Chris and Jed, “Only Fades Away” (Cause Co-Motion cover)
The Outfits of the Open
Rafael Nadal wore tone-on-tone Nike blues, which the Twitterati labeled alternatively Smurflike and Cookie Monsterish.
Edited by Vivian Sky Rehberg and Marnie Slater
This new volume brings together a selection of Jan Verwoert’s most recent writings. COOKIE! is a sequel to Verwoert’s Tell Me What You Want, What You Really, Really Want (edited by Vanessa Ohlraun, 2010), and third in a series of books published with the Piet Zwart Institute.
Smog meringues
… we spent Thursday afternoon mixing different chemical precursors, and then “baking” [meringues] under UV light to form a London peasouper, a 1950s Los Angeles photochemical smog, and a present-day air-quality event in Atlanta.
We chose these three places and times to showcase three of the classic “types” that atmospheric scientists use to characterize smogs: 1950s London was a sulfur- and particulate-heavy fog, whereas 1950s Los Angeles was a photochemical smog created by the reactions between sunlight, NOx, and partially combusted hydrocarbons. Present-day Beijing often experiences London-style atmospheric conditions, whereas Mexico City’s smog is in the Angeleno style.
Each city’s different precursor emissions and weather conditions produce a different kind of smog, with distinct chemical characteristics—and a unique flavour.
As it turns out, Arie Haagen-Smit, the man known as the “father” of air pollution science, was originally a flavour chemist who rose to prominence thanks to his work on pineapples. Nadia Berenstein, the flavour historian I interviewed for a recent episode of Gastropod, pointed me to a speech Haagen-Smit gave in the 1950s, explaining his shift in research from fruit flavours to smog science to a room full of his former colleagues. In it, he explains, “I am engaged at the present time on a super flavor problem—the flavor of Los Angeles.”
Lüscher Color Test
These four colors—blue, yellow, red, and green—“are ‘psychological primaries’ and constitute what are called the four ‘basic colors’ of the test. In the Eight-color Panel of the Quick Test there are… four more. These ‘auxiliary colors’ are: violet, which is a mixture of red and blue; brown, which is a mixture of yellow-red and black; a neutral gray, containing no color at all and therefore free from any affective influence, while its intensity places it halfway between light and dark so that it gives rise to no anabolic nor catabolic effect—it is psychologically and physiologically neutral; and finally, black, which is a denial of color altogether” (Max Lüscher’s Quick Color Test, 1969 p. 19).
“In the Lüscher Color Test, the ‘structure’ of a color is constant; it is defined as the ‘objective meaning’ of that color and remains the same for everyone—dark-blue, for instance, means ‘peace and quiet’ regardless of whether one likes or dislikes it. The ‘function,’ on the other hand, is the ‘subjective attitude towards the color’ and it is this which varies from person to person, and it is the ‘function’ on which the test interpretations are based. One person may like a particular color, another may find the same color boring, a third may be indifferent to it, while a fourth may find it definitely distasteful.
“In the test the person being tested (or testing himself) selects the colors in descending order of preference; the color he likes best and places in the first position is thus the one for which he has the greatest sympathy; that which he chooses last and places in the eighth position is the one for which he has the greatest antipathy (or least sympathy). By observing where in the row a color occurs, we can determine what ‘function’ the particular color represents, since the subjective attitude towards the various colors varies from greatest to least sympathy” (p20).
“Bearing in mind that it is necessary to group color selections correctly [as described in the book]… the following attitudes or ‘functions’ can be generally established… [The 1st position] represents a ‘turning towards’… [and] shows the essential method, the modus operandi, of the person choosing it, the means by which he turns to or adopts to enable him to achieve his objective. For example, with dark-blue in this position the modus operandi would be ‘calmness’… [The 2nd position] shows what the objective actually is. With dark-blue in this position, for instance, the goal for which he is striving is ‘peace and quiet’… [The 3rd & 4th positions] show the ‘actual state of affairs,’ the situation in which he actually feels himself to be, or the manner in which his existing circumstances require him to act. Dark-blue in these positions would show that he feels he is in a peaceful situation or in one in which it necessary for him to act calmly… [The 5th & 6th positions] show that [the colors’] special qualities are neither being rejected, nor are they especially appropriate to the existing state of affairs, but are being held in reserve… Dark-blue in one of these positions shows that ‘peace’ has been suspended… [The 7th & 8th positions] represent a ‘turning away from.’ Colors which are rejected as unsympathetic represent a particular need which there is some special reason for inhibiting, since not to do so would be disadvantageous… With dark-blue in one of these positions, for example, the need for peace has to remain unsatisfied because—due to unfavorable circumstances—every relaxation, every surrender, every attempt to bring about closer more harmonious relationships would have unsatisfactory consequences” (p21-22).
Lüscher’s text further explains the choice and meaning of the eight colors of the test and the structural meanings of their pairwise combinations, and gives interpretation tables for all functional groupings of the colors in all possible positions, describing their associated anxieties, compensations, conflicts, and prognoses.
Velvet gentleman
In early 1893, Satie started a relationship with the painter and former trapeze artist Suzanne Valadon. She kept two cats to whom she fed caviar on Fridays and described as ‘good Catholics’, as well as a goat, who ate any art she wasn’t pleased with. Satie recognised a kindred spirit and the two fell in love. He nicknamed her ‘Biqui’ and wrote a jarring, utterly unromantic, four-bar piece for her called Bonjour, Biqui, Bonjour!: three diminished chords to be played ‘very slowly’. Their relationship fell apart after six months, leaving Satie devastated. He wrote to his brother: ‘I shall have great difficulty in regaining possession of myself … She was able to take all of me.’ Another composer might have poured his feelings into a tempestuous storm of a piece; Satie wrote the infuriating Vexations, a short, creepy-sounding motif which was intended to be repeated a mind-numbing 840 times. The piece wasn’t performed in full until 1963, when John Cage managed it with a relay team of 11 pianists: it took 18 and a half hours. The relationship with Valadon was, as far as we know, the last sexual relationship Satie had.
His despondency slowed down his rate of production. For at least two years, his friend Augustin Grass-Mick recalled, he ‘did absolutely nothing at all’. He came into some money in 1895, and immediately blew almost all of it on seven identical chestnut-coloured corduroy suits with matching hats, acquiring the nickname of ‘velvet gentleman’ from his friends. A couple of months later he was broke again. In 1897 he managed to finish a piece, the sixth Gnossienne (from gnostic? Knossos?), a series of piano pieces he’d started in 1889. It’s perhaps the most alien of the set, jerky and not exactly atonal, but of unstable tonality – one bar in one key, the next in another. But it wasn’t until he cleared out of his garret in 1898 and moved to the suburb of Arcueil-Cachan that he began to feel himself again. Walking seems to have helped. Every day he walked the ten kilometres from Arcueil to Paris, setting off in the morning with his umbrella tucked under his arm, and staggering back in the small hours. According to another friend, George Auriol, he carried a hammer in his pocket for protection as he crossed the bandit-ridden stretch between Glacière and La Santé. Friends would sometimes accompany him and Satie would entertain them with his knowledge of Parisian history. Pierre-Daniel Templier, his first biographer, painted a charming picture of Satie on the move: ‘When talking he would stop, bend one knee a little, adjust his pince-nez and place his fist on his hip. Then he would take off once more with small, deliberate steps.’
Big Mac
The Big Mac was created by Jim Delligatti, an early Ray Kroc franchisee, who was operating several restaurants in the Pittsburgh area. It was invented in the kitchen of Delligatti’s first McDonald’s franchise, located on McKnight Road in suburban Ross Township.[1] The Big Mac had two previous names, both of which failed in the marketplace: the Aristocrat, which consumers found difficult to pronounce and understand, and Blue Ribbon Burger. The third name, Big Mac, was created by Esther Glickstein Rose, a 21-year-old advertising secretary who worked at McDonald’s corporate headquarters in Oak Brook, Illinois.[2] The Big Mac debuted at Delligatti’s Uniontown, Pennsylvania restaurant in 1967, selling for 45 cents.[3] It was designed to compete with Big Boy restaurants’ Big Boy sandwich; Eat’n Park was the Pittsburgh area’s Big Boy franchisee at the time.[4] The Big Mac proved popular, and it was added to the menu of all U.S. restaurants in 1968.[3]
The Big Mac consists of two 1.6 oz (45.4 g) 100 per cent beef patties, American cheese, “special sauce” (a variant of Thousand Island dressing), iceberg lettuce, pickles, and onions, served in a three-part sesame seed bun.[5]
The Big Mac is known worldwide and is often used as a symbol of American capitalism. The Economist has used it as a reference point for comparing the cost of living in different countries – the Big Mac Index — as it is so widely available and is comparable across markets. This index is sometimes referred to as Burgernomics.[6]
Special sauce
The name was popularized by a 1974 advertising campaign featuring a list of the ingredients in a Big Mac: “Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions – on a sesame seed bun.”
Big Mac Sauce is delivered to McDonald’s restaurants in sealed canisters designed by Sealright, from which it is meant to be directly dispensed using a special calibrated “sauce gun” that dispenses a specified amount of the sauce for each pull of the trigger.[7] Its design is similar to a caulking gun.
In 2012, McDonald’s admitted that “the special sauce ingredients were not really a secret” because the recipe had been available online “for years”.[8] It consists of store-bought mayonnaise, sweet pickle relish and yellow mustard whisked together with vinegar, garlic powder, onion powder and paprika.[8]
Ply Magazine
There’s a lifetime of spinning in Leicester. Our Spring 2015 issue focuses on the 3 main Leicester wools: Bluefaced, Border, and Longwool. Brimming with history, fiber studies, breed comparisons, spinning techniques, finishing tactics, and some fabulous projects, this issue will leave you satisfied and eager to sit and spin. If you want to tailspin a yarn that looks like it’s still on the sheep or spin some Longwool for weaving, we’ve got you covered. If you’ve wondered how the 3 breeds stack up next to each other or how to finish this amazing fiber, this issue can help. If you’d like to spin Leicester for softness or to know if you should use BFL or Merino, you’ll find help on our pages. Also, a “who’s that spinner?” that should be called “who’s that shepherd?” and a closer look at our 3 fibers under a scope. Of course Lazy Kate is there to make you laugh and Ergo Neo will help keep you pain -free.
