SEP 10, pill-poppin' poetry: oral hypoglycemics (anti-diabetic pills)

 a) Review of material posted on September 10 in prior years ...

2020: Italian loanwords, Gino's food intolerance (poem - 'brief saga')
2021: waterfowl, cormorant rookery (poem - 'brief saga') 
2022: trace minerals, vitamins, beri-beri and alcohol (poem - 'brief saga')
2023: medical statistics, clinical trial (poem - 'brief saga')

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... clinical trial), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

Authors' Note: This poem satirizes the 'direct-to-consumer' ads by Big Pharma that Americans are subjected to alll day while watching television. Such public announcements are mandated by only a handful of regulatory national agencies in the entire world, one being the U.S.

Orgactis is an apocryphal (i.e. 'fake'), pharmaceutical product, a medication taken by mouth that is marketed for longterm use in adult onset ('type 2') diabetes. That disorder is a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease. 'Jack' is the patient portrayed as possibly benefitting from the drug in the first verse.

Many classes of drugs have recently become available to control type-2 diabetes; these have undergone, particularly recently, rigorous monitoring during the stage of early drug approval. Earlier, one of the first groups of anti-diabetic pills, the sulfonylureas, (e.g. chlorpropamide and tolbutamide), discovered in 1942, became widely used worldwide. However in 2013, a monitoring group raised serious concerns that these particular chemical compounds were associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular death. The American FDA (Food and Drug Administration) now requires that anti-diabetic sulfonylureas carry a warning label to that effect.

You can view informative verses like this one in a wider context by proceeding to the collection "Pill-Popping Poems (selected pharmaceuticals)" on our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE! 

SEP 9, basic medical science: autophagia

  a) Review of material posted on September 9 in prior years ...

2020: Greek prefixes, auto- (illustrated poem)
2021: patients and maladies, diabetes insipidus (poem) 
2022: parasites, cat fleas (poem)
2023: higher connections, haredim, ultra-orthodox (poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... auto-), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 9, 2024): 

Authors' Note:

 -some (SOHM, sometimes ZOHM): Greek suffix for an 

intracellular body, or organelle, e.g. chromosome or lysosome

-phagia, or -phagy: Greek suffix for eating, or consumption

lysis: term of Greek origin for destruction or disintegration

lysosome: cellular organelle adapted to the destruction of extracellular material which has been internalized

autophagosome: membranous organelle that entraps targeted intracellular components, later merging with lysosomes for degradation and recycling of these components; their role in cell defence and in disease causation is under investigation

 And, HERE's a verse about autophagia explaining use of the term to describe a rare and gruesome phenomenon. 

Readers can enjoy our whole collection of verses on this topic by clicking HERE. 

SEP 8, OEDILFian limericks: poems about Elizabeth 2 (two year memorial)

 a) Review of material posted on September 8 in prior years ...

2020: classic palindrome, Able ere Elba. (illustrated poem)
2021: waterfowl, ruddy turnstones (illustrated poem) 
2022: OEDILFian limericks, tribute to Elizabeth II (poems, various)
2023: non-sequitur, Edmond Hoyle (illustrated poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... Edmond Hoyle), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 8, 2024): 

 

SEP 7, palinku (poetic novelty): 45th prez, 1/7

 a) Review of material posted on September 7 in prior years ...

2020: Toronto oases, Scarborough Bluffs (photo-collage)
2021: funny bones, comminuted fracture (poem) 
2022: patients and maladies, lichen sclerosus (poem)
2023: defining opinion, hourly (poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... hourly), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 7, 2024): 

   In this post, we continue with our novel form of poetic wordplay. 

  Inspired by Japanese haiku poetry, the "palinku" is a terse verse with a total of 17 syllables displayed on three lines. Unlike its earlier English-language forerunners, this concoction does not mandate the precise distribution of the syllables among the three lines, but does stipulate that each word in the poem be included in a palindromic phrase or sentence  (i.e. one that can be read either forwards or backwards). 

  To help the reader discern the origin of the lyrics, each palindrome, generally occupying one of the three lines of the poem, has been color-coded. Readers will note that we have been publishing verses of this type on the 17th of each month.  

   And, just in case you have forgotten what palindromes are about, your blogsite hosts have arranged a serial set of brief lessons on the topic ('Political Palindromes') which you can review by clicking HERE. 

Stay tuned, as we have more example of this startlingly terse wordplay in store for you! 

 You can readily view all our verses of this type if you proceed with a single click to our more encyclopedic blog "Edifying Nonsense". Click HERE. 

(Or if you prefer, you can stay on this particular blogsite and look for the offerings for the 17th (and in some cases on the 7th as well) of each month -- there are now more than 60 of these.)

SEP 6, chemical states (and provinces): imaginary, U.S.

 a) Review of material posted on September 6 in prior years ...

2020: new world palindromes, 35 (wordplay maps)
2021: bottom-line humor, hemorrhoids (poem) 
2022: mammalian wildlife, goats at play (action photos)
2023: lexicon of word-pairs, echoic binomials A to D (wordplay)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... goats at play), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 6, 2024):  

You can view the collection of posts on this topic with this link to our full-service blog "Edifying Nonsense" -- click HERE.

SEP 5, portraits of couples: A-B, background-subtracted format

a) Reprise of material posted on September 5 in previous years ...

2020: Toronto ravines, Lawrence Park (photo-collage)
2021: mammalian wildlife, skunks, evolution (illustrated poem) 
2022: reptiles, gila monsters (illustrated poem)
2023: submitted palindromes, targeted, A Santa at NASA (wordplay)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ...skunks), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of wonderments (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 5, 2024):

BS = background-subtracted

   Birds, and occasionally other types of animal, exhibit paired behavior that seems to reflect the human proclivity for sharing among two mates, traditionally, but not always, of different gender. Photographs of these moments, often intimate, are only available for certain species, but are highly prized. We have tried to capture this state of pairing in a series of 40 or so blogposts entitled "Portraits of Couples" (you can find these assembled into collections on our topic-based blog "Edifying Nonsense".)  

   We wondered whether a recent technical advance, automated background subtraction, targeted principally at single human subjects, might be of value in highlighting some representations of shared experiences in the biosphere as well as with humans. The software renderings below (the original photos were all taken with Giorgio's cellphone) show some of our results. It seems that the technique is not bothered too much by the presence of two heads, but only works if the two bodies are touching. And, as with single bird photos, there is the danger that some dangly body parts, such as legs, claws, horns and beaks may be unwittingly amputated by the software.  

BACKGROUND SUBTRACTED COUPLES

("True-and-Faux Photos")

"Adam and Eve"
from a 16th century painting by Lucas Cranach

"Aurora and Cephalus" (statue)

basset hounds

broad-headed skinks

bros

The fun continues in a follow-up post. Click HERE for more background-subtracted couples. 

SEP 4, defining opinion: hoarding (construction)

  a) Review of material posted on September 4 in prior years ...

2020: classic palindrome, Zeus Sees Suez (poem) 
2021: numbers, trio (poem) 
2022: painterly poetry, Manet's Lunch on the Grass, (illustrated poem)
2023: Toronto oases, Toronto Islands (photo-collage)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... Toronto islands), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 4, 2024):  

Our blogpost "Defining Opinion" on the topic-based blog "Edifying Nonsense" shows a selection of similar verses submitted to OEDILF (the online Omnificent English Dictionary in Limerick Form). You can see all of these on one visit by clicking HERE.

SEP 3, bar-fauna: the 'mule', a summer cocktail

 a) Review of material posted on September 3 in prior years ...

2020: sister-cities anagrams, MareCot/Paul'sCrib (wordplay map)
2021: sister-cities anagrams, SodAcre/Rubeclasp (wordplay map)

2022: American satire, special master (poem)
2023: Toronto ravines, Brickworks, floating islands (illustrated poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... trio), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

Bossa nova trio,
Yorkville Village parkette, Toronto

b) Today's Offering (Sep 3, 2024):   

 Authors' Note:  The photo embedded in the first slide shows Giorgio with a thirsty mule on the Greek island of Santorini in 2017 (Giorgio is on the right); incidentally Giorgio's favorite mixed drink is the 'mule', 'Moscow' with vodka as the liquor, or 'southern' using bourbon, or non-alcoholic. Ouzo might work, but that remains an untested hypothesis.

 If you liked this submission, you might want to refer to our entire collection of verses about human and animal denizens of bars, pubs and other watering-holes. Click HERE.

SEP 2, appended adventures of Leslie Moore (suffixes): gallingly

  a) Review of material posted on September 2 in prior years ...

2020: anagram swarm, very-stable-genius 19 (wordplay)
2021: doctors and practices, urologist (poem) 
2022: binomial phrases, high and dry (poem)
2023: terminal exclamation, OY, GEVALT! (poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... OY!), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 2, 2024):

 

 Readers might enjoy reviewing our complete collection of poems about the adventures of linguist Leslie Moore in the land of suffixes. Click HERE! (or if you prefer prefixes, click HERE).

SEP 1, reprehensible modern history: Emperor of Elba

  a) Review of material posted on September 1 in prior years ...

2020: scopes of medicine, EGD (poem)
2021: Panama palindrome spoof, One man .. a panameno. (illustrated poem) 
2022: mythed opportunities, Ovid's Metamorphosis (illustrated poem)
2023: mammalian wildlife, upsetting gnus (illustrated poem)

To access the details of any item in slide format, type its title, as displayed above in red font (e.g. ... EGD), into one of the two search bars at the the top of your blog-page. Underneath the slide(s) for each entertaining delight that you discover, you will find a clickable link that lets you easily explore a more widespread collection of blog-stuff (verse, photos, wordplay, song-lyrics etc.) on the topic of your choice. 

b) Today's Offering (Sep 1, 2024): 

Further enlightenment on this specific topic can be obtained by viewing a post entitled "Able Ere Elba". Click HERE. 

 View the entire collection of poetic assertions on this topic at our more encyclopedic blog 'Edifying Nonsense', by clicking HERE.