Tuesday: Hili dialogue

May 11, 2021 • 6:30 am

Good morning on Tuesday, May 11, 2020: National “Eat What You Want” Day. But why the scare quotes? Are we supposed to want only healthy food like carrots and broccoli? On the bad-food side, though, it’s Hostess CupCake Day (a staple of my school lunches, and first sold on this day in 1919).  I also liked Twinkies, but my favorite were the marshmallow-and-coconut covered Sno-Balls. I wonder if they still make these:

News of the Day:

Hamas fired more than 50 rockets into Israel in the last two days; Israel responded with airstrikes. This is a complicated situation, but there’s no excuse for firing rocket at civilians. The odd thing is that the Palestinian rockets were aimed at Jerusalem for the first time in seven years, and Palestinians themselves could have been killed. Nevertheless, they applauded the attacks.

A survey of mainstream media shows a fair amount of venues that don’t even mention in the headlines the instigating Gaza rocket attacks. Here’s one from the Washington Post:

I would call that blatantly dishonest journalism. “Palestinian officials say”: only one side quoted. This kind of biased reporting is reprehensible. The situation overall seems unresolvable.

Ever eaten a banana peel? Probably not, but if you have the curiosity (I don’t), the New York Times offers a number of recipes for the inedible peel, including some from Nigella Lawson.

The travails of the rich: The Guardian reveals that Gwynnie (see screenshot below),driven to distraction by the quarantine (and apparently not distracted by her millions), broke down in a big way:

In the latest celebrity attempt to prove they had it just as hard as normal people in the pandemic, Gwyneth Paltrow has admitted she was driven to extremes during quarantine.

Things got dark. She admitted to drinking as many as two cocktails a night during lockdown (quinoa-based whiskey cocktails, of course); and even sometimes eating bread and pasta – shock, horror!

OMG! Bread—and PASTA!

Finally, today’s reported Covid-19 death toll in the U.S. is 581,669, an increase of 650 deaths over yesterday’s figure. The reported world death toll is now 3,318,777, an increase of about 11,300 over yesterday’s total.

Today is a thin day in history. Stuff that happened on May 11 include:

  • 868 – A copy of the Diamond Sutra is printed in China, making it the oldest known dated printed book.

Here’s the frontispiece of that book, which was blockprinted from carved wooden templates, not made from movable type like the Gutenberg Bible:

After a trial, the odious Eichmann was hanged in Israel in 1962, but I oppose that, as I oppose all capital punishment. Here he is in prison in Israel in 1961.

  • 1963 – Racist bombings in Birmingham, Alabama, disrupt nonviolence in the Birmingham campaign and precipitate a crisis involving federal troops.  

In 1964 Norman Rockwell exemplified the whole tenor of the era with this one painting, “The problem we all live with.” It is a great painting; note that the n-word is written on the wall, which we wouldn’t see in any modern rendition. This painting appeared on the cover of Look magazine:

  • 1997 – Deep Blue, a chess-playing supercomputer, defeats Garry Kasparov in the last game of the rematch, becoming the first computer to beat a world-champion chess player in a classic match format.

The Battle of the Titans:

  • 2010 – David Cameron takes office as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom as the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats form the country’s first coalition government since the Second World War.

Notables born on this day include:

  • 1888 – Irving Berlin, Belarusian-American pianist and composer (d. 1989)
  • 1894 – Martha Graham, American dancer and choreographer (d. 1991)
  • 1904 – Salvador Dalí, Spanish artist (d. 1989)
  • 1924 – Antony Hewish, English astronomer and academic, Nobel Prize laureate
  • 1941 – Eric Burdon, English musician

Here’s Burdon with one of the worst songs ever recorded:

Those who shuffled off this mortal coil on May 11 include:

  • 1927 – Juan Gris, Spanish painter and sculptor (b. 1887)
  • 1979 – Lester Flatt, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1914)

Here’s flat with Earl Scruggs performing “Earl’s Breakdown”. This should wake you up!

  • 1981 – Bob Marley, Jamaican singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1945)

And here’s Marley doing “Stand Up, Get Up” in Munich in 1980, the year before he died of melanoma.

  • 2001 – Douglas Adams, English novelist and screenwriter (b. 1952)
  • 2020 – Jerry Stiller, American comedian, actor (b. 1927) 

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Szaron is being nice to Hili:

Szaron: It’s nice to see you.
Hili: Really?
In Polish:
Szaron: Miło cię widzieć.
Hili: Naprawdę?

Here is little Kulka having a lie-down:

A meme from Nicole:

From Lenora:

From Pradeep. Not only is there a gun, but there are bowling pins and ducks!

A tweet showing Ricky Gervais saying goodbye to his dog at the vet’s (it’s a television scene, but still so sad):

From Dom, who says he too can’t stop laughing at this.

Sent by Luana, and it seems pretty accurate:

Tweets from Matthew. An incompetent cat (almost an oxymoron):

A magpie teases a fox. Corvids just can’t resist pulling tails:

Just think of how many amazing adaptations occur on such small scales that we don’t see them. Here’s one. Read the thread to understand the adaptation:

Yes, but how many mated?

Sophie Scholl’s last words before, at 21, she was decapitated by the Nazis for being part of the White Rose resiistance. I believe Scholl spoke these on the way to the guillotine.

This is most likely the guillotine on which the Scholls and hundreds of others were executed by the Nazis:

A guillotine found in a Bavarian museum’s storage area is believed to have been used to execute thousands of people during the Nazi era. Credit…Walter Haberland/Bayerisches National Museum, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

From an excellent movie about the White Rose resistance; the final scene.  This always distresses me, but I watch it nonetheless. There’s no gore but it’s ineffably sad as she says goodby to her brother and her comrade before a perfunctory sentence and execution.

19 thoughts on “Tuesday: Hili dialogue”

    2. I’m hoping no news is good news. Loved the Italian cookery masterclass!

      Edit: Oops, forgot to refresh the page before posting (again!) – I see all is well at Botany Pond.

      Reply

      1. The cook is probably Mexican, not Italian. She’s speaking Spanish and working with masa. No Mama Mia, either😂Hilarious in any case.

        Reply

  5. Speaking of bad journalism. Here’s what made me switch the station this morning (from my local NPR news station):

    A jeering piece about Biden’s statement that people on unemployment should take a job offer.

    The talking head said that the requirements being currently added back by states to show proof of job search were “no change from current law”. Omitting that the requirement has been suspended during COVID — hence the reinstatement.

    And then she said requiring people getting unemployment benefits to look for work was like “requiring people to breathe.” Laugh, laugh, laugh!

    Reply

    1. An earlier piece on NPR went into some depth about why people choose to not work in service jobs like restaurant jobs. Among the reasons were some rather good ones. For wait staff, their salary is mostly from tips and they are just not getting tips. Hours are also commonly cut back since there is a significant drop in customers, and that effects back-room staff like cooks and so on. So they really can’t make a living wage if they work. Meanwhile there is the heightened risk of getting Covid, and they can have good reasons to not risk that.

      Reply

      1. Exactly. But the didn’t talk about that at all in this piece. Some people ARE making more in UE than they would working. It’s OK for a short time; but long term, not.

        Reply

  7. Reprehensible report from the Washington Post on the Middle East problems, maybe. I wonder if it isn’t just their internet click bait draw because the actual headline for the article was – Hamas & Isreal Exchange Rocket Fire Following Continuous Jerusalem Day Clashes. And the article seemed to cover the event on both sides.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/jerusalem-alaqsa-templemount-haramalsharif/2021/05/10/17f29614-b161-11eb-bc96-fdf55de43bef_story.html?utm_campaign=wp_todays_headlines&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_headlines&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F32493d6%2F609a55bf9d2fdae3024b9ac8%2F5d32a7bcae7e8a7c4f3bf9bc%2F13%2F65%2F609a55bf9d2fdae3024b9ac8

    Reply

  10. In addition to the gun and the duckies, the Doctor Playset also has a couple of plastic “capsules” for kids to put in their mouth.

    Reply

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