Weekend 573.0

Artists specialize in designs. God is the greatest artist of all. This is evident in nature, but also in the designs that He has for His creatures. He has a unique plan for each one of us. Given the number of creatures, God’s designs are innumerable¹.

What an odd movie. I think I liked it. My university mentor was one of the original Detroit Mad Men, but my favorite English professor gave me a copy Adbusters and had us watch Brazil and read Zen and the Art of Motocycle Maintenance and The Little Prince. The Limestone Library™ has a copy of The Heart of Our Cities by Victor Gruen and Ogilvy on Advertising.

(1) The Coca-Cola Kid and the Corporate Comforts of Selling Out (Back Row)

(1a) The Australian Sound:

(2) The Allure of Ruins by James Lileks (Discourse)

(2a) Quotes from On Modernism’s Ruins: The Architecture of “Building Stories” and Lost Buildings by Daniel Worden:

Decaying and dilapidated architecture resonates as loss, as evidence of the irreversible passage of time, yet architectural ruins emanate past grandeur. Ware’s comics, then, focus on ruins and the melancholy they elicit in an attempt to render the irreversible passage of time into an aesthetic object. In both “Building Stories” and Lost Buildings, melancholy is remade into the imagination of the ruin as whole through an engagement with the built environment.

Architecture is a vehicle to convey both the affective possibilities of experiencing the past as a whole and the perpetual frustration of the inability to reconstruct modernity’s ruins seamlessly.

¹Daily Meditations on the Psalms

Immortalized in Stained-Glass

A quote from Bermuda’s Story by Terry Tucker:

“On the north side of the nave in the Bermuda Cathedral in Hamilton you will see a stained-glass window picturing the storm on the sea of Galilee and the small boat struggling through mountainous waves. At the foot are the words: ‘In Memory of the First Settlers in these Islands and of their Historian, Sir John Henry Lefroy, K.C.M.G., sometime Governor of this Colony.’ This seems a meagre public reminder of a governor who did more for Bermuda than would seem possible for one man in the short span of a six-year tour of duty. To you who want to know the story of your home-land, no name can mean more than that of Lefroy who was Governor and Commander-in-Chief from 1871 to 1877.”

Weekend 561.1

(1) The English Way (The Imaginative Conservative)

“One of my favorite current Christian Humanists, Canadian Michael O’Brien, has argued in his own masterful novel, Sophia House, that every book that enters the world is akin to the human soul. Some do well, some do ill, and many—simply through the beauty of creation—reflects bits and pieces of divine grace. In essence, when art, a book might very well magnify the Lord.”

Weekend 524.2 (seditious persons…covetous rule…singular lucre)

Quotes from The Brothers York: An English Tragedy by Thomas Penn:

“He [Edward IV] was comfortable enough to schedule in a diversionary loop, a pilgrimage through East Anglia to the great north Norfolk shrine of Walsingham, during which he would recruit additional armed forces for his norther operation.”

“The area was a hotbed of support for the pro-Lancastrian Percy family, whose heir, the twenty-one-year-old Henry Percy, was securely in the wardship of William Herbert away in south Wales: the insurgents wanted him restored as earl of Northumberland in place of the man who had supplanted him, John Neville. Late May, some fifteen thousand strong, they reached the gates of York before Neville and his men materialized. There, after a ‘long fight’, Robin of Holderness was captured and beheaded.”

“While Cook himself was still in custody, Edward ordered Rivers and Fogge to break into his property and seize his moveable assets in order to pay off the debt: a common, if harsh, practice that their men interpreted liberally, turning Cook’s London townhouse upside-down, drinking his cellar dry and carting off large quantities of cloth, £700 in plate and jewels, and a series of exquisite, jewel-encrusted tapestries depicting the Siege of Jerusalem.”

“Late that October, in a small chamber in Westminster Palace, Henry Percy swore an oath of allegiance to Edward, witnessed by a small knot of royal councillors including William Hastings and the archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Bourchier. In return, Percy was given his liberty. His release was seismic. Percy, everybody now knew, was to be restored to his earldom of Northumberland – with inevitable consequences for those who had profited from it: Warwick, Clarence and the earldom’s current incumbent, John Neville.”

“Though the carnage of Towton was now a decade ago, it lingered in the memory and everybody knew somebody who had died there; mostly on the Lancastrian side, fighting for Henry Percy, earl of Northumberland.”

Weekend 523.1

“Judica me, Deus, discerne causam meum de gente non sancta.” Psalm 42

Quotes from The Brothers York: An English Tragedy by Thomas Penn:

“Meanwhile, shortly before sunset on Thursday 18 July, a rider had arrived in Canterbury from the north with urgent news for Edward, there with Elizabeth on pilgrimage to the tomb of St Thomas Becket.”

“The English, he wrote, were great observers of protocol, always ready to genuflect to power and authority. But ‘no matter how they bend the knee’, he concluded, ‘they are not to be trusted.'”

“There were pressing reasons why he needed to do so, chief among them the fact that the Medici relied heavily on exports of English wool to fill the convoy of galleys that docked each year at Southampton.”

“Progressing through Kent, taking in the elegance of Canterbury Cathedral and the richness of Thomas Becket’s gold, gem-encrusted shrine, the saint’s hair shirt hanging above it, Rozmital and his party started to acquaint themselves with English customs, including a beverage drunk by the common people, which, one of the party noted, was called ‘Al’selpir’ (though he didn’t apparently realize that he was being offered a choice: ‘ale’ or ‘beer’).

“Noting Edward’s freshly minted currency, ‘nobles and other good coins’ changing hands, they quickly formed the conclusion that London – a ‘powerful’ city, they appraised, with its face turned outward towards the world and ‘rich in gold and silver’ – was England.”

Weekend 521.3

“It’s been remarked many times that Walt was Mickey, Mickey was Walt—and nowhere is that more evident than in the iconic scenes of Mickey eagerly improvising an airplane and taking to the skies; scaling a beanstalk and challenging a giant; donning a Sorcerer’s hat and “conducting” the courses of the stars and planets. That joyous, wholehearted celebration of life was at the core of Walt’s spirit—and the same spirit was, and still is, embodied in his most personal creation: Mickey Mouse. As long as Mickey lives, that carefree spirit will continue to venture forward, with boundless enthusiasm and great good humor, toward distant horizons we cannot even yet imagine.”

Taschen was highlighted in “The Art of _______________________” in Weekend 461.0. They publish beautiful books and the recently released Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse: The Ultimate History is no exception. It’s a must for any Walt Disney / Mickey Mouse fan.

Taking refuge at home…

I didn’t post a ton during my sabbatical but enjoyed some serious downtime. I’ve compiled a list of all the happenings (in true Limestone Roof tradition).

(1) Finished Fatal Colours by George Goodwin. My next book assignment is The Brothers York: An English Tragedy by Thomas Penn

(2) Updated LIMESTONE with a new theme (it had remained more or less the same since moving from BLOGGER in 2010)

(3) Helped my brother earn the KINGDOM HEARTS III Complete Master trophy

(3a) IRL Trophy: Kingdom Hearts Wayfinders Lasercut Pendant (Etsy)

(4) Attended 1 NHL and 1 AHL hockey game. Saw my beloved Bridgeport Islanders defeat the Charolotte Checkers on Saturday, January 8 at Webster Bank Arena

(5) Walked to Mass via the greenways in NC; attended Mass at St Thomas (homecoming).

Weekend 517.0

Early start; I got my reasons.

(1) Fringe Intro [1985] [HD]

(2) Pink Floyd’s A Momentary Lapse Of Reason – Remixed & Updated will be released on 29 October 2021

(3) Two books from Steven Levy that should be on every shelf:

(3a) Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution

(3b) Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer that Changed Everything

(4) Slim titles with a BIG punch:

(4a) John Betjeman: Poems Selected by Hugo Williams (published by Faber and Faber Ltd.)

(4b) Murder in the Cathedral by T.S. Eliot

(4c) The Book in the Cathedral by Christopher de Hamel