Best of the Internet Next Thread

[Corvinus85]

Another SF milestone passed by real science.

[Zorral]

Knights in shining armor? You can find them doing battle in the U.S.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/05/24/medieval-armored-combat-knights-competition/

Quote

 

NEW YORK — Even in a city where pretty much anything goes, the sight and sound of knights in shining armor swinging swords at each other still draws a crowd. ....

.... Yet the allure of armor has attracted an increasingly diverse group of participants across race, gender and sexual identity lines.

“The sport is historically White and male,” says D’Ondre Cyrus, the 36-year-old president of the American Medieval Combat Federation, “but we understand that representation matters.”

Cyrus is a member of the Dallas Warlords as well as the Knights of Wakanda, an African American team of about 20 that pulls from across the country and comes together for events. “When you’re out there fighting,” he says, “no one can tell who is inside that armor. Then you take off your helmet, and you’ve got little Black kids asking if they can be knights, too.”

 More women are suiting up, too. “It’s a classically masculine space,” Ganley says, “but it’s also a sport still in its infancy, so it allows women and nonbinary people a place to discover the kind of person you want to be within it. I had a queer reckoning of my own that was just really fulfilled by the sport.” ....

 

 

[Zorral]

Bram Stoker’s Dracula inspired by writings of maverick Scotswoman
Research into folklore of Transylvania by 19th century writer Emily Gerard directly inspired author of famous novel

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jun/06/bram-stokers-dracula-inspired-by-writings-of-maverick-scotswoman

Quote

 

...  the gruesome details came not from Stoker’s own imagination but from the factual works of a maverick Scottish author, Emily Gerard, whose research into the folklore of Transylvania directly inspired him.

And now the author’s great-grandnephew Dacre Stoker is embarking on what he describes as “a big puzzle hunt” to learn more about the Scotswoman who travelled the Carpathian countryside interviewing people about their superstitions, writing two volumes on the subject and ultimately introducing Stoker to the term “Nosferatu”.

He said: “The first document that I found her name was an interview that Bram gave to Jane Stoddart in the British Weekly. She asked Bram: ‘Where’d you get this information?’ and he said there were quite a few bits of information but the most thorough was from an essay in the Nineteenth Century [a British literary magazine founded in 1877] by Emily Gerard.

“So that triggered my interest. Who was she and what did she contribute?”

Searching his ancestor’s notes, which are kept at the Rosenbach Museum in Philadelphia, he discovered significant references to Gerard’s research. He said: “Bram used the traits she described in the words of Van Helsing, when he’s explaining to the band of heroes what powers Dracula has, and how they’ve got to kill him.”

“In very obstinate cases of vampirism it is recommended to cut off the head, and replace it in the coffin with the mouth filled with garlic, or to extract the heart and burn it, strewing its ashes over the grave,” he added. Gerard wrote in The Land Beyond the Forest, a two-volume work published in 1888.

As much as Dacre Stoker, himself an author, has been dedicated to uncovering what motivated and influenced his ancestor, his attention has now turned to Gerard, who was born in the Scottish Borders in 1849 in a wealthy military family. “What kind of a lady grows up in an affluent family in Jedburgh and Airdrie but goes off to Transylvania and does something that is fairly risque for the time, looking into superstition?” he asks. ....

 

 

[Spockydog]

 

 

[Spockydog]

This is why you should never be rude to Alexa.

 

[Jaxom 1974]

Use these at your leisure...

 

 

 

[Maltaran]

1 hour ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Use these at your leisure...

 

 

 

And if you read to the end of the thread, there’s proof that the “your mum” joke is older than people think

[LongRider]

@Zorral  Tips for dealing with smoke I didn't even know, good info.   

 

Edited June 11 by LongRider

[Wilbur]

And to follow up LongRider's excellent link, you can build your own air purifier:

DIY box fan filters – Corsi-Rosenthal box - Clean Air Crew

[Tywin et al.]

 

[Spockydog]

 

 

[Tywin et al.]

 

[dog-days]

DNA of Pompeian eruption victim sequenced

[Derfel Cadarn]

For the Brits

[Tywin et al.]

This is how you write a headline:

Quote

Spare relationship causes awkward split

SFA assistant bowling coach out after affair with athlete

 

NACOGDOCHES — Stephen F. Austin State University assistant bowling coach Steve Lemke chose to resign rather than be fired this spring after the university discovered he had an affair with a student-athlete.

Lemke, 38, who is married to head coach Amber Lemke, resigned April 10 from the program he helped coach to two national titles and two second-place finishes.

https://lufkindailynews.com/news/community/spare-relationship-causes-awkward-split/article_fb8f6ae4-0fbc-11ee-8ecf-ff57d9685d28.html

[kiko]

7 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

This is how you write a headline:

https://lufkindailynews.com/news/community/spare-relationship-causes-awkward-split/article_fb8f6ae4-0fbc-11ee-8ecf-ff57d9685d28.html

This one has daytime tv movie written all over it, but please swap the gender to make the characters more likable and the head coach a monster.

[Jaxom 1974]

This might be a good way for this thread to end...?

 

[Spockydog]