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Do sleepy sheep count people? Photo by Kiki Falconer on Unsplash
These look quite comfy. The great artists of yore weren’t always painting portraits of aristocrats, drawing designs for inventions centuries ahead of their times, or depicting Biblical scenes, great battles, or subjects from mythology. Sometimes they drew pillows. Albrecht Dürer’s Pillow Studies (1493) are probably some of the best executed drawings of pillows you’ll ever see.
Those look comfy. Albrecht Dürer (1493) Source: The Metropolitan Museum via Public Domain Review
And, of course, art critic types can get a lot from a drawing of some pillows:
On the verso side, we find a composition brought to life in another way — six pillows, contorted into the shape of fitful sleep, which seem to slip between the waking world and the stuff of dreams. There is the same spatial ambiguity of the recto: the hatching on the first two pillows extends beyond their borders to become shadows on the page, while the other cushions float in a depthless vacuum. No countenance of the artist features here, but if you look long enough, the cushions’ folds may assume the contours of distorted faces. “Once set in motion”, writes Joseph Leo Koerner, “this game of ‘seeing as’ can be played indefinitely, transforming corners into noses, chins, or satyrs’ horns, and creases into mouths and brows, until each pillow is animated by a number of hypothetical masks frowning, laughing, fretting, and speaking”.
Well, yes, obviously. But also, it makes me want to take a nap.
Alexa, open the airlock. I don’t have an Amazon Echo product set up in my house because I don’t want to voluntarily place myself under electronic surveillance in my own home. You know, beyond already being watched by my phone, tablet, laptop, television, and possibly my microwave.1 But for those of you who have invited a disembodied always-listening AI to take up residence in your living room, you’ll know about Alexa “skills” (basically voice-activated apps) and you may rely on them to help you accomplish various tasks and make your life easier2. So as a public service to you here are The 50 Best Alexa Skills That Help Make Your Life Much Easier
These include:
Skill Finder... which helps you discover new skills. Launch it by saying, "Alexa, open Skill Finder" or "Alexa, tell Skill Finder to give me the skill of the day."
Automatic skill. “Automatic is a dongle you install in your car's OBDII port which connects with your smartphone and tracks the status of your car. You can connect your Automatic account to Alexa and ask for the current fuel level, where your car is or how far you've driven in a span of time.” (Now Alexa is in your car. Good luck.)
MySomm skill will tell you what wine goes with what food. Just ask, "Alexa, ask Wine Gal what goes with a pot roast? (I presume you can then have Alexa drive your car to go buy the wine.)
Domino's has a skill that lets you order a pizza from Domino’s via Alexa.
And there are 46 more! Click on through to the article to see them all. Or have Alexa do that for you.
How did ancient Greek athletes train? Slathered in olive oil, apparently. I stumbled on this article from a few years ago about the exercise regimens of ancient Greek athletes: Fitness Tips from Ancient Greece. So if you want to get really, really old school about your workout, read on!
The first thing you should know about sports training in ancient Greece is that it wasn’t for gym bunnies. The Greeks of the Classical era believed that physical fitness and mental clarity were two sides of the same coin. A good citizen was virtuous in mind and in body; training was a civic duty, rather than a lifestyle choice.
I’m with you so far, ancient Greeks.
The gymnasium, now shortened to “gym,” derives its name from the word gymnos, meaning naked.
And now you lost me. Working out naked is frowned on at most gyms these days. Which is probably a good thing.
The article relates that the first systematic training programs followed the establishment of the Olympic Games in the 8th c. BC. The likes of Plato, Aristotle, and, later, Philostratus included training manuals and advice in their writings. So not only did the Greeks develop philosophy, democracy, and early science, they were pioneers of fitness programs too.
What did those programs include?
Philostratus wrote that systematic training evolved out of the more empirical methods that early Olympic athletes devised to improve their fitness. He describes (Gymnasticus, 44), somewhat imaginatively, how “they lifted weights, raced horses and hares, bent or straightened metal bars, pulled ploughs or carts, lifted bulls and wrestled lions, or swam in the sea so as to exercise their arms and their entire body. Their diet was natural, with whole grain bread and meat from oxen, bulls, goats and deer. They slept on hides or straw mattresses, and anointed themselves with plenty of olive oil.
You thought I was kidding about the olive oil? Far from it!
The warm-up started with a massage, followed by gentle movements to boost blood flow and prepare the muscles for more intense exercise. What followed will be unfamiliar to modern exercisers: a rubdown with olive oil by a professional aleiptes. Oiling was an art because it played a critical role in sports such as wrestling, where a deft application could make it almost impossible for an opponent to perform a hold.
Again, working out while coated in olive oil is frowned on, at least at my gym. Don’t ask me how I know. The article goes in fair detail about ancient exercise and training programs, including many practices and concepts that remain in use today. So it is worth a full read if the topic interests you
Also, here is a more breezy listicle of 11 Workout Tips from Ancient Civilizations.
Thank you for reading Thursday Things! Again, please click the hearts, comment, and use the share feature to send this issue to a friend who might enjoy it. See you next Thursday!
No one ever suspects their microwave. But it emits microwaves! That’s how they send out the mind control rays!
At least until Alexa turns on you.