of note

Realizing that the last week of October is almost upon us, I re-uploaded an old post that has been getting a lot of accesses recently called, 神無月--the Goddless Month. As I have been working with a friend on a translation of an interview with one of Japan's greatest living composers, Miki Minoru, I added two videos to the post of his composition for koto called, Autumn Fantasy.

And, speaking of autumn fantasies, Japan's second moon-viewing festival is coming up this Friday, the moon of the 13th night 十三夜 (more about that at the bottom of this post) This moon-viewing is unique since it is not the full moon but rather the moon at three quarters full that is appreciated.

Also of note in Peony's RSS Reader is the topic of the recent NYTimes article, In Chinatown the Sound of the Future is Mandarin: Learning Catonese's dm comemnts here. Languagehat points to the metafilter discussion here and Victor Mair writes here on languagelog-- all interesting reading, indeed. 

My fellow moon-gazer MW sent me this article of interest, Has Conceptual Art Jumped the Shark Tank, to which another friend remarked that he admired the author's restraint.

Speaking of which-- last but not least-- this too is recommended reading, Monsieur Rodriguez on Mirrors (I continue to re-read this one). Oil by Nguyen Thanh Binh