Zeus

This is an absolutely phenomenal bike photo, and I haven’t got the faintest who it’s by. (My front page displays photos from a Flickr feed using a WP plugin. Until now I thought I preferred the sheep.)

Franco in English

Apparently this is the dictator doing a Kurt Schwitters parody: Unfortunately there’s no sound on this machine – Pyrenean Telecentro. (Thankyou Shanghai L)

What on earth is velutina impalpable, II?

OK, it was a mixture of bismuth powder with small quantities of vaseline, but what was it meant to do (late C19th) and what was its English name? (Lots of products at the end of the C19th were made by mixing powders with petroleum jelly (eg coal dust to make mascara). It might be unsafe…

Good video site

I’m looking at setting up a pornohop group and found http://www.milkandcookies.com while looking for an MP3 of that classic, I wanna fuck you in the ass. Unfortunately the link doesn’t work. I originally had the song on a compilation of filthy hiphop given to me by some grubby French person, which may have been purged…

Truffle kerfuffle

From Ibn ‘AbdÅ«n’s rulebook for Seville market, translated by Bernard Lewis: “Truffles should not be sold around the mosque, for this is a delicacy of the dissolute.” (Medieval Iberia: Readings from Christian, Muslim, and Jewish Sources, ed Olivia R Constable) There’s no reason to believe this ties in with the prohibition on the use of…

Spanish translation out-sourcing

I’ve long shared Mr Davies’ view that translation budgets here are viewed principally as a means of financing feckless relatives and acquaintances.

Happy rain

Early one morning, just as the gays were yawning, I met R walking down a boulevard in some fairly heavy rain with a big smile on his face. R is a literary man who speaks Hamburg German and either Tennessee or Missouri English–we’re not out on this one–and whose career has not progressed as it…