Stardust Memories

In “The Analytical Language of John Wilkins,”Borges describes ‘a certain Chinese Encyclopedia,’ the Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge, in which it is written that animals are divided into:

1. Those that belong to the Emperor

2. Embalmed ones

3. Those that are trained

4. Suckling pigs

5. Mermaids

6. Fabulous ones

7. Stray dogs

8. Those included in the present classification

9. Those that tremble as if they were mad

10. Innumerable ones

11. Those drawn with a very fine camelhair brush

12. Others

13. Those that have just broken a flower vase

14. Those that from a long way off look like flies.

Jumbo flying squid have invaded the shallow waters off San Diego, spooking scuba divers and beachgoers after washing up dead on the beaches.

The carnivorous cephalopods, which weigh up to 45kg (100lb), came up from the depths last week, with swarms of them roughing up unsuspecting divers. Some reported tentacles enveloping their masks yanking at their cameras and gear.

Stories of close encounters with the squid have chased many divers out of the water and created a whirlwind of excitement among those torn between their personal safety and the once-in-a-lifetime chance to swim with the deep-sea giants.

The so-called Humboldt squid, named after the current in the eastern Pacific, have been known to attack humans and are nicknamed “red devils” for their rust-red colouring and mean streak. Divers wanting to observe the creatures often bait the water, use a metal viewing cage or wear chainmail to avoid being lashed by the creature’s tentacles.

The squid, which is most commonly found in deep water from California to the bottom of south America, hunts in schools of up to 1,200 individuals, can swim up to 15 mph and can skim over the water to escape predators.

“I wouldn’t go into the water with them for the same reason I wouldn’t walk into a pride of lions on the Serengeti,” said Mike Bear, a local diver. “For all I know, I’m missing the experience of a lifetime.”

The squid are too deep to bother swimmers and surfers, but many experienced divers say they are staying out of the surf until the sea creatures move on.

Roger Uzun, a veteran scuba diver and amateur underwater videographer, swam with a swarm of the creatures for about 20 minutes and said they appeared more curious than aggressive. The animals taste with their tentacles, he said, and seemed to be touching him and his wet suit to determine if he was edible.

Guardian 17th July 2009

Thank you, I like creepy excitement too. The hair came from my head and Theresa’s head (my wife). She has wonderful red/gold hair. I have brown hair but when the sun shines there is plenty of red to be found. In the future the work will be found in a lake and our DNA will be combined to create some kind of clone. My Daughter Eloise has Golden hair that would fit your book…maybe a new scan of both.

Dear Patrick That’s really interesting thank you I have been thinking about red hair a lot recently and wrote it on my list of things to research at my last supervision meeting. There’s a book on it but I have forgotten what it’s called the something of desire…not as good as the Blonde book.
Red hair really is best seen in the sun and you can discover secret redheads that way it’s true.I was recently at a party where there were two other redheads and I made them line up with me.
I would love a scan of Elöise’s and Theresa’s hair too if they wouldn’t mind. I have just been looking at your blog which I like very much and found a giant squid ( did you see that picture of a giant squid that was in the observer/guardian a while ago? It was great I believed it was real but it was a text misprint and it was a replica) the hair picture you sent me reminded me of a squid/octopus so I was excited to see one on your blog.
I have only just understood the joy of reading and writing blogs. I have recently started one on the a-n site.

Annabel x

Dear Annabel,

Did the two other redheads mind? Was the line-up for a photo? Did a fight ensue?
Yes…I know the 2 books, unable to remember titles too. I work in University Library.

Eloise had her hair cut into a bob recently, so I have a strand. She has Theresa’s hair, very lucky. I find it very striking. When I first heard Theresa’s name being spoken by her Brother at the start of 1996(before I met her), I imagined an orange/gold/red/pink formless cloud shape just above my head…I sort of felt it more than visually sensing it .

Yes of course you can use the image, I look forward to reading the blog. Full of detail. Lot’s of Animals. Your website is very interesting too. I can imagine a huge monograph of your work. or museum in a whole house. or a theme park in a forest. I’ve attached a slightly better image of the work, plus a picture of the giant squid at Propeller Island. Violet Clark likes the picture, which is nice as I like her music.

All the best
Patrick

In 1837 a young Hungarian boy called Iguatz von Peczely cared for an owl with a broken leg. He noticed a black stripe in its eye, which became paler as the leg healed. More than 30 years later, having qualified as a naturopathic physician, Peczely found the same complaint. His research into the 200 or so markings in the coloured part of the eye, which are unique to each person’s health from their eyes is the basis of modern iridology.

From The Guardian 27th Novermber 2005

In 1850 Florence Nightingale saved a baby owl from some boys who were tormenting it in Athens, smuggled it home, and christened it Athena. To be persuaded to enter a cage, the owl had to be mesmerised, but soon became a devoted companion.

She would perch on her mistress’s finger for feeds, as well as bow and curtsy on a table, but her life came to a rather sad end in 1855.

On hearing of Florence’s imminent departure for the Crimea, the family left Athena shut in an attic. Starved of the attention she craved, the owl – it seems – died of a fit, leaving her owner heartbroken.

Following Florence’s instructions, the bird was taken to London and embalmed. It remains in very good condition and was recently conserved by the National Trust, who for a time had it on display at Claydon House in Buckinghamshire.

Florence Nightingale’s sister, Parthenope wrote and illustrated a book: The Life and Death of Athena an Owlet.

From The 24 Hour Museum 29th July 2004

The pie-crust head of Craig Brown looks damp between the lights of Aldeburgh cinema. He is interviewing Louis Theroux and he has just assured us, the audience that Theroux (junior) has

” a basic faith in human nature and a belief that we are all good”

Is this why he seems so excited by the sinister? Hoping to expose the naiveties of Max Clifford, Jimmy Saville & American neo-Nazis. People driven by their need tyo control;ridiculed by their lack of it.

I ask Louis a question assuming, naturally that we are a love-match, that he’ll feel a sense of relief when I ask it-yes, that girl understands me

Me: “Have you ever met anyone who was so funny that you felt sobered and could not find the humour in the situation, perhaps until later?”

Louis: “So the question is um…have I ever met anyone so poisonous and evil that I didn’t want to interview them?”

I repeated the question but to no avail. I think he thought I believed that people could be categorised as evil. This has never appealed to me as it explains nothing.

Maybe Louis had a fundamentally happy childhood. His father may write lascivious memoirs from his condo in Hawaii, but maybe there was little darkness in the Theroux household. Louis continues to try and answer me by telling an anecdote about someone who initially comes across as very unpleasant but who later revealed his vulnerability through a love of Are you Being Served.

I know of the photographs of Mussolini that were banned and that guests had to continue the conversations Hitler had stopped when he had fallen asleep half an hour previously.

I watched Marnie the other night and was interested how Marnie’s behaviour was explained and excused as part of a Freudian equation. I suppose my very unpleasant childhood may account for my vertiginous fear of darkness-of the literal and the modern ‘murky and unpleasant sort. Vertiginous in the sense that I want to jump from high places. I feel I am from and part of something with such Exxon Valdese darkness that I must avoid it at all costs and yet it is somehting I often find myself overwhelmed by.

So to owls: the most collected of all figurines in Britain and America. Traditionally birds of the dark and often thought to be ghosts.

I have two owl stories, one light-filled and one a sort of twilight…

Ctd on next post

Adapted from a text published in Dark Arty