An irregular hodgepodge of links gathered together … Omnium Gatherum for October 28, 2020

Last week, at library HQ, there was a day with a high in the 80s F. This week there was a day entirely below freezing all day and snow, which stayed on the ground for two days. Hope you and yours are staying warm, well, and safe!

Here’s a variety of notable things I’ve recently found that you may also be interested in checking out:

• Tonight! Witches, Ghosts & Judaism, tonight October 28, 2020 at 8 PM (presumably Central/UTC-5) on Zoom. “As Jews we don’t celebrate Halloween, but you can find witchcraft and ghosts in our Jewish texts. Join Rabbi Fort to learn more in this discussion on Zoom!” Also “Houston rabbi examines intersection of magic and Jewish religion.”
• Tonight! Reclaiming the Damned: Toward a New Understanding of Bigfoot, Flying Saucers, and Other Inconvenient Realities with Mitch Horowitz by North Carolina Masonic Research Society, tonight October 28, 2020 at 7 PM CDT.
• “A Global History of Sex and Gender: Bodies and Power in the Modern World. Discover how a focus on gender and sexuality transforms our understanding of modern, global history.” A free online course, available now, by Tanya Cheadle, Hannah Telling, and Maud Anne Bracke; from The University of Glasgow.
• Crowdfunding: Strange Lusts / Strange Loves: An Anthology of Erotic Interactive Fiction—”Strange Lusts / Strange Loves is an anthology of short interactive stories/games that all touch on themes of sex and the many forms it takes. This collection brings together new works by Anna Anthropy, Nibedita Sen, Natalia Theodoridou, as well as by co-editors Sharang Biswas and Clio Yun-su Davis. Each story is influenced in some way by interacting with it, and each explores a different facet of sex, desire, and romance.” Check out a demo at Strange Lusts / Strange Loves Demo.
• “Man banned from Highland mansion with Aleister Crowley history.” Also “Addict banned from going within five miles of Boleskine House near Loch Ness.”
• More about this: “The Hide That Binds. A medical librarian’s history of books covered in human skin.” About Dark Archives: A Librarian’s Investigation into the Science and History of Books Bound in Human Skin [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by Megan Rosenbloom.
• Watch Surviving Autocracy: Masha Gessen with Anand Giridharadas—”Russian-American author, journalist, and activist Masha Gessen, whose latest book is Surviving Autocracy, discusses the current political crisis just ahead of the final 2020 United States Presidential Debate.” With Masha Gessen author of Surviving Autocracy [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher]—”As seen on MSNBC Morning Joe and heard on NPR All Things Considered: the bestselling, National Book Award-winning journalist offers an essential guide to understanding, resisting, and recovering from the ravages of our tumultuous times.”; and Anand Giridharadas’s Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher]—”The New York Times bestselling, groundbreaking investigation of how the global elite’s efforts to “change the world” preserve the status quo and obscure their role in causing the problems they later seek to solve. An essential read for understanding some of the egregious abuses of power that dominate today’s news.” Also partially transcribed at “Last exit before autocracy“—”A conversation with Masha Gessen on how to prevent “autocratic breakthrough,” why Russiagate was a “crutch” for the left, and what really happened in that New Yorker election s(t)imulation Zoom.”
• “D. H. Lawrence, Arch-Heretic. The Bad Side of Books.” About The Bad Side of Books: Selected Essays [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by D. H. Lawrence, edited by Geoff Dyer.
• “Freudian slips. An artist who wouldn’t cultivate his inhibitions.” About The Lives of Lucian Freud: Fame: 1968-2011 [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by William Feaver, due January 2021—”In this brilliant second and final volume of the definitive biography of Lucian Freud—one of the most influential, enigmatic and secretive artists of the twentieth century—William Feaver, the noted art critic, draws on years of daily conversations with Freud, on his private papers and letters and on interviews with his friends and family to explore the intimate life of Freud, from age forty-five to his death in 2011 at the age of eighty-nine.”
• Why Do We Think Learning About History Can Make Us Better? How the study of the past became the conscience of the present.” Adapted from Time’s Monster: How History Makes History [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by Priya Satia—”An award-winning author reconsiders the role of historians in political debate.”
• “The Most Dangerous Film in the World. ‘We thought this film was defective. But we were mistaken. This is how radiation looks.'” Adapted Susan Schuppli’s book Material Witness: Media, Forensics, Evidence [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher], part for the Leonardo series—”The evidential role of matter—when media records trace evidence of violence—explored through a series of cases drawn from Kosovo, Japan, Vietnam, and elsewhere.”
• “A Compendium of Severance.” About Divorcing [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by Susan Taubes, introduction by David Rieff—”Now back in print for the first time since 1969, a stunning novel about childhood, marriage, and divorce by one of the most interesting minds of the twentieth century.”
• “Baba Yaga Will Answer Your Questions About Life, Love, and Belonging. We Could All Use a Little More Slavic Witch in Our Lives.” Excerpt from Poetic Remedies for Troubled Times: From Ask Baba Yaga [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by Taisia Kitaiskaia—”Baba Yaga offers more off-kilter remedies for the modern dilemmas of an unstable age using her uncanny style, poetic simplicity, and surprising candor.” Also check out 2017’s Ask Baba Yaga: Otherworldly Advice for Everyday Troubles [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher]—”With a strange, otherworldly style, poetic clarity, and striking honesty, Ask Baba Yaga contains beautifully skewed wisdom to be consulted in times of need.”; and Literary Witches: A Celebration of Magical Women Writers [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher]—”Celebrate the witchiest women writers with beautiful illustrations and imaginative vignettes.”.
• Holy shit. The world of wolf kink porn is wild AF. But, not the way you might think. “Addison Cain’s lawyer e-mailed me, and it only got worse from there.”
• “Andreas Hourdakis – ‘Underworld’“—”Aiwass, the next track, was evidently a mysterious being summoned by Aleister Crowley who dictated one of his most famous works to the author, This ghostly idea is brought to life by a conversation between Hourdakis and Tobias Winklund on cornet. Hourdakis here is all about the arpeggios and runs, allowing the bassist to wend his way stealthily in between. The peppery playing by Winklund is never over-wrought, sitting very much the right side of uncomfortable, increasingly so as the track develops.” About Underworld by Andreas Hourdakis (currently only finding this at Amazon UK).
• Unambiguous Water is my new Dune-themed filk band name. “NASA’s SOFIA Discovers Water on Sunlit Surface of Moon.” Also “Tiny moon shadows may harbor hidden stores of ice.” Also “Water found in new locations on the Moon, may be trapped in glass. Water is present in more places but won’t be equally accessible.” Also “Water ice on the Moon may be easier to reach than we thought, new studies claim. But there are still a lot of unknowns.” Also watch “NASA finds more water on moon’s surface.” Also watch “Nasa announcement: What is on the Moon?“—”Unlike previous detections of water in permanently shadowed parts of lunar craters, scientists have now detected the molecule in sunlit regions of the Moon’s surface. But what does this mean for future missions to the Moon? And beyond? And what else is on the Moon?” Also watch “LIVE: NASA Announces Water Discovered on Sunlit Surface of the Moon.”
• “NASA’s OSIRIS-REx Spacecraft Collects Significant Amount of Asteroid.” Also “A NASA probe is so full of asteroid material that it now has a problem.” (Maitre D: “Oh sir… it’s only wafer thin.” Mr Creosote: “Look – I couldn’t eat another thing. I’m absolutely stuffed. Bugger off.” from Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life.)
• ‘Fireball’ That Fell to Earth Is Full of Pristine Extraterrestrial Organic Compounds, Scientists Say—”A fireball that fell to Earth in 2018 contains “pristine extraterrestrial organic compounds” that could help tell us how life formed, scientists say. The meteor arrived on Earth in January 2018, as a streaking fireball visible across the sky of the US Midwest. Scientists were able to track it using weather radar, and hunters picked the meteorite up from the ground before its chemical makeup was changed by exposure to liquid water. Now researchers say the material they recovered offers them the ability to explore such rocks as they might appear when they are still in space, but using the equipment they have down on Earth.”
• “Besides the “Big One,” closer faults could also shake Portland. Digging a trench across a fault reveals evidence of past quakes.”
• Geologists ‘resurrect’ missing tectonic plate
• Researchers create a single-molecule switch
• “Surveillance company harassed female employees using its own facial recognition technology. Verkada’s clients include Juul Labs, Equinox, and Red Lobster.”
• “Police are using facial recognition for minor crimes because they can. Law enforcement is tapping the tech for low-level crimes like shoplifting, because there are no limits. But the tool often makes errors.”
• “US grid-battery costs dropped 70% over 3 years. The EIA expects 5,900 megawatts of battery capacity in the next few years.”
• Solar power fuels South Australia’s total energy demand in global first—”Last Sunday, for one hour between 12 noon and 1:00pm, solar power provided 100 per cent of South Australia’s energy needs – a first in Australia and for any major jurisdiction globally.” Also “All of South Australia’s power comes from solar panels in world first for major jurisdiction.”
• “The Earth Is Pulsating Every 26 Seconds, and Seismologists Don’t Agree Why. Like clockwork, seismometers across multiple continents have detected a mysterious pulse since at least the early 1960s.”
• “Cell Discovery May be Key to Treating Currently Incurable Neurological Diseases. New study shows potential for unprecedented recovery from stroke, Alzheimer’s Disease, ALS and many other brain and spine diseases and injuries.”
• “Scientists use gene therapy and a novel light-sensing protein to restore vision in mice. NIH-funded therapy will now be tested in humans.”
• “Stanford materials scientists borrow solar panel tech to create new ultrahigh-res OLED display. Repurposed solar panel research could be the foundation for a new ultrahigh-resolution microdisplay. The OLED display would feature brighter images with purer colors and more than 10,000 pixels per inch.” Also “Samsung, Stanford make a 10,000PPI display that could lead to ‘flawless’ VR. Truly seamless VR could be a thing.”
• “No Implants Needed For Precise Control Deep Into The Brain. Optogenetics can now control neural circuits at unprecedented depths within living brain tissue without surgery.”
• “Fix, or Toss? The ‘Right to Repair’ Movement Gains Ground. Both Republicans and Democrats are pursuing laws to make it easier for people to fix cellphones, cars, even hospital ventilators. In Europe, the movement is further along.”
• “Scientists Discover 24-Million-Year-Old Megashark Hunting Ground in South Carolina. The site, where young prehistoric megasharks ate their fill to grow large, is the first ancient shark nursery in the U.S. to be confirmed with fossils.”
• Australian Scientists Discover 500 Meter Tall Coral Reef in the Great Barrier Reef–First to Be Discovered in Over 120 Years
• Tiny golden bullets could help tackle asbestos-related cancers
• “Bioplastics no safer than other plastics. Bioplastics contain substances that are as toxic as those in ordinary plastics.”
• The evil anti-black has arrived! “The world’s whitest white is here—and it’s coming to a roof near you. The paint is capable of reflecting heat back into space. But the whitest paint in the world still isn’t a silver bullet to global warming.”
• “Reading literary versus popular fiction promotes different socio-cognitive processes, study suggests.”
• “Facebook tells academics to stop monitoring its political ads for any rule-breaking…. on privacy grounds. Irony overload as social media giant accuses NYU of bulk data collection.”
• Was the password “maga2020!”? Also, we’ve secretly replaced their regular scam with Cryptocurrency, let’s see if they notice! “Trump’s campaign website hit with cryptocurrency scam. A fake FBI notice asked visitors to send funds.” Also.
• “Lot 62 Wozniak, Steve & Steve Jobs. Blue Box, 1972. An original first iteration “blue box” populated circuit board made by Steve Wozniak and marketed by Steve Jobs and Wozniak, 51 x 72 mm, with speaker wire and 9volt battery connector.” For more history, check out this 2013 article: “The Definitive Story of Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs, and Phone Phreaking.”
• But, can it be used to make a lightsaber yet? “General Atomics, Boeing Partner on High Energy Laser Weapon System.”
• “Ultra Safe Nuclear Technologies Delivers Advanced Nuclear Thermal Propulsion Design To NASA. New Propulsion Concept To Facilitate Rapid Transportation To The Moon And Mars”—”could deliver a crew to Mars in as few as three months”
• NASA, European Space Agency Formalize Artemis Gateway Partnership
• “Folding@home exascale supercomputer finds potential targets for COVID-19 cure. One million volunteers and more than 2.5 exaFLOPS later, the group behind the crowdsourced distributed-computing project says it has found possible targets for stopping the SARS-CoV-2 virus.”
• “UK study finds evidence of waning antibody immunity to COVID-19 over time.” Also “Coronavirus antibody prevalence falling in England, REACT study shows.”
• “Scientists 3D-Printed a Human Immune System to Battle Covid-19. A completely artificial immune system quickly pumps out much-needed antibodies.”
• “Why the Pandemic Is Forcing Women Out of the Workforce | The New Yorker. Isaac Chotiner speaks with Betsey Stevenson about how the pandemic has affected men and women differently and what the past six months should teach us about paid family leave.”
• Excess Deaths Associated with COVID-19, by Age and Race and Ethnicity — United States, January 26–October 3, 2020—”Overall, an estimated 299,028 excess deaths occurred from late January through October 3, 2020, with 198,081 (66%) excess deaths attributed to COVID-19. The largest percentage increases were seen among adults aged 25–44 years and among Hispanic or Latino persons.”
• “Health Agency Halts Coronavirus Ad Campaign, Leaving Santa Claus in the Cold. The $250 million federally funded effort had aimed to ‘defeat despair, inspire hope’ on pandemic.”
• Wait. Whut?! “White House science office says Trump ended COVID-19 pandemic as US hits record cases.”
• Plague Poems – The Thirty-Second Week—”How strange to speak / of waves / when the waters never / recede.”
• “The Surprising Power of Color to Ease Quarantine Anxiety.”
• “NIN Modular Face Mask. Featuring interchangeable messages for uncertain times. Nine inch nails presents the NIN modular face mask system. Also known as the INASAAIBIS* mask, this heavy duty mask features a unique interchangeable message system that allows you to customize your mask to match your mood. Defiant? Just getting by? Provocative? You decide.”
• “You have misunderstood the relevance of Hannah Arendt. The thinker has been pillaged by those seeking to denounce Trump. They overlook her most vital insight.”
• “Mary Trump’s Grim Analysis Of Trump Campaign: ‘He Knows He’s In Desperate Shape’. ‘He’s going to burn it all down, sow more chaos and division because that’s where he succeeds,’ the president’s niece predicted.”
• “‘60 Minutes’ Reveals What Was Really In That Giant Trump Health Care Plan Book. Spoiler alert: It’s not what the White House said it was.”
• “‘Just like propaganda’: the three men enabling Trump’s voter fraud lies. The hysteria over voter fraud has reached an alarming pitch – and this dangerous moment in US democracy wouldn’t be possible without the work of these men.”
• Watch “How Homegrown Disinformation Could Disrupt This U.S. Election.” “In 2016, Russia developed a simple, effective playbook to undermine U.S. elections with disinformation on social media. Four years later, Americans are using the same playbook on each other.”
• “The White Extremist Group Patriot Front Is Preparing For A World After Donald Trump. In its secret chat, the group that sprang from Charlottesville is creating a new generation of white supremacists.”
• “Hundreds of Trump supporters stuck in the cold for hours when buses can’t reach Omaha rally. The Trump campaign said it had provided enough buses to move the attendees but that traffic on the two-lane road outside the airport was throttled to one direction after the rally.”
• “Seeking power in Jesus’ name: Trump sparks a rise of Patriot Churches. These believers are praying for a Trump victory to keep America Christian.”
• “Trump Had One Last Story to Sell. The Wall Street Journal Wouldn’t Buy It. Inside the White House’s secret, last-ditch effort to change the narrative, and the election — and the return of the media gatekeepers.”
• “Rallies Are the Core of Trump’s Campaign, and a Font of Lies and Misinformation. A recent rally in Wisconsin was typical. In 90 minutes, President Trump made 131 false or inaccurate statements.”
• “19 women allege medical abuse in Georgia immigration detention. Records and a report obtained by The Times detail allegations of widespread medical abuse and forced sterilization against women held at an immigration detention center in Georgia. The report was presented Thursday to Congress. ”
• “U.S. Early Voting Tops 70 Million, Continuing Historic Pace. The tally shows a record-breaking pace that could lead to the highest voter turnout in percentage terms in more than a century.”
• “What We’re Voting for: Democracy. It’s time to get serious about power and accountability.”
• “McConnell Played Trump.”
• “An Island for Discarded Rulers. Imagine a permanent homeland for deposed or discarded rulers.”—”Editor’s Note: At a rally on October 16, 2020, Donald Trump floated the idea of leaving the United States, saying, “Could you imagine if I lose? I’m not going to feel so good. Maybe I’ll have to leave the country, I don’t know.” The president’s remarks called to mind this essay, from our April 1992 issue, in which Cullen Murphy proposes a remote island where odious heads of government could flee.”
• “Economics for the people. Against the capitalist creeds of scarcity and self-interest, a plan for humanity’s shared flourishing is finally coming into view.”
• Inception! “Smear Campaigns Seek to ‘Red-Pill’ Boomers with Fake Snopes Content. We’ll give them this: “Operation Snopes-Piercer” isn’t the worst name we’ve heard for a smear campaign.”
• Watch “NXIVM sex cult founder sentenced to 120 years in prison.” Also “NXIVM Leader Sentenced to 120 Years in Prison.” “Keith Raniere, a self-improvement guru whose organization NXIVM attracted millionaires and actresses among its adherents, was sentenced Tuesday to 120 years in prison on convictions that he turned some female followers into sex slaves branded with his initials.” Also watch The Vow, official trailer.
• “The man who destroyed skepticism. Scourge of psychics James Randi was no skeptic; our culture is poorer as a result.”
• “Modern Celebrity Is What Happens When No One Says ‘No’. We once marveled at the celebrity bubble, now many of us are disgusted by it.”
• “How Hedges Became the Unofficial Emblem of Great Britain. A shear celebration of the ubiquitous boxy bushes that have defined the British landscape since the Bronze Age.”
• Pope Francis Appoints First African-American Cardinal
• “Waiting for Normal. A journalist returns to Beirut fearful that the revolution she’s had to watch from afar ended. the embers of hope still burned. then came the explosions of August.”
• “The Lifelong Guilt Trip of Abstinence Pledges and Purity Balls. ‘It took both talk therapy and physical therapy to even be able to have sex as an adult. There was still that guilt looming over me. It was very hard to shake. I’m now married, and sex can still sometimes be difficult and painful.’”
• “Chilling find shows how Henry VIII planned every detail of Boleyn beheading. Archives discovery shows the calculated nature of the execution and reinforces the image of the king as a ‘pathological monster’”
• “The Abolition Movement. What we talk about when we talk about addressing the savage roots of policing: justice and safety for everyone.”
• “Where Does Protest Art Fit in the ‘Canon’ of Contemporary Art?” About We Fight to Build a Free World, an exhibit at the Jewish Museum in New York through January 24, 2021.
• “The British Museum Isn’t Doing Enough to Fight Illegal Antiquities Trafficking.”
• “The room where it happens: why writers’ rooms make for great TV. It’s been a staple of American shows for decades, but the collaborative model has proved less appealing in the UK. So what is the reason for the new cultural shift?”
• The Ghosts of Newspaper Row—”All writers contribute to humanity’s intellectual compost, nourishing future ideas, but few do so more plainly than those anonymous writers.” By Elizabeth Mitchell, author of Lincoln’s Lie: A True Civil War Caper Through Fake News, Wall Street, and the White House [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher]—”A thrilling dive into the little-known, darker side of a revered president’s history, Lincoln’s Lie untangles the threads behind a mysterious 1864 newspaper article to reveal how Lincoln manipulated the media during the Civil War, shining new light onto today’s issues of fake news and presidential conflict with the press.”
• The World Is Trapped in America’s Culture War. America won the internet, and now makes us all speak its language.
• “Can a Black Novelist Write Autofiction? Why the hottest literary trend of the last decade is so blindingly white.”
• “The ‘Purge’ Films Reveal the Ugly Truth About America.”—”However gloomy they may sound, the films do offer a way forward. Unlike with our rosier movies, hope does not reside in a preternaturally gifted member of an oppressed class. Each film ultimately argues that the only way out is through collective action. Families, neighborhoods, revolutionary cells — all must band together if they expect to do so much as survive one night. This is perhaps the franchise’s most sustained belief. In the era of superheroes’ teaming up with the C.I.A. to defeat terroristic supervillains, “The Purge” depicts ordinary people willing to protect and support one another in the face of a political system abandoning them to a cruel fate. If there’s any lesson for the political artist to be found in these films, it is this: It’s better to be clumsy in the pursuit of an ugly truth than eloquent in telling a flattering lie.”
• “13 New Dating Terms We Have COVID-19 To Thank For. Be careful not to rush into a ‘turbo relationship’ during the coronavirus pandemic with your ‘quarantine bae’ or you may end up getting a ‘covidivorce.'”
• “I Miss Restaurants, So I Opened My Own…for a Chipmunk. It all started when my uncle sent a tiny wooden picnic table in the mail.”
• “In 2020, Self-Care Is Becoming A More Radical Act. Gone are the days of pampering in the name of mental health. Taking care of ourselves now requires real and uncomfortable work.”
• Actually reminds me a bit of Crowley’s paintings, only marginally better. “Anthony Hopkins Steps Out of the Shadows as an Artist.”
• Italian islands become ‘sex pilgrimage’ sites—”Many people who embark on an eight-hour trek up to the crater like to strip naked, she says, and lie with their bellies on the trembling soil to better feel the eruptions and vibrations run through their bodies. ‘It’s an orgasmic experience, a ritual that ignites passionate sex. The heat and volcanic beat get into your blood and trigger this sexual vibe in the air. The volcano is alive, we call it ‘Iddu’ (him), and he’s guilty of turning folks on. He’s a naughty boy.'”
• ‘Moon Knight’: Oscar Isaac Tapped To Star In Marvel And Disney+ Series—”Moon Knight, aka Marc Spector, is a mercenary who has numerous alter egos — cabbie Jake Lockley and millionaire playboy Steven Grant — in order to better fight the criminal underworld. But later he was established as being a conduit for the Egyptian moon god Khonshu. Most recently, the character was a consultant who dresses in all-white and goes by the name Mr. Knight.” Check out Moon Knight [Bookshop, Amazon, Hoopla, Publisher]. Via Marvel: “Struggling with multiple personalities and amoral inclinations, Marc Spector fights on against all odds as the cloaked avenger Moon Knight.”
• Twitter—”Blackwoman, I mean Batwoman is here.” Also “‘Batwoman’ Unveils First Look at Javicia Leslie in the New Batsuit“—”I felt it was important that viewers could tell by the silhouette that Batwoman was a Black girl. With the form-fitting suit and beautiful Afro, we definitely nailed it!”
• More about this: “Lovecraft Country is a cleverly subversive take on notoriously racist author. The finale doesn’t make a lot of sense, but the characters and their stories are aces.”
• More about this: “Incredibly strange and almost offensively bad. The Witches is a weird, unfunny lesson in how not to adapt Roald Dahl’s classic — and problematic — horror tale.”
• On Netflix: The Devil All The Time. “Tom Holland, Bill Skarsgård, Sebastian Stan, Riley Keough and Robert Pattinson star in this Midwestern gothic saga. Sinister characters converge around a young man devoted to protecting those he loves in a postwar backwoods town teeming with corruption and brutality.” About The Devil All the Time [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher] by Donald Ray Pollock—”In The Devil All the Time, Donald Ray Pollock has written a novel that marries the twisted intensity of Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers with the religious and Gothic over­tones of Flannery O’Connor at her most haunting.”
• The best women-centric and feminist horror movies
• “The history of American jack-o’-lanterns. Celtic rituals, tricks of nature, and deals with the devil have all played a part in creating this iconic symbol of Halloween.” And, you know, for a counterpoint: Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Pumpkins.
• Mediaeval Mythbusting Blog #2: The Problem of “Witchmarks”
• Why Do Witches Ride Brooms? The History Behind the Legend
• Howl’s Moving Castle! Watch “Old Chinese building ‘walks’ to new location to make way for Shanghai’s new commercial centre.”
• From 2015, watch “To future scientists # 07 “Invisible glass”.” Rube Goldberg device made of glass submerged in oil with the same refraction index.
• Watch a cover of Billie Eilish’s Bad Guy an Gaeilge.
• Watch a cover of America’s A horse with no name in Latin. Bardcore!
• Watch a cover of Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song in Old Norse. Skaldcore!
• Watch “Ancient church becomes unique home-studio for Basque artist.”—”When Tas Careaga first saw his 16th-century church it was advertised for sale as a “land plot with build-in ruins”. Abandoned for decades – the town has 6 other churches for a population of 2000 – it was being sold by the local bishopric for very little, but the new owner was required to rebuild it.” “The home is deeply personal, filled with furniture from Careaga’s family, religious art from his grandmother, and idiosyncrasies like a slackline to cross the thirty-foot-drop between the office and a secret bedroom above the cupola. Careaga spent 3 years converting the church to his home with mostly his own labor and help from friends. He continues to add new touches, like converting the bell tower into a reading nook and bunk room for guests.”
• Watch “Earn $20K EVERY MONTH by being your own boss.” A parody of low grade online horror that becomes top tier horror?
• Watch “The Last Meal of Ichabod Crane.”
• Watch Yoga For When You Feel Dead Inside from Yoga With (Zombie) Adriene.
• Jack Black (Tenacious D) covers Time Warp from Rocky Horror (& Picture) Show, with a ton of fun cameos. “Time to ROCK-Y THE VOTE!”
• Watch “How the Irish really invented Halloween.”—”Find out how the customs, traditions, food, divinations, spells and stories of this time of year all originate in Ireland.”

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