
~Edgar Allan Poe

Friday, March 15, 2019

Weekend Link Dump

Entertainment for this week's Link Dump is provided by the Strange Company Choir!

Watch out for the Ohio River Octoman!

France's first serial killer.

How old newspapers covered the Bell Witch.

The secret to fasting like a 17th century monk?  Beer!

Surgical anesthesia is not as effective as you'd like to think.  (Personal note:  I used to date the son of a former anesthesiologist.  I say "former," because he eventually decided he could not bear the job any longer.  He, the dad, enjoyed telling me various horror stories he had seen in the operating room, and boy howdy, were they doozies.  I once told him, "You know, thanks to you, I will never consent to having any sort of surgery, no matter how bad off I am."  He replied, "You're a very wise girl.")

The history of one of my favorite gemstones, amethyst.

That time a Princess and a Countess fought a duel over flower arrangements.

Facebook needs to be killed with an ax, and Mark Zuckerburg given a one-way ticket to Pluto.

And he should take Google with him.

The link between King Tut and some ancient Nordic graves.

The story behind Britain's Contagious Diseases Acts.

The woman who ran a WWII spy network.

A learned pig.

A treasure map tattoo.

One heck of a treehouse.

A spy's bizarre death.

Emily Dickinson's fruitcake recipe.

Santa Barbara is really getting hairy.

How to ride "en cavalier."

Two swimming vegetarian cats.

Ghosts seeking a higher education flock to Loyola University.

Farewell to the Water Poet.

Cats here,
Cats there,
Cats and kittens everywhere,
Hundreds of cats,
Thousands of cats,
Millions and billions and trillions of cats.

No, we're not talking about Strange Company HQ.  It's the first American picture book.

Eve Babitz, chronicler of 1970s Los Angeles.

How the sun could kill us all.

Then again, the scientists might beat the sun to it.

Stylish mourning jewels.

The saga of the White Rose of Miamis.

The Elmira, NY, suicide epidemic of 1920.

Charles Dickens and the crossing sweeper.

What might happen if Yellowstone erupts?  I'm not a scientist, but I feel pretty confident in saying, we wouldn't like it.

Fortean odors.

The haunting of Rectory Lane.

Early 19th century nursery songs.

Oh, just a peasant woman and her demon cat baby.

Trust me, this is not how to go down in history.

The diary of a visitor to West Africa in 1954.

Horatio Nelson's abandoned wife.

A bequest of bindings.

A remarkable WWII rescue story.

Decoding the DNA of Lil Bub.

The darker side of fairies.

The world's last Blockbuster store.

More evidence that something very, very bad happened to our planet 13,000 years ago.

St. Patrick's day traditions.

That does it for this week. See you on Monday, when we'll look at the mystery surrounding the disappearance of a young bicyclist. In the meantime, here's a bit of Italian Baroque:


  1. I am quite disappointed there is no mention of hair color in the anesthesia article. Although "redhead" syndrome isn't necessarily limited to redheads, I do think a smart anesthesiologist should be aware of this. I am allergic to local anesthetic, and i wake up too fast from general.

  2. I liked the article about Fourcade, though I take issue with the notion that she is unknown today because she is a woman. If any special operators of World War Two are remembered at all these days, it's the women who stand out - Violette Szabo, Odette, Noor Inayat Khan, Nancy Wake, etc. Sometimes people are forgotten or neglected for reasons that have nothing to do with political correctness. If J. S. Bach can be neglected by musicians for eighty years after his death (and dismissed by many in his old age) then it can happen to anyone.

