My mare she needs a saddle cloth

[sovay]

I aten't dead, I have just stopped sleeping again, which produces similar absence of evidence on the internet. Have a couple of links.

1. Courtesy of spatch: seventeenth-century armillary sphere finger rings. The oldest of my three rings is a replica of an eleventh-century Benedictine sundial ring, but that doesn't mean I can't covet something like this.

2. Also courtesy of spatch, who has been re-reading Michael Tisserand's Krazy: George Herriman, a Life in Black and White (2016), a delightful quotation which handily features in this article on the gender fluidity of Krazy Kat:

Krazy's gender, to the consternation of many readers, was never stable. Herriman would switch the cat's pronouns every so often, sometimes within a strip; in one, from 1921, Krazy switches gender four times in a single sentence. When Krazy is portrayed as male, the comic becomes the story of one male character openly pining for another—in some touching scenes, the characters even nestle together to sleep. For all his pestering and punishing of Krazy, Ignatz ultimately seems to have a soft spot for the ingenuous cat; when Krazy plants a kiss on a sleeping Ignatz in one daily, Ignatz's dreams, suddenly visible to the reader, become filled with little cupids and hearts. In two strips from 1915, Krazy wonders aloud "whether to take unto myself a 'wife' or a 'husband.'" In a strip from 1922, an owl attempts to find out Krazy's gender by knocking on the cat's door and asking if the lady or gentleman of the house is in, only to find that Krazy answers to both titles. At the end of the exchange, Krazy charmingly self-identifies simply as "me."

Some fans of "Krazy Kat" were mystified by all of this. In his autobiography, the director Frank Capra described a conversation he had with Herriman on the subject. "I asked him if Krazy Kat was a he or a she," he writes. Herriman, Capra tells us, lit his pipe before answering. "I get dozens of letters asking me the same question," Herriman told Capra. "I don't know. I fooled around with it once; began to think the Kat is a girl—even drew up some strips with her being pregnant. It wasn't the Kat any longer; too much concerned with her own problems—like a soap opera. . . . Then I realized Krazy was something like a sprite, an elf," he continued, according to Capra. "They have no sex. So the Kat can't be a he or a she. The Kat's a spirit—a pixie—free to butt into anything." Capra, bemused by the answer, remarked, "If there's any pixie around here, he's smoking a pipe."

We agreed that "free to butt into anything" is the best description of a cat, no matter what.

3. Courtesy of a friend who is not on Dreamwidth: the 1974 theft of the grasshopper weathervane from Faneuil Hall. "If I could just interrupt myself for a moment, a 100-foot crane is enormous."

On the recommendation of sholio and isis, I have watched nearly two seasons so far of Turn: Washington's Spies (2014–17) and I am extremely fond of the disaster astronomer who really shouldn't be in charge of a British garrison. Also I envy most of the cast their waistcoats.

Comments

[isis]

OMG I covet that ring too!

And yay for finally watching Turn!

[yhlee]

Actually, I have a cheap armillary sphere ring (probably made of brass) that I think I bought off Etsy or eBay. If one is not picky, these things can be had for maybe $20.

[nineweaving]

O my! I want to give that ring to my character Margaret. I want one myself.

Nine

[davidgillon]

I aten't dead, I have just stopped sleeping again

Sympathies, I'm just getting over a bout of that (says he at 4AM). Hope you get some decent sleep soon.

[reconditarmonia]

I love armillary spheres! I saw some great ones at the Museo Galileo in 2018. And ended up getting, not an actual armillary sphere piece of jewelry, but one with a few orbit-y rings (as a necklace) that I wear very frequently because having something to play with is really helpful to me.

[gwynnega]

That is excellent information about Krazy Kat.

I've added Turn to my Netflix queue.

[teenybuffalo]

The article about George Herriman is lovely. I grew up with his cartoons for the archy and mehitabel poems, so I feel fond of his work even though I've never read any of Krazy Kat.

[egologic]

As a boy growing up in the early 60s in Buzzards Bay I remember watching Krazy Kat cartoons. I believe we received our television programming from Cambridge. It's been a while since I read it but I can recommend "Krazy Kat" by Jay Cantor. This Washington Post from 1988 might help you decide if this book is for you. I'm assuming you don't need a subscription to read it. https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1988/01/11/a-krazy-kat-by-the-tale/3d1d5703-a681-46c6-bc9e-bd3faeef7189/

It's been a while since my husband and I watched "Turn" so I'm not absolutely certain but I think you can see Anna Strong in an exhibit at the NSA's National Cryptologic Museum. The exhibit, if memory serves, covers the people in the NSA's history. It's called "The Legacy of Women in American Cryptology."
https://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic-heritage/museum/

If you look at the photo, there's the image of a woman at top and all the way to the left that I believe is Anna Strong. I liked watching the series and seeing her recognized in the exhibit.

[ashlyme]

O Lord how I desire those rings. And possibly a pocket orrery too.

Has anyone considered the (facetious) theory that the grasshopper jumped off its perch? It might be hopping around a large gilded field even now. *ducks*

[oracne]

That is totally cool about Krazy Kat.

[alexxkay]

On the off-chance that spatch is rereading by coincidence and hasn't seen this tweet from the author: https://mobile.twitter.com/m_tisserand/status/1297047122529878016