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Bike Punk

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Kai ran into a SCUL armada last time he was visiting. They made a documentary about their organization, which showed in August.

I finally sat down and fixed all those broken links on the sidebar! Check out Cecil Kleakins. Matt's been moonlighting.

I just finished reading Oreille Rouge by Eric Chévillard. It was great, as usual. I've liked everything I've read by this author.

Here is a list of words I don't know found in this book:



un aerolithe
un pleutre
un lopin
chiquenaude
s'enticher
un tuffeau
un griot
idoine
chitineux
torve
pétochard
chapardeur
postillon
raffut
caravelle
rônier
le balanzan
haltérophile
une calebasse
ahan
le pilon
une gravide
razzié

White Elephant

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Yesterday near Davis Square, we stumbled upon a yard sale of half-broken violins, Chinese instruments, wooden flutes, rejected jewelry, hundreds of cds, old cameras, and miscellaneous curiosities.

I think this one qualifies as a real White Elephant Sale.

It was the joint effort of Micheal Knoblach, a local dealer in antiques and musical instruments and his friend, a retired dealer, who has a home at the prime Davis location.

Erik got a snare drum.

I got a shoe horn and a Brownie Hawkeye Flash box camera. The camera has a little nick on the body, where the two halves join, which I'll have to cover with tape. I think the flash was there in the pile of junk, but I didn't look for it because I know I'll never use it.

My Brownie cost $3.00, which is $2.50 less than it originally cost when it was America's favorite camera between 1949 and 1961. I'm particularly excited because I love square photographs.

It takes 620 film, which is identical to 120 film except that its spool ends have a smaller diameter. I'm hoping I'll be able to just trim the 120 spool ends rather than having to find an extra 620 spool somewhere so I can respool the film onto it.

I even found the owner's manual (pdf) online.



I went online today to buy stamps and was struck by the quantity of people I had never heard of, for whom commemorative stamps had been issued.

I've heard of Theodore Seuss Geisel, James Baldwin, Moss Hart, Robert Penn Warren, Lewis and Clark, Ronald Reagan, Henry Fonda, and the Pacific Coral Reef.

But who are these other characters, surely people any American should know. I'll see what I can glean from the stamp design before googling.

R. Buckminster Fuller. Looking at the stamp, I would guess that he built something. There's a fifties feel to the design. The wacky bus in the foreground. The guys in wide-legged pants looking up at him with wonder. Bucky Fuller is the idealist inventor of the geodesic dome. "On the verge of suicide, it suddenly struck him that his life belonged, not to himself, but to the universe. He chose at that moment to embark on what he called, 'an experiment to discover what the little, penniless, unknown individual might be able to do effectively on behalf of all humanity.'"

Arthur Ashe appears to be a tennis player. Not so surprising that I've never heard of him. "For Arthur Ashe, tennis was a means to an end."

Yip harburg. Looking at the stamp, I guess he's the guy who wrote the song "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," from the movie The Wizard of Oz. His real name was Edgar.

Martin Johnson Heade. Painter of flower arrangements?

Marian Anderson. Black Heritage. Nice jewelry. I have no clue. She is a singer.

You know what? I don't really know who Robert Penn Warren is. People are standing behind him with signs. Political activist? Politician? Poet, novelist, political activist. Read a couple of his poems.

"So hangs the hour like fruit fullblown and sweet,
Our strict and desperate avatar,
Despite that antique westward gulls lament
Over enormous waters which retreat
Weary unto the white and sensual star."

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