Things I learned while looking up other things, 2023.09.11
Dear friends,
I was lucky enough to visit five really good museums in the last two weeks, so this edition of TILWLUOT might range a bit further afield than usual.
Greenlandic mythology is not for the squeamish. "The qivittoq (the mountain wanderer) is a person who has left their village or settlement in shame and wandered into the mountains. For a qivittoq to gain magical powers, the person has to freeze to death over the course of five days."
Haruki Murakami has run a marathon a year for more than twenty years.
The arpanetta: "Imagine a harpsichord standing on its keyboard, vertically upright. But there's no keyboard, you just pluck the strings with your right-hand fingernails. And the instrument is double, with another set of strings for the left hand, on the other side." "Bird organs were used to teach caged birds to sing different tunes."
The office of Howard Pursuivant Extraordinary has been vacant since 1998; it seems a shame because the badge is really something.
Make your own furniture from packing crates. I didn't understand The Infinite Conversation but I enjoyed reading it anyway.
Some beautiful things to look at: the textile art of Pauline Caulfield. Johanna Unzueta's work. The climate art of Eske Kath.
"They returned home tired but happy. The end."
Stay well!
Your friend,
Erin