l'estate profonda

 

deep summer mmxxvi

'era il maschio,' diceva marisa borini.

--giac--

 

three thoughts on turkeyday

1.  'thanksgiving is just a blip between hallowe'en and christmas.'  this comes from a boomer who loves to cook for 10-20 family members at a time.

2.  'isn't it sad that we celebrate thanksgiving by killing turkeys?'  this comes from a barely twenty-something who must've smelled chickpeas on my breath.

3.  'of course mass murder and genocide make it hard for indigenous peoples to celebrate turkeyday.' this comes from a way-cool, possibly now unemployed, presenter on npr at 4:15 turkeyday morning.--giac

Otiosity

Jett,

  Let us begin our trek to an instinctive universal language--would you like to call it Ietspik, after your own name?--with a peep at the station from which we're starting.

  Here is a list meant to wear you down with tedium and dismay.  Supply as the context for one and all this preparatory statement:  'Giac and I discussed ideogrammatika at the coffee-shop, then . . . .'



Giac left

Giac hurried out

Giac walked out

Giac stalked out
Giac strode out

Giac dashed out

Giac sped out

Giac went away

Giac walked away

Giac walked out

Giac departed

Giac skipped

Giac skipped (literally) out

Giac vamoosed

Giac toddled out

Giac sidled out

Giac limped out

Giac ran out

Giac jogged out
Giac fled
Giac slipped out
Giac marched out
Giac waltzed out
Giac flounced out
Giac galumphed out

Giac disappeared

Giac vanished

Giac escaped

Giac crawled away

Giac mounted his high horse and rode off into some imaginary sunset

 

  Well, basta, I quit.  Albeit Shakespeare could've gone on quite some.

  The ideogram that best conveys the information in the preparatory statement is a selfie with GPS, therefore streetview, and time incorporated, with a soundbite involving the word 'rhetorical.' 😉  Follow this by my selfie as the doors close behind me . . . .

  Many of the verbs add a little colour to the story.  But whether I left, walked through the store and out, departed, went through the store and out, vamoosed--somewhere otiosity enters the pictogram, I mean, the picture.  In many verbs, your intuitive, speculative, interpretation of my mood colours the picture.  Even if I limped out, why mention it unless you personally sprained my ankle during the discussion?

  O how I love to talk piffle, o how I agree with Harriet Vane.  O how I love to play with my words before I let them mean anything.

  O how I love to quote Umberto Eco: 'Un libro è fatto di segni che parlano di altri segni, i quali a loro volta parlano delle cose.'  But you and I and Plato and Stephen Hawking know better when it comes to those squirrelly 'cose.'

  Ietspik is not an attack on Shakespeare.  Ietspik, instinctive and intuitive language, begins by stripping the cultural accretions to bare reportage.  Ietspik, unlike Esperanto, is equal opportunity.  The Mandarin, the Maori, the Quechua, the Brit and Frenchy have equal possibility of understanding it at first sight: 

                                                                                          

 🚶   →

           ← 

 

  Capito?  Your very first sentence in Ietspik.--Giac

 

Lingua Uniuersalis

Jett,

  Sì sì, oc oc, once upon a time there was a Universal Language, every educated person read it, most wrote and spoke it.  It lasted 2 millennia, indeed, it gave us the word 'millennium' and its exotic plural.

  Every educated person, I mean to say, who wasn't educated in China, India, practically all of Asia, all of Australia and Antarctica, all but the top fringe of Africa, not to mention North, Central, and South America.  And associated islands.

  As Latin faded into a sort of indistinct, dusky afterlife with tantalising glimmers of stunning eroticism and braininess, Esperanto came into being to take its place.  Esperanto:  66% Latin, 33% Anglo-sassone.

  It was obvious to its inventor that the Brits and Austrians and Hessians, the French and Spaniards, and, magari, Italy and Romania, would forever rule the world.

  It is not obvious to me that that is likely to be the case bimeby.

  O just beat me over the head with Milo, I'm so veddy veddy pc. 

  And yet, the only reason, me seemeth, that Chinese will not become the lingua franca soonishly, is that it is way too difficult to learn.  At least Hindi is Indo-European.  Linguists know the tricks to devolve the modern words back to their roots, and then evolve them forward into a cousin modern language.

  Pace Captain Fantastic, a lingua uniuersalis must be as accessible to a Quechua or Maori as it is to Nobel Laureate Bob Dylan.  Moreover a lingua uniuersalis must be as intelligible to Seth, aka my pc, as it would be to Baudolino (compulsive Umberto Eco allusion, je suis désolé).

  On the path to Ietspik . . . .--Giac 

Jett Works Magick

   I'd paid for my espresso, joked with the barista, taken a sip.  It tasted as if someone there still troubles to clean the machine every night.

   I turned, you'd materialised from thin air. 

   Magick!

   Alas, as long as there are susceptible folk, who want to be characters in novels, there'll be Magick.  From now on, whenever I sip an espresso, I'll turn and make excuses if you aren't there.  A mistake in the rite, an error in the spell.  My fault, no doubt.

   Povera Ifigenia!  Padre predisposto, vittima lui stesso di un prete furfante.  Povera Ifigenia, niente bidente sfortunato come sosia.

 

   I was so startled by your apparition, I hadn't time to pretend to be glad to see you.  So I didn't pretend.

 

   Catulli Carmen l.  That's how it was.  Whatever theme you started, I developed.  Whatever theme I started, you developed.  Like the 8-year-old boy, our minds had been working through the night.

   Ideography.  Esperanto.  Catullus.  Caluus.--Giac

Jett!

Jett!  Voglio dire, Giaietto!--Giac

Captain Fantastic

   'You're a professor, aren't you,' she said confidently as she sat there with husband and son in the bar.

   'O no no no no no,' I assured her, 'just outstandingly near-sighted.'

   They were in town for a wedding, had surveyed the used book store nextdoor, were nursing coffee and soft-fruit tarts till it was time for Captain Fantastic at the neighbourhood cinema.

   'According to the reviews,' said the twenty-something, 'it's the story of my life.'  For Dad most assuredly is a professor, in Chicago.

   'Lucky lad,' I thought to myself.  Minus, of course, the rock climbing.--Giac

mare!

  The neighbour's mare got out this morning.  She was so tame, she would not be whispered back. 
  Neighbour not at home.
  A pickup truck comes along.  Slowly. 
  Nevertheless, the mare spooks, gallops off to who knows where.
  I get in the car to search for her.  I'm scarcely at the bottom of the hill when the Good Samaritan appears.  The mare has run to his farm, he's shut her up with his own horse, and in the absence of the owner, he proceeds to repair the gap in the fence, then restore the mare to her own pasture.
  Living in the country . . . .  Per precisare, in the ungentrified, authentic country.--Giac

buon anno a tutti

Quilt 1891

 

Auguri!--Giac

Down the River

Down the River mailing today.

Music of Bedrich Smetana.

Giac.

I Fantasmi di Pietra, di Mauro Corona

      The rooves are collapsed, the floors stacked one upon another, some of the stone walls of the dwellings still resist gravity. In the ghost town of Erto, high in the Dolomites, there is a curious wall, imbedded with some dozen of hooks. It is where the 3000 former citizens used to kill and hang their fat hogs, cattle, goats.

      And dogs. No, they didn't slaughter dogs. But if one died by misadventure, they hung it, for the skin.

      Dog skin, it seems, makes a drum twice as loud as goat skin. News to me.

      Vittorin was the town skinner. Coincidentally, he led the 80-member troop of drummers in the Good Friday procession. His drum, not surprisingly, could be heard above all the rest.

      Vittorin was small of stature. He was a shrimp. Not surprisingly, he married an amazon. Not too surprisingly, she beat him daily. Not her fault, she suffered from indigestion brought on by overeating, so naturally she had to vent. Not her fault at all, never is.

      The beatings went on for many years. Every Ertano knew about it. Every Ertano looked down on Vittorin. Literally and otherwise.

      Finally, Vittorin's luck changed. His big giant female ran off with another man. Peace at last!

      At first, some catty neighbours surmised that Vittorin had pushed the behemoth into a fast moving stream, during flood time. But that dog wouldn't hunt. For if Vittorin was famous for anything, except his skinning and his drumming, it was for his pusillanimity.

      30 years passed, 30 Good Fridays.

      Vittorin, age seventy, felt Death Most Holy approach. He called for the priest and a couple of his best friends.

      Confession. Sort of.

      "I want y'all to do something for me. There under the cattle trough, you will find . . . ."

      Well. He had, in fact, ucciderated his big giant wife. Pressed a hay fork through her goozle while she was napping. Skinned her. Cured it in the attic. Did you know what with a round of her dried skin, burnt the rest. Tucked her flesh and bones under the cattle trough.

      "You all knew how she beat me. None of you lifted a finger to stop it. Not even you, Reverend Father." Then Vittorin croaked. "Then," in story time, in fact he dragged on for days and weeks. But bimeby, yes, he did croak.

      The friends and priest disbelieved, like the Apostles. But sure as the world, there she was, much of her, under the cattle trough. Obedient to Vittorin's last wishes, they took her bones, and Vittorin's prized drum, and buried the lot next to Vittorin.

      The moral, of course, is Waste not, Want not. Or Recycle.  Or something, bound to be a moral.

      This story, so much more richly told, and hundreds of others as juicy or juicier, are to be found in Mauro Corona's I Fantasmi di Pietra.--Giac.

Il Pranzo di Ferragosto



Il Pranzo di Ferragosto. Il Pranzo di Babette. 

Cioccolato. Schegge di April (“use your words, Leon”).

Food flicks specialise in happy endings. Unless, perhaps, Eating Raoul or La Grande Abbuffata.

Throughout August I et pumpkin babies.

Take one infant pumpkin, about the size of a softball. Wash, trim the ends. Slice thinly. While butter is melting over medium heat in a skillet, slice some green onions, some sweet red peppers. Crumble feta or mozzarella. When butter is sizzling, arrange the pumpkin slices as for Pommes Anna, or just dump them in, if that is the sort of person you are. Layer with vegetables and cheese. Salt and pepper. Cover. Ignore for fifteen minutes. Uncover and serve. Don't forget to turn off the burner, probably that's just me.

Pranzo di Ferragosto. Ripe olives. Pumpkin Baby. Tuscan bread from the one bakery in Overton that does it right. Cantaloupe, sweet and musky, with fat blueberries to counterpoint. Pecans and gorgonzola to finish. (Or organic goat gouda, no animal rennet.) Prosecco to downwash.

From the garden, organic it goes without saying: pumpkin baby, red peppers. Organic, but storebought: butter, green onions, cheese, pecans (regional), blueberries.

Immigrants from the bel paese: olives, gorgonzola, prosecco.

How come I have pumpkin babies? Last year's jack o'lantern's guts survived the winter in the compost heap, sprouted, ran 40 feet in every direction, and right now are dangling green and ripe pumpkins 8 feet up in the boxwood hedges.

Happy ending for this summer.--Giac.

Signs from Above?

Early reports from the earthquake zone indicate fissures in the highest levels of the Washington Monument and of the National Cathedral.

Signs from Above?

Signs, maybe.

News, alas no.--Giac

John Paul Getty

In Paradisum, G P. Ci vedremo, Giac.

l'Incantesimo

ATTIVISTA MISTICO CERCA CHIACCHIERONE PRIMORDIALE Eccomi! Sceglimi per la tua crociata impossibile! Eccomi! Sceglimi per aiutarti ad assediare il Regno di Cielo! Ognuno è il giulare di qualcuno, fammi essere il tuo! Non ho vergogna, non ho degli scrupoli! Non do finché non mi faccia male, do finché mi faccia sbalzare il desiderio. Sii scaltro, fammi insegnarti il mio metodo matto! M'elettrizza nel santuario, bel affascinante! Sorprendimi nel labirinto! Spogliami sul altare! Fammi inturgidire alla stazione secondaria! Io ti farò risorgere dovunque ti piacerà!--l'Incantesimo per la Festa di San Valentino, dal libro Pronoia di Rob Brezsny.

l'Ometto dell'Anno

° Un solo peccatore distrugge un gran bene: Ben Bernanke, l'Ometto dell'Anno.

Why I Do Not Hate the Rich Folks

°°° My little cousin, astonished at the selfishness of the Healthcare Haves directed towards the Healthcare Haven'ts, proposes a solution. A solution the Rich Folks wouldn't like at all. It is as if he hates his betters.
°°° No use my hating the Rich, I don't know but two of them, unless you count F T. I call "rich" someone who can count on the income from an estate of at least $100,000,000. And even then, I may be lowering the cut-off a bit much. Grandma Agnelli, with a pension of 700,000-odd euro the month, for life, plus, I suppose, a palace or two thrown in--Grandma Agnelli I call rich. She doesn't have to trouble herself with the family business, the checks clear, a million bucks a month.
°°° I wish her well.
°°° And no, I don't hate the Rich Folks.
°°° First of all, I was brought up Francescan. That means that I think a banquet is 1500 calories of firm but still chewable pugliese bread, and the day's nutritional balance made up in local ripe olives so abundant nobody else has wanted them. A feast is the same, except the bread doesn't have so much sandy grit ground into the wheat that it makes my teeth sore.
°°° Possessions enslave. Even benign possessions enslave by symbiosis. It's not just a Truthy Truism, it's Truly True. Slaves are forever getting under foot, not to mention their spitting in our lemonade behind our backs.
°°° Second, Do Not They Bleed, If We Prick 'em? Don't Rich Folks die? Don't they be dreadful parents? Don't they grow old and have to stuff their faces with cow goo, till their eyebrows climb halfway up their foreheads? Don't they make fools of themselves over slimy married jerks? Don't they snort the coke just to get through the day? And F T even has to work, like Anna Wintour.
°°° Third, the wealth of the Rich Folks doesn't amount to a hill of beans. Suppose Bill Gates got religion, and distributed his entire wealth to his grateful and worthy fellow citizens. If Microsoft is in a bubble, he has $60,000,000,000 to spread around. If Microsoft has had the air squeezed out, he has $30,000,000,000, a wife, chirren, and a palace or two. He can keep the wife, the chirren, and the palace, nobody else wants them.
°°° But, 300,000,000 American citizens dividing $30,000,000,000. Yes folks, that's only 2 zeros extra.
°°° 2.
°°° Ergo, each of us grateful and worthy fellow Americans would receive a fabulous legacy of $100. One time. Then Bill Gates would have nothing, except the wife chirren and palace, and how would he pay the heat bill? And after one trip to the grocery store, the entire body of worthy and grateful fellow Americans would have nothing too.
°°° I guess you really have to be a selfmade trillionaire, like Bernanke, S. p. A., to have a red cent nowadays.--Giac.

Double Feature

I like Anna Wintour. She describes herself as "decisive." She appears so to be. Therefore, she possesses an abundance of a quality I lack practically altogether.
I like Grace. I like the luckless Italian fotografer. I like the little muscle-guy who knows how to print out fotos. I like the models, the designers, the slaves, the vassals.
For, they're all wholeheartedly in pursuit of an ideal, il bello.
I never knew before, for I've never had a copy of Vogue in hand.
They're painters, artists. They take young flesh and brilliant costumes and distinctive settings, and create foto-paintings.
God bless their hearts, one and all.
Besides, The September Issue was so much funnier, and so much more suspenseful than advertised, I was delighted to have bought the ticket.

Meanwhile, down the hall, was Lord, Save Us from Your Followers. Always glad to see Jon Stewart, that handsome dog. And Senator Franken, that--er--entertaining dog. And Bono's hair.
And so very many Uncle Toms, wherever did the presenter find them?
And the self-confessing, self-forgiving presenter. How pat he has it down. A little lipstick on the pig, no need for a change of heart. Or self-examination. Or a sense of justice.
A most disheartening movie, so glad I didn't buy the ticket.--Giac.

home economy

I was searching for an old recipe for pâté de fruit.
I didn’t find it.
Instead, in a 1929 cookbook published by the Woman’s Missionary Society of the Pope First M. E. Church South, I came across this recommended budget for household expenses:

36%--Operating Expenses (rent, utilities, ecc.)
24%--Food
10%--Wearing Apparel
6%--Advancement (education, donations)
5%--Health
12%--Investment
7%--Amusement

Well.
Health insurance costs so much nowadays that a family of four would have to have an after-tax income of $200,000 in order for medical expenditure to be only 5% of the budget. Something has to give. I hope it won’t be Amusement.
As for the perpetual harping on Americans’ refusal to save “12%” of their annual incomes--pish tush. Social Security deductions do that for us.
Only, the deductions stop before they get to the CEOs.

§§§

And just God bless the Woman’s Missionary Society for slashing the tithe, doubtless they knew best.--Giac.