Time for another selection of links to articles you may have missed.
As usual let’s start with the real nerdy science stuff and descend into banality.
For those of a mathematical bent, and to celebrate the 400th anniversary this year of logarithms, here are ten top mathematical innovations.
We now know that our bodies are home to many microbes, both good and bad. But are we using them, or is our microbiome using us?
We all use pharmaceuticals of some form at least sometimes. What is surprising is how little we absorb and how much is excreted. So what happens to all those drugs we flush down the toilet?
Scary stuff for all those mothers and would-be-mothers out there. There’s actually a war going on in the womb.
So much of what we think we know is actually urban legend. Here’s an interesting long read on how such academic urban legends arise.

After many years scientists have finally sequenced the genome of the domestic cat. What’s interesting is the high degree to which their genome has been conserved over the years.
While on felines, none of the cats can taste sweet. This and other differences between us and other species.
Do you allow your dog to sleep in the bedroom? Or your cat to sleep on the bed? Or should you banish your pets from the bedroom?
OK, so now let’s move on to food …
So why wouldn’t we eat blue chicken? What is it about blue food that doesn’t appeal?
Next up, five things we should all know about washing food. We probably all do know them, but how many of us actually bother?
Walk on … does pressing the pedestrian crossing button actually do anything?
Most of us have to write stuff, at least occasionally. But why is it so hard to find your own typos?
OK here are some more of the things we think we know, but actually don’t … 33 well known “facts” that aren’t.
And so, at last, to history. I found this an interesting piece on London’s coffee houses, taverns, tea and chocolate.

Ah, yes, chocolate. It comes in many forms, but also now also as LEGO bricks.

And finally one to make you smirk. Some examples of phallic cartography.