history, links, medical, science, sexuality

Monthly Links

So here goes with this month’s selection of items you may have missed the first time round. And there is quite a lot in this month!

Science, Technology & Natural World

Death-Cap Mushrooms are spreading across North America. But why? [LONG READ]

If you don’t like stinging things, look away now … The world’s largest bee has been found in Indonesia, after having not been seen for almost 40 years. And as stinging things go, it is huge!

One from the “I didn’t know that” box … Apparently (and I’ve not yet tried this) grapes can ignite in the microwave. And now scientists have worked out why.

After a long period of relative stagnation, scientists are now trying to work out why the magnetic north pole is moving fast towards Russia.

Health & Medicine

There are male and female brains, right? Wrong; there aren’t; just brains which are moulded slightly differently by our sexist culture.

The hormone testosterone is the thing which makes boys, well boys. Well not entirely: there’s also androsterone which is not produced in the testes. Also it seems that boys also go through several periods of “puberty”.

It seems that there are molecules in ginger which can remodel our microbiome (the flora & fauna that live in our guts).

Sexuality

Book Review: 100 women reveal their vulvas in words and pictures.

The clitoris is a gift, and we need to get over this if we are to really tackle FGM.

The Crown Prosecution Service has decided that pornographic adult consensual sex is no longer taboo. “In principle, anything which is legal to consent to doing is now legal to consent to distribute images of, providing the likely audience is over the age of 18.”

Apparently the female human body blocks weak sperm. Well who would have guessed?

Social Sciences, Business, Law

Ocado, the grocery supplier, recently lost a huge warehouse to a major fire. BBC reporter Zoe Kleinman visited one of their warehouses to see how their leading edge automation in action.

Art & Literature

After far too many years, the British Library are finally making their collection of obscene writing more generally available online – through accredited institutions and in their reading rooms.

London’s National Portrait Gallery has an exhibition of Elizabethan miniatures by Hilliard and Oliver, including one of Sir Walter Ralegh (right).

History, Archaeology & Anthropology

There is a cave, in Siberia’s Altai Mountains, where Neandertals and Denisovans set up home – and it’s challenging our view of cultural evolution.

The first evidence of beer brewing in Britain has been found in Cambridgeshire.

At the other end, the remains of a three person, 12th-century, loo seat is going on display at the Museum of London Docklands.

A guy called John Harding has spent the last 20 years tracking down and cataloguing carvings of naked women showing off their genitals (aka. Sheela-na-gigs) on Britain’s churches.

After which we can only go to the gateway to Hell! A cave in Nottinghamshire has been found to contain a huge number of anti-witch graffiti.

HMS Victory – taht’s the one before the famous one – is an abandoned shipwreck in the English Channel. And now there’s an argument over whether it should be raped by archaeologists or left to decay in peace.

London

Ianvisits goes to London’s newest cathedral.

Lifestyle & Personal Development

In Sweden there’s a “stylish” shopping mall where everything is recycled, reused or upcycled.

There are people around who have decided to make not buying new closthes a lifestyle and a business.

Women across the world stopped depilating for Januhairy. Here four of them talk about what they learnt.

There’s a new emoji for menstruation. But it seems to me, and many others, to be a bit too weak.

Fed up with being positive all the time? Then don’t. Take note of what makes you annoyed and feel negative; and just see the benefits!

Food & Drink

So do you eat mouldy jam? The Prime Minister says she does, but should you? The experts consider.

Shock, Horror, Humour

And finally … There’s a woman in Glasgow who can taste your name. I feel for all the jacks and Johns out there.

Toodle Pip.

quotes

Monthly Quotes

OK, so here we are again with this month’s collection of recently encountered, interesting and/or amusing quotes.

The image of Time brought thoughts of mortality: of human beings, facing outward like the Seasons, moving hand in hand in intricate measure, stepping slowly, methodically, sometimes a trifle awkwardly, in evolutions that take recognizable shape: or breaking into seemingly meaningless gyrations, while partners disappear only to reappear again, once more giving pattern to the spectacle: unable to control the melody, unable, perhaps, to control the steps of the dance.
[Anthony Powell; A Question of Upbringing]

True freedom is being without anxiety about imperfection.
[Sengchen; 6th century Chinese Zen master]

When you work hard to make your relationship work and stay together for a long time, then you each become the person you were meant to be with.
[Haemin Sunim; Korean Buddhist monk]

You’re fine just as you are but you could use little improvement.
[Sunryu Suzuki]

Woodcutters and fishermen know just how to use things. What would they do with fancy chairs and meditation platforms? In straw sandals and with a bamboo staff, I roam three thousand worlds, dwelling by the water, feasting on the wind, year after year.
[Ikkyu]

Sometimes all we need is a hug to make us realise that everything will soon be alright.

If people bought no more books than they intended to read, and no more swords than they intended to use, the two worst trades in Europe would be a bookseller’s and a sword-cutler’s; but luckily for both they are reckoned genteel ornaments.
[Lord Chesterfield]

Many of us haven’t owned a nice box of coloured pencils since we were children. Yet no adult should be without one, because having a range of colours at our fingertips provides a route to a wide array of moods and inspirations. This box knows that colours are connected to the chords of our souls. It includes a booklet about the psychology behind twelve shades, explaining how each of these colours links us to specific memories and feelings.
[From Twitter, apparently from a box of coloured pencils]

There was an old woman from Slough
Who developed a terrible cough
So, she drank half a pint
Of warm honey and mint
But, sadly, she didn’t pull through.
[Seen on Facebook]

Light is known to be fuzzy at the quantum level. With the help of a team in Australia, researchers are sharpening the light by squeezing the fuzziness.
[From https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-47213202]

books, personal

10 Books I Hated / Can’t Read: Part 2

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Following on from my series of 10 Books I’ve Loved I now bring you 10 Books I Hated or Can’t Read

Some of these I’ve read and didn’t like, some were destroyed for me by school, and some I’ve tried and just couldn’t get to grips with despite wanting to.

Rather than spread this across 10 days, one book per day, I’m posting this in two posts, each of five books, a few days apart. Also (because I want to) I’m going to provide a short commentary on why I found each book so difficult. This is part two.

In each part I’m nominating three people to produce their own list, in any way they like – just leave a comment here with a link to yours. The second three are: Sophie Clissold-Lesser, Nick Birns, Gabriella Walfridson. Of course anyone else is welcome to sing along!

Leo Tolstoy; War and Peace

I tried reading this, from choice, in my teens. I failed. I could not get into it and couldn’t identify with it as nothing seemed to happen in slow motion. Oh and there was too much of it.

Thomas Hardy; The Mayor of Casterbridge

This is another that was destroyed for me by being flogged through it at school. I detested it so much that I remember almost nothing about it.

Haruki Murakami; The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

I’ve tried to read this two or three times, but I’ve had to give up each time as for some reason I find it depressing, with the prospect that it gets worse as you go on. I’m told it isn’t like that, but that’s what it does to me. I’ve also found this with the other bits of Murakami I’ve tried, so it’s likely something about the way either his subject matter or his style work on me. It’s a shame as there’s something I still find intriguing here.

Charles Dickens; A Christmas Carol

Yet one more destroyed by school, and on every encounter since. I find it (as I find almost all Dickens) dark, disturbing, depressing … and tedious. The only Dickens I’ve ever tried and enjoyed is Pickwick Papers.

James Joyce; Ulysses

My parents had an early copy of Ulysses – it may even have been the original contraband Paris edition – so I read it in my mid-teens. To this day I don’t know why I bothered. WTF is it on about? Whatever it is made no sense at all. Even the Hardy and Dickens I so hate at least make some sense. I have a suspicion that Joyce is just taking the gullible for a ride.

Later in the year I hope to follow on with at least one further, similar, theme: I already have Books I Found Influential / Formative lined up. (Yes, that’s different to Books I’ve Loved.) There may be others.

books, personal

10 Books I Hated / Can’t Read: Part 1

2 Comments

Following on from my series of 10 Books I’ve Loved I now bring you 10 Books I Hated or Can’t Read

Some of these I’ve read and didn’t like, some were destroyed for me by school, and some I’ve tried and just couldn’t get to grips with despite wanting to.

Rather than spread this across 10 days, one book per day, I’m posting this in two parts, each of five books, a few days apart. Also (because I want to) I’m going to provide a short commentary on why I found each book so difficult. This is part the first.

In each part I’m nominating three people to produce their own list, in any way they like – just leave a comment here with a link to yours. The first three are: June Laurenson, Graham Page, Sue Lubkowska. Of course anyone else is welcome to sing along!

JRR Tolkien; Lord of the Rings

I would like to read this, if only to know what all the fuss is about. But over the years I’ve tried several times and never managed to get past page 50. I just don’t find it captivating.

Mervyn Peake; Titus Alone

Having read the first two books of the trilogy, I embarked on the third but had to give up about a quarter of the way through as I found it just too depressing.

Grace Metalious; Peyton Place

I read this in my early teens because everyone at school was talking about it, and it was supposed to be salacious. Frankly it was an extemely tedious soap opera.

Salman Rushdie; Satanic Verses

I will not be told by anyone what I may/may not read, so when some Ayatollah put an interdict on this I made sure I acquired a copy. In two or three attempts I’ve never got past page five; it’s worse than Finnegan’s Wake and that’s going some.

John Buchan; The Thirty-Nine Steps

Like all the (so-called) classics, this was destroyed for me by having to flog through it at school, at an age when I found engaging with books difficult. It doesn’t help that I read slowly, so I was always way behind with any reading assignment.

Part two in a few days time.

personal, ramblings

Ten Things, February

This year our Ten Things series is focusing on each month in turn. The Ten Things may include facts about the month, momentous events that happened, personal things, and any other idiocy I feel like – just because I can. So here are …

Ten Things about February

  1. Was originally named after the Roman purification ritual Februa held on 15th.
  2. It is always the shortest month.
  3. Pagans celebrate Imbolc, halfway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox on 1st.
  4. Whereas Christians have Candlemas on 2nd.
  5. St Valentines Day is, of course, on 14th.
  6. Most years Chinese New Year falls in February; this year it is on Tuesday 5th.
  7. In Anglo-Saxon this is Sol-monath (cake month – sounds good to me!).
  8. Shrove Tuesday & Ash Wednesday fall in February in most years, unless as this year Easter is especially late when they are just in March.
  9. February is the only month which is variable in length, having the extra day every four years (except century years); there are 97 Leap Months every 400 years.
  10. Birthstone: Amethyst
books, sexuality

One Small Step

After an almost infinite number of years the British Library has finally opening its “Private Case” – ie. writing it has considered too obscene for general access – and digitised the 2500 books it contains. The digitised images will be made available online.

But don’t all rush. Although the “Private Case” collection has been accessible to the public through the British Library’s rare books collection since the 1960s, the digitisation means the titles will now be available to a wider audience: by subscription to libraries and higher education institutions, or free at the BL’s reading rooms in London and Yorkshire. So you’ll still have to be a bona fide person to get access. Why, I don’t know as much of the contents are already widely available on the open market.

But let’s rejoice! It is a small step forward for freedom and the removal of prudery.

science, words

Word: Olericulture

Olericulture

The cultivation of edible plants, especially leafy vegetables and herbs.
The branch of horticulture that specializes in the cultivation of edible plants.

The word is a Latin derivative, recorded by the OED as first used in 1886.

amusements

Counters

Each month this year we’re bringing you a post under the general title “Things that Count in [Number]” where [Number] will be the month. And naturally each month’s post will contain the [Number] of items (so just one for January, up to 12 for December).

For our purposes the definition of counting includes things which either come in groups of [Number] (eg. four suits in a pack of playing cards) or things which count in [Number] (eg. decimal coinage counting in tens).

Things which Count in Two …

  1. Noah’s animals
  2. Lily-white boys
environment, history, medical, science, topographical

Monthly Links

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Blimey! It can’t be the end of January already – Christmas was only last week! Well anyway here is the monthly selection of links to items you may have missed, and there’s a lot of it this month.

Science, Technology & Natural World

Why do cats have rasping tongues? It isn’t primarily for cleaning meat off bones as most of the bones a cat would encounter in the wild would be small enough for them to crunch up. No their tongues are ideally suited for keeping their fur properly groomed so it stays waterproof and insulating. And I’ve noticed, from having had quite a few cats, that female cats’ tongues are raspier than males – presumably to better groom their kittens.

The immediate challenges with Artificial Intelligence are not that it may take over but far more philosophical.

Almost three hundred years on a scientist corrects the physiological errors in Gulliver’s Travels

Health & Medicine

So how does ‘flu kill people? Spoiler: It doesn’t.

Haemochromatosis is a genetic disease where the body stores dangerously too much iron, and it’s a bigger problem than was hitherto realised.

There’s a lot of debate over whether cannabis is good or bad for mental health. Jonathan Stea on the Scientific American blog investigates.

A recent study has found that around half of people who think they have a food allergy actually don’t.

In another recent study medics have found that many people with back pain are told to do the exact opposite of what the science says works. [LONG READ]

Most of us get the “winter blues” to some degree, but for some (like me) it is full-blown Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). Whether you’re one of the unlucky ones may be related to the colour of your eyes.

As I have always suspected, the need for sunscreen is somewhat over inflated. [LONG READ]

[trigger warning] And finally in this section, it seems that miscarriages could be the result of damaged sperm.

Sexuality

Thoughts on how parents should talk to their children about sex.

On women, desire and why their ability to orgasm is supposedly so mysterious.

Environment

Focusing on how individuals can help limit climate change is very convenient for corporations as it takes then focus off them.

That great British tradition, the lawn, is actually not very environmentally friendly.

Social Sciences, Business, Law

I wasn’t sure where this best fits … Apparently most UK police forces fail to meet fingerprint evidence standards. (That’s not really surprising since there has never been a rigorous scientific study of the evidence as to whether fingerprints are reliable.)

History, Archaeology & Anthropology

Recent DNA studies are fermenting a brouhaha in India over who were the first Indians.

A tumbledown Welsh farmstead (above) has been discovered to be a rare medieval hall house. And now you can stay there.

The worriers are out to tell us that everyday Victorian and Edwardian objects were far too dangerous, although uranium glass certainly isn’t one of them (it is negligibly radioactive).

Once upon a time Britain was protected by some large concrete blocks.

London

Near Great Portland Street underground station, archaeologists have found an almost intact 18th-century ice house.

London’s Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology houses one of the greatest collections of ancient Egyptian and Sudanese archaeology in the world, but it is well hidden.

London’s weather in 2018.

What to London Underground’s service announcements actually mean? Well it depends, and it’s complicated.

Here’s a report of the major mess which Crossrail is in. How does any project manager get here?

Lifestyle & Personal Development

Apparently, and to my surprise, the second-hand book trade is thriving.

Throw it away! Decluttering is actually good for you.

Gesshin Claire Greenwood, one of our favourite zen masters, considers Marie Kondo, Japanese Buddhism and breaking away from tradition.

Is it possible to live without plastic? Pioneer families show how it can be done.

Bicarb, vinegar, lemon juice: how to clean your house, efficiently, the old-fashioned way.

Here are a clutch of everyday objects with features you didn’t know were there, or didn’t know their purpose.

Apparently millennials are burnt-out. You mean every corporate employee isn’t?.

Late nights and erratic sleep patterns produce social jetlag and make you ill.

Of Walls and Squirrels. Our other favourite zen master, Brad Warner, on not sweating the things we can’t control.

What are the effects of total isolation, and can we cope with it?

Veganism is on the rise, but is it the latest piece of cynical marketing, or is it really the future of food. [LONG READ]

To sleep nude or in pyjamas? Which is better for your health?

Food & Drink

Five, allegedly important, genetically modified fruit. Maybe.

Shock, Horror, Humour

And finally … I do love it when the experts get their comeuppance! An apparently ancient Scottish stone circle was built in 1990s by a farmer.

More next month. Be good!

amusements, arts, personal

10 Books I’ve Loved: 10

Before Christmas I was nominated by Graham Page to post, over 10 days, the covers of 10 Books I’ve Loved, no explanation necessary – just the covers.

This is being spread over the five working days of each of two weeks. I don’t usually tag people on memes, and tagging someone every day (as requested) seems too big an imposition, so to compromise I’m nominating these five people to produce their own list: Alden O’Brien, Keeley Schell, Ivan Hutnik, John Monaghan, Ashley Herum. Of course anyone else is welcome to sing along!

Day 10 : Malcolm Bradbury; Rates of Exchange

Later in the year I hope to follow on with other similar themes. I already have Books I Hated / Can’t Read and Books I Found Influential / Formative lined up. There may be others.