Thursday, December 19, 2013

Link Round-Up: December 19, 2013


EARTH is an amazing visualization of global weather conditions which uses data from the NOAA and the public domain natural earth dataset, to show the wind patterns across the entire globe in real time.

Here is all of 2013 summed up in one super clever drawing

Science fiction themed stamps from around the world.

So, you want to eat like a hobbit do you? The big old dragon of Middle-Earth recipes is the charmingly retro 'Middle-Earth Recipes' (now with a more modern and photo-friendly blog version ) from which NPR's Beth Accomando has complied an all-day feasting menu suitable for marathon watching (or reading) assorted Lord Of The Rings media while Recipewise sticks to foods served by Bilbo in The Hobbit itself and explains the Victorian convention of high vs. low tea. (Author Diane Duane's own Hobbit-inspired recipe, Took Family Seed Cake can be made with poppy rather than caraway seed if that's your thing) Need something to do while digesting? Why not read about the history and meaning of the rural comfort food in Tolkien at Strange Horizons " Well Stocked Larders: Food And Diet Of Hobbits" by Stephanie Green.


SuperWhoLock The Comic: Awesome comic where the worlds of Supernatural, Doctor Who and Sherlock collide (and try not to kill each other in the process). Captain Jack flirts with Cas, the Winchesters wave guns at the Doctor, Sherlock’s hanging with Martha Jones, etc. 133 pages and counting!

There has long been various lines of speculation about Mona Lisa, including the existence of an earlier version of the painting. A painting purported to be the earlier version was revealed in 2012. The accuracy of the statements are supported by The Mona Lisa Foundation, who have set up an extensive website around the history of the Mona Lisa and other versions, and also prepared a 21 minute documentary with various professionals providing their knowledge on the topic.  The "earlier" portrait is associated with Leonardo's biographer, Giorgio Vasari, who noted that the painting lingered, unfinished (PDF). Then a fully finished painting of a "certain Florentine lady" surfaced again in 1517, which everyone recognizes as the Mona Lisa.

If you'd like to compare the Isleworth Mona Lisa versus the painting in the Louvre, The Mona Lisa Foundation has a write-up, and The Washington Post has an interactive tool that lets you compare the images with a slider to display more of either image, or you could download high quality versions of the images and compare them yourself: 4193 × 5480 Isleworth Mona Lisa (also available on Wikipedia, but the largest size is 1,210 × 1,600 pixels) | Mona Lisa at the Louvre (up to 7,479 × 11,146 pixels)

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