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Synagogue of Augsburg, Germany.
Source: Neil Folberg. And I Shall Dwell Among Them. Historic Synagogues of the World.
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no desire to see the show again but
how I do love this supreme jackass
let me count the ways
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even a single book may overspill the skin.
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Carl Kronberger - A Portrait of a Girl Wearing a Golden Hood
![theatlantic:
Why We Took Cocaine Out of Soda
Hale’s account of the role of racism and social injustice in Coca-Cola’s removal of coca is corroborated by the attitudes that the shaped subsequent U.S. cocaine regulation movement. Cocaine wasn’t even illegal until 1914 — 11 years after Coca-Cola’s change — but a massive surge in cocaine use was at its peak at the turn of the century. Recreational use increased five-fold in a period of less than two decades. During that time, racially oriented arguments about rape and other violence, and social effects more so than physical health concerns, came to shape the discussion. The same hypersexuality that was touted as a selling point during the short-lived glory days of Vin Mariani was now a crux of cocaine’s bigoted indictment.
Read more. [Image: 1894 ad for Vin Mariani, art by Jules Cheret]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/8793f59a6923d31cf34be320df2e69c8/tumblr_mhhxdvJEiX1qcokc4o1_500.png)
Why We Took Cocaine Out of Soda
Hale’s account of the role of racism and social injustice in Coca-Cola’s removal of coca is corroborated by the attitudes that the shaped subsequent U.S. cocaine regulation movement. Cocaine wasn’t even illegal until 1914 — 11 years after Coca-Cola’s change — but a massive surge in cocaine use was at its peak at the turn of the century. Recreational use increased five-fold in a period of less than two decades. During that time, racially oriented arguments about rape and other violence, and social effects more so than physical health concerns, came to shape the discussion. The same hypersexuality that was touted as a selling point during the short-lived glory days of Vin Mariani was now a crux of cocaine’s bigoted indictment.
Read more. [Image: 1894 ad for Vin Mariani, art by Jules Cheret]
“You really have to work hard to get hooked on smoking opium. The Victorian-era form of the drug, known as chandu, is rare, and the people who know how to use it aren’t exactly forthcoming. But leave it to an obsessive antiques collector to figure out how to get to addicted to a 19th-century drug.”
In Focus: Mexico’s Drug War: 50,000 Dead in 6 Years
Warning: All images in this entry are shown in full. There are many dead bodies; the photographs are graphic and stark. This is the reality of the situation in Mexico right now.
Top: A masked Mexican soldier patrols the streets of Veracruz, on October 10, 2011. Soldiers of the Army, Navy and members of Federal Police patrol the streets of the city as part of “Veracruz Safe Operation” after a rising tide of violence plaguing this tourist city.
Bottom: A forensic technician points his flashlight at the shoes of a man at a crime scene in Mazatlan, on February 13, 2012. The man was shot dead by gunmen while he was walking on the street, according to local media.
See more. [Images: AFP/Getty, Reuters]
npr:
Krokodil Tears - Russia’s favorite new (skin-eating) drug
Before we set off on our trip, we heard whispers of a new drug called krokodil—a homemade synthetic opiate stronger than heroin made from petrol and codeine—that gets its reptilian name because it turns addicts’ skin scaly, while eating them from the inside, rotting the brain and limbs before invariably killing
its users.
When we got there we found that the krokodil whispers were becoming louder and more insistent, verging on mild yelling, like the sound you make when bolting upright in your bed from a wide-awake nightmare.Gritty.
It is one of those times where I am feeling particularly put together. Extremely in control. Seamless. Semi-perfect. On the level I wish to be.
I find when I am extremely busy, this tends to be the case. When I am social but not overly so. When my mind is too full of work to be void of emotion. When there exists a logical, linear task. That environment is productive. No one demands things of me that are intangible. I can perform. I can excel. I can be admired.
It is refreshing to be admired and praised for surface-level things. To be told my product is exceptional. To be told I am handsome. To be lusted for. To be judged by my value in the manner I judge others to be valuable.
It is all just a cycle and we’re peaking again. At the highest height. Doing so well.
A friend of mine invited me to drop acid with him this weekend and since my project is over and my fiancee is with her family and we haven’t fucked in three days and won’t until Monday I need something to celebrate my success at work and something to take off the edge of this sexual tension or it’s all I’ll think about because I am obsessed and the longer its been the more I find myself looking at a particularly well-dressed man and picturing him blindfolded with that smart striped silk tie and gagged with that leather belt and sprawled across the bed of an amtrak sleeper car when we share it to travel but I won’t proposition him even if he admires me even if he wants it and I’m in the best state of mind possible for this otherwise speaking. My friend and I have different tastes in drugs but he extends the offer and I still appreciate that.
I am concerned only about control. And self-reflection. Introspection. What will I see? I want to know but it’s the last frontier and perhaps I’ll hate it. In fact I think I will.
