Collection of Cunning Curiosities – May 30, 2015

Johann Georg Hainz's Cabinet of Curiosities, circa 1666. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Johann Georg Hainz’s Cabinet of Curiosities, circa 1666. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

A weekly compendium of things that delight my fancy.

Dear Internet, You can follow this collection on Pinterest. x0x0, lisa

Reading

I’ve been super lax on keeping my list updated but no more! I’ve added loads of new books as well as the comic serials I’ve been reading and finishing, so the list is mostly current now. The best book this year I’ve read is Genevieve Valentine’s The Girls of the Kingfisher Club, which I finished in one sitting. Valentine confirmed what I’ve known for quite some time: exquisite writing will be the convincer needed to get me to finish a book. Time is far too short to read bad books and I seemingly keep picking up bad books.

Links

Noon Pacific is a weekly mixtape of the best songs handpicked from the best music blogs, delivered to your inbox every Monday at Noon (Pacific Time). Definite pluses: You can listen via their app which you can grab from iTunes and Google Play. Lisa’s take:  I was recently turned on to this via somewhere and the idea I can stream it on my phone/iPad as an independent app was a great appeal as well as the introduction to new music, curated weekly.
Neko Atsume is Animal Crossing sans annoying talking creatures but populated with cats. So what exactly do you do in this game? You buy some food, a few toys, put them in the garden and wait for the cats to show up. That’s it. The cats will come and go as they please but as a reward for keeping them fed and toyed, they will leave you trinkets of sardines to continue buying them food and toys. It’s the new obsession as illustrated here, here, and here. You can pick up Neko Atsume at iTunes and Android.
How to: Perfect Winged Eyeliner! is the best YouTube tutorial I’ve seen on how to do perfect winged eyeliner. Yes, I’m almost 43 years old and need help putting on make-up but this easy to follow tutorial with practical steps (make dots on your eyelids, connect the dots, viola! Perfect eyeliner) was a huge game changer for me. Seriously. I typically like to wear eyeliner + mascara as the sum of my make-up for the day but my lack of steady hand or unable to draw a straight line means my eyeliner is always just a bit off. First go around with this technique and my eyeliner was on point.
Ceremony (the band) is, according to Wikipedia, a punk band from California. I disagree with this, naturally, because they are post-punk and this is an important distinction. They are grittier than Interpol but still have that Joy Division sound, so of course I like them. Their single Separation from their most recent album, L-Shaped Man, was demoed on some place I forget and I loved that so much, I preordered the album. So if you’re into a Joy Division derivative with hints of She Wants Revenge and Sex Pistols, this is your band.
New authorized James Bond novel will resurect Pussy Galore.I’m super excited by this announcement as I’m a huge fan of the Bond movies AND books. Yes, yes, both media should be against my feminist leanings (misogyny is but one of the fallacies), but sometimes you have to just ignore things to enjoy something. I mean, Sean Connery – amirite? If you too are interested in the Bond universe, I highly recommend getting your hands on the Moneypenny Diaries, which can be had for dirt cheap on Amazon.

This day in Lisa-Universe in: 2001

Le mie passioni, parte 2: Penguin Books

(Le Mie passioni,  Italian translation of “my passions,” is a an occasional series of things I really, really love.)

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Penguin Books
This is not a librarian thing, an English major thing or an archivist or design thing: It’s simply just a Lisa-thing. The lust began in my youth but became personified in 2005 when Amazon.com started selling the complete Penguin Classics collection for a mere $8,000 USD (now pricing at $13,000 USD and change). Nearly 1100 titles of the greatest works of literature – ever in the history of the written word. Instant library, beautiful editions and awesome editors and translators.
Then, Penguin started outdoing themselves by presenting the classics (i.e. Jane Austen, Ian Fleming and F. Scott Fitzgerald) reworked with new cover designs by leading designers, releasing additional classics to bring the “complete library” up to 1300+ titles, introducing the deluxe classics, reworking their Great Food series, and of course, they have a fantastic backlist of contemporary titles. Squee! In addition, Penguin gets and uses social media with gusto: they are on the Facebooks, Twitters, RSS feeds galore and my favs, Penguin podcast and Penguin Classics podcast; Penguin just does so many things with such passion and thoroughness, that if it is wrong to love a publisher so hard, then, I just don’t ever want to be right.