The Password [via].
Seen that scene many times, but it wasn’t until recently that I connected it to something I read years ago.
The Code Breakers” by David Kahn is a classic book on the history of cryptology. In Chapter 2 he described the simple alphabet letter-shift that every schoolboy knows, but then he double-encrypts the shift with a password. Kahn used SWORDFISH as an example.
Using a simple alphabet shift from A to B:
TACKYRACCOONS reads SZBIXQZBBNNMR. Lot of repeated letters, but if you add a key like SWORDFISH to the shift, you get LWQBVGIUJGKJ, and it’s tougher to crack. That’s kind of how the WWII German Enigma machine worked.
Leadbelly cover found here.
Grace Slick’s vocals (sans backup music) on White Rabbit creeps me right out [via]. “Remember what the door mouse said.” Oh shut up. Go feed your cats or something.
I need an aural palate cleanser after that one, so let’s roll with this:
Yeah, Ernie Andrews, one of the greatest big band soul singers of all time, and “Do I Worry” is one of my all-time favorites.
Have a great weekend or two, folks. We’ll keep the porch light on.






A television screen is inset into an avant-garde cabinet for canned music called the “Kuba Komet” at the Radio and Television Exhibition in Frankfurt, West Germany, Aug. 5, 1957. As well as the television set, the Komet houses a radio, a record player and a tape recorder. The upper part of the assembly swings on a vertical axis to face any direction.