It's interesting to me

[673f238ee3676Kolya]

http://www.givingbacktothefuture.com/

Originally Eric Stoltz (Some kind of wonderful) was cast as Marty McFly in Back to the Future. After 4 weeks of filming he was replaced by Michael J. Fox who had been the first choice for the role but initially was tied with another project (the series "Family Ties"). Along with Eric Stoltz Melora Hardin was replaced by Claudia Wells, because Hardin was considered too tall to play Fox’s love interest.
Producer Bob Gale said that conversation with Hardin was “the hardest thing I ever had to do, I was sick about it for days.”
Righting that wrong(?) David Guy Levy created a comic that imagines the producers going back in time to prevent Stoltz from ever getting replaced...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_7izQQQiSM

[673f238ee39c4Kolya]

The ancient Greeks had no specific word for Blue.
In fact their whole color perception must have been very different than ours. Not for biological reasons but because of how language influences our perception and minds. This excellent article by Erin Hoffman on Clarkesworld goes far beyond this curiosity and makes enlightening points about the relations of such diverse phenomena as synesthesia, metaphors, onomatopoeia and our perception of the world.

To a certain extent, we are all synesthetes, and [...] this inherent interconnection between our cognitive functions is intrinsic to the most beloved traits of humanity: compassion, creativity, ingenuity. What, after all, is an idea, but one flash of thought leaping across the mind to suggest novel possibility?

http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/hoffman_01_13/

[673f238ee3af8AP]

So... is anyone free to leave their interesting facts here? (within reason of course)

[673f238ee3bd3The Many]

 Obviously

[673f238ee3d01xdiesp]

I think it's debatable, that the greeks had no word for blue: they were people of the sea, weren't color blind and also generally smarter than us. It is true that in the Iliad, the sea is always livind or as wine; but an epic poem isn't a good place to hunt for the mundane. We have lost so much information about the ancient times (think of Pompei: every new building introduces amazing discoveries about roman life), down to literature which was routinely selected and purged, that I would sooner believe in our ignorance than in the greek being so otherwordly bizarre.

[673f238ee3ec3AP]

Alright, here's something interesting that's more related to television.

I don't know if anyone's a fan of Star Trek Voyager, but the original Captain of the ship wasn't played by the actress Kate Mulgrew. The Producers went with their first choice which was a woman named Genevieve Bujold, a French Canadian actress who's biggest role was in "Anne of the Thousand Days" in 1969, which won her a Golden Globe as well as an Academy Award nomination. Allegedly, Bujold left after only a day of working on the set, since she wasn't used to the hectic 16 hour work days and fast paced schedule that comes with shooting for television. Even though she was only on the set for a short period of time, some footage has made it onto the internet that shows her acting. Not the greatest, if you ask me


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SIZcDWKyw0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genevi%C3%A8ve_Bujold

[673f238ee3fe0xdiesp]

AP: very interesting, I always assumed that the tall and manjawed Kate Mulgrew was a first choice. But she definitely had a better haircut than the first Janeway! I'm a trekkie myself, used to skip catechism to watch the newest TNG.

[673f238ee414bKolya]

A few years back we had that discussion here about the nature of humour, which that line by Erin Hoffmann reminded me of ("a flash of thought leaping across the mind"). ZB came up with the best definition of humour I've heard before or after.

[673f238ee42a6voodoo47]

yeah, we should consider sharing that with wikipedia.

[673f238ee4693xdiesp]

A few years back we had that discussion here about the nature of humour, which that line by Erin Hoffmann reminded me of ("a flash of thought leaping across the mind"). ZB came up with the best definition of humour I've heard before or after.

Speaking of words shaping the world, isn't there a more meaningful word for "animal sound" or "animal noise"? The vers, the syllabe (in our understanding, at least) that each species use to build their various calls and communications. Because I read in the past, in poems, about laughing being either the vers of angels or humans. My personal addition to that, is that crying and laughing use different rythm and tone for the same vers.

[673f238ee4803Kolya]

At Feng Zhu Design course: Term 3, Digital Paintings students had to do a few production paintings based from short paragraphs taken from popular books.

[673f238ee4a3aAP]

Here's an interesting article I read a couple days ago about Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. My dad and I are going to drive from Denver to Portland later this summer, so I was reading up on places I'd like to visit when I read about this.

http://www.wnd.com/2014/07/prediction-23-of-u-s-could-be-devastated/

In a Nutshell:
Yellowstone lies on top of a giant underground volcano that has become increasingly active within the last couple of decades. If it erupts some seriously bad shit would happen to the world. This paragraph from the article sums it up pretty well

While most scientists believe the probability of a major eruption is very small, there are signs that have some analysts worried, and most agree the volcano holds catastrophic potential.  It could blast 240 cubic miles of ash, rocks and lava into the atmosphere, rendering about two-thirds of the nation immediately uninhabitable, according to some estimates, and plunge the world into a “nuclear winter.”

This picture shows where a lot of the ash would end up falling, but this kind of incident would impact the entire world.

Image: http://www.wnd.com/files/2014/07/KillZone1.jpg

Kind of scary, if you ask me

[673f238ee4ba8voodoo47]

yeah, but not really, as you can't do anything about it. also, I think it blows up pretty periodically, and guess what, the last eruption is a couple of thousands years late.

if you are into this kind of stuff, you should read about things that lurk in outer space - things that can toast us, crush us, vaporize us in seconds, and we won't even see it coming. one example off the bat is the closest neutron star if I remember correctly - any tiny crack on it's surface means a radiation blast that will cook us to crisp and turn this planet into a scorched boulder. ask me, I'd take the nuclear winter any day.

also, this.

[673f238ee4d20Kolya]

Fruit bats have gotten a bad rap in Ghana lately because they're made responsible for spreading Ebola. However this is going to change with help of two musicians from Ghana who recorded a rap song highlighting the ecological significance of fruit bats. You can listen to a part of that song here at 12:10. (Does anyone know where to find the full track?) They're not the first ones to tackle the subject. My Little Pony covered fruit bats in a surprisingly sophisticated manner before.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PL4Ilhr49tY

[673f238ee4e15xdiesp]

Why contain it? Don't you want ebola-chan spreading in your country?

[673f238ee4f0dKolya]

If you are aware and well informed about the risks you can contain Ebola without sending fruit bats to extinction. It's not like they attack humans by themselves. As their name suggests they are frugivores.

[673f238ee5155Kolya]

I have taken it upon me to correct the subtitles for the 1982 Italian film "La ragazza di Trieste" (The girl from Triest). The only available subtitles online are quite sketchy and my DVD has none at all. My enterprise is not made easier by the fact that I don't actually speak Italian. I merely have some basic understanding, partly through Latin. Apart from the existing subtitles (which I'm about to correct), I have a German dub (which is atrocious in it's own way) and the google translator at hand. I don't see what could possiby go wrong. 
After translating the first 10 minutes beach scene which had a lot of very obvious mistakes (eg "Ciao!" does not mean "Hi!" when someone's leaving) I came to a scene that really convinced me to keep at it: In this scene the aging comic artist Dino talks with the girl he picked up on the beach (Nicole). In the original subtitles he states the nature of the woman he is drawing in broken English: "Provocative, but not Knowledge."
To which Nicole replies "Like me?"
He: "I said without Knowledge."
At first I ssumed that Dino holds Nicole for a stupid little girl. But once I figured out the original Italian speech and re-translated it, what's actually being said is this:
"Provocative, without knowing it."
"Like me?"
"I said without knowing it."
Instead of calling her stupid this is a rather clever little logic trick! Awesome.
I might eventually have to ask for your help, xdiesp, to check my translation as a native speaker.
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[673f238ee531bfox]

Image: http://www.oaklandzoo.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/kumbas-special-moment.jpg

[673f238ee582dxdiesp]

I might eventually have to ask for your help, xdiesp, to check my translation as a native speaker.

"Ciao" is our informal "yo" between friends and family, that can work both as "hi" and "bye". Its original meaning is "servant" from venetian dialect, as in "at your service". If you have problems, send me the italian subs file if you have it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMyr1pGTHqM
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[673f238ee5946Kolya]

Haha, yes this was certainly the first time I saw Muti. Great film. I don't have Italian subs but I'll look into it. It would also make it much easier for myself to re-translate.

[673f238ee5da3Kolya]

A drowning man will clutch at a straw. And I imagine that it must have been with that desperate sentiment with which Mark Zuckerberg sat down and composed this text-only mail to me today. And he was so saddened by this loss that he even forgot it was text-only.

Hi Kolya,<BR><BR>We have received a request to permanently delete your account.
Your account has been deactivated from the site and will be permanently deleted
within 14 days. <BR><BR>If you did not request to permanently delete your
account, please login to Facebook to cancel this
request:<BR><BR>https://www.facebook.com/login.php<BR><BR><BR>Thanks,<BR>The
Facebook Team

Yeah, right. But I won't budge!<BR>Not this time. I am determined to end my Facebook existence which never really took off, partly because my friends are a pile of conformist airheads who brought me there through subtle peer pressure (Oh! I thought I'd invited you!? Didn't you get the invite? On Facebook!)  No, actually I only created that account so I could access the Facebook chat API through a setup that is too awesome and too difficult to explain here, I'll just say that it includes Bitlbee. And actually that's it. But anyway. Mark Zuckerberg, I drink your tears!
Okay.
I have fallen victim to another addiction that is much more fun and kinda old school, at least it feels old school, because I am listening to the radioooioioiouuuuiiiehscrrrrrrrtch. Well really I'm listening to podcasts, but that's just a fancy way to hear my favourite radio show right now which is Sanft & Sorgfältig with Olli Schulz and Jan Böhmermann! *recordscratch* Yes, these guys save my day now every day. And they might save yours as well, if you understand. Thanks for reading!

[673f238ee5f5bKolya]

Since I'm knee deep in this 60s Italian vibe (I think it's a sort of overcompensated winter depression that I'm going through) here's a video by Claudia Mori who is the wife of that grapes stomping dude above in real life. But in this song she is the other woman who calls her lover (Franco Morgan) at home, while he pretends for his wife that he's talking to a doctor.
She asks when he can come to her, if his wife is near, if he loves her and she speaks about how she can't sleep and that she's wearing the perfume that he bought for her. You know, all those sweet nothings. He answers her while still trying to keep up the façade of an official telephone call (which is just a bit funny). In the end she allusively threatens to commit suicide ("I might even die") on which he finally agrees to come by. It's really dramatic stuff. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmod3ybPy0I

[673f238ee60a4fox]

You can also find the recorded Sanft & Sorgfältig-streams on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXSDf1glyNsSfS2kIWiUkxQ

I really like them too but I don't think they are of much interest to anybody outside of Germany. It's local humor for local people.

[673f238ee6214xdiesp]

More memories.
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