Wednesday Media Consumption Roundup

[mousetrappling]

Books

Fiction: Still reading "The Bonehunters" by Steven Erikson - Ok, so I definitely hadn't read this one before because I don't remember that or THAT! And I would've. There is a sense of the world shifting around the characters and things that seemed to be facts or the way things worked turning out to not be what they seem.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - continuing with the Eastern Mediterranean in the 2nd Millennium BCE, looking at the interconnections on various levels, the evidence for which includes the Amarna letters and also a shipwreck from the right era (heavily laden with trade goods) amongst other things.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 5.4 of the History of India - a new Mauryan emperor several centuries after the last (and he claims to've conquered the world tho that is sheer propaganda).

ep 97-103 of The History of China - more of the Tang dynasty, after the Empress Wu. The narrative has now got as far as the An Lushan rebellion, which I mostly remember the lead up to because it's the plot of a Guy Gavriel Kay novel ("Under Heaven").

ep 182 of The History of Byzantium - the Bulgarian rebellion against Michael IV's rule (nearly resulting in Michael IV's death).

bonus ep of The History of England - second part of an interview with Elizabeth Chadwick this time about Eleanor of Aquitaine.

ep Eleanor 8 of The History of England Shedcasts - Louis and Eleanor on Crusade/pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and their disintegrating marriage.

ep Marshal 2 of The History of England Shedcasts - looking at his lineage, and setting his family in the context of The Anarchy.

Sunday podcast: Listened to an episode of In Our Time about Venus - the planet, that is. Covered some of the history of what we used to think plus the current understanding of what Venus is like.

Music: While running I listened to The Raveonettes "In & Out of Control", The Pipettes "We Are the Pipettes" and The Monkees' greatest hits; in a sort of early (sounding) pop/rock & roll mood. To drown out the TV sounds so I could write I listened to the rest of "Now 29 CD1", Bill Bruford with Ralph Towner & Eddie Gomez "If Summer Had Its Ghosts" (jazzy, instrumental, and surprisingly pleasant - it had decent melodic lines and less wibbling about than I might've expected), a compilation called "Sometimes God Smiles: the Young Person's Guide to Discipline" (had a track by Bill Bruford with Ralph Towner & Eddie Gomez on it, was OK to listen to but I don't remember much sticking out) and CD1 of the "Dreamboats & Petticoats 2" compilation (had a Bill Hailey track on it which I should check to see if it's a typo in our tags because that's not how I thought he was spelt; fun rock & roll tracks).

Watching

ep 7-10 of The Hairy Bikers Home for Christmas - the problem with watching it so close together is that the format got a bit too obvious but quite fun & a lot of food we liked the look of, and it's always good to get more ideas to use up leftover roasts.

ep 3 of Earth's Greatest Rivers - the Mississippi this time, which drains a much much larger part of the USA than I'd realised. An interesting series overall, glad we watched it.

ep 2 of Guitar, Drum & Bass - this was Tina Weymouth talking about the bass, both the instrument and the other ways of getting bass in one's music (in a modern Western rock/pop context). Not quite the same sort of film as the drum one, but still interesting particularly as we're both playing Rocksmith learning the bass at the moment.

ep 3 of The Art that Made Mexico: Paradise, Power & Prayers - the art of faith, including a lot of ultra-ornate New Spanish Catholic ... er... monstrosities (I'm not a huge fan of the over-done style of the New Spanish Baroque style). A really interesting series, very definitely from a Mexican perspective rather than an outsider one.

ep 1 of Icons - this is a sort of reality show for famous people of the 20th Century. Each episode will be looking at a few candidates for best X of the 20th Century then there's a public vote (and there'll be a finale too where various winners are set up against each other). We're not watching in a timely enough fashion for the voting side of it (and don't much care about that) but the four mini-bios of potential most iconic leader of the 20th Century were interesting so we'll keep watching the episodes to see the other bios.

The Bank that Almost Broke Britain - in our depressing TV slot last week was this documentary about the collapse of RBS, told alternately through the history of the bank from the early 80s to 2008 and through the events of the day it nearly brought down the British economy. Unusual for a depressing current affairs/recent history programme to have the politicians come out looking better than the rest.