Tuesday 6 October 2026 to Tuesday 13 October 2026

[mousetrappling]

Books

• “Understanding Early Civilizations” Bruce G. Trigger
  Partway through the chapter on Priests, Festivals and the Politics of the Supernatural. All the civilisations had people who were specially trained to carry out the necessary rituals/sacrifices but whether they were full time or not varied a lot. In all cases the king is the point of contact between the people & the supernatural, and the priests act on his behalf. One of the key things he emphasises is that there is no sign in any of the civilisations of a power struggle between “church” and “state” – historians & archaeologists have seen its presence only because they are inappropriately applying a model derived from medieval Europe to other cultures.

Podcasts

• The Rest is Politics Leading
  
  • interview with Shabana Mahmood, who came across quite well.
  • interview with Andy Burnham, which was essentially a venue for him to talk to a broader public about the things he said in his conference speech, came across well and certainly seems to have a vision but still very short on actual detail
• Talk 90s to Me
  Interview with someone who’s written a book about queer moments on TV in the 90s (the book probably covers a longer time than that).
• The History of Egypt
  The end of the 19th Dynasty – Siptah dies not that long after his chancellor Bay was executed, his successor is his predecessor’s wife & his regent Tausret. She doesn’t last long on the throne either, and a king called Sethnakht takes over amidst violence and we count him as starting a new dynasty.
• The Rest is Politics
  
  • Michael Gove standing in for Rory this week, and as always I found him rather oily even if personable. They covered the Tory conference, in particular Badenoch’s speech, plus the riots in France, the election in Spain & the election in Brazil
  • in the Q&A episode there was more disagreement – Gove is pro-Brexit even now and somehow thinks it has worked better than anyone admits(!), they also covered among other things the Middle East (more disagreement), the Man City stuff
• The Rest is Politics US
  
  • in the run up to the midterms Trump is becoming a liability but he’s going out on tour anyway
  • more corruption, this time people who run things like campaigns for Trump having been found to be giving information to a pro-Russian Balkan government, also the Democrat candidate who it turns out was a fetish model at some point in his life and has decided to lean in to that rather than try & hush it up now it’s out there
  • some discussion of the Kansas mid-terms race, where the Democrats are polling very well for a red state, also discussed the Russian oil deal and made the point that the quantity of oil involved is essentially nothing (16 hours of US use) so suggesting that this is more about getting money into Russia possibly with a quid pro quo of money flowing into business connected with the Trumps
• Behind the Lines with Arthur Snell
  An episode about undersea cables & their vulnerabilities (which started by pointing out that this goes back further than one thinks, one of the first acts by the British in World War One was to cut Germany’s telegraph cables)
• The Bunker
  
  • an interview with Naomi Klein & Astra Taylor about their book End Times Fascism, which is about the unholy alliance between evangelicals, nationalists & tech bros who all seem to be gleefully welcoming and accelerating the end of the world
  • an interview with someone who works for Anthropic and has written a book about the worrying ways that AI might affect democracy
  • Weekly Wrap Up, recorded before the by-election results so didn’t mention that, instead led with the awful botched execution in Tennessee
  • a discussion about investigative journalism and how truth seems to be less valued both by journalism and consumers of journalism
  • Start the Week, where the lead story was Andy Burnham confirming that Russia interfered in the 2016 referendum (this was on The Rest is Politics Leading so I listened to that later the same day), also covered amongst other things the discussion round the upcoming budget, Trump buying diesel from Russia and once again being very anti-Ukraine, the war in Yemen spilling over into Saudi territory, the atrocious idea put forward by Hegseth of live-streaming an execution
• The History of Philosophy
  
  • continuing his mini series of interviews on topics he skipped over, this is an episode on Zoroastrianism
  • the last of the mini series, on Irish Medieval philosophy
  • an interview with an expert on both Bayle (and his dictionary) and pessimism about how the philosophy of pessimism shows up in the dictionary
• Oh God What Now
  
  • main subject was the re-opening of the Brexit debate, which was generally welcomed, also discussed the death of Jeffrey Archer
  • bonus episode about the Holborn & St Pancras by-election, which Labour won, including discussing what it means for Zack Polanski (any time you have to come out & say you aren’t stepping down over something is a bad time)
  • the main subject was Andy Burnham saying that Russia had interfered in the referendum, broadening out to a wider discussion about the state of the world vis-a-vis Russia & potential war. Quite gloomy actually, one of the panellists in particular seems convinced we’re at a point where a hot war in the next 10 years is a significant possibility and sees the Burnham statements around foreign policy as about getting the country in the right place to accept higher defence spending as we desperately need it.
• Empire
  
  • the story of the build up to William’s invasion in 1066, expanding beyond the Bayeux Tapestry to give more context for it
  • the story of the Battle of Hastings and the immediate aftermath
• The Rest is Science
  
  • a Q&A episode where the show & tell object was the vertebrae of a mammoth dredged up from the North Sea (so they talked about Doggerland)
  • an episode about placebos, and how they’re getting more effective in the US (a lot of the discussion was around how “doing something” will often alleviate symptoms as some symptoms (like pain) are less objective and more subjective ways of our body getting us to change the thing that is a problem)
• Starship Alexandria
  Discussed the graphic novel Helen of Wyndhorn, which sounds rather good, sort of portal fantasy, sort of Conan the Barbarian
• The History of China
  The Taiping Rebellion continues, but suffers a great defeat when one of their strategic cities is beseiged and eventually sacked (in part because there were European ships bringing supplies but then the British stop that from happening because they need the Qing propped up) – but the Emperor dies, and dies young leaving a 5 year old heir while having abandoned Beijing when the British & French turn up, so the legitimacy of his dynasty is called into question at the same time as his troops are winning.
• The Rest is History
  I’m caught up with all the ongoing podcasts, so I’m returning to The Rest is History which I’m about 100 episodes in to but haven’t listened for a couple of years or more.
  • first part of a two parter about Thermopylae & Salamis, the release was timed to coincide with the 2500th anniversary of those battles, this episode set the scene and got us right up to the brink of the battles
  • second part of the Thermopylae & Salamis episodes, covering the battles themselves & discussing the legacy – if the Persians had won & incorporated the rest of Greece into their empire, would the world be different, Tom Holland argues yes
  • an episode about the decolonisation of Africa
• Your Time Your Way
  If you’re trying to get back on track, it’s a good idea to consider whether the track you’re getting back to is still right for you
• In Our Time: Cybernetics
  Cybernetics grew out of the new science of the Second World War and developed into a paradigm that could be applied to many fields from biology to computing to administration of cities & corporations. But that wide range of uses is probably why it dissolved into part of the underpinnings of each discipline rather than a scientific field in itself. The basic idea is to look at everything as systems of feedback loops, where the information flowing round the system is the important element.
• The History of England
  It all starts to fall apart for James II, tho he’s oblivious until close to the very end, and the episode ends with William of Orange & his army waiting for the wind to be right so he can sail across to England (an amusing juxtaposition with the Empire episodes on the Norman Conquest as that was also a key plot point in that invasion and the cliff hanger where they broke their episodes)

TV

• England v. Czechia 3-0
• For the Record: An Incomplete History of Music
  This episode looked at opera & classical music (in the umbrella term sense of the word not the specific period), and how they underpin a lot of Western music, also some references to other traditions but not a lot this time.
• Wilderness with Simon Reeve
  Second episode was about the Sea of Cortez – the ocean wilderness ones seem less viscerally “do not want” than the land based ones, I think it’s because it looks peaceful (they weren’t caught in any storms). Most of the episode spent looking for sharks & other signs of how the ecosystem is doing (mostly pretty badly, it’s very overfished like all the rest of the oceans 🙁)
• Later … with Jools Holland
  New season of Jools has started, tho there wasn’t much to our tastes on this one – I liked the not-the-Beautiful South band (it’s the guy from the Beautiful South with a different band, and I can't remember the name of the band or the man) more than J did as I like the Beautiful South more than he does, but when they played an actual Beautiful South song it was a lot better than the two new ones.

Games

• Diablo IV
  We’ve opened up Rank VII and Torment VII (tho we’re still playing on Torment VI), and have both found a 5-piece charm, so we’re doing pretty well this season. I wish my Ring of Jordan would stop crapping out tho, as it means I suddenly get very fragile.