{ Going to the store by David Lewandowski }

She found that 20 percent of the models on the agency’s books were in debt to the agency. Foreign models, in particular, seem to exist in a kind of indentured servitude, she writes, often owing as much as $10,000 to their agencies for visas, flights, and test shoots, all before they even go on their first casting call. And once a model does nab a job, the pay is often meager. (…)

Why do so many models operate against their own economic interests? Mears details how, in the fashion world, there is typically an inverse relationship between the prestige of a job and how much the model gets paid. A day-long shoot for Vogue pays a paltry $150, for instance, while a shoot for Britain’s influential i-D magazine, which Mears calls “one of the most sought-after editorial clients for a model,” pays absolutely nothing, not even the cost of transportation or a copy of the magazine for the model’s portfolio.

The alternative to high-fashion poverty is to be a “money girl,” working for catalogs and in showroom fittings, jobs that pay well and reliably. The best-paid model at Mears’ agency, for instance, was a 52-year-old showroom model with “the precise size 8 body needed to fit clothing for a major American retailer. She makes $500/hour and works every day.” But the commercial end of modeling is widely derided within the industry as low-rent, as mere work without glamour. Once a model has done too many commercial jobs, she is thought to have cheapened herself, and it’s exceedingly difficult for her to return to high fashion.

{ Slate | Continue reading | Thanks Tim }

photo { Yasuhiro Ishimoto, Untitled (Chicago), 1948 }

1985. Five lionesses at the Singapore Zoo are put on birth control after the lion population increases from 2 to 16.

{ Wikipedia }

images { 1. Henri Rousseau, The Dream, 1910 | 2. Veterinary Anatomical Illustrations, 1898-1925 }

related { Women who use contraceptives like birth control pills experience memory changes, according to new research }

{ 1 | 2 }

Lisa and Louise Burns, the actresses who played the Grady daughters, are identical twins; however, the characters in the book and film script are merely sisters, not twins.

{ Wikipedia }

Stuart Ullman: My predecessor in this job left a man named Charles Grady as the Winter caretaker. And he came up here with his wife and two little girls, I think were eight and ten. And he had a good employment record, good references, and from what I’ve been told he seemed like a completely normal individual. But at some point during the winter, he must have suffered some kind of a complete mental breakdown. He ran amuck and killed his family with an axe. Stacked them neatly in one of the rooms in the West wing and then he, he put both barrels of a shot gun in his mouth.

{ Quotes from The Shining, 1980 }

Diane Arbus, Identical Twins, Roselle, New Jersey, 1967. The Grady Twins are a reference to Diane Arbus’s photo. Stanley Kubrick was a friend of the photographer.

{ The Shining: A Rough Guide By Stuart Gray }

{ Emotion in Good Luck and Bad Luck: Predictions from Simplicity Theory | PDF }

{ The typography of John Carpenter’s ‘They live’ (1988) }

{ Do you know the game called the Fifteen Puzzle? }

{ Dutch 1,000-guilder banknote featuring Spinoza }

{ In May 2010, a tattered and brittle map was discovered in storage at the Brooklyn Historical Society. Experts identified it as a rare item, a Bernard Ratzer “Plan of the City of New York” map in its 1770 state. Until then, only three copies were thought to exist. After a painstaking restoration to remove layers of shellac and grime and repair dozens of breaks, the map is now behind plexiglass and ready to be displayed to the public. | NY Times | full story }

{ Eric Elms }

{ 1 | 2 }

{ Visualization: USA national debt in physical $100 bills }

related { Why the Debt Crisis Is Even Worse Than You Think }

The concept that the gut and the brain are closely connected, and that this interaction plays an important part not only in gastrointestinal function but also in certain feeling states and in intuitive decision making, is deeply rooted in our language.

Recent neurobiological insights into this gut–brain crosstalk have revealed a complex, bidirectional communication system that not only ensures the proper maintenance of gastrointestinal homeostasis and digestion but is likely to have multiple effects on affect, motivation and higher cognitive functions, including intuitive decision making.

{ Nature Reviews Neuroscience }

images { 1 | 2 }

{ Stranger moves into foreclosed home, citing little-known Texas law }

images { 1. Young Kyu Yoo | 2. John Portman }

{ Willem Claesz Heda, Still Life With Oysters, Rummer, And Silver Tazza,1634 }

{ Grant Cornett }

{ George Widener, for future robots, orientation map of events, for the year 4421| Elenore Weber of Ricco/Maresca Gallery in New York defined Widener, one of the most widely collected living outsider artists, as “a high-functioning savant” and a “lightning calculator.” His bio reads: “Like some people with aspergers, he is gifted in dates, numbers, and drawing. In his memory, he has several thousand historical dates, thousands of calendars, and more than a thousand census statistics.” | Salon }

{ Thanks Glenn! }