A HOLE IN THE SKY

The total eclipse of 21 August 2017, photographed in Englewood, TN by Yours Truly. Several prominences are visible on the right limb of the Sun: these could be seen as red flashes by the unaided eye.

...Once upon a time there was light in my life
But now there’s only love in the dark
Nothing I can say
A total eclipse of the heart...
 - Bonnie Tyler, “Total Eclipse of the Heart”

...I’m being followed by a moon shadow
Moon shadow, moon shadow...
- Cat Stevens, “Moon Shadow”

...Then you flew your Learjet up to Nova Scotia
To see the total eclipse of the sun...
- Carly Simon, “You’re So Vain”

...Mama always told me not to look into the sights of the Sun
 Oh, but Mama, that’s where the fun is
- Bruce Springsteen, “Blinded by the Light”

There was a small crowd of us gathered together in front of Eric the Blade’s Tennessee compound to see an event some of us had been anticipating eagerly for years. I speak, of course, of the total solar eclipse of 21 August 2017, the one christened by the Newsertainment Media as “The Great American Eclipse,” a blackout of the Sun that would cross the entire width of the continental United States. Meanwhile, the parts of the Lower 48 that did not see totality would at least experience a partial eclipse.

Partial solar eclipses aren’t that uncommon, as it happens, but the difference between even a 99% partial eclipse and The Full Monty is, well, all the difference. The first is interesting; the second, utterly mind-boggling. For that reason, I had been looking forward to this day for over ten years, ever since I learned that the path of totality would be just a short drive north of Chez Elisson. Even better, the centerline of that path would sweep through Tennessee, passing just a couple of miles north of Eric and Fiona’s place. It would be hard to find a better excuse for a blogmeet.

Dee and I arrived early, as did K-9 and Red, his elusive (and lovely) bride. Sunday night, Tommy and Shyam stopped by, and in the wee hours of the morning, the Mistress of Sarcasm cruised in after having dropped Erica and The Other Elisson off at the infamous Red Roof Inn. And on Monday - Eclipse Day! - we were greeted by Eric’s Sainted Mother and her friend Barb.

Everyone was well provisioned with the requisite eclipse glasses, with Tommy and Shyam having brought a couple of colanders as well. (Colanders, aside from being a Dubious Fashion Accessory, have small holes that cast interesting diffraction patterns during the partial phases of an eclipse.)


Totality Ridiculous: Dee and I sport the latest eclipsy fashions. Eclipse Glasses and Colanders protect against both eyeball-sizzling solar radiation and Mysterious Chemtrailz ’n’ Kozmik Rays! 

August in Tennessee can be a blast furnace, and Eclipse Day was no exception. We could almost feel our faces sizzle as we took brief peeks at the Sun through our eclipse glasses, waiting for the first chip of moonshadow to appear. It did, and we all watched the slow progression of partiality, the Sun’s weirdly obese crescent gradually looking more and more like some sort of astronomical Pac-Man and then becoming the thinnest of slivers. Even so, it was too brilliant to gaze upon without those nearly opaque eclipse glasses.

As the eclipse progressed, we all could see diffraction patterns take shape in shadows cast by the leaves, an array of crescents. Even Tommy’s colander could throw a skein of crescents across the driveway.





It was Eric who first noticed the cicadas, who had begun thrumming as though it were twilight. And, we realized, it was twilight. The Moon’s shadow was rushing toward us, a dusky umbrous darkening of the Western sky.

Then, suddenly, totality.


It got plenty dark for a couple of minutes.

The last brilliant sliver of sunlight vanished and the eclipsed Sun appeared in all its magnificence: a jet-black disc surrounded by the pearly solar corona. It was like nothing so much as a glowing hole in the sky. And the corona! White it was, bluish at the edges, with barely discernible reddish flickers appearing intermittently at the edge of the Moon’s ebon surface. It was a sight for which I had waited all my lifetime.

We watched, jaws agape. And then, as the all-too-brief time window closed, we could see dawn approaching... out of the west. In a twinkling it was over, and the cicadas ceased their song.

It had been awesome in the truest sense of the word, a rare glimpse of a near-miraculous phenomenon. And being able to share the experience with Dee, the Mistress of Sarcasm, my brother, and a handful of good friends? Priceless.


Composite photograph of the eclipse as it progressed from partial to total. Don’t let those thin crescents fool you: Even the thinnest sliver of unobstructed Sun was too brilliant to look at without eye protection.

I can now check “See a total solar eclipse” off my bucket list. But there’s another one coming down the pike in seven years (8 April 2024) and it’ll be a doozie, with totality lasting about four and a half minutes. The centerline of totality will pass almost right over Kerrville, Texas; just a hair west of Cleveland, Ohio; right over Buffalo and Rochester, New York; and will touch the northernmost tip of Prince Edward Island. Plan ahead!


Big Jack sez, “Hey, did I miss something?”

DUST

He has been dust for well over a century, but his image still shines in the ephemeral reflection from a silver-plated sheet of copper.

This is a daguerreotype, an image captured by the first commercially successful photographic process. The technical details were made public in 1839, and daguerreotypy became a craze. For the first time in history, average people could afford to have their portraits made.

But by the time of the American Civil War (AKA “The Late Unpleasantness”), the process had largely been displaced by newer, less costly technologies. We can be reasonably certain, therefore, that this photograph was made sometime in the span between 1840-1860.

The subject is unknown. Who was he? What was he like? We can only speculate. Yet there is, at least, more than a weathered, semi-illegible tombstone to mark his brief passage on Earth. There is a photograph.

ROWDY RENAISSANCE

A Reuters photographer recently shot a photograph of a brawl in - of all places - the Ukrainian Parliament.

That, in itself, was not especially noteworthy. Sure, you don’t necessarily expect a country’s lawmakers to be duking it out in the midst of a legislative session, but this was Ukraine, after all. Besides, governmental civility has been on the decline in our own country for years. We might not have reached bottom yet, but who is to say that fistfights won’t be breaking out in the House of Representatives after the next election?

What was remarkable about the photograph was not so much its subject matter as its composition. Inadvertently, the image was an almost perfect exemplar of a beloved Renaissance compositional technique involving the use of the Golden Spiral. Caravaggio would have understood this photograph perfectly, although he might have wondered just what exactly a Parliament was supposed to be.


Art is where you find it: Ukrainian solons duke it out in a manner befitting Michelangelo or da Vinci.

(I tweaked the lighting a bit and “oilpainterized” the image before sticking it in this frame, in case you were wondering.)

BLOWN AWAY

That was my reaction to this video of fireworks in West Palm Beach, Florida... filmed from the midst of the explosions, using a GoPro Hero 3 silver camera attached to a DJI Phantom 2 drone.

Remarkably, the drone was not damaged despite its proximity to the bursting shells.



Now I wanna get me my own drone. At the very least, I can use it to terrify the local conspiracy theorists.

CURSES! RECURSION! or,HOUSTON STEVE’S TWO GRAND-DADS

Houston Steve and two old grand-dads. [Click to embiggen.]

This photograph amuses me no end.

Houston Steve is pictured here with a bottle of Old Grand-Dad bourbon that is old enough to be a Grand-Dad itself, having been distilled in 1959 and bottled in 1964... just in time for our friend Sid’s Bar Mitzvah, the occasion for which the bottle was purchased.

Alas, this particular Old Grand-Dad is now expired, having gone where all of our spirituous brethren eventually go. I am proud to say that I had a hand in hastening his demise... as did both Houston Steve and Sid.

But there’s another Old Grand-Dad in the photo, this one being Houston Steve’s very own grandpa. He’s the one wearing the Santa Claus suit in the picture displayed on the iPhone... and standing next to him is none other than the young (and beardless) Houston Steve.

As I said, this photograph amuses me no end.

HOMEY DEPOT

The old Tate rail depot. [Click to embiggen.]

This Sunday, we took a drive in the hills just north of town and happened upon a dilapidated old railroad depot in the hamlet of Tate.

A little research uncovered the fact that the building had been constructed back in 1916 by the L&N (Louisville and Nashville) Railroad and that as recently as 1966 it was still in service and (outwardly, anyway) in good condition. Now? Not so much. Nevertheless, it’s still a fine subject for photography.







We will want to come back. In a week or so, the leaves in the nearby hills will be bursting with their full fall colors... and there’s also the Tate House, built in the 1920’s by “Colonel Sam” Tate and sheathed in gorgeous pink Etowah marble, mined from the local veins.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MISTER BUFFY

A lovely specimen: a proof 1913 Type 1 Indian Head nickel.  [Photo: PCGS.]

The Indian Head nickel, AKA the Buffalo nickel, is one hundred years old this year, having been released into circulation on March 4, 1913.

Despite issues with some aspects of the design that made the coin difficult to strike well and the dates vulnerable to wear, it is still - in my not-so-humble opinion - one of the most beautiful American coins.

Perhaps it is a mark of my advancing age that I clearly remember when these bad boys were commonly encountered in pocket change.  I suppose we didn’t appreciate their beauty at the time, for they were commonplace... and generally fairly worn out as well.  But in pristine condition, this venerable nickel is a lovely little piece of artwork... the inspired creation of James Earle Fraser, whose initial F can be seen just below the date.

Years ago, we knew someone who bought an antique nickel slot machine - the old-school mechanical kind with the lever that you would pull to spin the cylindrical reels.  For authenticity’s sake, he filled that sumbitch up with buffalo nickels.  I was eaten up with envy, because that was a Cool Thing to have.

What coins do you remember from your childhood?  Which were your favorites?

THEN AND NOW: AN AERIAL OBSERVATION

Several years ago, when I was writing over at the Old Place, I wrote a post that referenced that most nerdly of Youthful Activities: flying model rockets.

It’s hard to get deeper into Nerd Territory unless you’re also a member of the school marching band... at least, so they say.  Whoever “they” are.

In any event, that post included several aerial photographs that a friend and I had taken with a rocket-mounted camera back in the fall of 1966.  It was primitive technology by today’s standards, but nevertheless it yielded some interesting results: photos of identifiable pieces of Local Geography.  Plus, it was cheap as borscht - five bucks bought the rocket and camera - the only other thing you needed was a supply of engines, film discs, patience, and wishful thinking.

After a few attempts from our usual launch venue - the then-undeveloped John J. Burns Park in Massapequa, New York - yielded mostly uninteresting results (aerial photos of roads and parking lots aren’t all that exciting, after all), we decided to move our base of operations to the parking lot of one of the local elementary schools.  From there, we were able to score a few shots that at least had some recognizable landmarks.  Roads!  Water!  Houses!

I’ve taken a couple of those old rocket photos and juxtaposed them against views of the same scenes available to anyone with Google Earth and an Internet connection.  Here they are:


This is the part of Bar Harbor immediately south of Birch Lane School.  Kings Walk runs L-R across the bottom, with Thornwood Road on the left and Queens Court to the right (and a glimpse of Harbor Drive on the far right).


Looking across the river at Nassau Shores, West Shore Drive winds along the left side of this photograph, with Seneca Place in the center and a bit of Seneca Street West visible on the leftmost edge.

The only difference between the photos on the left and those on the right?  Forty-seven years... and a metric buttload of technology that nobody could possibly have imagined back in 1966.

A FORMAL PORTRAIT SITTING...

...is a challenging task when it involves a cat.  Especially this one:


Levon sits for a formal portrait. Photo ©2013 Gary Feinberg Photography.

Unlike his predecessor-kitties Hakuna and Matata, Levon generally does not sit still while I try to photograph hm while he performs his numerous Kittenish Tasks.  Matata was a notorious lens-whore, while Hakuna was mostly oblivious to the camera; Levon, by contrast, will take off once he notices the baleful glare of the lens.

When our friend Gary posted this photograph of Levon on Facebook (he and JoAnn had been cat-sitting him during our recent trip to New York and Philadelphia), I wondered just how many shots he had to take to capture this Formal Portrait.  Eighty-seven?  Two hundred?

Turns out, he took exactly two shots.  Two. Shots.

I’ll give the boy credit.  He’s talented and efficient!

MUG SHOTS

Harry Pot o’ Coffee... an ephemeral piece of artwork in foamed milk and espresso.  Courtesy Kazuki Yamamoto and NPR.

When we were in Israel last summer, one of the wonderful little treats that accompanied the massive buffet-style hotel breakfasts we had every day was the coffee.  Specifically, it was the espresso bar, where you could walk up and have your espresso, cappuccino, or latte made to order.  Often the barista would add an extra little touch: a leaf, delicately drawn in the contrasting brown and white of the coffee and steamed milk froth.  It was an ephemeral piece of art, one that would last mere moments before disappearing down my gaping, caffeine-starved maw... but it never failed to make me smile.

This art form is nothing new, of course.  Anyone who has ever ordered a pint of Guinness from a reasonably skilled bartender has seen a shamrock rendered in Stout-Foam.  This is kinda-sorta the same, but without the alcohol.

Now, however, artists in Japan are now upping the ante, with remarkable creations in milk froth.  Peanuts characters, kitty cats, Einstein, Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” - all have been rendered on the small canvas of the coffee mug.  What do you call this art form?  Baristart?  Mug shots?

Design philosopher Leonard Koren, quoted in the NPR piece linked above, has this to say about Japanese aesthetics: “...Many things are beautiful precisely because they are short-lived and fragile.”  What better example of fragility than a film of froth in a coffee cup?  And what better way to find beauty in an unexpected place?

GREAT MOUSTACHES OF THE SEVENTIES

See if you can figure out which one of these idiots is me.  Shouldn’t be all that difficult, I would think.

Bonus points - and not much else - for figuring out who the other three are.  And no, not one of ’em was a porn star (at least, to the best of my knowledge).

BACK TO THE FUTURE

A bloggy buddy of long standing - the estimable Bakerina - introduced me to a remarkable website: Thrilling Tales of the Downright Unusual.  Sort of like James Lileks meets Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow meets Epic Mickey.

The best part?  There’s a page (the Pulp-O-Mizer) where you can design your own retro-pulpified magazine covers.  Here’s one:


Attack of the Spambots: Looks like the future is now.

This is the kind of site that can provide hours and hours of dopey amusement.  Its creator, one Bradley W. Schenck, has a unique skill set and artistic vision... and if part of the website is designed to sell merch (calendars, coffee mugs, posters, cards, T-shirts, iPad cases, et alia), I can hardly blame him.  Who can count how many hours went into creating the amazing design and graphics of Retropolis?  Well played, Mr. Schenck!

MAMMA-DRAMA IN THE SKY

Unusual mammatus clouds in the eastern sky over Marietta, Georgia, a harbinger of nasty weather. 

Last night as our Thursday evening Minyan Gang was polishing off the remains of our supper at the local diner, we noticed an ominous darkness gathering toward the east... an inky greyish-black sky that could not be explained solely by the fact that the sun was setting.

A quick check of the Weather Channel radar maps (ain’t smartphones smart?) established that Nasty Business was indeed brewing.  Unlike most springtime nastiness, however, the storms that were building were coming in from the east rather that the west.  Bizarre.

We stepped outside and were greeted by a rare sight: mammatus clouds.

Also known as mammatocumulus clouds, these clouds get their name from their resemblance to udders or breasts... which is why I refer to them as Sky-Tits on those uncommon occasions when I see them.  They are sometimes associated with very severe thunderstorms, so I was more than just a little nervous as we piled into the car to head home.

Surprisingly, we encountered no bad weather of any kind as we worked our way eastward.  A few drops of rain was the most we had to deal with, although the distant eastern sky was lit intermittently by huge crackling flashes of lightning.  But as we approached our neighborhood, we saw evidence that the drama we had seen in the sky had been matched by drama on the ground.

The area was completely covered in leafy detritus, the sort of thing you would see in the aftermath of a hailstorm.  But the sheer amount of shredded leaves was astonishing; we had never seen anything remotely like it.  Later we found that a violent hailstorm had passed through, with hailstones up to one inch (!) in diameter piling up on the ground in sufficient quantity to mimic a snowstorm.  But by the time we got there it had all melted, leaving only shredded shrubbery as evidence.


The driveway at Chez Elisson, carpeted in shredded shrubbery after the storm.

I’ve seen hail like that only once, at Stapleton Airport in Denver back in March of 1992.  It fell thick and fast, enough to pile up in drifts.  And then, in the warm spring air, it melted away in minutes as though it had never been there.  This storm must have been like that.

In fact, it was exactly like that - as evidenced by this photograph taken by one Dean Sever, who lives just over the county line from us in Roswell, a distance of about two or three miles:



It would have made for an extra bit of excitement had we been there to see it.  But it’s just as well we missed it.  Who the hell needs a car with a pebble finish?

FROM THE ELISSON ARCHIVES: YET MORE JAPANALIA

Further to this post, here are a few more images from our Japan trip four years ago.  Click on any of ’em to embiggen.


A confectioner’s display showing some of the local matcha (fine powdered green tea) goodies.

There is nothing compares with the artful arrangement of the items for sale in Japanese shops.  Combine a general tendency toward fussiness with a food item that has a whole ceremony associated with it, and you have an inkling of what you’ll see in Kyoto when you start looking for matcha-based confectionery.


Hello Kitty, Hakone style.

Hello Kitty is beloved by the Japanese: To say that she is their answer to Mickey Mouse is to damn her with faint praise.  This poster shows the typical style of the Hakone region - the area around Mount Fuji - with intricate patterns, wood grains, and (of course!) Fuji-san in the background. The Japanese hiragana calligraphy on the right side says “Herrou Kittei.”


Licorice?  No, black sesame rice candy.

Westerners, when confronted with a jet-black confection, will immediately think “licorice.”  Wrong-O.  This is black sesame candy, a gelatinous rice-based affair, with a taste vaguely reminiscent of halvah... which, when you think about it, makes perfect sense.  


Poster advertising an upcoming performance at the Kabuki-za, April 2008.

The old Kabuki-za, the 55-year-old theatre in the heart of the Ginza district, was demolished after its last show on April 28, 2010.  Its replacement, still under construction, will open in 2013, but Elder Daughter and I managed to catch a show at the Old Place.  Couldn’t understand a word, but Kabuki, surprisingly, is an art form that transcends language with its timeless stories of love and betrayal. I’d go back again in a heartbeat.

Kabuki, incidentally, is performed by male actors only... a characteristic it shares with the Princeton Triangle shows of the 1960’s and prior.  And that’s about the only characteristic it shares with the Princeton Triangle shows of the 1960’s and prior.

FROM THE ELISSON ARCHIVES: FOUND ART IN JAPAN

Hard to believe that it has been over four years since Elder Daughter and I made our memorable ten-day voyage to Japan, innit?  But time flies... or, as Eli (hizzownself) likes to say, Tempus Nudgit.

Once in a while, I will open up the folders wherein reside the photographs I took on that trip... if only to remind myself that it actually happened: it was not a dream.  And with the passage of time, the images seem fresh and new, strange as that may seem.

Here are a few that you haven’t seen before:



Manhole covers in Beppu.

Manhole covers are an indigenous art form uniquely Japanese in the same way that comic books and jazz are uniquely American.  Apparently, I’m not the only one who thinks so: An entire book, Drainspotting, has been written on the topic.

 
Poster advertising a geisha-related art exhibition from the Gion district, Kyoto.

 
Tulips in Hiroshima... so bright, they practically glow in the dark.

There’s beauty everywhere you look, but when you’re in an exotic foreign locale, it seems to strike you with just a little more force.

I ALWAYS KNEW I WAS A HIPSTER

You never know where pictures you post on the Inter-Webby-Net will end up.

There are plenty of merry pranksters who will take the most innocent images and Photoshop the crap out of them, to ridiculous effect. I myself have been known to get involved in similar nefarious activities.

And then there are the folks over at Worth 1000, who take Photoshopping to a whole new level.

One of their current contests involves creating a hoax planking shot. Imagine my surprise at finding myself in a whole new planking pose...



I have no idea who the Photoshop artist is who found my image on the ’Net and used it as the basis for his (or her) contest entry, but I offer a happy fedora-tip! Now, where’s a towel, that I may wipe off all the hippo saliva?

Update: The artist’s name is johndiablo, and his entry scored a bronze medal in this particular contest. Now: is owling next?

TIGER, TIGER

Tiger, Tiger: Painting by Rebecca B.

Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
                              - William Blake

I am partial to tigers, being a product of Princeton University and the Great Corporate Salt Mine, both of which claim felis tigris as mascot. They are, in my view, the most beautiful of the Great Cats... which beauty does not necessarily imply a desire for physical proximity. They are, after all, King-Shit Carnivores, and to them, the vaunted human intelligence is merely the ghost in a machine made of tasty meat.

Nevertheless, I am partial to tigers - and when my sister-in-law Rebecca presented us with the above painting, I was practically ecstatic.

Now all we have to do is find a suitable wall upon which to hang it... and where its fearsome stare will not keep me - or Hakuna - awake at night.

STILL LIFE

High dynamic range image taken at the Four Seasons Hotel, Atlanta.

THE STEAMPUNK KID

Not just any random steampunk: this is none other than Elder Daughter.

O tell me, tell me, Lady Steampunk:
When you eat doughnuts, do you dunk?
Do you travel with a steamer trunk?
Does the steam make all your clothing shrunk?
Do you listen to Hip-Hop? Or James Brown’s funk?
When you go out on weekends, do you get drunk?
Or are you ascetic, like a Buddhist monk?
At camp, do you grab the bottom bunk?
Is your boyfriend a schlub, or a good-looking hunk?
In the Tunnel of Love, did your boat get sunk?
Is your car a Ferrari, or a piece of junk?
Grammatically, are you like White and Strunk?
Have you thought all the thoughts than can be thunk?

RANDOM IMAGES

I’m posting these ’cause I like ’em. Also, I’m too lazy to actually write anything.





[Click on either photo to embiggen.]

The first image is a closeup of the stained glass chandelier in our dining room; the second is a shot of autumn leaves taken in Eric’s backyard last November.