An irregular hodgepodge of links gathered together … Omnium Gatherum for April 13, 2020

Here’s some things I’ve found that you may be interested in checking out:

• 30% off Red Wheel/Weiser titles plus free shipping. Use code WBFF by April 14.
• “Collisions reveal new evidence of ‘anyon’ quasiparticles’ existence. Some types of anyons may eventually be useful for building better quantum computers.”—”In the three-dimensional world we live in, there are two classes of elementary particles: bosons and fermions. But in two dimensions, theoretical physicists predict, there’s another option: anyons. Now, scientists report new evidence that anyons exist and that they behave unlike any known particle.”
• 30 Days of Ekstasis – a Free Ecstatic Dance Program
• “What Do the Humanities Do in a Crisis? Crises are, at least while they are happening, not educational opportunities. But there are still things to learn.”—“Now is an apt time to ponder the fact that the human condition means living under the shadow of death”
• Okay, so far in this plague year, there’s been the pandemic. But, also more hurricanes, rising risk of locusts, Krakatoa is rumbling, and furthermore radioactive wildfires. What’s next evil mastermind robots invading?! Oh no.
• “Prepare for the Ultimate Gaslighting. You are not crazy, my friends.”
• Tweet—”This poem is called “First lines of emails I’ve received while quarantining.””
• Tweet—”a seance hosted in Pioneer Square in Seattle that was busted by health officers for violating the quarantine order” during the Spanish Flu in 1918.
• Lancelot’s Hangover: The Quest for the Holy Booze—”Monkey Island meets Monty Python’s Holy Grail (in a Belgian point-and-click adventure game with an attitude!) – WARNING : You play a sexy half-naked knight ! Your mom will be proud !” See also.
• The Procession to Calvary—”Pilfer from pirates, conspire with cardinals and perform miracles with an incompetent magician. The Procession to Calvary is a Pythonesque adventure game made from Renaissance paintings, and a spiritual successor to the critically acclaimed Four Last Things.” and “Huzzah! The holy war is over! Your oppressors have been vanquished, the churches of the Old God lay in ruin and thousands of innocent people have been murdered! But it’s not all good news; the tyrant Heavenly Peter has escaped your clutches, and you have been tasked with the mission of finding him… Your journey will take you through a richly detailed landscape built from hundreds of different Renaissance paintings. You will steal a ship, feed a donkey, compete in a talent contest, assist an inept street magician, sing, dance, play the (magic?) flute, poke a man’s face, hunt for treasure and have a chat with Our Lord God Almighty… But will you find Heavenly Peter? And if you do, how will you take your revenge!?” See also.
• Tweet—”There’s never been a satirical sci-fi mind in all of history astute enough to have predicted a future where Steak-Umm explains the scientific method in an act of resistance against a tyrannical game show host during a global plague. Not Aylett, Pynchon, Morrison, or Vonnegut”
• ‘Cards Against Humanity’ And Other Board Game Companies Are Releasing Print-At-Home Games For Families
• New normal? John Scalzi, famous local sci-fi author, predicts changes we may see post-pandemic
• Tweet—”When pestilence struck north Wales about 1550, Denbighshire poet Gruffudd ab Ieuan ap Llywelyn Fychan sought the advice of Master Llwyd, a local soothsayer. What was Master’s Llwyd’s advice? Self-isolate! Here are some of the englynion exchanged between the two men.”
• Oracles—”A modern day divination device based upon algorithms nobody understands, especially not the auhor. Maybe you’ll find it useful in these times of uncertainty.”
• The pandemic threatens imprisoned dissidents and journalists everywhere. They must be freed.
• “The 9/11 Era Is Over. The coronavirus pandemic and a chapter of history that should have expired long ago.”
• Diamond samples in Canada reveal size of lost continent
• Voting against Trump is an act of ceremonial magick
• “Curious Expedition” Game Review (Xbox One): Ready for Adventure?—”Other notable figures in Curious Expedition included Aleister Crowley”
• Unicorns—”Despite not actually existing, unicorns are everywhere.”
• The Beyt Tikkun Liberation Passover Seder Haggadah (PDF)
• Tzadik Records to Release its First Opera: David Hertzberg’s Hallucinatory THE WAKE WORLD
• “Birthing America’s Nation of Islam. In the ʺPrincess and the Prophetʺ, Jacob S. Dorman traces the winding path and idiosyncratic heritage of Noble Drew Ali, founder of The Moorish Science Temple of America, and America’s fascination with all things Oriental at the turn of the 20th century.” About The Princess and the Prophet: The Secret History of Magic, Race, and Moorish Muslims in America by Jacob S Dorman.
• Introduction to Romantic Satanism by Hermetic Library Fellow Michael Osiris Sniffin
• Letters against Separation on e-flux conversations—”As people around the world retreated into self-isolation, Hito Steyerl suggested “Letters against Separation” as a way of staying together: a collective project where writers from different parts of the world reflect on how Covid-19 has impacted them, their loved ones, their cities, and their work. Through a series of short, diary-like passages on e-flux conversations, the writers share their experience of this pandemic as its runs its course. And perhaps their words can, in some way, help us to turn this isolation into a form of kinship. […] “Letters against Separation” is loosely based on Boccaccio’s Decameron, which is structured as a mise-en-abyme—a story written by a group of young people sheltering in a secluded castle during the plague.”
• Jump into the fire with a mystical Twin Peaks reading list, with mentions of Jack Parsons, Aleister Crowley, and more.
• Video Premiere: The Servants’ Ball – Egyptian Princess—”The title, Egyptian Princess, is clearly a nod to the era of Egyptomania which started in the Victorian era and peaked in the 1920s with the discovery of Tutankhamun. It was a craze that didn’t just appear in music, but right across fashion, architecture, literature and even through to the Edwardian era’s ‘Wickedest Man in the World’ Aleister Crowley.”

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