­son Star­ship) Drag­on Fly
Abbeville Break­down 1929–1939:
. . . . 23216. (Amédée Breaux) “Vas y Carrément”
. . . . 23217. (Joe Fal­con) “Poche Town”
. . . . 23218. (Cleo­ma Breaux) “Prenez Courage”
. . . . 23219. (Cleo­ma Breaux) “Quand Je Suis Par­tis Pour le Texas”
. . . . 23220. (Joe Fal­con) “Aimer Et Perdre”
. . . . 23221. (Breaux Frères) “Egan One Step”
. . . . 23222. (Breaux Frères) “T’as Volé Mon Chapeau”
. . . . 23223. (Breaux Frères) “Home Sweet Home”
. . . . 23224. (Breaux Frères) “Le One Step à Martin”
. . . . 23225. (Breaux Frères) “La Valse du Bay­ou Plaquemine”
. . . . 23226. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Abbeville Breakdown”
. . . . 23227. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Te A Pas Raison”
. . . . 23228. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Se Toute Sain Comme Moi Ma Sain”
. . . . 23229. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Jolie Petite Fille”
. . . . 23230. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Quel Espoire”
. . . . 23231. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Moi Et Ma Belle”
. . . . 23232. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Je Vous T’Aime Les­sair Pleurer”
. . . . 23233. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Es Ce Que Tu Pense Jamais A Moi”
. . . . 23234. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Tu Ma Quite Seul”
. . . . 23235. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Jolie Petite Blonde”
. . . . 23236. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Apres Jen­gles A Toi”
. . . . 23237. (Alley Boys of Abbeville) “Te Bonne Pour Moi Estere”
23238. (Shel­lac) At Action Park
23239. (Djan­go Djan­go) Djan­go Django
23240. (Child­ish Gam­bi­no) Camp
23241. (Belle and Sebas­t­ian) If You’re Feel­ing Sinister 
23242. (Chvrch­es) The Bones of What You Believe
23243. (Gwen­dal) Joe Can’t Reel
23244. (Judy Gar­land) Judy Gar­land in Hollywood
23245. (NONONO) We Are Only What We Feel
23246. (Of Mon­sters and Men) “Lit­tle Talks” [sin­gle]
23247. (Mum­ford & Sons) Babel
23248. (Aulis Salli­nen) Sym­pho­ny #3 “The Sea Symphony”
23249. (Anthrax) Spread­ing the Disease
23250. (Mr. Twin Sis­ter) Mr. Twin Sister
23251. (Sleater-Kin­ney) Call the Doctor
23252. (Drake) Take Care
23253. (Char­li XCX) True Romance
23254. (Will But­ler) Policy
23255. (Björk) Vulnicura
23256. (Mum­ford & Sons) Wilder Mind
23257. (Sol­dat Louis) Bien­v­enue à bord
23258. (Peter & Gor­don) The Best of Peter & Gordon
23259. (Ghost­po­et) Peanut But­ter Blues & Melan­choly Jam
23260. (Nuclear Assault) Survive
23261. (Trom­bone Shorty) Backatown
23262. (Alan Stiv­ell) Tro Ar Bed
23263. (Josquin des Prez) Motet­ti De Pas­sione: “Tu solus qui facis mirabilia”
23264. (Josquin des Prez) Motet­ti De Pas­sione: “Domine, non secundum”
23265. (Josquin des Prez) Motet­ti De Pas­sione: “Ave verum corpus”
23266. (Josquin des Prez) Motet­ti De Pas­sione: “O Domine Jesu Christe”
23267. (Josquin des Prez) Motet­ti De Pas­sione: “Chris­tem ducem; Qui velatus”
23268. (Josquin des Prez) Tout a par moi
23269. (Josquin des Prez) Mis­sa faisant regretz
23270. (Chance the Rap­per) 10Day
23271. (David Bowie) Rare Sin­gles, Out­takes & Lives,1969–74
23272. (Killers) Bat­tle Born
23273. (John Ren­bourn) Live in Italy
23274. (Of Mon­sters and Men) My Head Is an Animal
23275. (Armens) Sans contrefaçon
23276. (Patrick Wat­son) Waterproof9
23277. (Overkill) Feel the Fire
23278. (Shel­lac) Live in Tokyo
23279. (Vielles Pies) Utopies de Comptoir
23280. (Pao­lo Nuti­ni) Caus­tic Love
23281. (Palo­ma Faith) A Per­fect Contradicton
23282. (Ellie Gould­ing) Hal­cy­on Days
23283. (Phar­rell Williams) G I R L
23284. (Bastille) All This Bad Blood