‘For a season that’s supposed to bring joy and good cheer to people, there is an awful lot of horrific beasts and creatures associated with Christmas.
Some are terrifying like the Yule Cat (Jólakötturinn) of Iceland which is said to prowl around in the night in search of naughty children to feast on, unless they’re wearing new clothes, in which case, they’re safe.
Another frightening creature which should probably be part of the Halloween canon instead is Krampus, the folkloric devilish creature who accompanies St. Nicholas, and gives naughty children lumps of coal and a bit of a scare. Countries whose lore features Krampus include those in the Central and Eastern Europe regions like Slovakia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania.
Poland, on the other hand, has a merry beast in Turoń, who is an auroch-like creature which dances around in festivals and is said to bring blessings of a good harvest, being a symbol of fertility, virility, and abundance to the people of the land. Turoń is probably the least monstrous on this list as it doesn’t punish anybody for being naughty, although it did chase children around.
And then, there’s the French and their Père Fouettard, literally Father Whipper. Much like Krampus, this old miser of a character tags along with Old St. Nick and gives children lumps of coal or beatings when they have been naughty. Sometimes, they get both, which is what earned him the nickname.
Then, going back to Iceland, we have Grýla the witch or ogress, and her 13 sons called the Yule Lads. Grýla, much like Jólakötturinn, likes to eat naughty children, whom she boils in a pot. Her 13 sons, on the other hand, are naughty pranksters who go gallivanting around town, stealing and harassing people. They also give obedient children gifts and naughty children rotten potatoes.
From these, we can infer that most of these monsters were created simply as deterrents for children’s misbehavior. However, apparently, the Yule Cat also encouraged people to work harder. Since children needed new clothing to protect themselves from the clutches of the 12-foot black cat, this prompted many farms working on wool to increase their productivity.
Nowadays, these monsters have simply become part of some Christmas traditions like Krampuslauf, not necessarily as a means of scaring children during Christmas….’ (Neatorama)
Monthly Archives: December 2023
R.I.P. John Cutler, 73
‘Longtime Grateful Dead producer/engineer John Cutler died at age 73 on Christmas Eve after a long illness as per his brother, Bill Cutler. John Cutler’s numerous credits include co-producing the Grateful Dead’s final two studio albums — 1987’s In The Dark and 1989’s Built To Last — with Jerry Garcia…
John Cutler began doing odd jobs for the Grateful Dead in the early ’70s including the repair of amps. Cutler served as the band’s advance man before their famed September 1978 trip to Egypt for a series of concerts by the pyramids of Giza. After that, he signed on full time as an employee of the Grateful Dead. Among his duties was making a mix used by local radio stations or for television broadcasts, while FOH engineer Dan Healy would do the house mix…
Following Garcia’s death, John Cutler produced and engineered Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia live and studio archival releases. Rob Wasserman, Sanjay Mishra, Backbone, Gov’t Mule, New Grass Revival and Warren Zevon were among other artists Cutler worked with in production or engineering capacities…’ (Jambase)
Man Tries to Fix the Universe By Realigning One Manhole Cover at a Time
‘Comedian Jared Ewy, who is the founder of Green AF, took it upon himself to fix the universe by realigning one manhole cover at a time. His very first effort centered around a particular cover on a street in Beaumar, Colorado that didn’t align with the painted traffic line….’ (Laughing Squid)
Shavian alphabet info | 𐑖𐑱𐑝𐑾𐑯 𐑨𐑤𐑓𐑩𐑚𐑧𐑑 𐑦𐑯𐑓𐑴
An alternative alphabet for English
‘Towards the end of 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis had just ended, it was still a year-and-a-day until the first episode of Doctor Who would air, and a remarkable book was published. It was not the content of the book that was so astonishing; Bernard Shaw’s play Androcles and the Lion was fifty years old by this stage. This edition of Androcles and the Lion witnessed the birth of an entirely new alphabet, and its publication was a close-run thing.
The Shaw alphabet, which came to be more commonly known by the latinised name of “Shavian”, represented the culmination of a lifetime of advocacy by Irish playwright, writer and wit, Bernard Shaw. It was perhaps the subject on which Shaw wrote most earnestly, often—but not always—casting aside his love of levity to argue on purely rational grounds about the economic inefficiencies of silent letters and absurd spellings, and the failure of traditional orthography to offer any instruction to children (or adults, for that matter) on how to speak English….’
𐑑𐑩𐑢𐑹𐑛𐑟 𐑞 𐑧𐑯𐑛 𐑝 1962, 𐑞 ·𐑒𐑿𐑚𐑩𐑯 𐑥𐑦𐑕𐑲𐑤 𐑒𐑮𐑲𐑕𐑦𐑕 𐑣𐑨𐑛 𐑡𐑳𐑕𐑑 𐑧𐑯𐑛𐑩𐑛, 𐑦𐑑 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑕𐑑𐑦𐑤 𐑩 𐑘𐑽-𐑯-𐑩-𐑛𐑱 𐑩𐑯𐑑𐑦𐑤 𐑞 𐑓𐑻𐑕𐑑 𐑧𐑐𐑦𐑕𐑴𐑛 𐑝 ‹·𐑛𐑪𐑒𐑑𐑼 𐑣𐑵› 𐑢𐑫𐑛 𐑺, 𐑯 𐑩 𐑮𐑦𐑥𐑸𐑒𐑩𐑚𐑩𐑤 𐑚𐑫𐑒 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑐𐑳𐑚𐑤𐑦𐑖𐑑. 𐑦𐑑 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑯𐑪𐑑 𐑞 𐑒𐑪𐑯𐑑𐑧𐑯𐑑 𐑝 𐑞 𐑚𐑫𐑒 𐑞𐑨𐑑 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑕𐑴 𐑩𐑕𐑑𐑪𐑯𐑦𐑖𐑦𐑙; ·𐑚𐑻𐑯𐑼𐑛 𐑖𐑷𐑟 𐑐𐑤𐑱 ‹·𐑨𐑯𐑛𐑮𐑩𐑒𐑤𐑰𐑟 𐑯 𐑞 𐑤𐑲𐑩𐑯› 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑓𐑦𐑓𐑑𐑦 𐑘𐑽𐑟 𐑴𐑤𐑛 𐑚𐑲 𐑞𐑦𐑕 𐑕𐑑𐑱𐑡. 𐑞𐑦𐑕 𐑦𐑛𐑦𐑖𐑩𐑯 𐑝 ·𐑨𐑯𐑛𐑮𐑩𐑒𐑤𐑰𐑟 𐑯 𐑞 𐑤𐑲𐑩𐑯 𐑢𐑦𐑑𐑯𐑩𐑕𐑑 𐑞 𐑚𐑻𐑔 𐑝 𐑩𐑯 𐑦𐑯𐑑𐑲𐑼𐑤𐑦 𐑯𐑿 𐑨𐑤𐑓𐑩𐑚𐑧𐑑, 𐑯 𐑦𐑑𐑕 𐑐𐑳𐑚𐑤𐑦𐑒𐑱𐑖𐑩𐑯 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑩 𐑒𐑤𐑴𐑕-𐑮𐑳𐑯 𐑔𐑦𐑙.
𐑞 ·𐑖𐑷 𐑨𐑤𐑓𐑩𐑚𐑧𐑑, 𐑢𐑦𐑗 𐑒𐑱𐑥 𐑑 𐑚𐑰 𐑥𐑹 𐑒𐑪𐑥𐑩𐑯𐑤𐑦 𐑯𐑴𐑯 𐑚𐑲 𐑞 𐑤𐑨𐑑𐑦𐑯𐑲𐑟𐑛 𐑯𐑱𐑥 𐑝 ·𐑖𐑱𐑝𐑾𐑯, 𐑮𐑧𐑐𐑮𐑦𐑟𐑧𐑯𐑑𐑩𐑛 𐑞 𐑒𐑳𐑤𐑥𐑦𐑯𐑱𐑖𐑩𐑯 𐑝 𐑩 𐑤𐑲𐑓𐑑𐑲𐑥 𐑝 𐑨𐑛𐑝𐑩𐑒𐑩𐑕𐑦 𐑚𐑲 𐑲𐑮𐑦𐑖 𐑐𐑤𐑱𐑮𐑲𐑑, 𐑮𐑲𐑑𐑼 𐑯 𐑢𐑦𐑑, ·𐑚𐑻𐑯𐑼𐑛 𐑖𐑷. 𐑦𐑑 𐑢𐑪𐑟 𐑐𐑼𐑣𐑨𐑐𐑕 𐑞 𐑕𐑳𐑚𐑡𐑧𐑒𐑑 𐑪𐑯 𐑢𐑦𐑗 ·𐑖𐑷 𐑮𐑴𐑑 𐑥𐑴𐑕𐑑 𐑻𐑯𐑩𐑕𐑑𐑤𐑦, 𐑪𐑓𐑩𐑯—𐑚𐑳𐑑 𐑯𐑪𐑑 𐑷𐑤𐑢𐑱𐑟—𐑒𐑭𐑕𐑑𐑦𐑙 𐑩𐑕𐑲𐑛 𐑣𐑦𐑟 𐑤𐑳𐑝 𐑝 𐑤𐑧𐑝𐑦𐑑𐑦 𐑑 𐑸𐑜𐑿 𐑪𐑯 𐑐𐑘𐑫𐑼𐑤𐑦 𐑮𐑨𐑖𐑩𐑯𐑩𐑤 𐑜𐑮𐑬𐑯𐑛𐑟 𐑩𐑚𐑬𐑑 𐑞 𐑰𐑒𐑩𐑯𐑪𐑥𐑦𐑒 𐑦𐑯𐑦𐑓𐑦𐑖𐑩𐑯𐑕𐑦𐑟 𐑝 𐑕𐑲𐑤𐑩𐑯𐑑 𐑤𐑧𐑑𐑼𐑟 𐑯 𐑩𐑚𐑕𐑻𐑛 𐑕𐑐𐑧𐑤𐑦𐑙𐑟, 𐑯 𐑞 𐑓𐑱𐑤𐑘𐑼 𐑝 𐑑𐑮𐑩𐑛𐑦𐑖𐑩𐑯𐑩𐑤 𐑹𐑔𐑪𐑜𐑮𐑩𐑓𐑦 𐑑 𐑪𐑓𐑼 𐑧𐑯𐑦 𐑦𐑯𐑕𐑑𐑮𐑳𐑒𐑖𐑩𐑯 𐑑 𐑗𐑦𐑤𐑛𐑮𐑩𐑯 (𐑹 𐑨𐑛𐑳𐑤𐑑𐑕, 𐑓 𐑞𐑨𐑑 𐑥𐑨𐑑𐑼) 𐑪𐑯 𐑣𐑬 𐑑 𐑕𐑐𐑰𐑒 𐑦𐑙𐑜𐑤𐑦𐑖.
Wendell Berry: To Know the Dark
‘To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings….’
New Year’s Customs and Traditions
This is the annual update of my New Year post, a longstanding FmH tradition. Please let me know if you find any dead links:
I once ran across a January 1st Boston Globe article compiling folkloric beliefs about what to do, what to eat, etc. on New Year’s Day to bring good fortune for the year to come. I’ve regretted since — I usually think of it around once a year (grin) — not clipping out and saving the article. Especially since we’ve had children, I’m interested in enduring traditions that go beyond getting drunk [although some comment that this is a profound enactment of the interdigitation of chaos and order appropriate to the New Year’s celebration — FmH], watching the bowl games and making resolutions.
A web search brought me this, less elaborate than what I recall from the Globe but to the same point. It is weighted toward eating traditions, which is odd because, unlike most other major holidays, the celebration of New Year’s in 21st century America does not seem to be centered at all around thinking about what we eat (except in the sense of the traditional weight-loss resolutions!) and certainly not around a festive meal. But…
Traditionally, it was thought that one could affect the luck they would have throughout the coming year by what they did or ate on the first day of the year. For that reason, it has become common for folks to celebrate the first few minutes of a brand new year in the company of family and friends. Parties often last into the middle of the night after the ringing in of a new year. It was once believed that the first visitor on New Year’s Day would bring either good luck or bad luck the rest of the year. It was particularly lucky if that visitor happened to be a tall dark-haired man.
“Traditional New Year foods are also thought to bring luck. Many cultures believe that anything in the shape of a ring is good luck, because it symbolizes “coming full circle,” completing a year’s cycle. For that reason, the Dutch believe that eating donuts on New Year’s Day will bring good fortune.
Many parts of the U.S. celebrate the new year by consuming black-eyed peas. These legumes are typically accompanied by either hog jowls or ham. Black-eyed peas and other legumes have been considered good luck in many cultures. The hog, and thus its meat, is considered lucky because it symbolizes prosperity. Cabbage is another ‘good luck’ vegetable that is consumed on New Year’s Day by many. Cabbage leaves are also considered a sign of prosperity, being representative of paper currency. In some regions, rice is a lucky food that is eaten on New Year’s Day.”
The further north one travels in the British Isles, the more the year-end festivities focus on New Year’s. The Scottish observance of Hogmanay has many elements of warming heart and hearth, welcoming strangers and making a good beginning:
“Three cornered biscuits called hogmanays are eaten. Other special foods are: wine, ginger cordial, cheese, bread, shortbread, oatcake, carol or carl cake, currant loaf, and a pastry called scones. After sunset people collect juniper and water to purify the home. Divining rituals are done according to the directions of the winds, which are assigned their own colors.
First Footing: The first person who comes to the door on midnightshould be a dark-haired or dark-complected man with gifts for luck. Seeing a cat, dog, woman, red-head or beggar is unlucky. The person brings a gift (handsel) of coal or whiskey to ensure prosperity in the New Year. Mummer’s Plays are also performed. The actors called the White Boys of Yule are all dressed in white, except for one dressed as the devil in black. It is bad luck to engage in marriage proposals, break glass, spin flax, sweep or carry out rubbish on New Year’s Eve.”
Here’s why we clink our glasses when we drink our New Year’s toasts, no matter where we are. Of course, sometimes the midnight cacophony is louder than just clinking glassware, to create a ‘devil-chasing din’.
In Georgia, eat black eyed peas and turnip greens on New Year’s Day for luck and prosperity in the year to come, supposedly because they symbolize coppers and currency. Hoppin’ John, a concoction of peas, onion, bacon and rice, is also a southern New Year’s tradition, as is wearing yellow to find true love (in Peru and elsewhere in South America, yellow underwear, apparently!) or carrying silver for prosperity. In some instances, a dollar bill is thrown in with the other ingredients of the New Year’s meal to bring prosperity. In Greece, there is a traditional New Year’s Day sweetbread with a silver coin baked into it. All guests get a slice of the bread and whoever receives the slice with the coin is destined for good fortune for the year. At Italian tables, lentils, oranges and olives are served. The lentils, looking like coins, will bring prosperity; the oranges are for love; and the olives, symbolic of the wealth of the land, represent good fortune for the year to come.
A New Year’s meal in Norway also includes dried cod, “lutefisk.” The Pennsylvania Dutch make sure to include sauerkraut in their holiday meal, also for prosperity.
In Spain, you would cram twelve grapes in your mouth at midnight, one each time the clock chimed, for good luck for the twelve months to come. (If any of the grapes happens to be sour, the corresponding month will not be one of your most fortunate in the coming year.) The U. S. version of this custom, for some reason, involves standing on a chair as you pop the grapes. In Denmark, jumping off a chair at the stroke of midnight signifies leaping into the New Year. In Rio,
The crescent-shaped Copacabana beach… is the scene of an unusual New Year’s Eve ritual: mass public blessings by the mother-saints of the Macumba and Candomble sects. More than 1 million people gather to watch colorful fireworks displays before plunging into the ocean at midnight after receiving the blessing from the mother-saints, who set up mini-temples on the beach.
When taking the plunge, revelers are supposed to jump over seven waves, one for each day of the week.
This is all meant to honor Lamanjá, known as the “Mother of Waters” or “Goddess of the Sea.” Lamanjá protects fishermen and survivors of shipwrecks. Believers also like to throw rice, jewelry and other gifts into the water, or float them out into the sea in intimately crafted miniature boats, to please Lamanjá in the new year.
In many northern hemisphere cities near bodies of water, people also take a New Year’s Day plunge into the water, although of course it is an icy one! The Coney Island Polar Bears Club in New York is the oldest cold-water swimming club in the United States. They have had groups of people enter the chilly surf since 1903.
Ecuadorian families make scarecrows stuffed with newspaper and firecrackers and place them outside their homes. The dummies represent misfortunes of the prior year, which are then burned in effigy at the stroke of midnight to forget the old year. Bolivian families make beautiful little wood or straw dolls to hang outside their homes on New Year’s Eve to bring good luck.
In China, homes are cleaned spotless to appease the Kitchen God, and papercuttings of red paper are hung in the windows to scare away evil spirits who might enter the house and bring misfortune. Large papier mache dragon heads with long fabric bodies are maneuvered through the streets during the Dragon Dance festival, and families open their front doors to let the dragon bring good luck into their homes.
The Indian Diwali, or Dipawali, festival, welcoming in the autumnal season, also involves attracting good fortune with lights. Children make small clay lamps, dipas, thousands of which might adorn a given home. In Thailand, one pours fragrant water over the hands of elders on New Year’s Day to show them respect.
- a stack of pancakes for the New Year’s breakfast in France.
- banging on friends’ doors in Denmark to “smash in” the New Year, where it is also a good sign to find your doorstep heaped with broken dishes on New Year’s morning. Old dishes are saved all years to throw at your friends’ homes on New Year’s Eve. The more broken pieces you have, the greater the number of new friends you will have in the forthcoming twelve months.
- going in the front door and out the back door at midnight in Ireland.
- making sure the First Footer, the first person through your door in the New Year in Scotland, is a tall dark haired visitor.
- water out the window at midnight in Puerto Rico rids the home of evil spirits.
- cleanse your soul in Japan at the New Year by listening to a gong tolling 108 times, one for every sin
- it is Swiss good luck to let a drop of cream fall on the floor on New Year’s Day.
- Belgian farmers wish their animals a Happy New Year for blessings.
In Germany and Austria, lead pouring” (das Bleigießen) is an old divining practice using molten lead like tea leaves. A small amount of lead is melted in a tablespoon (by holding a flame under the spoon) and then poured into a bowl or bucket of water. The resulting pattern is interpreted to predict the coming year. For instance, if the lead forms a ball (der Ball), that means luck will roll your way. The shape of an anchor (der Anker) means help in need. But a cross (das Kreuz) signifies death. This is also a practice in parts of Finland, apparently.- El Salvadoreans crack an egg in a glass at midnight and leave it on the windowsill overnight; whatever figure it has made in the morning is indicative of one’s fortune for the year.
- Some Italians like to take part in throwing pots, pans, and old furniture from their windows when the clock strikes midnight. This is done as a way for residents to rid of the old and welcome in the new. It also allows them to let go of negativity. This custom is also practiced in parts of South Africa, the Houston Press adds.
- In Colombia, walk around with an empty suitcase on New Year’s Day for a year full of travel.
- In the Philippines, all the lights in the house are turned on at midnight, and previously opened windows, doors and cabinets throughout the house are suddenly slammed shut, to ward off evil spirits for the new year.
- In Russia a wish is written down on a piece of paper. It is burned and the ash dissolved in a glass of champagne, which should be downed before 12:01 am if the wish is to come true.
Romanians celebrate the new year by wearing bear costumes and dancing around to ward off evil- In Turkey, pomegranates are thrown down from the balconies at midnight for good luck.
- How to Celebrate the New Year in Greenland? Terrify Everyone.‘ Masked figures chase people throughout Mitaarfik….’
“It’s a bit bizarre when you think about it. A short British cabaret sketch from the 1920s has become a German New Year’s tradition. Yet, although
The 90th Birthday or Dinner for One
is a famous cult classic in Germany and several other European countries, it is virtually unknown in the English-speaking world, including Britain, its birthplace.” (Watch on Youtube, 11 min.)
So if the Germans watch British video, what do you watch in Britain? A number of sources have suggested that it is Jools Holland’s Hootenanny, “even though it’s awful and everyone hates it.”
On a related theme, from earlier in the same week, here are some of the more bizarre Christmas rituals from around the world.
Some history; documentation of observance of the new year dates back at least 4000 years to the Babylonians, who also made the first new year’s resolutions (reportedly voews to return borrowed farm equipment were very popular), although their holiday was observed at the vernal equinox. The Babylonian festivities lasted eleven days, each day with its own particular mode of celebration. The traditional Persian Norouz festival of spring continues to be considered the advent of the new year among Persians, Kurds and other peoples throughout Central Asia, and dates back at least 3000 years, deeply rooted in Zooastrian traditions.Modern Bahá’í’s celebrate Norouz (”Naw Ruz”) as the end of a Nineteen Day Fast. Rosh Hashanah (”head of the year”), the Jewish New Year, the first day of the lunar month of Tishri, falls between September and early October. Muslim New Year is the first day of Muharram, and Chinese New Year falls between Jan. 10th and Feb. 19th of the Gregorian calendar.
The classical Roman New Year’s celebration was also in the spring although the calendar went out of synchrony with the sun. January 1st became the first day of the year by proclamation of the Roman Senate in 153 BC, reinforced even more strongly when Julius Caesar established what came to be known as the Julian calendar in 46 BC. The early Christian Church condemned new year’s festivities as pagan but created parallel festivities concurrently. New Year’s Day is still observed as the Feast of Christ’s Circumcision in some denominations. Church opposition to a new year’s observance reasserted itself during the Middle Ages, and Western nations have only celebrated January 1 as a holidy for about the last 400 years. The custom of New Year’s gift exchange among Druidic pagans in 7th century Flanders was deplored by Saint Eligius, who warned them, “[Do not] make vetulas, [little figures of the Old Woman], little deer or iotticos or set tables [for the house-elf] at night or exchange New Year gifts or supply superfluous drinks [another Yule custom].” (Wikipedia)
The tradition of the New Year’s Baby signifying the new year began with the Greek tradition of parading a baby in a basket during the Dionysian rites celebrating the annual rebirth of that god as a symbol of fertility. The baby was also a symbol of rebirth among early Egyptians. Again, the Church was forced to modify its denunciation of the practice as pagan because of the popularity of the rebirth symbolism, finally allowing its members to cellebrate the new year with a baby although assimilating it to a celebration of the birth of the baby Jesus. The addition of Father Time (the “Old Year”) wearing a sash across his chest with the previous year on it, and the banner carried or worn by the New Year’s Baby, immigrated from Germany. Interestingly, January 1st is not a legal holiday in Israel, officially because of its historic origins as a Christian feast day.
Auld Lang Syne (literally ‘old long ago’ in the Scottish dialect) is sung or played at the stroke of midnight throughout the English-speaking world (and then there is George Harrison’s “Ring Out the Old”). Versions of the song have been part of the New Year’s festivities since the 17th century but Robert Burns was inspired to compose a modern rendition, which was published after his death in 1796. (It took Guy Lombardo, however, to make it popular…)
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
and never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
and days of auld lang syne?
For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we’ll take a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
and never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
and days of auld lang syne?
And here’s a hand, my trusty friend
And gie’s a hand o’ thine
We’ll tak’ a cup o’ kindness yet
For auld lang syne
Here’s how to wish someone a Happy New Year around the world:
- Arabic: Kul ‘aam u antum salimoun
- Brazilian: Boas Festas e Feliz Ano Novo means “Good Parties and Happy New Year”
- Chinese:
Chu Shen TanXin Nian Kuai Le (thanks, Jeff)- Czechoslavakia: Scastny Novy Rok
- Dutch: Gullukkig Niuw Jaar
- Finnish: Onnellista Uutta Vuotta
- French: Bonne Annee
- German: Prosit Neujahr
- Greek: Eftecheezmaenos o Kaenooryos hronos
- Hebrew: L’Shannah Tovah Tikatevu
- Hindi: Niya Saa Moobaarak
- Irish (Gaelic): Bliain nua fe mhaise dhuit
- Italian: Buon Capodanno
- Khmer: Sua Sdei tfnam tmei
- Laotian: Sabai dee pee mai
- Polish: Szczesliwego Nowego Roku
- Portuguese: Feliz Ano Novo
- Russian: S Novim Godom
- Serbo-Croatian: Scecna nova godina
- Spanish: Feliz Ano Nuevo
- Swedish: Ha ett gott nytt år
- Turkish: Yeni Yiliniz Kutlu Olsun
- Vietnamese: Cung-Chuc Tan-Xuan
[If you are a native speaker, please feel free to offer any corrections or additions!]
Which of these customs appeal to you? Are they done in your family, or will you try to adopt any of them? However you’re going to celebrate, my warmest wishes for the year to come… and eat hearty!
[thanks to Bruce Umbaugh (here or here) for original assistance]
Related?
- Lucky Foods for the New Year (wholefoodsmarket.com)
- New Year’s Day food traditions around the world (examiner.com)
- Lucky foods to Eat on New Year’s Day (kasamba.com)
- 10 Good Luck Foods (beatcancer2010.wordpress.com)
- Good luck food for New Year’s Day (mnn.com)
- New Year’s Eve Traditions 3 (languagelearnersandteachers.wordpress.com)
- How to Manifest Good Luck in the New Year (norinedresser.wordpress.com)
- New Year’s foods for prosperity and luck?
- What’s Cooking in January
- Pickle, Peach, Carp Drops Mark New Year
- It’s New Year’s Eve, You’re Drunk and Damnit, You Drove
- Regency Christmas Traditions: Hogmanay (trsparties.com)
Why trump and Ronna McDaniel Will Regret Michigan Phone Call
‘They weren’t just bullying two Michigan election officials. A case can be made that they were bribing them….’ (Daily Beast)
Putin Quietly Signals He Is Open to a Cease-Fire in Ukraine
A damaged skyscraper in a Moscow business district after a reported drone attack in August.
‘Buoyed by Ukraine’s failed counteroffensive and flagging Western support, Mr. Putin says that Russia’s war goals have not changed. Addressing his generals on Tuesday, he boasted that Ukraine was so beleaguered that Russia’s invading troops were doing “what we want.”
“We won’t give up what’s ours,” he pledged, adding dismissively, “If they want to negotiate, let them negotiate.”
But in a recent push of back-channel diplomacy, Mr. Putin has been sending a different message: He is ready to make a deal.
Mr. Putin has been signaling through intermediaries since at least September that he is open to a cease-fire that freezes the fighting along the current lines, far short of his ambitions to dominate Ukraine, two former senior Russian officials close to the Kremlin and American and international officials who have received the message from Mr. Putin’s envoys say….’ (The New York Times)
A brief history of the end of the world: Every mass extinction, including the looming next one, explained
‘at least five times, a biological catastrophe has engulfed the planet, killing off the vast majority of species from water and land over a relatively short geological interval.
New analysis identifies largest threat to thousands of species facing extinction
The most famous of these mass extinction events — when an asteroid slammed into Earth 66 million years ago, dooming the dinosaurs and many other species — is also the most recent. But scientists say it won’t be the last.Many researchers argue we’re in the middle of a sixth mass extinction, caused not by a city-size space rock but by the overgrowth and transformative behavior of a single species — Homo sapiens. Humans have destroyed habitats and unleashed a climate crisis.
Calculations in a September study published in the journal PNAS have suggested that groups of related animal species are disappearing at a rate 35% times higher than the normally expected rate.
And while every mass extinction has winners and losers, there is no reason to assume that human beings in this case would be among the survivors.
In fact, study coauthor Gerardo Ceballos thinks the opposite could come to pass, with the sixth mass extinction transforming the whole biosphere, or the area of the world hospitable to life — possibly into a state in which it may be impossible for humanity to persist unless dramatic action is taken.
“Biodiversity will recover but the winners (are) very difficult to predict. Many of the losers in these past mass extinctions were incredibly successful groups,” said Ceballos, a senior researcher at the Institute of Ecology at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
While the causes of the “big five” mass extinctions varied, understanding what happened during these dramatic chapters in Earth’s history — and what emerged in the aftermath of these cataclysms — can be instructive….’ (CNN)
Worrisome and ‘enigmatic’ chemical reactions in two LA-area landfills
‘As of November 2023, the “reaction area” in one of the L.A. dumps “had grown by 30 to 35 acres, according to the agency [CalRecycle]. Already, the heat has melted or deformed the landfill’s gas collection system, which consists mostly of polyvinyl chloride well casings. The damage has hindered the facility’s efforts to collect toxic pollutants.” This seems to imply it will get worse, and nearby residents have begun reporting chemical smells.
“The bad news,” L.A. County Supervisor Kathryn Barger told the paper, “is we’ve never seen anything like this, and if we don’t understand what triggered it, it could happen at other landfills that are dormant. So it’s important for us to get a handle on it.” The earth, riddled with dormant landfills, attaining enigmatic chemical vigor in the darkness…’ (Geoff Manaugh via BLDGBLOG )
The Real Russian Nuclear Threat
‘The advent of the war triggered fears of outright nuclear conflict between the West and Russia. That period of somewhat frenzied speculation has passed. The war has since settled into a grinding—but conventional—stalemate. To be sure, U.S. officials are still concerned that Russia may use tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield. “I worry about Putin using tactical nuclear weapons,” U.S. President Joe Biden said in June. The risk, he continued, is “real.” But officials do not appear to believe that the war in Ukraine could lead Russia to use its nuclear arsenal against a NATO state, however furious it is at the West for supporting Ukraine.
That is a mistake. U.S. officials have it backward. It is actually quite unlikely that Russian President Vladimir Putin will use a nuclear weapon on the battlefield in Ukraine, but it is very possible that he will move toward using one against NATO. Unlike the West, Putin may not fear a nuclear standoff: he is well versed in Russia’s nuclear arsenal and the tenets of nuclear deterrence, and possibly sees himself as uniquely suited to navigating a nuclear crisis. And Putin has been remarkably consistent that Russia is willing to use nuclear weapons against NATO to defend its interests in Ukraine. Even eight years ago, in a television interview done a year after Russia invaded Crimea, Putin declared that he had been ready to place Russian nuclear forces on alert to prevent Western forces from interfering in Moscow’s takeover of the peninsula.
Russian nuclear weapons use is not imminent. But if Putin does escalate the war, for instance by attacking NATO with conventional weapons, he will likely move very swiftly, so as not to give the United States a chance to maneuver away from a crisis. Washington will struggle to deter a Kremlin so emboldened. Ukraine is too central to the Kremlin’s ambitions—and too secondary to the United States’—for Putin to believe any American threats. Ultimately, Putin will expect the United States to back down before fighting a nuclear conflict over land so far from home….’ ( By Peter Schroeder via Foreign Affairs )
The Three Bomb Problem
‘In an influential article published last April, Andrew Krepinevich argued that we are entering a new nuclear age. China, he said, is ‘upending the bipolar nuclear power system’. That world was dangerous enough, but a world of three major thermonuclear powers could be much worse. ‘In a tripolar system,’ Krepinevich argued, ‘it is simply not possible for each state to maintain nuclear parity with the combined arsenals of its two rivals.’ Any attempt to do so would likely result in an uncontrolled arms race, increasing the chances of a catastrophic war.
Think of the three body problem in classical mechanics. The interactions of two masses are relatively easy to calculate, but three are unstable and chaotic: there is no easy equilibrium. Nuclear armed states create a similar dynamic, a three bomb problem….’ ( Tom Stevenson via The London Review of Books )
Warm Places May Have Loud Languages and Cold Places May Be Quieter
‘Places that are usually hot or cold developed languages differently….’ ( via Atlas Obscura )
Beware the Yule Cat, Iceland’s Child-Eating Christmas Monster
‘For travelers unfamiliar with Iceland’s stories and mythical legends, the idea of a 12-foot-tall, bloodthirsty cat may not seem to have the most natural tie with Christmas good cheer. But in a country where a third of residents report a belief in hidden people and an entire school devoted to studying elves, Jólakötturinn starts to make sense….’ (Atlas Obscura)
Think You Are a Person of Good Taste?
I just became acquainted with Pierre Bourdieu’s 1979 Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, published by of all people MIT Press. While I no longer have much patience for the tortuous language of a certain genre of postmodern French intellectuals, Bourdieu’s observations, drawn from the empirical study of 1960’s French society, are intriguing.
Our preferences regarding cultural phenomena — art, music, clothing styles, other consumer goods — are not simply matters of personal preference but are shaped by, and become signifiers of, our social position. Class status and social inequality are maintained by generational transmission of one’s cultural capital. Cultural institutions such as museums and schools perpetuate inequalities by favoring certain forms of cultural capital over others. Your sense that you are a person of good taste is reinforced by, and becomes a powerful reinforcer of, your sense of social belonging, largely unconsciously.
This wonderful article draws out the implications to the succeeding decades’ more modern culture through the author’s introspection on their own tastes, while skewering the obfuscating complexity of the discourse (itself a cultural signifier) and recasting the argument in plain English.
A Warm and Happy Winter Solstice!
And so the Shortest Day came and the Year died,
And everywhere down the centuries of that snow white world
came people
Singing, Dancing
To drive the Dark away.
They lighted candles in the winter trees
They hung their homes with evergreens
They burned beseeching fires, all night long
To keep the Year alive
And when the new Year’s sunshine blazed awake, they shouted
Reveling!
Through all the frosty ages, you can hear them
Echoing behind us.
Listen.
All the long echos sing the same delight
this Shortest Day
As promise wakens in the sleeping land
They carol, feast, give thanks, and dearly love their friends,
And hope for peace.
And so do we, here, now
This year and every year: Welcome Yule!
All: Welcome Yule!
— Susan Cooper, “The Shortest Day”
AI tool can guess your location from a single photo – a privacy nightmare
‘…[A] new AI project has just emerged that can pinpoint the location of where almost any photo was taken – and it has the potential to become a privacy nightmare.
The project, dubbed Predicting Image Geolocations (or PIGEON for short) was created by three students at Stanford University and was designed to help find where images from Google Street View were taken. But when fed personal photos it had never seen before, it was even able to accurately find their locations, usually with a high degree of accuracy….’ (TechRadar)
Support the Continuation of the Dog Aging Project. Sign the petition!
I signed a petition on Action Network telling Monica M. Bertagnolli, M.D., Director of the National Institutes of Health to Support the Continuation of the Dog Aging Project.
The Dog Aging Project represents a pioneering effort in the scientific community. It engages nearly 50,000 Americans in research, and drives significant advancements in aging biology. Despite its remarkable success, the project now faces uncertainty. Your voice is crucial to secure its future. Initiated with National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding in 2018, this project aims to understand aging in dogs, and to ultimately help us extend healthy lifespan of both humans and pets. It has surpassed all expectations, even amidst the COVID-19 pandemic’s challenges, with substantial achievements such as:
- Creating the largest longitudinal study of aging in the world
- Publishing over 50 influential peer-reviewed papers
- Developing a free, open-access database with more than 36.5 million data points
- Initiating the first-ever randomized clinical trial for longevity
These efforts have sparked global research and inspired biotechnology companies to seek new life-extending treatments.
Now, we stand at a crossroads. The Dog Aging Project has become a symbol of hope, demonstrating the power of science in a period of skepticism. Its loss would not only hinder advancements in health but also diminish the public’s engagement with science and their faith in NIH.
We urge the NIH to reaffirm their commitment to this vital work. This isn’t merely about scientific inquiry; it’s about improving lives. Join us in advocating for the Dog Aging Project. Together, we can secure a future where the health and vitality of our beloved dogs shed light on our own paths to healthy long lives.
Act now. Lend your voice to champion the Dog Aging Project and contribute to a healthier tomorrow.
Can you join me and take action? Click here: https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/support-the-continuation-of-the-dog-aging-project?source=email&
Forget Halloween, Bring Ghost Stories Back to Christmas
‘If your idea of festive joy is being haunted by past memories or driven insane by mysterious specters, have we got the tradition for you….’ (The New York Times)
How Scientists Are Using AI to Talk to Animals: stop trying to teach them human language and begin to understand theirs
‘The invention of digital bioacoustics is analogous to the invention of the microscope. When Dutch scientist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek started looking through his microscopes, he discovered the microbial world, and that laid the foundation for countless future breakthroughs. So the microscope enabled humans to see anew with both our eyes and our imaginations.
The analogy here is that digital bioacoustics, combined with artificial intelligence, is like a planetary-scale hearing aid that enables us to listen anew with both our prosthetically enhanced ears and our imagination. This is slowly opening our minds not only to the wonderful sounds that nonhumans make but to a fundamental set of questions about the so-called divide between humans and nonhumans, our relationship to other species.
It’s also opening up new ways to think about conservation and our relationship to the planet. It’s pretty profound….’ ( Sophie Bushwick via Scientific American )
