KLEM AM

Overheard at Lem's:

Trooper York said...Actually women come up to me all the time in the Supermarket to ask about picking out stuff. I am usually teaching the wife about it and it always seems to gather a crowd.
May 29, 2018 at 3:45 PM

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Sorry about the trippy visuals.  Prima did many versions of this song, and this one (from "Louis Prima Digs Keeley Smith") is my fave.

KLEM AM

Dappled, non-stick photos of the 2017 eclipse from my mailbox:

I don't have any filters so I took indirect pictures of the partial eclipse we had here. 

Two of those utilize the leaves on my walnut tree to form multiple pinhole cameras, the other is a picture I took of the image cast by a "pinhole" camera I made using a scrap of walnut through which I bored a half inch diameter hole. 

Eclipse is over, as you were.

Photo by Sixty Grit

Photo by Sixty Grit

Photo by Sixty Grit

Question for Sixty: Are you going to butcher that walnut tree someday for its wood?

KLEM AM

The eclipse started early today...

Photo by Sixty Grit

KLEM AM

Photo By Sixty Grit

Related: Wal-Mart Applies For Patent For Blimp-Style Floating Warehouse

There are two disused wooden blimp hangars in Tustin, CA, which date from WW II. One of them is slated for destruction. What a publicity coup if one of the big retailers would refurbish, preserve, and use these white elephants.

link to original

@Sixty Grit: The hangars are made from Douglas fir. They look gray because of age and exposure. Can you just imagine the growth rings in that old wood?

KLEM AM

Murder in the skies over Carolina:

Photo by Sixty Grit

KLEM AM

Photo by Sixty Grit

Hawk (shadow), Moon (reflection), Sky (scatter), Cloud (dispersion and absorption).

White light matters

KLEM AM

photo submitted by Sixty Grit

It took me a few seconds, but I chuckled. Collective nouns. Here are some surprising ones: link

I know there must be a smart, single word for this. What is it?

KLEM AM

Scattered clouds forecast...

photo by Sixty Grit

Conversation continues, back here.

KLEM AM

Photo by Sixty Grit

Are you cirrus, Sixty?

cross reference

KLEM AM

A crow flies in the morning...

photo by Sixty Grit

Planes fly in the mourning...

photo by chickelit

KLEM AM

link

"Prime the pump" -- where have I heard that metaphor before?

KLEM AM

photo by Sixty Grit. Click for crows

What is the average distance between trees and clouds as the crow flies?

KLEM AM

Good morning, sunshine!

Photo by Sixty Grit

What's the over and under for cloud cover in your neck of the words?

KLEM AM

linky

Those dirty rings!

Speaking of the annular -- we're approaching another year, so it's time to reflect a bit on January. Everyone pretends to know that January was named after Janus, the two-faced worthless Roman god. But did you know that that may be false?

January (in Latin, Ianuarius) is named after the Latin word for door (ianua), since January is the door to the year. The month is conventionally thought of as being named after Janus, the god of beginnings and transitions in Roman mythology, but according to ancient Roman farmers' almanacs Juno was the tutelary deity of the month.^[1]

Interestingly, the Romans only had 10 months and each one was longer. How else to fill a full year with months? Surely I thought, the month is defined by how many times the moon orbits the earth [moon, month, get it?]. Wrong!  The moon goes around the earth 13 times in a year, not 12 as people might think. My faith in the power of words and etymology is shaken. It's a mixed-up, muddled-up, shook-up world:

linky

n.b., that is the original "Coca-Cola" version of the song -- the one banned in the UK.

KLEM AM

Getting a Handel on Christmas...

linkage

That one came highly recommended by Sixty Grit and MamaM -- two of the straightest shooters at Lem's.

Here's the thing: Handel is gorgeous but above all -- baroque. I crave simplicity. Musically, I actually liked three-man power trios better than The Beach Boys and The Beatles. Maybe that's why I like small molecule chemistry better that molecular biology. Simplicity. Less is more.

Consider the following video that I found, researching a post a few nights ago:

linkage

What daunting challenges that musician faces! Four keyboards and more foot pedals than a centipede could master -- and yet somehow he does. Why was that instrument perfected for a soloist?  Why didn't organists have footmen, much like a locomotive engineer had a fireman? Because they could?

I suppose that next you'll tell me that the pipe organ soloist evolved specifically to play baroque music.

Merry Christmas, All!

KLEM AM

Overheard at Lem's:

Dust Bunny Queen said....

Listen to this while contemplating.....Gloria en Excelsis Deo or a clunky rendition of Michael Row the Boat Ashore.
December 20, 2016 at 10:48 AM

The phrase Gloria in Excelsis Deo (glory to God in the highest) appears in a familiar traditional Christmas carol...the one with the long, melismatic vowel movement inside "gloria." You will recognize it:

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I put up the French/English video to recognize the original French carol -- no matter how Latin the refrain.

I also put up Van Morrison's "Gloria" to see if he had used a bit of melisma in his 1964 hit:

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I think he did. What do you think?

KLEM AM

Overheard at Lem's, years ago:

Amartel said...
Christmas favorites:
Chanticleer
Bob and Doug McKenzieDecember 15, 2013 at 1:59 PM

Here is Chanticleer, appropriate for the shortest day of the year:

linkage

KLEM AM

Titus sent me a link to his favorite Christmas carol:

linky poo

KLEM AM

Overheard at Lem's:

Eric the Fruit Bat said...
Don't know if this qualifies, but we have a Chris Isaak Christmas album that's one of my favorite things.
December 7, 2016 at 8:42 PM

linky

The song reminded me of the refrain of another favorite of mine:

O star of wonder, star of night,
Star of royal beauty bright,
Westward leading, still proceeding,
Guide us to thy perfect light.

Gorgeous!  I woke up the other night with the melody of that refrain on my brain. I hummed and hummed it but could not recognize it.  Then I remembered a few words..."Star of Wonder, star of...." and a couple of Google dead ends finally led me to "We Three Kings."  I couldn't find a favorite version, but this one comes close:

linky

KLEM AM

This is my favorite traditional Christmas carol; it may be my favorite version as well:

linky

What's not to like about it?  Even the title has two old timey words: "Hark" and "herald."

"Hark" is of course an imperative mood form of the verb "to hearken," to listen.  The Germans preserve this word in their verb horchen, to listen, (not to be confused with their word hören which mean to hear).

"Herald" is fuzzier. The old meaning is "messenger." In the song title, "herald" is an adjective modifying angels. So, a modern translation of the song title might be: "Listen! The Messenger Angels Sing"

But the Anglo-Saxon roots of this song are even deeper than I suspected. First of all, the song is old -- first dating from 1739. According to Wiki, the original first couplet was "Hark how all the Welkin rings." "Welkin" is an archaic English word meaning heavens (lit. clouds). German/Dutch speakers may recognize their modern cognate words Wolke/welk. The lyrics evolved in the 18th and 19th centuries to what we have now.

There are richer, even deeper linguistic connections to the past in that song's lyrics, if you care to dig there.