---

I provide this for Learn & Earn challenge, initiated on Steemit blockсhain by @matkodurko and successfully run in 2019 by @brittandjosie. Now it is powered by @jizzyjoe. Round 6 this week. Join the fun!

Recently I have read three music books at the same time, so my knowledge has increased mainly in the field of music ... but post is not limited to music facts only!

---

1. Saffron or Woolly? / Рыжик или волнушка?

I studied the question whats the difference between these two relative mushrooms. It is an important to distinguish them, cause one of them is more or less edible (with a stretch!) and the other is simply 1st grade mushroom.

The Woolly milkcap, or the bearded milkcap, is on the photo above.

When I was shooting it (and a few of his relatives) in the Summer, I was sure I've got a Saffron milk mushroom in my hands... but later some doubts appeared. It could be actually Lactárius torminósus! It's very easy to confuse both species (and your smartphone app will surely confuse them - 146% guarantee!). Both species have very similar outlook. Both belong to milk mushrooms, grow in the same spruce and birch forests.. but there are significant nuances that should be remembered by inexperienced mushroom hunters. L.torminósus are more common in the forest, and rather wide-spread. As for the saffron milk caps - you have to look hardly for them, and know well the places where they occure. Saffron milk caps are the most delicious of all milky mushrooms, they belong to the 1st grade mushrooms, and even can be eaten raw, without cooking (@bambuka showed us beautiful examples in his posts), they have an aroma reminiscent of bitter geranium... And L.torminósus have bitter taste, they should be soaked for 3 days before cooking.

---

Woolly milkcap's cap is really fluffy! They have a color of pink, light yellow and orange, similar to the color of camelina caps. Both mushrooms have a concentric rings pattern on their caps - but Saffron milkcap has it more pronounced. (To me, this sounds like a obscure criterion...) Their juice is different; being cut, saffron milk's stem turns blue over time, and woolly cap remains white & slightly greenish.

---

2. strange Mursi / ну и рожа, Шарапов!

I learned it from a photo post here on the HIVE. Looking at the top 25 @crazy-andy photos of 2020, I couldn't pass by this amazing shot. I left a comment, we hang on it, and a tangible layer of useless (in a practical sense) but pleasant historical knowledge, from the series "how the world around us works", fell upon me. It turned out that during the time of the slave trade, some African tribes developed a clever tactic: they were disfiguring their face, to lower their 'value' and attractiveness in the eyes of slave reiders - and, thus, increasing safety of not becoming a slave. Amazing, isn't it? The Negro of this tribe inserts a clay plate into his mouth, which deforms the body in such a monstrous way. Moreover, the times of the slave trade have passed - but the tradition has remained!

---

'Mursi people are special. There are several rumors about their culture. They used to "insert" lip plates to be less attractive to slave traders. The other story is again that the bigger the plate, more cattle they receive when they marry. That is the local tradition'.

NB. the photo is clickable > source of publication (c) @crazy-andy.
Feel free to check his post and enjoy the beautiful phtographs!

---

---

Yesterday I finished reading Joe Boyd's book "White Bicycles" - these are the memories of a man about the 60s period of the XX century. Boyd was not the last person in the music business, I think it would be enogh to mention he was one of two founders of the famous 'UFO' club at London, which propelled the 'Pink Floyd' career. The most important thing is, that his memory has preserved a lot, although he starts the book with such a joke: "If you remember the 60s well, then you did not live in the time", hehe.

---

Below are the covers of international editions; the most primitive and repulsive and tasteless, in my opinion, is the Russian edition. Fortunately, I read the ebook version which has no cover at all :)))

---

So... What have I learned? quite a lot! but let me name a few things

3. The Incredible String Band

I've got away with this name. Another amazing piece of 60-es, another brick in the wall, another slice of pie I was not aware of. I downloaded their 1st three LPs and venturing more and more into it!

You may check this video from the Julie Felix Show, UK TV 1968.

4. On origin of Chrysalis

A small fact that you probably won't be interested in. See, for many years I have been a fan of 'Jethro Tull' band, which was signed and released all its LPs at the Chrysalis recording label. I always thought this name meant a butterfly - don't ask me why! The LP envelopes always had a butterfly image near the Chrysalis logo. But after reading the book, I learned the truth: it is composed of bands' two managers names: Chris Wright + Terry Ellis. The book also revealed the remarkable fact that this sub-label received creative freedom and self-government from the parenting 'Island' label due to some condition, a bet, an agreement ... but, perhaps, I will not "overload" my post with information about this ;=)

---

5. marijuana > heroin > cocaine

... or musical evolution theory in a nutshell. Boyd claims that a lot of good music (right in front of his eyes) appeared in the process of using "weed", well, heroin also took place... but never, never ever good music was born due to a cocaine! Boyd has a theory that the overall regression of the 70s music scene, compared to its rise in the 60s (especially, in the case of the same creative and talented performers), happened precisely in connection with their transition to cocaine. Of course, this was not the only factor. The 1973 world energetic crisis also affected.

---

Well, maybe I can name an exception of this rule... one of the greatest songs I met in my life, is 'Heroin & cocaine' by The Tiger Lillies. But, uh, I am nt sure if the cocaine actually took place in the process of music-making, I can only speculate here.