Another round of excellent costume ideas culled from the Google image search and from here, here, here, and here.  Some costumes have a wee touch of the ol’ NSFW after the jump.

Happy 4th!

Civil War era portraits by photographer Mathew Brady.  The National Archives, once notoriously difficult to navigate, now has a photo-stream on Flickr!

These are from the National Archives collection of Flip Schulke’s photos for the 1971-1977 Documerica EPA Project.

From the 1983 adaptation of Hercules directed by Luigi Cozzi.

One of the best places to waste time while doing time at your lousy office job is the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library website.  They have a glorious and vast image collection.  These scans are of the Visconti-Sforza tarot card deck- one of the oldest known to exist.  More tarot cards after the jump as well as other offerings from the image collection.

The film score for Conan the Barbarian by Basil Poledouris, as everyone knows, is one of the best things ever in the history of Earth.  Apparently, Basil himself did not think so.  Juicy rumors are circulating on the internet that he was unhappy with the orchestra in Rome during the original 1981 recording sessions.  Who knows.  However, the score has been re-recorded in an attempt to recreate the composer’s original vision for his masterpiece of Leitmotifs.  My Dad, a huge fan of everything Conan, received the album for Christmas.  While the recording of the immensely talented Prague Philharmonic orchestra is doubtlessly superior, I have so long loved the original that my ears were not receptive to any deviation from the sound that my brain had mapped note for note.  Also, there’s something scrappy and unaffected about the original that is pure magic.  (You can hear one of the trumpet players totally mess up in the climax of “Anvil of Crom” and it only makes it more alive.) Listen and decide for yourself after the jump.  The 2010 album is available here or here and includes a lovely intro written by Zoe and Alexis Poledouris as well as previously unrecorded compositions.  Also after the jump is a picture of Sandahl Bergman because she is awesome.

Conan the Barbarian original recording

Conan the Barbarian new recording

I would LOVE to hear this thing in person! Located in Zadar, Croatia, The Sea Organ was built by architect Nikola Basic as part of a project to renovate the city coast.  It’s a series of marble steps that descend into the sea, concealing 35 harmonic pipes.  The wind and the tide oscillate directly into the pipes, acting as the bellows of a giant watery pipe organ.  Go here to this excellent website for a more detailed description of how the sea organ works and to listen to an audio clip.

Hungry Heart, 1999 by Norwegian artist Louise Nippierd.  A catalog clipping from a 2004 show called “Nordic Cool” at the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

Apparently, the best Portuguese Malasadas are to be found in Honolulu at Leonard’s Bakery.  I can confirm that this bold statement is, in fact, a fact.