FORMULA ONE FUEL TIDBITS PART 1
FORMULA ONE IS SERIOUS about its racing fuels. Ask Sebastian Vettel, whose Aston Martin-Mercedes got disqualified from second at last month’s Hungarian GP for not having the required 1.0 liter … Continue reading
ARLES TIDBITS
LYDIA DAVIS DOESN’T call them “tidbits,” though her article One French City,” London Review of Books, August 12, 2021, is a perfect example. Davis begins her article with “What follows … Continue reading
CELEBRATING ORNATENESS
HAVING RECENTLY CELEBRATED architectural minimalism, let’s explore the other extreme. The Discoverer Blog is an entertaining website, with lots of helpful information on travel (whether real or of the armchair … Continue reading
DIEGO RIVERA—ART PRODIGY, MURALIST, AND POLITICAL ACTIVIST
MEXICAN MURALIST DIEGO RIVERA briefly appeared earlier at SimanaitisSays as the mentor of aviatrix/muralist Aline Rhone. Her Roosevelt Field 1938 mural celebrated aviation from 1909 to 1927, with more than … Continue reading
BABBLING BABY BATS
WHAT WITH COVID and all, bats have had particularly bad press of late. However, science comes to a rehabilitation of their reputation: It turns out the greater sac-winged bat, Saccopteryx … Continue reading
MUDLARKING—ITS PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE
A MUD LARK IS defined by Merriam-Webster as “a person who grubs in mud (as in search of stray bits of coal, iron, rope). specifically: an urchin who grubs for … Continue reading
THE ART OF IMPERIAL AIRWAYS
FROM 1924 TO 1939, Imperial Airways linked the British Empire during what in retrospect is termed aviation’s Golden Age. It was a golden age of aviation graphics too, as displayed … Continue reading
A JEOPARDY SETUP (AND AN R&T ROAD TEST)
THE JEOPARDY CATEGORY is “Celebrity Cars.” The setup is “This British-bodied GT coupe is piloted by a driver known by two different names.” Ah. Easy-peasy: “What is James Bond/007’s Aston … Continue reading
ME AND THE SUITS
I’VE NEVER BEEN much of a corporate type. When I left Caribbean academic life for the real world in the mid-70s, Joe Gilbert, rest his soul, was general manager of … Continue reading
HOLMES NOIR?
IT SOUNDS ACHRONOLOGICAL, but was the world’s first consulting detective a noir shamus? Let’s examine this thesis with the help of Merriam-Webster, Sherlockians, and film authorities. Weak Merriam-Webster Evidence. M-W’s … Continue reading
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