And speaking of Chimpanzees...

...Sometimes Facebook targeted ads get it completely right. By which I mean, in such a way did I find out about this.

In his characteristic heartwarming style, Patrick McDonnell tells the story of the young Jane Goodall and her special childhood toy chimpanzee named Jubilee. As the young Jane observes the natural world around her with wonder, she dreams of "a life living with and helping all animals," until one day she finds that her dream has come true. One of the world’s most inspiring women, Dr. Jane Goodall is a renowned humanitarian, conservationist, animal activist, environmentalist, and United Nations Messenger of Peace. In 1977 she founded the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI), a global nonprofit organization that empowers people

to make a difference for all living things. With anecdotes taken directly from Jane Goodall’s autobiography, McDonnell makes this very true story accessible for the very young--and young at heart.  Jane Goodall's father gave her a stuffed toy chimpanzee called Jubilee for her first birthday. It became her favorite toy, foreshadowing her life's work. Academy of Achievement via Jane Goodall Institute

Today on zulily

 

Grubbie Style Monkey Tee

"Your little monkey will be the king of the jungle gym whenever he wears this cool, comfy tee. Anything but grubby, this tee showcases a clean design that's made in the USA and always seems to make him crave bananas."

I love this shirt. I'd wear this shirt. While only available in two colors at zulily, the Grubbie Style site offers 8 art colors and 7 shirt colors (depending on the article of clothing -- there are 5 to choose from), mix and match. They also cost $38.00. (And we wonder why more American clothing isn't made in the USA?)
I wouldn't spend 38 bucks on a t-shirt for myself, ever. Not even if I was at a U2 concert and Adam Clayton himself was going to sign it. He could sign the shirt on my back.

And another problem...

That's not a monkey!!!

I not-so-patiently await the release of DisneyNature's Chimpanzee (Earth Day 2012) so that the children of America will (hopefully) be in a position to explain to the adults of the world the difference between a chimpanzee and a monkey so that I, every other anthropology major I know, and Jane Goodall can move onto more important things.

Easter Hibiscus

Forgot to share the Easter hibiscus bloom.

Rocky Ridge Romp

 Ali and I got off our buns and went for a hike in Rocky Ridge County Park!

Mountain bikers, ARGH, don't get me started!

Damn tree-eating gypsy moths!

I wonder why they call it Rocky Ridge...

Nothing like the buzz of electric to make me feel "one with nature."

Pretty...

Not so pretty...

        

Pretty, but dead...

Polliwog!

Easter FYI

This is what Easter eggs made using
Doc Hinkle's are SUPPOSED to look like.
Photo by my cousin L.K. "Martha Stewart" Miller.

In case you were wondering what "avant-garde" meant...

Once again, thank you new book section at Martin Library for this serendipitous discovery. (Though my name recognition of David Levithan is owing entirely to my favorite YA librarian, Molly Krichten.)

A quick and delightful read, gender-neutral and immensely quotable, I include this quotation because it's laugh-out-loud funny (as opposed to morbidly depressing - I'm in a good mood today) and, the first of my many, many purple post-it notes.

avant-garde, adj.

This was after Alisa' show, the reverse-blackface rendition of Gone With the Wind, including songs from the Empire Records soundtrack and an interval of nineteenth-century German poetry, recited with a lisp.

"What does avant-garde mean, anyway?" I asked.

"I believe it translates as favor to your friends," you replied."

Buy the book from Amazon. Fan the author on Goodreads. Follow @loversdiction on Twitter.

I like my giraffes alive, thanks

If you always thought the stuffed menagerie at Nixon Park was uber-creepy, be forewarned; you might want to stop reading this post now.

via the blog of granite
I refuse to post a larger or more
detailed picture of plastinated
humans; I hope this one is enough
to give you the general idea. Also,
I relish any opportunity to insert
pictures of Daniel Craig.

Controversial anatomist Gunther von Hagens, father of  plastination and the associated Body Worlds exhibition -- famously depicted in Casino Royale--has reestablished the public display of his technique in his native Germany. As a result of a series of legal challenges, the original Body Worlds exhibit has, according to Wikipedia, been absent from that country since the Summer of 2004.

The new exhibit, entitled Körperwelten Der Tiere (Bodyworlds of Animals) features plastinated specimens of species other than Homo sapiens sapiens, including Troglodytes gorilla, Struthio camelus, and Giraffa camelopardalis. 

Anatomist Gunther von Hagens looks at a plastinated giraffe
during an exhibition at Neunkirchen Zoo in Neunkirchen near
Saarbruecken March 19, 2010. REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski

Although, based on press photos, the exhibit is at least a year old, I first heard of it last week via The Daily Need, a blog by the editors, producers, and hosts of PBS's Need to Know. A press photo of a plastinated lamb (Photo of the Day for April 18)  showed up in my Facebook feed; its caption mentioned a plastinated giraffe. One Google image search later, and voila! The inspiration for this post.

I've viewed plastination with a critical gaze ever since graduate school, where I read and presented a scholarly article by sociologist Tony Walter in my Anthropological Perspectives on Body and Person module (I considered rereading it before commencing this blog post, but alas, it disappeared, along with many a PDF, when my last hard drive kicked the bucket.)

ABSRACT: Plastination provides a new method, governed by medical technique rather than religious ritual, by which human remains may be transformed from unstable/wet to stable/dry. In the Körperwelten/Body Worlds exhibition, the public pay to view plastinated bodies, and are invited to donate their bodies for plastination after death. This article addresses the question of whether Body Worlds visitors accept plastination for display as a legitimate form of disposal. Three sources of data are drawn on: the ethnographer's account of his first visit to the exhibition in Brussels; the written comments of visitors to the London exhibition; and the stated motives of some donors. Plastination as final disposal is accepted by the vast majority of visitors; they perceive the dry, odourless body interiors within the clinical, scientific framework encouraged by the exhibition, and are often fascinated by what they see. This is complicated, however, by certain surface features and modes of display which enable the problematic reinsertion of personhood. So, plastination itself is accepted, but not all forms of display.

Walter, T. (2004), PLASTINATION FOR DISPLAY: A NEW WAY TO DISPOSE OF THE DEAD. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 10: 603–627. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9655.2004.00204.x

As I recall, one of the most interesting insights to come from that article and the subsequent class discussion on the voyeuristic dimension of plastination was that, as the only American in a British classroom I was the only one to have ever seen a dead person; open-casket funerals are extremely rare  in Britain.  (I'd be interesting in reading this article by Linda Schulte-Sasse on the Americanization of Bodyworlds.) 

I'm not going to deny that human anatomy is  fascinating; you're talking to a girl who can easily spend an hour just thumbing through the pages of Emily's Color Atlas of Anatomy.  But I have never  and have no desire to EVER see the original Bodyworlds, probably owing in large part to a NAGPRA-induced wariness towards human remains of sketchy provenance. For more insight into the moral and ethical objections to the display of plastinated cadavers, check out stopbodyworlds.) 
 

via Animalfwd

But getting back to giraffes.

A visitor looks at a plastinated giraffe during an exibition

at the Neunkirchen Zoo in Neunkirchen near Saarbruecken

REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski

According to Von Hagens (as quoted on the exhibit's official site - Where I could REALLY do without the creepy blinking giraffe eyeballs):

The more the individual thinks about the fragility of his or her body, the more respectful he or she will become toward other people and animals. BODY WORLDS of ANIMALS makes a valuable contribution to animal welfare and to increased appreciation of endangered species.

I think that statement is something of what we like to call in English, "a stretch." (No pun intended. Ha ha ha.)

You know what REALLY makes people more respectful of animals? Living, breathing animals. As opposed to glorified taxidermy.

 

P.S. This is the shirt I'm wearing as I type this. Christmas present 

from Emily from, if you can believe it, Five Below.

P.P.S. Everything I ever wanted/needed to know about giraffes,

I learned from reading Tall Blondes: A Book About Giraffes by Lynn Sherr

Avant-Garde Egg Dyeing

Happy Easter!  Not surprisingly, Ali and I procrastinated egg dyeing until today.  After hard-boiling some eggs, with Pennsylvania's own Doc Hinkle's dye at the ready, we set to work.

Originally, we were going to try to paint our eggs in a theme, such as the "Royal Wedding," but we quickly realized that far surpassed our abilities.  Believe it or not, these eggs were NOT painted by 8-year-olds.

Battle wounds.

Knitting Lessons

I'm very picky when it comes to my greeting cards.  I don't like ugly graphics or wordy messages.  PAPYRUS usually have some nice but expensive cards.  Since I don't actually have a gift for my friend Julie, I felt I could splurge.  Mermaids + glitter + heart confetti = AWESOMESAUCE!

I suppose I do have a gift of sorts for her. :)  She has expressed an interest in learning how to knit, so I have offered my services, not that I'm an expert.  I know I don't hold my needles properly, but whatever, I don't hold my pencil properly either and I have neater handwriting than most people I know.  We'll see how it goes...

Also, aren't these fuzzy hedgehog and puffy mushroom stickers adorable??

Troll Happy

A few weeks ago, Ali and I got into an argument about how many trolls I owned as a child. Y'all remember trolls, right? They actually used to be vaguely cute, but in recent years have morphed into some creepy shit:

Also creepy are these Halloween costumes:

But I digress...Ali argued that I had at least 20 trolls and I, of course, denied this. Sure, sometimes I would sneak a troll into my backpack pocket as a security blanket during school (Oh, whatever, like you never did anything like that!), but it's not like I was forming a collection. Regrettably, I did have one of those troll baby dolls with bright pink hair. Ali, being the neat-freak organizer she is, knew exactly where my sad trolls were stashed, and AHA, I do not have 20! More like 15. :)

Hey, look,  it's Michelle Tanner!

Jets vs. Sharks

Dear Columbia House DVD club...

...I hate to be the bearer of bad news...oh wait, I'm not - Dave Kehr and the New York Times beat me to it. The headline says it all: Goodbye, DVD. Hello, Future.

The DVD isn’t dead yet, but it’s definitely looking a little peaked, at least in the eyes of the home-video industry. Sales continue to decline (volume is down about 40 percent from this time last year for the Top 20 titles, according to Home Media Magazine), the formerly ubiquitous neighborhood rental shops have all but vanished (Blockbuster, once the dominant franchise, has plunged into bankruptcy), and the major studios have drastically cut back on full-scale releases of library titles.

I for one, can't remember the last DVD I bought. (Granted, I can't remember many a thing of late.) My best guess is that it was my impulsive purchase of In Bruges at TJ Maxx many, many months ago. The last mainstream new release DVD for which I paid full price? Um... It was probably a Harry Potter film. Like, the FOURTH Harry Potter film. Redbox and Netflix Instant have almost completely supplanted my once insatiable need to buy movies.

"This particular chart shows the 10 countries with the
fastest internet in the world. It also shows that
they're not slowing down." Akami via Gizmodo

Still, I find it highly unlikely that the DVD will ever disappear entirely from the U.S. the way it has in South Korea, mainly because our Internet is not and may never be as affordably fast as in that country.

Why is South Korea the world leader in Internet speed, year after year and why is it so far ahead of the U.S.? As CNN reports, it is the result of an interrelated matrix of economic, cultural, political, demographic and technological factors. But if I had to sum it up in one word that word would be: competition. Healthy, thriving competition among Internet service providers. Which is to say South Korea (and most of the other countries leading the list) have it, and the U.S. doesn't. You mean competition benefits consumers? Who would have thunk it?

But getting back to DVDs, this evening I received an email addressed to "Former Music Club Member" containing the following:

Yeah... no thanks. If you're reaching out to former music club members who'd forgotten your existence is the act of desperation I'm thinking it might be... what with your being bankrupt in Canada and all...
Sucks to be you. If you didn't suck so hard, I'd almost feel sorry for you.

And you're right, I WOULD prefer NOT to receive future promotional emails.

Upstairs, Downstairs, etc.

I have fond (if very, very vague memories) of watching early episodes of the original Upstairs Downstairs when I got home from school - the most vivid being the episode in which Rose is force-fed (off camera thank goodness) while imprisoned as a suffragette.

That being said, my level of anticipation and excitement at the prospect of the updated series was inevitably mellowed by the awesomeness that is Downton Abbey. And the first episode did nothing to improve my excitement, as evidenced by a rather lackluster live tweet and my near failure at watching the second episode on air (Because I was rather meh about the whole thing and NOT, sadly, because I was watching Game of Thrones).

Oh I'm glad I did. I'm not going to delve too heavily into plot details (You can watch the full episode --and you should-- here until May 24. Thank you PBS). I just wanted to say...

---

Lady Persephone, played by Claire Foy, is my least favorite character who gets all the best clothes. And when I say "all the best clothes" (because it's not like her sister, played by Keeley Hawes, is lacking in jaw-droppingly gorgeous wardrobe) I mean, all the RED clothes.

via fromasinkingboat

via recyledmoviecostumes

via Beyond the Pale

Why does she get all the red? Well, I'm sure part of the reason is that Claire Foy looks utterly fabulous in red. As production designer Eve Stewart notes (discussing sets, but the same holds true for costumes I'm sure):

...sometimes you have to tweak the colours that you've chosen once you know who has been cast. The cast will all have different skin tones and ultimately it's our job is to help make them look good.

And the other reason? (Maybe.) What better way to visually represent your character's budding  fascist sympathies than to put her in a lot of red and black. I must say, it's a pretty visually stunning shot when Lady Persephone is en route to an Oswald Mosely speech; the screen cap doesn't do it justice.

via claire-foy.org

---

The title of this episode,"The Ladybird",  is derived from the German lullaby that new parlormaid Rachel teaches to Ivy. I'd never heard of it, though Ivy says "oh, we have that in English." Like I said, I'm not getting into plot, but the song is all symbolic and foreshadowing and whatnot, in a way that is the opposite of subtle. (Hint: The swastika kind of looks like a spider, doesn't it?)

The lyrics (German and English) follow (Translation copyright © by Emily Ezust,
from The Lied and Art Song Texts Page -- http://www.lieder.net/):

Marienwürmchen, setze dich auf meine Hand, Ich tu' dir nichts zuleide. Es soll dir nichts zuleid geschehn, Will nur deine bunten Flügel sehn, Bunte Flügel meine Freude. Marienwürmchen, fliege weg, Dein Häuschen brennt, die Kinder schrein So sehre, wie so sehre. Die böse Spinne spinnt sie ein, Marienwürmchen, flieg hinein, Deine Kinder schreien sehre. Marienwürmchen, fliege hin zu Nachbars Kind, Sie tun dir nichts zuleide. Es soll dir ja kein Leid geschehn, Sie wollen deine bunten Flügel sehn, Und grüß sie alle beide.

Ladybird, sit on my hand I will do you no harm. No harm shall come to you; I only wish to see your colorful wings: your colorful wings are my joy. Ladybird, fly away, your house is burning, your children are crying so much, so much. The evil spider is spinning her web around them; Ladybird, fly home, your children are crying so. Ladybird, fly to the neighbor's children, They will do you no harm. No harm will come to you: they only wish to see your colorful wings, and greet them both for me.

I mention it here because I liked the song; it's sad, German, and about a ladybug/ladybird. Seems like something I should know, right?  I spent the after hour of Sunday night's broadcast scouring the Internet and learned a couple of things.

1.  There are actually two versions of Marienwürmchen - one with a melody by Schumann and the other by Brahms. They seem to get confused a lot. Brahms is the one we're interested in.
2. It's well nigh impossible to find free sheet music to said tune. It's not like buying one digital copy of the sheet music is going to break the bank - it's more the principle of the thing, i.e. why is this one song of Brahms (who died in 1897) is NOT in public domain.

So, I guess I'll be listening to the song on repeat and learning it by ear. Thankfully, the Internet came through with this video of the Southern California Children's Chorus singing it. Enjoy.

Marina and the Diamonds - Mowgli's Road

Chauffeuring my friend Laura around town means she is subjected to my music selections, and this weekend I managed to suck her into the world of Marina and the Diamonds. Mwahahaha! Here's possibly my favorite song from her debut album. Weird, yes, but I love it!

All for one and one for suck?

I was excited when I randomly learned of the new Three Musketeers movie, even more when so when I saw the cast list. It stars, in no particular order:

Percy Jackson

Tristram

Titus Pullo

Col. Hans Landa

Mr. Darcy

Legolas

Joan of Arc

In other words, it SHOULD be awesome.

So why did I throw up in my mouth a little when I saw the trailer? Because, ooh la la, it's in 3-D.

(Roger Ebert can tell you why 3-D sucks better than I can).  And as far as I'm concerned, in 9/10 cases, 3-D is code for "awesomely bad." And even though I love my awesomely bad films, it's a letdown when I was hoping for awesomely good.

Speaking of awesomely (if cheesily) good... I will be the first to admit that I own this song. Not on cassette tape from 1993 (I wish), no, I bought it off iTunes in 2008.