All the water in my body come through

[sovay]

I have had a useless and exhausted day. I made a sandwich. I tapped out of a movie. Hestia snuggled into the chair behind me and chewed on my hair. I went for a walk in the faintly ecliptic light of the Canadian wildfire drift that has turned the moon red as harvest the last two nights and photographed some flowering things.



The hibiscus was the size of a dinner plate and turned like a radio dish toward the sun.



However this plant had begun life, it wilted beautifully.



Return to the planet of the plate-sized hibiscus.

Please enjoy this 1934 RKO Technicolor screen test of Katherine Hepburn as Joan of Arc, discovered courtesy of staring at this gifset and tracking its origins feverishly down through MOMA. The production failed to materialize thanks to George Bernard Shaw's possessiveness over the script of Saint Joan. What an incredible fragment from the hell of a good Hollywood next door.

It seems my childhood exposure to Arthuriana was such that if I read an article about a water well that collapsed in the digging in first-century CE Roman Britain, my brain immediately decides it was dragons. Endemic construction hazard. Like the water table. Enough excavation and it's dragons every time.

Comments

[gwynnega]

I love those hibiscus photos!

OMG Hepburn as Joan of Arc. That really should have happened.

[sovay]

I love those hibiscus photos!

Thank you!

OMG Hepburn as Joan of Arc. That really should have happened.

I know. She's incandescent. Instead RKO lost money on her with The Little Minister (1934), which sounds glurgy as all heck. Thanks, Shaw.

[julian]

"...glurgy as all heck..."

It was. She had a *bunch* of awful stuff like that early on.

I love her cheekbones here. Her mannerisms-in-movement, as ever, bother me a bit, but my goodness what a face in light. I *wish* Shaw had let them do it.

[sovay]

It was. She had a *bunch* of awful stuff like that early on.

Condolences on the experience.

I love her cheekbones here. Her mannerisms-in-movement, as ever, bother me a bit, but my goodness what a face in light. I *wish* Shaw had let them do it.

She could have done the language. And she looked astonishing.

(Her cheekbones in this lighting—I wish Shaw had seen the screen test—made me think of Wendy Hiller.)

[sovay]

She had a *bunch* of awful stuff like that early on.

spatch and I just saw Mary of Scotland (1936).

[pameladean]

A radar dish is exactly what that hibiscus looks like. It's a shame they aren't all that pretty.

I wish your construction people would find a dragon, I tell you what.

P.

[asakiyume]

Petition for all radar dishes to have hibiscus crimps and coloring from now on.

[pameladean]

Signed! This would completely transform the appearance of so many neighborhoods! P.

[sovay]

Petition for all radar dishes to have hibiscus crimps and coloring from now on.

I could get behind this.

[sovay]

A radar dish is exactly what that hibiscus looks like. It's a shame they aren't all that pretty.

I have an affection for radar dishes because of radio astronomy, but I have an affection for hibiscus, too.

I wish your construction people would find a dragon, I tell you what.

*hugs*

[thisbluespirit]

*shakes fist at everything again for you* *hugs*

Those are beautiful flowers! And I had seen that gifset on tumblr, but it was very cool to see the clip. Certainly an interesting alternate universe going there.

my brain immediately decides it was dragons. Endemic construction hazard. Like the water table. Enough excavation and it's dragons every time.

Aw. (I was slightly amused that the article concludes quite solemnly that the inhabitants must have been digging the well because they needed water.)

ETA: Just got up BBC Sounds to get the next Twelve Maidens ep up, and the continuity announcer got carried away by how many Martin Jarvises he was having to announce that evening, lol.

[sovay]

Those are beautiful flowers! And I had seen that gifset on tumblr, but it was very cool to see the clip. Certainly an interesting alternate universe going there.

Thank you! I'm glad I hunted the source of the gifset down; the context was fascinating and the full range of motion worth it to me.

ETA: Just got up BBC Sounds to get the next Twelve Maidens ep up, and the continuity announcer got carried away by how many Martin Jarvises he was having to announce that evening, lol.

A multiplication of Martin Jarvises in a stone ring absolutely sounds like an Iron problem to me.

*hugs*

[asakiyume]

We should be listening in on the signal the hibiscus is receiving--I feel like it might be salutary.

I have never seen a screen test before! I didn't realize they're silent (it is silent, right? I had my volume on, and it was showing that the volume was on at Youtube, but I didn't get sound). Katherine Hepburn looks so young--and yet checking IMDb I discover she'd already been in some other films by now. I was a little freaked out by how she clasped the naked sword blade, but I guess that's something you can do with a European-style sword? Maybe you can do that with Japanese swords as well, but in films they're always dropping a piece of silk on the blade and it cuts the silk, which makes me think you wouldn't be able to hold it in your hand that way. But (a) maybe that's not actually true even of Japanese swords, and (b) this is a European one! ... And clearly also (c): I don't know much about swords.

Re: dragons, wakanomori saw something, some months ago, that someone had posted on social media about when people stopped reporting on dragons in Chinese regional reports to the central government. It was sometime in the beginning of the 20th century, iirc. And the social-media poster apparently said, somewhat wistfully tongue in cheek, something along the lines of, "from this we can conclude that dragons went extinct in China in the early 20th century."

[sovay]

We should be listening in on the signal the hibiscus is receiving--I feel like it might be salutary.

I really like the idea of Radio Free Hibiscus.

I have never seen a screen test before! I didn't realize they're silent (it is silent, right? I had my volume on, and it was showing that the volume was on at Youtube, but I didn't get sound).

It is silent! I don't think she's even speaking dialogue for the visual effect. I have seen them occasionally before, but never so strikingly. I wish I could be sure that the screen test William Wyler made of Robert Newton as Heathcliff for Wuthering Heights (1939) survived.

But (a) maybe that's not actually true even of Japanese swords, and (b) this is a European one!

I think most saliently it may be a prop sword, although I could always ping choco_frosh for the particulars of the sharp parts in this century.

And the social-media poster apparently said, somewhat wistfully tongue in cheek, something along the lines of, "from this we can conclude that dragons went extinct in China in the early 20th century."

Oh. I hope it is merely that sightings became underreported.

[asakiyume]

Me too, re: your final comment!

[shewhomust]

Thank you for the Hepburn.

[sovay]

Thank you for the Hepburn.

You're welcome. I'd had no idea.

[isis]

Ooh pretty flowers!

[sovay]

Ooh pretty flowers!

Thank you!

[minoanmiss]

I visited friends of mine today and the wife is a bloodhound [1] . She walked outside, took a breath, and said, "I can smell the smoke from the wildfires."

[1] Not literally but I have never met another human being with as acute a sense of smell as she has.

[sovay]

She walked outside, took a breath, and said, "I can smell the smoke from the wildfires."

I can't breathe through my nose at the minute, but I believe her. It's like a wet towel full of splinters out there.

[lokifan]

The moon's been red here in London as well! I think the fires must be enormous?

It seems my childhood exposure to Arthuriana was such that if I read an article about a water well that collapsed in the digging in first-century CE Roman Britain, my brain immediately decides it was dragons. Endemic construction hazard. Like the water table. Enough excavation and it's dragons every time.

*cackles*

[sovay]

The moon's been red here in London as well! I think the fires must be enormous?

The smoke has crossed the Atlantic! I hadn't realized until you mentioned it. We definitely live on one planet.