Newsletter Leaf Journal CLXVI 〜 Christmas Eve Eve 〜
The penultimate Newsletter Leaf Journal of 2023 features links to our six newest articles, 21 links from around the web, links from our archive and our most-read articles of the week, and news and notes from the week that was including a few new posted Christmas-season music recordings.
Welcome to the 166th edition of The Newsletter Leaf Journal, the official newsletter of the perennially virid online writing magazine, The New Leaf Journal. This newsletter comes to you as always from the waterproof keyboard of the editor of The New Leaf Journal, Nicholas A. Ferrell. Today's Christmas Eve Eve newsletter comes with six new articles, more links from our new around the web backlog, and other news and notes.
Leaves from the week that was
I was busy on Thursday and Friday after a brief publishing drought...
A Boat Named "S-cape"
N.A. Ferrell. December 17, 2023.
Despite being entirely spoiled by the headline, this article strangely had one of the better debut weeks of any 2023 article.
Make it Christmas With a Santa Hat
N.A. Ferrell. December 21, 2023.
Justin of our Justin and Justina dialogue duo has a theory, supported by evidence in the form of photographs, for how to make just about anything Christmas.
Dynamic Inflatable Chimney Santa
N.A. Ferrell. December 21, 2023.
This is one of the more exciting inflatables covered in the pages of The New Leaf Journal.
Moonshine - Visual Novel Review
N.A. Ferrell. December 22, 2023.
Reviewing one of the better-known visual novels to come out of the mid-2000s al|together translation project while nearing the end of my review project...
My Black Cat – Visual Novel Review
N.A. Ferrell. December 22, 2023.
The last of what ended up being 29 full-length reviews of al|together visual novels. I will note that the player sees the world through the eyes of a talking pet cat in this one.
Snowman Christmas Countdown Clock
N.A. Ferrell. December 22, 2023.
Seldom have we seen such a useful outdoor holiday decoration.
Leaves from around the web
Let's check in around the world wide web...
Real Christmas trees
President bans Christmas tree from White House!
James Lewis for Forest History Society. December 1, 2019.
Correcting the record on former President Theodore Roosevelt.
The ‘Christmas Tree Boat’ Shipwreck That Devastated 1912 Chicagoans
Jonathan Feakins for Atlas Obscura. December 13, 2023.
The true story behind an incident highlighted by many sunken Christmas trees.
Artificial Christmas trees
Toilet Brushes Are Partly to Thank for Artificial Christmas Trees
Kathy Adams for Atlas Obscura. December 19, 2023.
You can guess the connection.
103-Year-Old Artificial Christmas Tree Sells for Over $4,000
Antonia Mufarech for Smithsonian Magazine. December 19, 2023.
Sounds high but don't doubt contemporary artificial Christmas tree inflation.
DIY
The Laptop Every British Kid Would Have Wanted For Christmas 1983
Jenny List for Hackaday. December 17, 2023.
You can make one like it is 1983.
20 best Christmas decorations to sew - Gathered
Sarah Orme for Gathered. October 11, 2021.
I would offer recommendations but (unsurprisingly) I cannot make any of these.
Let's party!
Happy 4th Birthday to the U.S. Space Force!
James M. Lindsay for Council on Foreign Relations. December 20, 2023.
I hope the Space Force guardians got something better to celebrate than one of those vacuum sealed space cakes.
Paris’s Wild Costume Balls
Livia Gershon for JSTOR Daily. December 9, 2023.
"But, by the mid-1860s, the era was over. Slum areas were demolished, and working-class Parisians largely moved out of the center city. Balls returned to being elite affairs, and elegant evening wear replaced exuberant costumes."
Time for lunch (or not)
My oh maitake! Japan’s oldest hamburger chain’s new mushroom burger is like eating a forest
Casey Baseel for SoraNews24. December 20, 2023.
This good looking burger would be at least 5X as expensive in New York City.
Rich or Poor, Uzbeks Eat Plov
Devorah Lev-Tov for Smithsonian Magazine. December 20, 2023.
I'm not an expert on Uzbek cuisine but this does look good.
Migrants reject ‘bad’ sandwiches, pancakes, donuts and chicken dishes at NYC shelters
Jack Morphet, Nolan Hicks, and Emily Crane for the New York Post. December 15, 2023.
No tax-paying New York City residents (i.e., the ones paying for all this free food to go into the trash) were reached for comment.
Time for dessert
What Is Gingerbread? The Answer Is Complicated
Anne Ewbank for Atlas Obscura. December 18, 2023.
It doesn't always involve ginger, apparently.
Nama Donuts 生ドーナツ
Namiko Hirasawa Chen for Just One Cookbook. December 15, 2023.
Those do look good but not good enough to make me get into home deep frying.
Remembering past persecution
Catholicism and martyrdom in Japan: Church marks 400 years since Edo massacre
Jonah McKeown for Catholic News Agency. December 17, 2023.
We are also 150 years removed from Japan ending its persecution of Catholics and lifting its ban on Christianity.
Pretty colors
Tyrian purple: The lost ancient pigment that was more valuable than gold Zaria Gorvett for BBC. November 24, 2023.
Let's go with synthetic methods of manufacture if we bring this back at scale.
A Still Life by Dutch Master Clara Peeters, Unseen for a Century, Heads to Auction
Brian Boucher for Artnet News. November 27, 2023.
Very flowery.
Let's check in on the wonders of "AI"
NYC councilwoman-elect Susan Zhuang admits to quietly using AI to communicate with the public, answer media questions
Rich Calder for the New York Post. December 16, 2023.
An example of "your explanation is making it worse."
Hallucinating Josh Blackman
Josh Blackman at Volkoh Conspiracy. December 15, 2023.
If you're going to use an AI tool that makes up citations for your law paper, ask it to look up dead scholars who are not amenable to being contacted by your grading professor via email.
This week in libertarianism
Make Thailand’s Golden Thread Dessert
Andrew Coletti for Atlas Obscura. December 8, 2023.
Or not. Only if you want to. Certainly not because Atlas Obscura or any other entitity ordered you to.
Like Dogs, Some Cats Will Play Fetch—but Mostly on Their Own Terms
Sarah Kuta for Smithsonian Magazine. December 18, 2023.
The libertarians of house pets.
Ending with a song
The Surprising Origins of Popular Christmas Songs
Olivia E. Waxman for Time Magazine. December 19, 2023.
Whether these are surprising depends on you -- but the article comes as advertised.
The Old Leaf Journal
I wonder what The Old Leaf Journal theme will be this week...
Lizzie Deas’ “The Christmas Rose”
N.A. Ferrell. December 20, 2021.
Re-printing a classic Christmas short story (my PDF version is included).
Justin & Justina 〜 A Christmas Present Struggle
N.A. Ferrell. December 24, 2020.
For those of you struggling with last minute Christmas present decisions.
Plain Song Christmas Special – VN Review
N.A. Ferrell. December 23, 2022.
A humorous parody of another freeware visual novel, Plain Song. The two make a for a fun way to spend an evening this Christmas weekend (or after -- depending on when you read this).
“Christmas at the Door” – A Children’s Poem by Margaret E. Sangster
N.A. Ferrell. December 22, 2021.
If you need a Christmas poem and already used Night Before Christmas...
An Inquiry Into the Nature of Santa Claus
N.A. Ferrell. December 23, 2020.
Just who is this Santa Claus character?
Constantine and the Last Vespers at Hagia Sophia
N.A. Ferrell. July 14, 2020.
Accounts of the last vespers at the Hagia Sophia before Constantinople fell to the Turks.
Most-turned leaves of the newsletter week
I list our most-read articles from the previous newsletter week (Friday to Saturday) in each edition of The Newsletter Leaf Journal. These statistics come courtesy of Koko Analytics, our local, privacy friendly page-counting solution (see my review). Below, I present the 5 most-visited articles of the penultimate newsletter week of 2023, week 51. Note: All stats are for 2023 only.
(1) The Story of Billy Possum, President Hoover's Pet Opossum
N.A. Ferrell. November 30, 2021.
2 appearances. 1 top placement.
(2) Recommended F-Droid FOSS Apps For Android-Based Devices (2021)
N.A. Ferrell. November 28, 2021.
10 appearances. 1 top placement.
(3) Installing Ubuntu Touch on a Google Nexus 7 (2013)
N.A. Ferrell. July 5, 2021.
21 appearances. 2 top placements.
(4) The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten - Anime Review
N.A. Ferrell. March 30, 2023.
3 appearances.
(5) An In-Depth Look at Norton Safe Search
N.A. Ferrell. October 18, 2022.
11 appearances. 5 top placements.
Discussion
My history of former U.S. President Herbert Hoover's pet opossum has been on the upswing lately, posting a 12th place finish in our November ranking. But I did not expect it to have a midweek break out which was enough to not only easily take its first weekly first place finish, but also put it in the mix for the overall top spot in December en route it its best month on record. I did see there were a large number of internet searches relating to Hoover and Billy Possum -- of which my article converted a small percentage.
There were no other major surprises in the ranking. I foreshadowed last week that I expected to see my anime review of The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten make the cut, and it did so after having been in play for the top spot before Billy Possum's break out.
We have had 13 articles lead at least one weekly ranking in 2023 and 8 lead multiple rankings -- a notable increase over the seven first-place finishes in 2021 and eight in 2022. Billy Possum calmed down toward the end of the week, so I think that the field is wide open going into the final newsletter week of 2023. Maybe we will see a fun surprise to cap off the year.
News leaf journal
I have been focused on articles for the last week and will continue to do so through the first week or two of January. I do have two small site changes in mind in the interim, however. I plan to update our Christmas Decorations tag to a sub category of our broader holiday decorations category. I also created a number of new tags that I need to write meta descriptions for -- so I will do that over the next few days.
With respect to writing projects -- I have now reviewed all of the al|together visual novels I planned to write full reviews of and have begun working on my final al|together assessment piece, wherein I will rank all 31 al|together novels (including the two that I did not review in full articles). I think that this will be published in the first week of January 2024.
I am also working on my year-end anime year in review project. I am finishing a couple of series for final consideration, but my ranking is close to complete and I have begun the process of putting it together. This should be published right around New Years.
In what may be an even bigger project -- I have to also publish our New Leaf Journal year in review article. I have been working on that all year by keeping better track of the article view count statistics than I did in the lead-up to the article in 2020-2022. It will definitely be published on January 1, 2024.
I have some other smaller projects in the works that I will publish in the next week. These projects are part of why a couple of my longer pieces may be pushed into January. Readers will see why I have boosted the priority of a couple of shorter projects in short order.
Notable leaf journal
For those of you who are not aware, I maintain a static feed aggregator site which collects New Leaf Journal articles and other projects authored by me and my New Leaf Journal colleague, Victor V. Gurbo.
Victor's professional YouTube music channel is part of the feed aggregator (YouTube channels produce RSS feeds for those not in the know). I learned through following my own channel that Victor posted two recordings to YouTube that should make for fitting listening. First, we have his recording of Christmas & You with Johanna Telander, Katie Chambers, and Mark Caserta (also see another recent rendition he posted with Mark Caserta). Second, we have his 2020 blues version recording of Frosty the Snowman with Mark Caserta.
Taking leaf
Thank you as always for reading and following The Newsletter Leaf Journal (and, I hope, The New Leaf Journal). If you enjoyed our Saturday newsletter and have not done so already, you can sign up via email or add our newsletter's RSS feed to your favorite feed reader (note that it is part of the NLJ Feeds static site I listed above -- so following that will also bring you newsletter updates). See our options here.
I wish all of our newsletter readers a Merry Christmas. We will be back next Saturday for the New Years Eve eve with our final newsletter of 2023. I look forward to bringing you a good week of new articles to bring 2023 to a close.
Until New Years Eve eve,
Cura ut valeas.