“I played over the music of that scoundrel Brahms. What a giftless bastard! It annoys me that this self-inflated mediocrity is hailed as a genius. Why, in comparison with him, Raff is a giant, not to speak of Rubinstein, who is after all a live and important human being, while Brahms is chaotic and absolutely empty dried-up stuff.” — Tchaikovsky’s diary, Oct. 9, 1886
gongoozler
n. an idler who stares at activity on a canal
In June 1994, shortly after Pink Floyd released the album The Division Bell, someone calling himself Publius posted two messages to the newsgroup alt.music.pink-floyd:
When readers asked for proof of his authenticity, Publius wrote, “Monday, July 18, East Rutherford, New Jersey. Approximately 10:30pm. Flashing white lights. There is an enigma.” Sure enough, at the appointed time during a Floyd concert the words ENIGMA PUBLIUS appeared in white lights at the front of the stage.
Unfortunately, the clues then dwindled, no explanation was given, and no winner was ever announced. Rumors about the enigma have appeared ever since in fan circles and semi-cryptically from the band’s organization, but no one really knows what the enigma is. “It is important to note that neither I nor anyone involved with this zine will enter into any correspondence on this topic,” wrote Jeff Jensen, editor of the band’s fan magazine, in issue 34. “It’s a puzzle for you, devised by the one who loves you enough to drive you mad.”
New Hampshire’s Mount Washington looks placid from a distance, but don’t climb too high: The summit is blasted by hurricane-force winds 110 days a year (the weather station is literally chained to the mountain) and the wind chill reached minus 103°F in 2004.
In 356 B.C., Herostratus set fire to the Temple of Artemis.
He said he did it to immortalize his name in history.
He succeeded.
John Metcalf, a native of the neighbourhood of Manchester, … became blind at so early an age as to be altogether unconscious of light, and its various effects. His employment in the younger period of his life was that of a waggoner, and occasionally as a guide in intricate roads during the night, or when the common tracks were covered with snow. Afterwards he became a projector and surveyor of highways in difficult and mountainous parts; and, in this capacity, with the assistance merely of a long staff, he traverses the roads, ascends precipices, explores valleys, and investigates their several extents, forms, and situations, so as to answer his purpose in the best manner.
— John Platts, Encyclopedia of Natural and Artificial Wonders and Curiosities, 1876
How many letters are in ACE KING QUEEN JACK TEN NINE EIGHT SEVEN SIX FIVE FOUR THREE TWO?
Fifty-two.
(This also works in Spanish.)
Will Rogers allegedly said, “When the Okies left Oklahoma and moved to California, they raised the average intelligence level in both states.”
He was joking, but the effect is possible in principle. Consider two sets:
A = {1, 2, 3, 4}
B = {5, 6, 7, 8, 9}
If we move 5 to set A, the mean of both sets increases.
This produces a somewhat paradoxical effect when doctors find a better way to detect illness. Relatively healthy people are moved from the “well” category to the “ill” category, and the average health of both populations improves even before treatment takes place.
According to legend, pearl-hunting Spaniards sailed up the Gulf of California in 1610 and became grounded in a vanishing inland sea, leaving a ship full of treasure in the California desert. Reports are curiously specific:
In 1949 the Los Angeles Times reported that three UCLA students set out with 1910 Imperial Irrigation District maps and a story from a Cahuilla Indian who said he’d seen a “serpent-necked” canoe near the Salton Sea in 1917. The Times doesn’t report the result — but if you found a fortune in pearls, you wouldn’t tell a newspaper, would you?
Behold the arms of Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, GCSI, PC (1823–1889).
Plutarch wrote, “He who reflects on another man’s want of breeding shows he wants it as much himself.”
