Are there children's books now with this level of detail?

A word for things that are equal parts delicious and terrible.

A word for specific feeling of seeing a long lost friend who has forgotten you.

A word for satisfaction that comes from drawing a perfect circle.

A word strange revulsion of hugging someone you thought was a dear aunt, but then realizing it was someone else entirely.

A word for days in which there is an awkwardness to everything.

A word for the strange pleasure of the first few moments in a hot car on a hot day in Texas, and another for the misery of the next few minutes.

A word for friends who used to exist for us in real life, but now only exist in pixels.

A name for the absurd rage one experiences on possessing too many remotes and not knowing which one will switch the TV to the mode you want it to be in.

A word for the exact moment in dreams when we break the bounds of gravity and fly.

A word for the pleasure of opening a book and finding a note in the margin that feels as if it was meant only for you.

A word for the strange symbiosis we have with our children, and and one for the wash of fear when it feels disconnected.

A word for all the things people know about us that we will never know ourselves.

A word for the pause in a room after one speaks out loud of the dead.

A word for seeing the past and the future simutaneously.

A word for looking but not seeing.

A name for all of you people, out there clicking away, reading things like this, thinking; alone and yet together.

Related: Undefined, Concepts that don't exist in English, Words not in English

Richard Mosse's project Infra documents conflict in the Congo using Kodak Aerochrome, a discontinued infrared film. The film which renders foliage bright pink, heightens the surreally of an impossible to comprehend war (the Guardian reports 400,000 rapes in a single year and 5.4 million deaths over 10 years) and forces us to re-examine conflict images. When I first heard of this project (without seeing the images) I dismissed it, but the images are powerful—they would be without the exotic film stock. Mosse is a thinker who gives eloquent explanations for his choices. Ultimately Mosse does what good photographers always do, he forces us to look closely and reexamine what we think we know. (via Aperture Magazine)

Matt Couper is an artist who among other things creates modern ex-votos. This one reads, "To the Jesus of external hard drives, please fix the permissions on my drive so I can access all my files on it. There are a lot of corrupt files and psd files that won't open and I'm start panicking. 29th of November 2006" Explore the rest, they're super.

Over the past week I've twice heard twenty-somethings ponder whether kids growing up today—kids who were practically born with iPhones in hand—will still have the capacity for wonder.

Yesterday as a present for his first day of second grade I brought home an erasable gel pen for my iPhone savvy six year old. After a brief demonstration, he spontaneously hugged me, "I've been waiting for this pen my entire life!"

I think the kids are alright.

Charles Eisenmann was a Gilded Age photographer who focused almost exclusively on the people of the "living museums", carnivals, and sideshows of New York's Bowery district.

The Ronald G Becker Collection at Syracuse University holds over a thousand of Eisenmann's images. Online navigation of the archive is terrible, but well worth the work. (via Ephemeral New York)

Found this recording of Raul Andres when he was three.
Love it too much:

A British flickr user named unexpected tales has selected a nice off-kilter set of vintage photos titled peculiar snapshots. The set titled enigmatic is also worth the click.

I'm a sucker for a good beach picture. Love this one by Guggenheim fellow Greg Miller which is part of his series Primo Amore.

Need to get myself to a beach soon...

(via blink)
Not sure what the artist Park Dongseok wants to say here, but I found these portraits of Korean war gamers interesting and a little disorientating as they played on my (American) stereotypes of soldiers.

Cy Twombly is dead. He was 83. I saw him at a restaurant once in Rome. I'm happy to report I resisted the strong urge to interrupt his meal.

Rather than read the NY Times survey of his life, I recommend reading interviews. This is a good one to start with.

Mike Sinclair always makes somewhat iconic 4th of July pictures (in a way all his pictures are 4th of July pictures), this year is no exception. Click through for the full sized image.

I put my kids to sleep tonight with a story as I do most nights. Tonight's story was to be about a boy who finds a message in a bottle from a shipwrecked sea captain. I often wing stories making them up as I go along, but this one had been gestating for a few days... it was a good one. The kids were in their bunk beds eyes closed and ready.

Me: Once upon a time, before you were born, there was a boy who lived in a little white house on cliff overlooking the sea. Every morning before breakfast, he would walk down the stone steps carved into the wall of the cliff to the a small beach to search for treasures left by the tide.

Gabriel: Did he ever find sea snails? I found one once.

Raul Andres: What about sand dollars?

Me: Yes he found lots of sea snails and sand dollars and even a starfish or two.

Gabriel: Starfish look soft but the are really hard. It's true. Was the boy wearing shoes?

Me: Yes that's true, starfish feel hard and he found a few of those over the years, and no the boy never wore shoes in the summer. Now this boy was walking down the beach when...

Gabriel: Did the boy have a bucket?

Raul Andres: He had to have a bucket to collect all this stuff.

Gabriel: He could just hold everything in his hands.

Raul Andres: But the sea creatures would die.

Gabriel: Dad what was the bucket like?

Me: It was a metal bucket. Anyway, one day...

Gabriel: What color?

Me: It was blue. Do you have any more questions about the bucket?

Gabriel: Did it have any words on it or pictures or anything?

Raul Andres: Gabriel! Let dad finish the story.

Gabriel: But I want to know.

Me: The bucket had a moon on one side. No words.

Gabriel: Was it a big round moon with a face?

Me: Thin crescent. No face.

Gabriel: Did the moon glow in the dark?

Me: Yes, it glowed for when he would collect things by night.

Gabriel: What about stars? Did it have a few stars?

Me: Yes. it had lots. In fact the boy called this bucket his star bucket.

Gabriel: I like that bucket.

Raul Andres: It doesn't even exist Gabriel. It's just a story.

Gabriel: We could make one.... Dad can you make us a star bucket?

Me: I'll try.

Raul Andres: That's no fair. Can I get one too?

Me: Yes, you can get one too, but you have to help paint it...

[at this point the conversation veered in another direction.... but later...]

Gabriel: Remember you promised star buckets.

Me: I said I would try.

Raul Andres: I'll help you paint the stars.

Gabriel: The bucket glows in the dark. Those are my favorite buckets.

In his Oasis Hotel project Nicolo Degiorgis documents life on the Xinjiang highway that stretches across the Taklamakan. I've travelled the highway a few time and Degiorgis' project gives you a sense of the place. It's often grim. I wish more work was available. This feels more like the beginning of project than something that is fully realized. I hope more is coming...