NIST-F1 is a cesium fountain clock, a type of atomic clock, in the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Boulder, Colorado, and serves as the United States' primary time and frequency standard.  The clock took less than four years to test and build, and was developed by Steve Jefferts and Dawn Meekhof of the Time and Frequency Division of NIST's Physical Measurement Laboratory.  The clock replaced NIST-7, a cesium beam atomic clock used from 1993 to 1999.  NIST-F1 is ten times more accurate than NIST-7.  It has been succeeded by a new standard, NIST-F2, announced in April 2014.  The NIST-F2 standard aims to be about three times more accurate than the NIST-F1 standard, and there are plans to operate it simultaneously with the NIST-F1 clock.  Similar atomic fountain clocks, with comparable accuracy, are operated by other time and frequency laboratories, such as the Paris Observatory, the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in the United Kingdom and the Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt in Germany.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NIST-F1  See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_atomic_clocks and https://www.time.gov/ 

I would rather be bookfull than bookless.  Thank you, Muse reader! 

On May 27, 1936, John Steinbeck, then 34 years old and working on the manuscript that would eventually become Of Mice and Men, sent a letter to his agent, Elizabeth Otis.  In it, he thanks her for the $94 check, muses on the strangeness of criticism from England, and then reports:  Minor tragedy stalked.  I don’t know whether I told you.  My setter pup [Toby], left alone one night, made confetti of about half of my [manuscript].  Two months work to do over again.  It sets me back.  There was no other draft.  I was pretty mad, but the poor little fellow may have been acting critically.  Katie Yee  https://lithub.com/fun-fact-john-steinbecks-dog-ate-the-first-draft-of-of-mice-and-men/ 

Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (1903–1989) was a Belgian writer.  A prolific author who published nearly 500 novels and numerous short works, Simenon is best known as the creator of the fictional detective Jules Maigret.  In January 1919, the 15-year-old Simenon took a job at the Gazette de Liège, a newspaper edited by Joseph Demarteau.  While Simenon's own beat only covered unimportant human interest stories, it afforded him an opportunity to explore the seamier side of the city, including politics, bars, and cheap hotels but also crime, police investigations and lectures on police technique by the criminologist Edmond Locard.  Simenon's experience at the Gazette also taught him the art of quick editing.  He began submitting stories to Le Matin in the early 1920s.  Simenon's first novel, Au Pont des Arches, was written in June 1919 and published in 1921 under his "G. Sim" pseudonym.  From 1921 to 1934 he used a total of 17 pen names while writing 358 novels and short stories.  Simenon was one of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century, capable of writing 60 to 80 pages per day.  His oeuvre includes nearly 200 novels, over 150 novellas, several autobiographical works, numerous articles, and scores of pulp novels written under more than two dozen pseudonyms.  Altogether, about 550 million copies of his works have been printed.  See partial bibliography and list of film adaptations at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Simenon 

AMUSING TERMS  online flea marketing * wet blanketry * creativity assassination * controlled chaos  Cheer Up, Mr. Widdicombe a novel by Evan James 

Delicious.  Nutritious.  Makes you Feel Ambitious.—originally an advertising jingle—is so much a part of our language that a May 23, 2021 search produced 3,710,000 results.

The suffixes -ation, -cation, -ition mean “action or process” or “result of an action or process.”  ©2010 Benchmark Education   Find chart with examples of words ending in a base consonant—or e—or y—or osh--or ize at http://wordstudyresources.benchmarkeducation.com/pdfs/1_K3_U17_BLM.pdf 

Tomfoolery (or Tom Foolery) is a musical revue based on lyrics and music that American mathematician, songwriter, and satirist Tom Lehrer first performed in the 1950s and 1960s.  Devised and produced by Cameron Mackintosh, it premiered in London at the Criterion Theatre, directed by Gillian Lynne, on 5 June 1980, where it had a successful run.  It subsequently opened on December 14, 1981 Off-Broadway at the Top of the Gate in Greenwich Village, New York, where it ran for 120 performances.  For the 1936 German comedy film, see Tomfoolery (film).  For the cartoon series, see The Tomfoolery Show.  See song list at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomfoolery 

Tomfoolery was the term for a person as long ago as the Middle Ages (Thomas fatuus in Latin).  Much in the way the names in the expression Tom, Dick, and Harry are used to mean “some generic guys,” Tom fool was the generic fool, with the added implication that he was a particularly absurd one.  So the word tomfoolery suggested an incidence of foolishness that went a bit beyond mere foolery.  Arika Okrent  https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/548109/origins-of-common-phrases 

The Liverpool and Manchester Railway (L&M) opened on 15 September 1830.  Work on the L&M had begun in the 1820s, to connect the major industrial city of Manchester with the nearest deep water port at the Port of Liverpool, 35 miles (56 km) away.  Although horse-drawn railways already existed elsewhere, the Stockton to Darlington steam railway had been running for five years, and a few industrial sites already used primitive steam locomotives for bulk haulage, the L&M was the first locomotive-hauled railway to connect two major cities, and the first to provide a scheduled passenger service.  The opening day was a major public event.  Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, the Prime Minister, rode on one of the eight inaugural trains, as did many other dignitaries and notable figures of the day.  Huge crowds lined the track at Liverpool to watch the trains depart for Manchester.  The L&M remains in operation, and its opening is now considered the start of the age of mechanised transport; in the words of industrialist and former British Rail chairman Peter Parker, "the world is a branch line of the pioneering Liverpool–Manchester run".  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opening_of_the_Liverpool_and_Manchester_Railway 

May 5, 2021  Freckles the lobster wasn’t destined to be served up next to a delicious basket of Cheddar Bay Biscuits.  The extremely rare Calico lobster is now at the Virginia Living Museum in Newport News, Virginia, after being discovered at a Red Lobster in Manassas, Virginia.  Restaurant staff discovered the orange and black speckled lobster and decided it was best for Freckles to head to the museum for the world to see.  Only 1 in 30 million lobsters in the world have his special shell, because having bright colors isn’t the best way to hide from predators.  Brian Reese  See pictures at https://www.kxan.com/news/weird-news/freckles-the-extremely-rare-lobster-saved-from-red-lobster-now-star-of-museum/ 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2384  June 30, 2021

“Many of the great novels of our time are based on alienated narrators.”  *  “The largest part of the illegal goods, four kilos of Moroccan hashish, has already been tossed into Lake Geneva, where, I was told, it was joyfully devoured by the resident geese, which later that day were seen to be flying high.”  *  “inferior decorating”  *  “To this day, I love reading dictionaries.  I love the sounds and shapes of words, the way certain consonant blends can evoke related images . . . ”  *  “Love Medicine is the book that made me want to find my own voice.  It influenced my early attempts at writing fiction.”  *  When I was two hundred pages from finishing my second book, a woman in a book club in Columbus, Ohio said:  “Well, I just read Amy Tan’s second book, and believe me, it’s not nearly as good as the first!”  * “The best stories do change us.  They help us live interesting lives.”  The Opposite of Fate, Memories of a Writing Life by Amy Tan 

The Chinese Siamese Cat by Amy Tan with Gretchen Schields as illustrator  In this charming original folktale from the pair who produced The Moon Lady, a mother cat tells her kittens the true story of their ancestry:  “You are not Siamese cats but Chinese cats.''  She proudly informs them that they are descended from Sagwa of China, who lived during the reign of the Foolish Magistrate.  Sagwa's parents, we learn, had the hapless task of dipping their tails in ink to record the dour dictates of the Foolish Magistrate.  After inadvertently landing in the ink pot one day (hence acquiring the familiar dark markings of the Siamese cat), Sagwa uses her blackened pawprints to delete the word  “not” from the magistrate's latest ruling, whereupon it is promulgated that  “People must sing until the sun goes down.”  Foolish Magistrate is outraged, but when he suddenly realizes his subjects are chanting his praises, he changes his tune, reversing the laws and declaring that henceforth all Chinese felines will have dark faces, ears, paws and tails--in honor of Sagwa.  See titles in the Sagwa series at https://www.goodreads.com/series/272250-sagwa 

Suffix mancy:  from Latin -mantia, ultimately from Ancient Greek μᾰντείᾱ (manteíā, “divination”).  divination or variety of magic, especially that controlling or related to a specific element, substance, or theme.  Link to English words suffixed with –mancy at https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-mancy 

Few books have been adapted so many times, and in so many different ways, as Robert Louis Stevenson’s Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.  First published in 1886, the novel about a doctor’s transformative experiments and the dire consequences they provoke, has been turned into musicals, costume drama, slapstick comedy and psychosexual horror; the contours of its narrative have been twisted, mixed-up, and often ignored.  There have been whole films dedicated to Jekyll’s children, one about his son and another about his daughter, and at least five different pornographic adaptations.  Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Sylvester the Cat, and Tom and Jerry have all starred in their own parody versions.  Some have even been lost to time, or remain as ideas (like David Mamet’s reported 1998 adaptation, set to star Al Pacino, that was never made).  That filmmakers keep returning to Stevenson’s novella is understandable.  “The story is now so embedded in popular culture that it hardly exists as a work of literature,” Claire Harman writes in her 2005 biography of Stevenson.  People know what the words “Jekyll” and “Hyde” suggest, even if they have never read the book.  Craig Hubert   https://lithub.com/the-strange-cinematic-history-of-dr-jekyll-and-mr-hyde/ 

May 6, 2021  Enlisting the creativity of Frank Gehry, the Philadelphia Museum of Art has completed a $233m renovation and reorganisation of the lower interior spaces at the heart of its landmarked 1928 Beaux-Arts building.  The latest phase of a master plan for improvements that was approved by the museum’s board in 2004 and involved four years of construction, the so-called Core Project yields nearly 90,000 sq. ft of reimagined public spaces and new galleries.  The reinstallation of more than 800 works in the early American galleries incorporates a more inclusive range of narratives centred on Philadelphia, dating from William Penn’s first meetings with the Lenape people in the late 17th century and including fresh connections with the Caribbean, Central and South America, as well as the role of African Americans in the city’s cultural economy.  Hilarie M. Sheets  https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/gehry-spruces-up-philadelphia  The 72 steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, charged by Sly Stallone in the 1976 movie Rocky, made this stairway famous.   

Deserts are areas that receive very little precipitation.  People often use the adjectives “hot,” “dry,” and “empty” to describe deserts, but these words do not tell the whole story.  Although some deserts are very hot, with daytime temperatures as high as 54°C (130°F), other deserts have cold winters or are cold year-round.  And most deserts, far from being empty and lifeless, are home to a variety of plants, animals, and other organisms.  People have adapted to life in the desert for thousands of years.  One thing all deserts have in common is that they are arid, or dry.  Most experts agree that a desert is an area of land that receives no more than 25 centimeters (10 inches) of precipitation a year.  The amount of evaporation in a desert often greatly exceeds the annual rainfall.  In all deserts, there is little water available for plants and other organisms.  Deserts are found on every continent and cover about one-fifth of Earth’s land area.  They are home to around 1 billion people—one-sixth of the Earth’s population.  Although the word “desert” may bring to mind a sea of shifting sand, dunes cover only about 10 percent of the world’s deserts.  Some deserts are mountainous.  Others are dry expanses of rock, sand, or salt flats.  https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/desert/ 

The tundra is a treeless polar desert found in the high latitudes in the polar regions, primarily in Alaska, Canada, Russia, Greenland, Iceland, and Scandinavia, as well as sub-Antarctic islands.  The region's long, dry winters feature months of total darkness and extremely frigid temperatures.  Structurally, the tundra is a treeless expanse that supports communities of sedges and heaths as well as dwarf shrubs.  Vegetation is generally scattered, although it can be patchy reflecting changes in soil and moisture gradients.  Most precipitation falls in the form of snow during the winter while soils tend to be acidic and saturated with water where not frozen.  Link to information on specific tundras at https://www.worldwildlife.org/biomes/tundra#:~:text=The%20tundra%20is%20a%20treeless,darkness%20and%20extremely%20frigid%20temperatures.

On 28 June 1846 Adolphe Sax patented the saxophone, intended for use in orchestras and military bands.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolphe_Sax 

What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness? - Jean Jacques Rousseau, philosopher and author (28 Jun 1712-1778)

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2383  June 28, 2021 

Much of Frank Lloyd Wright’s genius lay in his ability to be a fearless innovator.  His idea of building decentralized, affordable communities in harmony with nature eventually led to his design of the “Usonian” house.  Usonian is a term usually referring to a group of approximately sixty middle-income family homes designed by Frank Lloyd Wright beginning in 1936 with the Jacobs House.  The “Usonian Homes” were typically small, single-story dwellings without a garage or much storage.  They were often L-shaped to fit around a garden terrace on unusual and inexpensive sites.  Constructed with native materials, flat roofs and large cantilevered overhangs for passive solar heating and natural cooling, natural lighting with clerestory windows, and radiant-floor heating.  A strong visual connection between the interior and exterior spaces is an important characteristic of all Usonian homes.  The word carport was coined by Wright to describe an overhang for sheltering a parked vehicle.  See many pictures and link to information on nine Usonian homes at http://www.midcenturymodernhudsonvalley.com/frank-lloyd-wright/ 

March 26, 2021  Flashes of light pierce the dark night.  On board large pick-ups, slowly, private guards patrol the avocado fields of a South African farm, a "green gold" that has become the target of large-scale thefts.  At the wheel, eyes narrowed on the hundreds of avocado trees more than two meters high, carefully aligned, Marius Jacobs draws on his cigarette.  "There are more and more thieves, they load whole trucks," he breathes.  The looting of orchards in recent years can be counted in thousands of tonnes and losses in millions of euros for South African producers.  The boom in avocado consumption, particularly in the United States and in Europe, has caused the prices of this confirmed star of plates to explode, the price of which on these markets can climb up to 10 euros per kilo.  https://www.tellerreport.com/news/2021-03-26-%22green-gold%22--the-juicy-trafficking-of-avocado-theft-in-south-africa---france-24.By8nGRboV_.html

ENGAGEMENT ROAST CHICKEN (BAREFOOT CONTESSA)  Recipe by Scoutie  serves 3-4  https://www.food.com/recipe/engagement-roast-chicken-barefoot-contessa-413946 

The Historic Buxton Inn in Granville, Ohio was built in 1812 and known as The Tavern for many years before serving as the final stop on a stagecoach line heading west into Columbus.  Over the years, it has welcomed famous guests ranging from Abraham Lincoln to Henry Ford and served as a place of safety for those seeking freedom on the Underground Railroad.  One of the inn’s former owners, Ethel “Bonnie” Houston, became known as The Lady in Blue after her apparition was spotted in a light blue dress a few times.  The ghost is known to evoke the scent of gardenias, even in the dead of winter.  Houston’s cat is said to appear in Room 9, which used to be the inn owner’s apartment.  (The cat is said to jump on the bed and cuddle up with whomever is spending the night in the room.)  Major Buxton, the previous owner for which the inn is named, has been spotted accompanied by the smell of cigar smoke.  The Historic Buxton Inn encourages its guests to explore the property and learn about the history of the spirits said to reside there during its Ghostory Tours.  Lindsey Sellman 

https://www.ohiomagazine.com/travel/article/haunted-ohio-historic-buxton-inn

 

The Music Box Theatre is located in the bustling Southport area of Chicago’s Lakeview district.  When it was opened on August 22, 1929 with Morton Downey in “Mothers Boy”, the Music Box Theatre was considered small compared to the much larger movie palaces that were being built in Chicago around that time.  Many of these larger theatres, like the Uptown Theatre, were often too large to stay in business throughout the rest of the 20th century.  The Music Box Theatre was designed in an Atmospheric style which was themed with a Spanish Renaissance style, the work of architects Louis I. Simon & Edward Steinborn.  It was designed and opened as a ‘talkie’ theatre, but had provision for organ chambers to hold the pipes, which were not put to use until 1984 when a custom made 3 manual electronic organ was installed with its speakers housed in the organ chambers.  The Music Box Theatre later played mainly second and third-run movies as well as closing and reopening several times.  The theatre had become more than a bit rough around the edges when it was closed on July 16, 1978 with William Holden “Omen II: Damien”.  It then went over to screening Spanish Language movies, porn movies and Arabic movies. 

Renovated in 1982, the Music Box Theatre reopened in 1983 and has been showing an eclectic mix of classic, foreign, and art house films ever since.  In 1991, a small theatre was built in an existing storefront adjacent to the lobby.  This second screen was designed to echo the architecture of the main auditorium, as an Atmospheric style, but because of the 13-foot ceiling height, the feel is that of sitting under a garden trellis with stars in the night sky beyond.  Contributed by Alan Van Landschoot  http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/274

 Mayonnaise as a term first appears in the famous 1806 cookbook by Alexandre Viard, though he doesn’t give a recipe for mayonnaise.  There is no documentary evidence that the sauce existed prior to the 19th century.  That’s not to say that it didn’t, but its origin stories are apocryphal.  One version of its genesis, from Larousse Gastronomique, says that the term comes from the old French, moyeu, meaning egg yolk.  That sounds plausible, as does the story that it comes from the Catalan word, maonesa, named after the town of Mahon in Menorca, Spain.  While mayo is egg yolks plus oil (usually olive oil, sometimes sunflower), béarnaise and hollandaise feature egg yolks plus clarified butter.  Add a bit of white wine and lemon juice for hollandaise, a sauce most often associated with eggs benedict but a treat on asparagus, broccoli, salmon, or just about anything you can think of.  Its origins are said to be based on a sauce made for the King of the Netherlands’ visit to France, hence the name.  With hollandaise on hand, add shallots pepper, tarragon and chervil to make béarnaise, with its origins in the Bearn province of France, a delight atop steak frites.  Bearnaise sauce was invented by chef Jean-Louis-François Collinet, of the famous restaurant outside of Paris, Le Pavillon Henri IV, which opened in 1836.  Noah Charney  https://www.finedininglovers.com/article/behind-secrets-aise-sauces 

One-liners and zingers are humorous forms of the epigram (a brief, pithy or startling statement).   What does this colorful crowd of characters have in common:  Woody Allen, Aristotle, Yogi Berra, Lenny Bruce, George Carlin, Johnny Carson, Winston Churchill, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, JFK, MLK, Abraham Lincoln, Groucho Marx, Marilyn Monroe, Richard Pryor, Joan Rivers, Will Rogers, Shakespeare, Mark Twain, Voltaire and Oscar Wilde?  They all produced immortal epigrams.  Other masters of the zinger include Alexander the Great, Brutus, Julius Caesar, Albert Einstein, FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt, Gandhi, Bob Hope, Jay Leno, David Letterman, Martial, Steve Martin, Plato, Dorothy Parker, Dolly Parton, Don Rickles, Sappho, Socrates, Jonathan Swift, Mae West and Jonathan Winters.  Zingers by Oscar Wilde:  One should always play fairly, when one has the winning cards. * The only thing to do with good advice is pass it on.  It is never any use to oneself.  * It is always a silly thing to give advice, but to give good advice is fatal. * If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.  compiled by Michael R. Burch  Find many more zingers at http://www.thehypertexts.com/Best%20One-Liners%20and%20Zingers.htm  “Quiver full of zingers” is a frequently-used phrase. 

Life is an adventure in forgiveness. - Norman Cousins, author, editor, journalist, and professor (24 Jun 1915-1990) 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2382  June 25, 2021

Looking back, 1828 turned out to be a big year for book lovers.  Literary giants Leo Tolstoy and Jules Verne were born, and Baker & Taylor began binding and publishing books.  Later, Baker & Taylor began distributing books.  Libraries have a long history, perhaps dating to ancient Egypt, of keeping cats.  In the 19th century, the British government paid libraries to house felines, who earned their room and board by keeping rodents from eating the glue and binding off of the books.  We have our own cat history. Librarians know us by our beloved cat mascots, named--of course!--Baker and Taylor.  Both have passed away, but Baker and Taylor were the pride of the Douglas County Public Library in Minden, Nevada.  The first of the pair took up residence there in 1983 and was named Baker, because he slept in a Baker & Taylor box.  The librarians told a Baker & Taylor sales director that Baker needed a friend. Taylor followed two months later, thanks to a grant from Baker & Taylor.  See a picture of library cats Baker and Taylor at https://www.baker-taylor.com/home_aboutus_details.cfm?sideMenu=Our%20History&home=home_aboutus_details.cfm 

“There is nothing on God’s green earth that someone won’t complain about, including both God and green earth.”  “When times are tough, you either pull together or fall apart.”  “A great library provides.  It is enmeshed in the life of a community in a way that makes it indispensable.”  “Find your place.  Be happy with what you have.  Live a good life.  It’s isn’t about material things:  it’s about love.”  Dewey, the Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World by Vicki Myron with Bret Witter  See also https://hacklibraryschool.com/2020/10/19/a-brief-history-of-library-cats/ 

Celebrities from Spencer, Iowa:  Dewey Readmore Books, Library Cat; Vicki Myron, co-author of Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World; Roger Neumann, jazz saxophonist, flutist, composer, arranger, music educator; Robert Suderburg, composer, conductor, pianist; Richard L. Tierney, author and poet.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spencer,_Iowa 

In computer science, a data buffer (or just buffer) is a region of a physical memory storage used to temporarily store data while it is being moved from one place to another.  Typically, the data is stored in a buffer as it is retrieved from an input device (such as a microphone) or just before it is sent to an output device (such as speakers).  However, a buffer may be used when moving data between processes within a computer.  In the distributed computing environment, data buffer is often implemented in the form of burst buffer that provides distributed buffering service.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_buffer 

Silverview, a final full-length novel by John le Carré, in which the late author delves into “the soul of the modern Secret Intelligence Service”, will be published in October, 2021.  Le Carré, the author of seminal thrillers including The Spy Who Came in from the Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, died in December 2020 aged 89.  Born David Cornwell, he had been working on Silverview, his 26th novel, alongside A Legacy of Spies and Agent Running in the Field.  He had completed the full-length manuscript of the book when he died.  Alison Flood  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/may/19/final-john-le-carre-novel-silverview-to-be-published-in-october 

“ . . . the true value of any gift does not depend on its worth to the receiver, but rather to the giver.”  The Islander, a Romance of the Future by Charles Whittlesey  

Samphire is a juicy green shoot eaten as a delicacy with fish dishes.  It has a briny taste because it grows in saltwater.  After the summer solstice is the traditional start of the samphire harvest.  The shoots are picked at dawn each day on mudflats along the coast and river estuaries, especially in the Wash of Norfolk, and then rushed to market.  Samphire is such an unassuming plant, almost prehistoric-looking, with tiny leaves and small thin flowers.  But this humble little plant is also our first line of defence against storms and rising sea levels that batter the coastline and lead to serious erosion.  Samphire’s remarkable strength is colonising muddy coasts and estuaries, where its mat of roots binds the soft mud and creates a foothold for other salt-loving plants to grow therefore aiding the development of salt marshes.  In olden days, the plant was also used for glassmaking because its ashes are rich in sodium carbonate, which is needed for melting sand into glass, hence the plant’s other name:  glasswort.  Paul Simons  https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/jun/23/plantwatch-samphire-sea-defence-coastal-marsh-erosion-glasswort 

On June 23, 1996, Haruki Murkami, the world’s most famous running novelist, ran his first (and only) ultramarathon, at Lake Saroma, in Hokkaido, Japan.  An ultramarathon, if you don’t know, is sixty-two miles.  As Murakami would later write in his running memoir, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, “No normal person would ever do something so foolhardy.”  (Well, after all, “normal” is perhaps not the first word that comes to mind when thinking of ways to describe the author of Kafka on the Shore.)  https://link.lithub.com/view/602ea8ce180f243d6536ae8deesnf.2gi4/433882bd

Prolific children’s book author-illustrator and fine artist Robert M. Quackenbush died on May 17, 2021.  He was 91.  Quackenbush was born on July 23, 1929 in Hollywood, Calif., and grew up in Phoenix, Ariz.  In his autobiography, Quackenbush recalled a childhood love of drawing, painting, and listening to stories and noted that his was a family of storytellers and readers.  He continued with his art and enjoyed copying the paintings of famous artists like Diego Rivera and some of the WWII art that ran in Life magazine at the time.  He also found creative outlet in his early teens by building furniture for his bedroom as well as painting and decorating the space.  Read more and see pictures at https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/childrens/childrens-industry-news/article/86654-obituary-robert-m-quackenbush.html

When Ross Bollinger posted a video of an animated stick figure online in 2004, YouTube didn’t exist and the 16-year-old artist didn’t envision a web show.  As of June 2021, Mr. Bollinger’s stick figure—who is named Pencilmate and has Curious George’s mischievous energy—is the star of a YouTube series with 19 million subscribers.  The “Pencilmation” channel on YouTube has more subscribers than the Pixar (6.24 million) and Walt Disney Animation Studios (4.83 million) channels combined.  YouTube doesn’t publish animation-channel audience tallies, but Ramin Zahed, editor in chief of Animation Magazine, says he believes “Pencilmation” is the platform’s most popular animated series.  When YouTube announced the creators with the most views globally in 2019—its most recent such figures—“Pencilmation” was third, with 2.8 billion.  Taner Halicioglu  https://techilive.in/how-pencilmation-became-a-youtube-sensation/ 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2381  June 23, 2021

The infamous 'dog in a manger', who occupied the manger not because he wanted to eat the hay there but to prevent the other animals from doing so, is generally said to have been the invention of the Greek storyteller Aesop (circa 600 BC).  Many of the fables that have been credited to Aesop do in fact date from well before the 5th century BC and modern scholarship doesn't give much credence to the idea that Aesop's Fables, as we now know them, were written by him at all.  Accounts of Aesop's life are vague and date from long after his death and some scholars doubt that there ever was a real Aesop.  If he existed at all, it was as an editor of earlier Greek and Sumerian stories rather than as the writer of them.  https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/dog-in-the-manger.html 

Lois Lenski was an artist and one of the best-known American book illustrators of the twentieth century.  Lenski was born on October 14, 1893, in Springfield, Ohio.  She spent most of her youth in Anna, Ohio.  Lenski attended The Ohio State University, studied art, and graduated in 1915.  She continued her studies at the Art Students' League of New York and the Westminster School of Art in London, England.  While she lived in Great Britain, Lenski illustrated her first books.  Lenski returned to the United States in 1921.  She married Arthur Covey, a well-known muralist.  Lenski continued to illustrate books for other authors.  During the 1920s, she began to write her own books for children.  Her first books, including A Little Girl of 1900, drew heavily on her childhood experiences in Ohio.  Lenski continued to write book-length monographs through the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s.  Most of her works dealt with historical topics.  She commonly described how children in the past experienced life.  Lenski also tried to provide her readers with descriptions of various parts of the United States.  She wrote her books about many different places and used dialects common to those regions.  She was awarded the Newbery Medal in 1946 for Strawberry Girl, a book about strawberry pickers in Florida.  Beginning in the 1950s, Lenski began to focus more on poetry rather than prose in her writings.  Over the course of her life, Lenski authored more than one hundred books.  She also illustrated fifty-seven books for other authors.  She died on September 11, 1974.  https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Lois_Lenski  See also https://www.bookologymagazine.com/resources/authors-emeritus/lenski-lois/ 

Carbonado, commonly known as black diamond, is one of the toughest forms of natural diamond.  It is an impure, high-density, micro-porous form of polycrystalline diamond consisting of diamond, graphite, and amorphous carbon, with minor crystalline precipitates filling pores and occasional reduced metal inclusions.  It is found primarily in alluvial deposits where it is most prominent in mid-elevation equatorial regions such as Central African Republic and in Brazil, where the vast majority of carbonado diamondites have been found.  Its natural colour is black or dark grey, and it is more porous than other diamonds.  Carbonado diamonds are typically pea-sized or larger porous aggregates of many tiny black crystals.  The most characteristic carbonados are mined in the Central African  Republic and in Brazil, in neither place associated with kimberlite, the source of typical gem diamonds.  Lead isotope analyses have been interpreted as documenting crystallization of carbonados about 3 billion years ago; yet carbonado is found in younger sedimentary rocks.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonado 

 

Carbonado in Washington State was one of quite a few towns in the Carbon River valley to be settled during an economic boom in the region.  The boom was brought on by raw material demands in nearby growing towns such as Seattle and Tacoma.  Starting with the town of Wilkeson and moving on through Burnett, Carbonado, Montezuma, Fairfax, and finally Manley Moore, these settlements sprawled up the valley to the very boundary of Mount Rainier National Park.  Most of these towns were company towns, meaning that they specialized in the harvest of raw materials on the plot of land that the town was situated on which was owned by a commercial company.  Often—and such was the case of Carbonado—the company also owned the houses and the energy resources as well.  The energy resource in Carbonado was also the raw material that the citizens of the company town were harvesting, coal.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbonado,_Washington

 

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

Hoyle  (hoyl)  noun  1.  A rule book.  2.  Rules.  After Edmond Hoyle (1672?-1769), British writer on games.  Earliest documented use:  1906.  The word is typically used in the phrase according to Hoyle, meaning strictly following rules and regulations.

Houdini  (hoo-DEE-nee)  noun:  An escape artist.  verb intr.:  To escape.  After Harry Houdini (1874-1926), a magician and escape artist.  Earliest documented use:  1923.   Houdini was born as Ehrich Weiss, but he admired the French magician Jean-Eugène Robert-Houdin so changed his name.  His nickname Ehri became Harry.  Watch a Houdini straitjacket escape in Houston, 1923:  (video, 3 min.).  How did he do his magic tricks and escapes?  Read all about it here.  In his later years, Houdini devoted his life to debunking psychics, mediums, and other fraudsters.  He worked with the Scientific American magazine to expose them.  Also see Houdini vs Arthur Conan Doyle.

pooh-bah  (POO-bah)  noun  1.  A person who holds a high office or has great influence.  2.  A pompous, self-important person.  3.  A person holding many offices or positions of power.  After Pooh-Bah, a government official in Gilbert & Sullivan’s 1885 operetta The Mikado.  Pooh-Bah holds all the high offices of the state (except Lord High Executioner), including relating to complaints about himself.  He is also known as the Lord High Everything Else.  Earliest documented use:  1886.

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From:  Hugh Eckert  Subject:  Houdini  Made me think of lines from one of my favorite Tom Waits songs “The One That Got Away”:  He’s got a snakeskin sportshirt and he looks like Vincent Price with a little piece of chicken and he’s carving off a slice but someone tipped her off, she’ll be doing a Houdini now any day she shook his hustle, the Greyhound bus’ll take the one that got away  (video, 4 min.)

From:  Terry Curley  Subject:  McDonaldization  My two sons invented (at least in my mind) the term Starbuckification in the early 2000s to note that American culture, in the guise of Starbucks, had penetrated to London and other cities in the UK.

From:  Andrew Pressburger  Subject:  pooh-bah  Of the many songs in Gilbert and Sullivan’s most famous work, The Mikado, the one that stands out for its satirical ribbing of all the pretentious characters in the world is Pooh-Bah’s “little list” (video, 5 min.).  The list is usually updated in each performance to suit contemporary issues and local circumstances.  AWADmailIssue 986 

Make Music is a free celebration of music around the world on June 21st.  Launched in 1982 in France as the Fête de la Musique, it is now held on the same day in more than 1,000 cities in 120 countries.  Completely different from a typical music festival, Make Music is open to anyone who wants to take part.  Every kind of musician—young and old, amateur and professional, of every musical persuasion—pours onto streets, parks, plazas, and porches to share their music with friends, neighbors, and strangers.  All of it is free and open to the public.  https://www.makemusicday.org/ 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2380  June 21, 2021

Japan is a country in love with noodles, which are an important ingredient of everyday life there; whether it's a quick lunch, or a special dish at a religious festival.  Soba noodles are made mostly from buckwheat flour, which gives them a richer and nuttier flavor than other noodles.  Soba noodles are brown, which makes them easy to recognize, because most other noodles in Japan are yellow or white.  Soba noodles are dense, thin, and long.  When dried, they are similar in shape to spaghetti.  They are not only low in calories but also low in carbohydrates and contain all eight essential amino acids.  The only ingredients are buckwheat flour, plain flour, and water.  The three ingredients are kneaded into thin dough.  Then they are sliced into long thin spaghetti-like strands.  Once the dough is formed the noodles are added to hot water, which is boiled until the noodles are cooked.  Then a broth or sauce is added to the noodles to make a complete dish.  Udon noodles are extremely popular in Japan, though they haven't yet become popular in other countries.  They are very different from soba noodles in appearance.  Soba noodles are brown, flat, and thin, udon noodles are glossy white, round, and thick.  Made from wheat flour, they are much milder in flavor than their buckwheat counterparts and are thick and chewy in texture.  They are served in many hot soup dishes as well as in some cold dry dishes.  Ramen is the best-known Japanese noodle outside Japan, though it is one of the newest culinary inventions in the country.  The biggest difference between ramen and soba noodles is the flavor.  While soba noodles are made mostly with buckwheat, ramen is usually made with wheat flour.  Yakisoba noodles are not made with buckwheat flour but instead with wheat flour, like udon and ramen.  Yakisoba noodles are round, but much smaller and thinner than udon.  They are most commonly used in stir-fried noodle dishes, and are not usually eaten with broth.  Somen noodles have a similar texture and flavor to udon noodles and are also made with wheat flour.  However, somen noodles are thinner and normally eaten cold with sauce, instead of in hot broths.  Unlike soba or udon noodles, somen noodles are not made by cutting, but by stretching the dough.  This gives somen noodles a smoother and more elastic texture.  posted by Carol  https://www.asiahighlights.com/japan/soba-vs-udon 

Amino acids are organic compounds that combine to form proteins.  Essential amino acids cannot be made by the body.  As a result, they must come from food.  The 9 essential amino acids are: histidine, isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine.  https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002222.htm 

Carbohydrates, or carbs, are sugar molecules.  Along with proteins and fats, carbohydrates are one of three main nutrients found in foods and drinks.  Your body breaks down carbohydrates into glucose.  Glucose, or blood sugar, is the main source of energy for your body's cells, tissues, and organs.  Glucose can be used immediately or stored in the liver and muscles for later use.  https://medlineplus.gov/carbohydrates.html 

BY THE NUMBERS  There are about 2,000 species of fireflies, each with its own flash pattern that it uses to communicate.  *  With 284 acres of ancestral land added, the Ioway Tribal National Park will encompass about 820 acres on a forested bluff overlooking the Missouri River, a historic trading village and 3,000-year old burial mounds.  Nature Conservancy Magazine  Summer 2021

In 1701, Copenhagen was a burgeoning city fortress of 60,000, a seaside capital enclosed by canals and high walls with just four gates.  The streets were narrow and crowded, lined on each side by cramped, timber-framed buildings, though strewn among the city were architectural jewels.  Copenhagen held the Renaissance-style Frederiksborg Palace, symmetrical baroque gardens, and Gothic churches.  The University of Copenhagen, the second oldest institute of higher education in Scandinavia, had the Round Tower astronomical observatory where the speed of light was first quantified.  A day in 1728 changed the face of the city forever.  A fire raged until October 23rd.  In the end, nearly half the medieval section was destroyed, totaling about a third of the city.  A full fifth of the residents of Copenhagen had been left homeless.  This was awful, but the cultural destruction was truly staggering:  virtually all of the books of Copenhagen had been destroyed.  The University of Copenhagen had lost everything; at Borchs Kollegium, 3,150 volumes burned; the city archives were lost.  “Almost all the books in Copenhagen were incinerated.  But many of the Icelandic handwritten manuscripts were saved because Arni Magnusson . . . managed to get the manuscripts out in time,” attests Professor Morten Fink-Jensen, a researcher and University of Copenhagen historian.  Egill Bjarnason  Read extensive article at https://lithub.com/the-obsessive-scholar-who-rescued-icelands-ancient-literary-legacy/ 

wake up and smell the coffee (third-person singular simple present wakes up and smells the coffee, present participle waking up and smelling the coffee, simple past woke up and smelled the coffee or woke up and smelt the coffee, past participle woken up and smelled the coffee or woken up and smelt the coffee)  verb  (idiomatic, US, informal) Often in the infinitive or imperative: to face reality and stop deluding oneself. quotations ▼ Synonyms:  open one's eyes, take the hint, (rare) wake up and smell the ashes, wake up and smell the decaf, wake up and smell the roses  Probably a humorous elaboration of wake up (“to become more aware of a real-life situation; to concentrate on the matter in hand”), alluding to the fact that coffee is often consumed at breakfast time after waking up in the morning.  The term was popularized by the American writer Esther Pauline “Eppie” Lederer (1918–2002), who used the pen name Ann Landers, in the syndicated newspaper advice column Ask Ann Landers.  https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wake_up_and_smell_the_coffee#English 

June 18 is designated as Sustainable Gastronomy Day by the United Nations to highlight the role that gastronomy can play in promoting sustainable development.  Wikipedia 

US President Abraham Lincoln announced the Emancipation Proclamation on September 22, 1862.  Issued under powers granted to the president “as a fit and necessary war measure”, the proclamation declared, “That on the 1st day of January, A.D. 1863, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward and forever free . . . "  Union troops arrived in Galveston, and Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger, commanding officer, District of Texas, from his headquarters in the Osterman building (Strand and 22nd St.), read ‘General Order No. 3’ on June 19, 1865.  The order stated “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the executive of the United States, all slaves are free.  This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves.”  With this notice, reconstruction era Texas began.  Freed African Americans observed “Emancipation Day,” as it was first known, as early as 1866 in Galveston.  Read more and see graphics at https://www.galvestonhistory.org/news/juneteenth-and-general-order-no-3 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2379  June 18, 2021