An infinity pool is a reflecting or swimming pool, where the water flows over one or more edges, producing a visual effect of water with no boundary.  Such pools are often designed so that the edge appears to merge with a larger body of water such as the ocean, or with the sky.  It has been claimed that the infinity pool concept originated in France, and that one of the first vanishing-edge designs was the Stag Fountain at the Palace of Versailles, built in the late 17th century.  In the US, architect John Lautner has been credited as one of the first to come up with an infinity pool design in the early 1960s.  He included infinity pools in various residential projects, and also created the vanishing-edge pool in the James Bond movie Diamonds are Forever (1971).  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infinity_pool  See also The 30 Most Beautiful Infinity Pools in the World at https://travel.usnews.com/gallery/the-30-most-beautiful-infinity-pools-in-the-world  

The Bibliothèque Nationale de France is the national library of the French Republic.  It was dedicated in 1995 by then-President François Mitterrand.  There are 7 sites comprising the library in Paris, with the largest being in the 13th arrondissement.  The historic site, dating back to the 17th century, is located in the 2nd arrondissement, on the site of the Palais Mazarin, which also housed the Paris Stock Exchange in the 18th century.  Its main mission is to archive and maintain everything published or written in France, but also to highlight knowledge and research-sharing activities, particularly by organizing various cultural demonstrations.  King Charles V of France placed his collection of 917 in a specially-built room in the Louvre, and the idea was followed upon by subsequent kings, who decided to combine all their books in an individual library.  The royal library came to be under François I, who ordered all booksellers and printers to deposit, in the Château de Blois library, any printed book sold in the kingdom (referred to as the dépôtlégal, or registration of copyright).  But it was in 1666, under Colbert (one of Louis XIV’s ministers) that the library truly took shape.  Indeed, Colbert wanted it to be a place dedicated to the glory of Louis XIV.  For this, he moved the collections into the 2nd arrondissement and conducted a large expansion campaign.  Today, the combined collections of the French National Library represent nearly 40,000,000 printed and specialist documents.  Additionally, the collections grow by 670,000 documents per year (solely through registration of copyright or acquisition), excluding internet files!  The collections comprise 14 million books and other printed materials (including 11 million at the 13th arrondissement site), several million periodicals (for 360,000 titles), around 250,000 manuscripts (including 10,000 illuminated medieval manuscripts), as well as maps, prints, photos, and music scores.  The Library is also increasingly known for Gallica, its digital library, which is used to consult reproductions of over 2,600,000 documents in text, image, or audio format.  https://infos.parisattitude.com/en/mitterrand-national-library/

Recipe for gobbledygook with toasted oat cereal, peanuts, raisins (or dried pitted prunes or apricots, chopped), melted butter, sunflower seeds and chopped pretzels http://www.bellybytes.com/recipe/snacks/gobbledygook.html#.W0yxTtVKiUk

Recipe for gobbledygook with bacon, potatoes and cheese  https://www.bigoven.com/recipe/gobbledygook/163732

Recipe for gobbledygook (stewed tomatoes) https://www.qins.net/recipe/stewed-tomatoes-gobbledygook-_31759.html

Dasheen (Colocasia esculenta), commonly known as taro and elephant's ear, is a large, tropical plant that is hardy in U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) plant hardiness zones 8 to 11.  Often grown for its edible underground root stems, especially in tropical cultures, dasheen also is grown for its large, exotic-looking leaves.  With a few good cultivation practices, you can enjoy a full-size, thriving dasheen plant the first season after it is planted, and it can add to a yard's curb appeal.  http://homeguides.sfgate.com/grow-dasheen-22974.html    See also

http://caribbeanpot.com/the-simplicity-and-splendor-of-dasheen/  and https://www.yummly.com/recipes/dasheen

'It cost an arm and a leg' is one of those phrases that rank high in the 'I know where that comes from' stories told at the local pub.  In this case the tale is that portrait painters used to charge more for larger paintings and that a head and shoulders painting was the cheapest option, followed in price by one which included arms and finally the top of the range 'legs and all' portrait.  As so often with popular etymologies, there's no truth in that story.  Painters certainly did charge more for large pictures, but there's no evidence to suggest they did so by limb count.  In any case the phrase is much more recent than the painting origin would suggest.  'Arm' and 'leg' are used as examples of items that no one would consider selling other than at an enormous price.  It is a grim reality that, around that time, there were many US newspaper reports of servicemen who had lost an arm and a leg in the recent war.  It is possible that the phrase originated in reference to the high cost paid by those who suffered such amputations.  A more likely explanation is that the expression derived from two earlier phrases:  'I would give my right arm for . . .' and '[Even] if it takes a leg', which were both coined in the 19th century.  https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/arm-and-a-leg.html

According to Wikipedia: "'In Our Time' is a live BBC radio discussion series exploring the history of ideas, presented by Melvyn Bragg since 15 October 1998.  It is one of BBC Radio 4's most successful discussion programmes, acknowledged to have 'transformed the landscape for serious ideas at peak listening time.'  More than 800 episodes have been aired and the series attracts a weekly audience exceeding two million listeners."  Programs are 45 minutes long and feature a lively, guided discussion with a panel of experts on single topics including everything from photosynthesis to the London gin craze of the early 1700s, to the life and writings of Cicero to Jane Eyre and Moby Dick, the science of glass and the Mexican-American War, etc. etc.  Links to other sites on each subject and a reading list are also provided.  Virtually all 800 episodes are available to stream or download at:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006qykl/episodes/player  Thank you, Muse reader!

The bones of people buried at Stonehenge, who died and were cremated about 5,000 years ago, have given up their secrets:  like the bluestones, which form part of the famous prehistoric monument, they came from west Wales, near the Preseli Hills where the stones were quarried.  The remains of at least 10 of 25 individuals, whose brittle charred bones were buried at the monument, showed that they did not spend their lives on the Wessex chalk downland, but came from more than 100 miles away.  Examination of the remains showed they were consistent with a region that includes west Wales, the most likely origin of at least some of these people.  Although the team, led by scientists from the University of Oxford with colleagues in Paris and Brussels, cannot prove that the remains are of people who actually built the monument, the earliest cremation dates are described as “tantalisingly” close to the date when the bluestones were brought into the earlier ditch and bank monument to form the first stone circle.  More attention has been paid to how and when Stonehenge was built--from the earliest earth works and totem pole-like timber posts to the final creation of the famous silhouette of the post and lintel circle of the gigantic sarsen stones--than to the people who built it.  This is partly due to the difficulty in extracting evidence from the early human remains.  The new discovery, published at nature.com August 2, 2018 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-28969-8 is the result of success in extracting strontium isotopes--which can reveal where the individuals spent the last years of their lives--from cremated bone, something which had until recently been thought impossible.  Maev Kennedy  Read more and see pictures at https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/aug/02/revealed-stonehenge-buried-welsh

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 1928  August 3, 2018