At the Mucha exhibit I thought I spotted an Art Nouveau poster in which Alphonse depicts a man instead of his usual idealized flowy-haired woman but it turned out it the poster was of Sarah Bernhardt dressed as a man.

The docent said that Sarah B and A. Mucha had a purely professional relationship, and I believe I said “Sure …” I might have thought, “Sure, Bernhardt slept with every other talented man in Europe except for the artist for whom she posed for hours on end. Sure.”

The docent shared some more of Mucha’s history, including what the Nazis thought of him, and that was “his art was …” And then she stopped.

I said, “I know what you are going to say; it starts with a ‘D’.”

“That’s exactly it,” she answered, “We are thinking of the same word. It’s Deeeeeeee — “

“Deeeeeeee …” I chimed in, clutching my head. “Deeeeeee … ”

“Degenerate,” added a strange man standing four feet away. I will never forget this man, this kind man, so generous with information it surpassed his reticence, who regrettably will forever be known to my heart as Degenerate Man, because he vanished in to the crowd immediately after.

I realized later I might know the term “Degenerate,” but not why the Nazis classified some art as degenerate.

All I know of Degenerate art is that my favorite piece previously housed at the Saint Louis Art Museum was “Geste et parole ” by Dubuffet, and it was also labelled Degenerate by the Nazis.

So both the above and below are Degenerate.

On further reading (of Wikipedia, let’s not kid ourselves) I found the answer: degenerate art is simply modern art. Both of the above examples are stylized, non-representational, modern art. Art “Nouveau”, not Art “Same Old Same Old”.

Some forward-thinkers might like the new style of art but the populace can’t understand it. So the powers that be say it’s degenerate.

Has the US gotten there yet? It looks like President Trump is busy enough editing actual history to bother with the techniques used to represent history.

When we bought the new bed at the Mattress Firm, we also bought a sheet set. (Sleepy’s deluxe cool stretch. I tell you this because you are going to want to know in a moment.)

When I went to make the bed I was trying to puzzle out where the top and sides were on the fitted sheet, as you do, because it’s impossible, and I found a sewn-in tag that said, “Side” and another that said “Top or Bottom”.

Praise be to whatever recent generation pulled themselves out of fitted sheet despair, I thought. All the sheets today must have this. But no, evidently, only the Sleepy’s sheets at Mattress Firm have this.

I now think the Mattress Firm needs to have daily showings in which they jackknife one of their adjustable beds, and then easily position the fitted sheet on the first try, and then easily flatten the bed so it all goes taut.

However …

Amazon sells little snaps you can add to your existing sheets.

I think I might need to buy some for the new twin duvet and duvet cover. That was a half hour struggle to get that set up.

And technically, don’t I just need one corner? This is a pack of 12 – for the person who has 12 king beds in one house?

I will report back.

Here’s the previous:

Here’s the progress:

When it was originally this:

One more sweep to get the values right and then this will be buried deeep in the stack.

At the Nelson-Atkins museum I overheard a dad mocking this Hieronymus Bosch painting to the delight of his family.

“So there’s this pond, and in it, first, we have a rotisserie chicken, and to the right there’s a bird at a restaurant wearing a police cruiser light. The bird ate some of the chicken, but he stopped to put a bellows in his beak. On the other side of the rotisserie is a winged fox wearing a kerchief and a mug on his head. He’s staring at the rotisserie chicken. He wants to eat it. So does the frog right below it. They don’t know there’s a funnel man who wants to kill them. Funnel man has it in for the turtle and the fish too.”

I turned around and said, “I’m sorry, what? I have to see this painting — Oh, wow. There is a funnel man. Wow, why? This is a job for the internet.”

And then a few Googles later the answer was clear. “The funnel represents the devil.” I announced.

‘Why,” the children wanted to know.

I said, “Well, I don’t know that. I only have part of the answer.”

“But why?”

I saw I had failed them, shrugged, and left, with Farzaana, who, and I did not know this, hates talking to strangers.

We were sitting on a bench in the next room, looking at some armor, when the family came in and stood in front of us, also looking at the armor. I felt guilt about not knowing why there was a devil – funnel connection, and I turned again to my phone and soon found a better answer.

“Oh!” I said to my niece, but loudly enough for them to hear. “It’s Dante. It’s the circles of hell: they’re shaped like a funnel.”

One of the older daughters peeled off from her group and sat on our bench. She sat at a right angle to us and made no eye contact. I went on:

“The outer circle has the most people, because it’s for people who commit ordinary sins, and each circle has a rarer sin with fewer people. So the circles get smaller for each level, that’s what makes the funnel shape.”

I didn’t note the source for that, but at least there was a reason.

According to Wikipedia the fish is folly, the rotisserie chicken is gluttony (sure) or sex (again, sure), the frog is pestilence, the fox is deceit, the turtle is sloth. Funnel Devil isn’t fighting them, he’s fighting the saint.

Some sources suggest Bosch was influenced by / high on Ergot poisoning when he painted this. That totally tracks.