We've never discussed that book before, and there's no reason at all for her to think I might have it, aside from the fact that I own a fair number of children's books. We've been working together for a couple of years, and this is the first time she's ever asked me if I happen to own a particular book. The reason that I'm posting about it is that Pete the Cat has been in the sync stream -- having been brought up by Bill, not me, because up until then I had no idea any such character existed. The book that came up before -- for example, in "Fools and wise men on hills, planetary shoon, and a literal Blueberry Hill" (January 16) -- was not the same one, but it also had a shoe theme: Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes.
According to Wikipedia, there have been no fewer than 87 Pete the Cat books published. It appears that only these two have shoes in the title.
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When Pete the Cat first came up on this blog, it was in connection with the theme of spectacles with mismatched lenses, which brings us to our next sync.
This evening I was skimming a /pol/ humor thread, looking for new ethically modified memes (Bruce keeps demanding more!). I didn't really find anything, but I did notice this familiar image:
You see the kind of garbage I have to wade through to find quality memes! I admit I haven't the slightest idea what this one is trying to express -- is that supposed to be the Strait of Hormuz in the background? -- but I do know that line and those spectacles, since on February 2 I published a post titled "The power of the sun in the palm of my hand," which includes this picture:
The really wild thing is that Doc Ock's specs actually have two black lenses. In the frame I screencapped, one lens appears gold because it's reflecting the light of a fire. For a second, Doc Ock is at just the right angle for only one of his lenses to reflect the blaze, and then the moment is gone. But whoever made this incomprehensible Iran meme chose to use almost the very same frame.
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Update (minutes later): That thread also includes a meme that syncs with yesterday's post "Back to the Future":
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Reading over this post and thinking on Pete the Cat, a peculiar notion occurred to me, "peet the cat". I believe I was intending the term "peat", but I misspelled it. In the event, I googled "peet" and the very first link it rendered me was to the Wiktionary etymology of same: "Blend of paw + feet." So, more animal/ human hybrids.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/peet
Doc Ock's lenses have come up again, and William emphasizes their blackness, etc. (And thanx to William for wading through...) We associate black lenses with sunglasses, they dim the light of the sun, "the power of the sun". Now, I haven't seen this movie (nor have I seen "Back to..."-- I googled it) but I take it that the renowned Doctor wears these specs so that he can witness a nuclear-type explosion-- another mode of the sun's power, or any star's power. In other words, the lenses dim the blinding light. This ties in to the theme of black backgrounds that have been in the stream recently; most notably, Vermeer's "Girl...", and the recent Praza logo. (Incidentally, just now I googled "Praza". Because it is, as I said before, a Galician word, you have to scroll down before you come across a company. I clicked on the LinkedIn page for Praza-- it was headquartered in Mashad, Iran. Almost certainly not the same Praza, but what a tie-in to the post's reference to Iran.) I further affiliated the black backgrounds-- of which, we saw at least half a dozen come down the stream-- with Poe's raven's "Nevermore" abyss. By implication, the black lenses help to bring about abyssal darkness. The paradox is, that the (needful) light is, in this case, blinding-- it cannot be seen unfiltered.
https://www.linkedin.com/company/praza-software
The lowermost graphic in this post includes a word that is evidently shared by a number of languages in what we might call the true Middle (as opposed to the Near) East: "dakh". Its most interesting iteration to me is the Arabic/Persian dakh, which means "essence". Since the graphic is obviously punning on "doc", I suppose we too might pun on dakh-octopus, the eight-limbed essence, whatever that is. Yet, dakh as "essence" reminded me of the skeletal deer/human hybrid that we came to think of as the merger of hermit and hart. A humanoid deer is eerie enough, but a skeleton thereof? I alluded to the skeleton as "the barest essence"-- the flesh having dropped off, only bone remains. I contend it is a figure of the idea that obedience to divine command cannot be fully achieved; there is always a remnant of stony flesh that spirit cannot finally decompose. Thus, prophecy is inherently defective. The cervine humanoid represents the viable alternative.
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