|k| clippings: 2015-11-17 — of mice and milk & honey

WORK

“A wall covered in spines, shelved from floor to ceiling, recognises the correspondence between bricks and books. It is the point at which knowledge becomes embedded in structure and the appearance is of books holding up the ceiling. The implication is that enlightenment, the journey towards the sky or the sublime is available within these pages. It is a metaphor made clearer by the special pieces of furniture, the chairs and stools which ingeniously convert to become ladders or in the sliding steps which glide along the floor scanning the shelves. And just as bricks humanise the scale of even a vast wall by introducing an element of human scale—a solid unit designed to fit perfectly into the hand, so books define the space and give scale to even the largest the wall. They are endlessly reproduced and faked in a game of trompe l’oeil in which their symbolic role alone is invoked. There are bookish wallpapers, there are rows of fake books spines, there are hidden jib doors hidden amongst the bookshelves which open, just as do books themselves to reveal another world and there are dealers who specialise in slightly-worn, leather-spined books by the yard, not for reading but for recreating a country house effect, the impression of history and wisdom. Already in the 1st Century AD Seneca swore by a small library, for knowledge rather than vanity, not ‘endless bookshelves for the ignorant to decorate their dining rooms.’”

—Edwin Heathcote
—from “Books”

WORD(S)

enow /i-NOW/. adjective or adverb. Enough. In archaic usage, a plural for enough. In Scottish dialect: a moment ago, just now or presently. From Old English genog (enough).

“There are enow of zealots on both sides.” (David Hume)

“His mere looks threw darts enow t’impress Their pow’rs with trembling.” (Homer, translated by George Chapman)

“Away, Away, John Carrion Crow,
Your Master hath enow
Down in his Barley Mow.”
(Thomas Bewick, from The History of Little King Pippin With an Account of the Melancholy Death of Four Naughty Boys, Who were Devoured by Wild Beasts. And the Wonderful Delivery of Master Harry Harmless, by a Little White Horse.)

“I like thy spirit, I do in truth; but I do not admire thy judgment. Bone-rackings and bastings be plenty enow in this life, without going out of one’s way to invite them.” (Mark Twain)

WEB

1. “English is not normal: No, English isn’t uniquely vibrant or mighty or adaptable. But it really is weirder than pretty much every other language”

2. Songs in the Key of Zzz: The History of Sleep Music

3. Lightweight but interesting nonetheless…I think I need to do a lot of personal investigation. » What Are the Defining Ingredients of a Culture’s Cuisine?

4. I’ve gone all descriptivist but I can still laugh at the funnies by would-be grammar czars and punctuation police » 20+ Gifts For Friends Who Work For The Grammar Police

5. Today in 1970, engineer and inventor Douglas Engelbart is granted a patent for an “X-Y Position Indicator for a Display System” or, as we all know and love/hate it, the computer mouse (see some pictures of the first mouse). Though Engelbart developed his idea independently, there were in fact both earlier versions of a mouse and a trackball, but both of these were part of secret military projects and thus not made public or patented. Engelbart’s invention was also referred to as “the bug,” but the mouse moniker became popular because the cord was thought to resemble a rodent’s tail. The 1981 Xerox Star workstation, officially called the Xerox 8010 was the first commercial workstation to ship with a mouse (and a graphical interface featuring folders, icons and many other now-standard features as well).

WATCH/WITNESS

“In 2001, Artist Ha Schult Wrapped a Former Berlin Post Office in Thousands of Oversized Love Letters Collected From the Public”.

REPRISES/RESPONSES/REJOINDERS/RIPOSTES

• Reader C. on a funny find: “Re: The Onion for nerds – Here’s The Onion for designers.”

• Reader M. on the insanity: “The Box of Crazy is what really introduced me to Reddit…How I wish I had never seen the Crazy.”

• Another Reader M.: “I love your newsletter so much.” — A real lifeline coming from this particular reader.

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