Silent Mob at HMNH

Running an event at the Harvard Museum of Natural History next Sunday, check it out!

Website: www.silentmob.wordpress.com

Facebook event (join to receive updates)

Today I learned about King Ludwig II of Bavaria. He built this:
Looks like Sleeping Beauty's castle, huh? That's because Disney based his castle on King Ludwig's, who based his castle on neo-Romantic German kitsch, which was based on cultural memory of medieval castles that never existed.

King Ludwig II liked to imagine that he was a fairy tale king, rather than the lame-duck monarch of a barely-sovereign state in the Industrial Revolution. Wikipedia says he was fond of wandering through the countryside, giving lavish gifts to commoners who were nice to him. His fairy tale castle broke the bank, but the Bavarians loved him anyway (who wouldn't love a deeply eccentric castle-commissioner?). His ministers loved him less, and they engineered a legal deposition by having him declared insane - not exactly a stretch, admittedly, for a man who wanted no more from his kingship than to canoe around his palace grotto while a soprano sang Die Walkure for him.

But still. The whitecoats came to get Ludwig and he balked - "How can you declare me insane?," he asked the doctor. "After all, you have never seen or examined me before."

The next day, Ludwig and the doctor were both found dead in a shallow lake.

How this is not yet a musical is beyond me.

Today I learned that
1) someone recently visited my blog through Googling the query "are rabbits inauspicious?", and
2) my blog is the first hit for the query "are rabbits inauspicious?"

So I rather feel I should expound a bit on this subject. Are rabbits, in fact, inauspicious?

The first question to address is really "inauspicious for whom?" On the one hand, rabbits are very soft, which doesn't really bode well for them. On the other hand, bunnies must really enjoy cuddling with one another. So, dear mystery-reader, if you return seeking further insight on the auspiciality of bunny rabbits, please clarify your terms and I will see what I can do.

And what's with all the carrots? What do they need such good eyesight for anyway?

Today I learned a new Harvard building! You know that building to the right of Lamont? Me neither till today! In all these years, I have not only never been inside that building, or known what it is, but I've never even really registered its existence. So today I walked in and announced my presence to the dude at the desk:

Me: Hi! I've been here five years and have never been in this building. Where am I?
Dude: This is the Houghton rare books library.
Me: Whoa, that exists?
Dude: ...yes.
Me: I mean, I always thought it was just one of those Hollis designations for a particular collection, not an actual physical location.
Dude: Rare books generally need to be stored somewhere secure. And physical.
Me: This makes sense.

Next up: Liz learns to navigate new Lamont floor-numbering, avoids further embarrassing attempts to locate Shakespeare in the government docs stacks.

Valley Stream pride

There's an escaped lunatic on the loose in Valley Stream State Park. Or possibly an escaped kitty-cat. One of those.

I'm reading in the park, around 6 pm, and a helicopter passes overhead. And again, lower. And it quickly becomes clear that it is circling the park at low altitude. Since a string of ninjas didn't come out the drop door, it seemed safe to assume they were looking for someone.

Near me, a guy in a balaclava (also known as a ski mask) was practicing parkour. A balaclava. Mid-day. Mid-June. While exercising. Definitely a terrorist.

After a half hour, I head out. The entrance to the park is blocked by a police car, and a few cops are at the gate. I know for a fact that the other 7 entrances aren't being watched. I try to head back in to investigate, but they aren't letting people into the park now.

"You guys do know that the other entrances are open, right?"
"We're looking for someone we think is in this area."
"..."

The park, mind you, is maybe a mile around. So because I'm a punk, I bike around the outside of the park and re-enter from another entrance. Because no one ever taught me not to make fun of police officers. The other entrances are all open, as I'd thought, though one is being watched by a couple guys in South Shore Hospital uniforms. Undercover men. Or someone escaped the psych ward.

Back inside the park, two more cops are staring at the trees. There's a trail in there. The entrance to the trail is around a bend from where the cops are standing, out of their sight-line. Okay. Meanwhile, balaclava guy has fled the scene.

At the first entrance, another guy is questioning the cops.
"It's not the crime of the century or anything."
"Oh okay, so it wasn't violent."
"I didn't say that. You move along now."

I'm figuring those darn kids stole Baby Lindbergh from the manger again.

Eventually I got bored of watching my tax dollars at work. Nassau County police are the highest paid in the country. Way to earn it, guys.

I made eye contact with Gerard Butler while doing the Chicken Dance

So there me and Candace were. Minding our own business. Doing the chicken dance in front of Penn Station. Because we had decided to walk from 23rd St. to Times Square by doing a different dance down each block. Naturally. And 34th St. was the chicken dance.

So we're minding our own business, doing the chicken dance, and the "clap clap clap clap!" part was getting a lot of attention. Not as much attention as our zombie walk got on 25th, but heads were turning. Including the head of Gerard Butler. And the rest of him. As well as his personal gentleman. He looked at us like we were crazy. With good reason. But he was dancing on the inside.

I smiled and waved at Mr. Butler. I didn't know who he was (of course). Candace informed me on the corner. And then we continued on our merry way, Macarena-ing down 35th.

The end.

Point-missing, Spoilery, or Otherwise Amusing Translations of Movie Titles

It was raining a lot in Sevilla, so Jenny and I amused ourselves by making this list in a FNAC.

Point-missing, Spoilery, or Otherwise Amusing Translations of Movie and TV Titles
(key below)

1. Mejor... Imposible
2. Desayuno con Diamantes
3. Atrapado en el Tiempo
4. El Invisible Harvey
5. Urgencias
6. Expediente X
7. A dos metros bajo tierra
8. El Sueño de mi Vida
9. Descubriendo Nunca Jamás
10. El Caballero Oscuro
11. La Guerra de las Galaxas
12. Padre Made in USA

(the originals)

1. As Good As It Gets
2. Breakfast at Tiffanys
3. Groundhog Day
4. Harvey
5. ER
6. X-Files
7. Six Feet Under
8. 13 going on 30
9. Finding Neverland
10. The Dark Knight
11. Star Wars
12. American Dad

Bonus book section!

Los Cuentos de Beedle el Bardo


Also, Harvard fails at policing unauthorized uses of its image overseas, apparently:

Don't mind the traffic...

Well, I just doubled the number of posts I've written here in the last two months! Sorry to clog your rss feeds or whatever, just posting some audition pieces for a blogging gig. Will let you know results, obviously. (and feedback welcome on the posts!)