Venice is an Engineering Marvel, Far More Impressive Than You Thought

Using engineering genius the Venetians — refugees from nearby towns seeking shelter from Visigoths and later Attila the Hun around 500-550 AD — turned a series of swampy islands into a real city and then into the global center of commerce by the 9th century, well before the time of Marco Polo in the late 13th century.

https://youtu.be/77omYd0JOeA?si=QcsfQ_SwjlqkKk0H

As the population grew they encountered the usual problems with growing cities — fresh water and waste disposal — and once again employed engineering genius to solve them in simple, effective and efficient ways.

Venice was the capitol of the Republic of Venice, for 1100 years a global power until conquered by Napoleon in 1797.

Another “Great Lake” Besides the Five We Already Knew

The Great Slave Lake in Canada, in the Northwest Territories, is over 2,000 feet deep, deepest in North America.

https://youtu.be/vZ8HQadZ__I?si=R6KkoIjOSezFUKKr

I have never heard of it. Learn something new every day!

And yes, the name seems a little odd but it’s named after a family named “Slavey”. Also kinda odd, but then lots of names are odd when you really think about it … 

Not Dead Yet

Not many updates around here lately … and that pattern will continue for awhile.

However I have been pretty active on Twitter (or X as Elon has rebranded it) and you can follow me at @jeffbrokaw2013.

My plan for the next few weeks or months is to write there instead, once or twice per week, using the “thread” concept, plus of course reposting things of interest and a few replies here and there (I don’t do much interacting on Twitter).

The Band with the Staples, “The Weight”

 

Nothing further need be said …

Enjoy every serendipitous moment of pure joy and beauty. It’s good for you.

Today in 1977, “Gonna Fly Now (Theme from Rocky)” Reaches #1

 

This song was everywhere that summer and as a song it’s nothing special, but after seeing the movie you subconsciously fix it permanently in your mind with this unforgettable and revolutionary scene.

The music builds to a crescendo while he sprints up the many flights of stairs, all the way to the top, and the camera spins around him to show the skyline as he suddenly raises his fists triumphantly … chills, every time. 

Scenes like this became common, but this was the first.

Stereogum has a good summary of how unique and revolutionary it was.

With Rocky, director John G. Avildsen more or less invented the training montage, a convention that would become a staple of American movies for about the next 20 years. (We still get training montages, but now they’ve become a self-conscious, parodic trope. Often, they still use the same music as the Rocky movies.) In Rocky, Rocky Balboa has randomly been booked in a fight with the champion of the world. He’s only in there because he has a good nickname, because he comes from the right city, because he’s white, and because he can’t possibly win. Rocky knows he can’t possibly win. But thanks to his hardbitten, motivational trainer, that starts to change. He starts to believe. And then the montage hits. ... As we watch Rocky, we can imagine “Gonna Fly Now” as the music in his head, as his own monosyllabic inner monologue. Rocky loses the big fight in the end, but he wins respect and becomes a contender. He achieves his destiny. A downbeat bummer of a story becomes a triumph for the ages, a harbinger of an era when movie ticket buyers demanded uplifting spectacle. “Gonna Fly Now” has everything to do with it.

Exactly right.

And So We Enter the Post-Pat Sajak Era

TV shows come and go, into and out of our lives — likewise so do the people in them. Most shows only last two or three seasons, maybe six or eight if they are really popular. It’s a very transient world in that way.

It’s a very rare show that lasts a decade or longer. 

And then we have Wheel of Fortune and specifically Pat Sajak who hosted the show for 41 years until his retirement this year . His final show aired last Friday.

Pat Sajak became a legend because he is so likable and funny and unassuming and naturally at ease with random strangers that, over time, you as the viewer start to think of him as almost a friend. A guy you are happy to see on the screen. Every night. For over 40 years. 

Here is his farewell message. 

Classy, selfless, genuine.

I loved watching the show and so did my whole family. Time marches on I guess and there will be reruns and a new guy in the fall and I’m sure he’ll be fine.

One thing he won’t be is Pat Sajak.