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Books

Fiction: Still reading "Reaper's Gale" by Steven Erikson - not sure I've anything interesting to say about it at the moment, there's definitely a feeling of some of the plot about to be resolved but I feel like until it all comes together I'm not quite sure what's going on. A theme seems to be developing of pairs of characters each thinking the other must be dead (for good reason) and I'm guessing they'll be meeting again.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - I'm on to the last chapter of the narrative sweep of history now, covering the last 300 years before the Classical period. All the pieces are almost in place for how the world will be in 500 BCE but not quite.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 121-134 of The History of China - the Tang have fallen, and China is going through another period of disunity (the 5 Dynasties & 10 Kingdoms period), he's nearly at the end of that now and the Song Dynasty are waiting in the wings.

ep 185 of The History of Byzantium - onward into the reign of Constantine Monomachos, dealing with revolts and incursions across the Danube. This is descending a bit into a sea of unrelated facts for me, it always seems to make sense when I listen to it but I'm not retaining enough of it to even make brief notes here, which is a shame.

ep HoS 32 of The History of England Shedcasts - James III takes the throne (young) in the wake of his father's disastrous encounter with an exploding cannon. This period includes the last time Berwick on Tweed changed hands, remaining English ever since.

Sunday podcast: Listened to an episode of In Our Time about Aristotle's Biology - which is based on an empirical methodology and much closer to a post-Enlightenment scientific way of looking at things than you might expect for an ancient Greek. Yet at the same time it's really not the same world view (and he does have a tendency to revert to "oh they must spontaneously generate" whenever he can't figure out how animals are reproducing).

Music: While running I listened to Everything But the Girl "Home Movies". To drown out the TV sounds so I could write I listened to three discs (out of 4) of the two "Dreamboats & Petticoats" compilations that we have (all had Billy Fury tracks on; the flavour is good old-fashioned rock'n'roll)

Museums

Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms: Art, Word, War - exhibition at the British Library which we caught just before it finished. A look at the sweep of Anglo-Saxon history in England from the early migration onto the island through to the Norman Conquest. Illustrated via a lot of manuscripts (of course) and several objects. Rather well done, I thought.

Egyptian Galleries at the British Museum - we had time to spare before the exhibition at the BL so came to the BM for a potter around. It's been a while since we've been in on a Saturday afternoon so we'd forgotten how much of a zoo it can be. Had a look at a few things in the statue gallery, then some of the upstairs ones (I kept to the quieter end and looked at some of the Nubian stuff and the early stuff).

Watching

ep 7 of Icons - artists for this one, defined broadly enough to cover writers and film makers (thus overlapping a bit with the entertainers category). A bit of a harder sell for me for icons. Only episode we have left is the final showdown between the category winners, which will make odd viewing as we know who won.

ep 2 of Our Classical Century - classical music during (and just before & after) the Second World War. The second presenter this time was John Simpson. Including composers like William Walton and Benjamin Britten.

ep 1 of Inside Europe: Ten Years of Turmoil - a look back at how we got to where we are now in British politics. As depressing as one might imagine. This episode looked at the attempt of Cameron to negotiate "better terms" with the EU in order to not hold a referendum on leaving, and it all felt a bit groundhog day - the same seeming inability to understand that the UK is not the only country with an interior life whilst negotiating.

ep 1 & 2 of The Hairy Bikers' Comfort Food - another series to make us hungry, and to get recipe ideas from, I may have to buy the book of this one (tho I need to check first it has the recipes we liked the look of that weren't on the BBC website).

Two weeks worth this time coz I was busy last Wednesday evening.

Books

Fiction: Finished "The Bonehunters" by Steven Erikson - there wasn't much left so not really anything more to say.

Started "Reaper's Gale" also by Steven Erikson - there's a feeling of several of the narrative threads pulling together in this one (can't be too many though, there are 3 more books), at least several of the more mundane (as opposed to godlike, but that's a spectrum not a binary in these books) protagonists are all in the same place with foreshadowing of convergence. No-one knows the full story of what's going on tho (nor does the reader).

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - the second half or so of the 2nd Millennium BCE is a time of increasing contacts across the Mediterranean, and of the decline and/or collapse of palace centred polities in favour of trading networks, the Sea Peoples, the rise of the Phoenicians, Iberia is no longer as isolated and so on.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 5.6 of the History of India - Kashmir's attempt to conquer India & the whole world.

ep 110-121 of The History of China - we are well into the decline & fall of the Tang now, bandit rebellions all over the place, so-called Governor Generals who are more like autonomous warlords etc etc.

ep Eleanor 10-11 of The History of England Shedcasts - Eleanor and Henry II of England marry, and a look at how much power and influence she actually had during the early years of their marriage.

ep Marshal 4-5 of The History of England Shedcasts - William's father and his King Arthur obsession, then William's adolescence which started with his moving to Tancarville to live with a (distant) relative's household to learn the skills he'd need in later life.

ep 215 of The China History Podcast - second half of a biography of V. K. Wellington Koo who continues to be a big part of the Chinese diplomatic machinery throughout the middle of the 20th Century.

ep 5 (remastered) of The History of Egypt - he's redoing the early episodes gradually, so I listened to this when it got re-uploaded. Covers Sneferu & his three pyramids.

ep 106 of The History of Egypt - moving forward with the last years of Amenhotep III's reign, and looking at international diplomacy & marriage alliances in particular.

ep 121 of The History of English - looking at how English became the language of government in the years following the Black Death for the first time since the Norman Conquest.

bonus episode of The History of Byzantium - about Harald Hardrada who spend his early adulthood in exile and some of that time as a mercenary in Byzantium.

ep 184 of The History of Byzantium - moving the narrative forward in the 1040s where Zoe & her sister are still the routes to power although they seem to have no overt desire to rule themselves instead another new husband of Zoe's becomes the Emperor.

two bonus episodes of The History of England - one an interview with someone about Joseph Lancaster who was a great reformer of education during the 19th Century, and the other a guest episode about trade during the Tudor period (and pirates, like Drake).

Sunday podcast: Listened to an episode of In Our Time about Emmy Noether - the most famous mathematician I'd never heard of (I think). She worked during the first half of the 20th Century and was responsible for some of the bits of maths in Einstein's theory of General Relativity, her own interests were more in the field of pure mathematics than theoretical physics and her work there changed the way mathematicians think about things.

Listened to an episode of In Our Time about Owain Glyndwr who declared himself Prince of Wales and lead a revolt against Henry IV. Although ultimately unsuccessful he had some definite momentum going at first and it took a while for Henry to reassert English control over Wales.

Talks: "Ancient Egypt & Nubian Leather Technology", Lucy Skinner - EEG meeting talk this month, she told us about how leather is made and how Egyptian & Nubian leather is different to European leather, and what & how it was used. Along with some examples of items she's worked on, including some armour from Tutankhamun's tomb.

"Papyrus BM EA87512: Always Look on the Bright Side of Wife?" Koen Donker van Heel - this year's Glanville Lecture about a papyrus of accounts written in abnormal hieratic and what it tells us about the lives of more ordinary people in the 9th Century BCE. He was a very entertaining speaker.

Music: While running I listened to Everything But the Girl "Amplified Heart" (not many solo runs in the last two weeks). To drown out the TV sounds so I could write I listened to more Bill Laswell "Spiritual Beauty: Imaginal Orient" (passed me by a bit more than the other one, might've been my frame of mind at the time tho), and a whole bunch of compilations: a soundtrack to a film I've never seen "The End of Violence" (had a Bill Pullman track on it, quite enjoyed it), Now 31 CD2 (had a Billie Ray Martin track on it, this is around where I stopped buying Now albums and so it part sounds of nostalgia and part sounds of kids these days have no taste), two Imagined Village things (the EP and the first album, both for Billy Bragg songs, I love most of this project's stuff, folk but modern), "Swing Brother Swing" (has a Billy Eckstine Orchestra piece, I keep forgetting we have this compilation), "Come & Get It: The Best of Apple Records" (which has a Billy Elliot track on it, quite liked this CD).

Watching

ep 3-6 of Icons - scientists, entertainers, activists & sports stars. The mini-bios continue to be interesting, and an interesting way to look at the 20th Century, you get to see a lot of different aspects of modern history. The vote bit is still somewhat of a gimmick.

ep 2 of 100 Days to Victory - the birth of modern warfare in the end of the First World War. Overall a bit of an odd skew to the series, you're rather given the impression there were no English or French soldiers on the battlefield anywhere in the last 100 days, and I'm sure there must've been ;)

ep 2 of Pubs, Ponds and Power - another village, this time Lavenham in Suffolk which is a well preserved medieval village that had been very prosperous when the wool & cloth trade was booming then less so after that (hence not replacing all their houses with newer ones over the centuries).

ep 1 & 2 of Nadiya's Asian Odyssey - a bit of a weird gimmick for this series basing it on what a DNA test showed about her ancestry, but it kinda worked even so. Thankfully the "science" aspect was kept to gimmick/framing device, and the actual shows focused on the cooking and travelogue stuff. She came across well, first programmes of hers we've watched.

ep 1 of Babies: Their Wonderful World - about early development of babies/toddlers, in this episode looking at things like how innate are personality traits and biases. But I think for my tastes too skewed towards an audience of people who have babies & are interested in what's happening inside their heads and not towards an audience of people who find human development interesting. Haven't quite decided if we're bothering with the rest.

ep 1 of Our Classical Century - Suzy Klein and Lenny Henry looking at British classical music during the early-ish 20th Century including composers like Holst, Vaughn Williams, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor & Gershwin. Slightly odd choice to show the episodes so far apart, this was aired in November and ep 2 has only just aired so we'll be catching up then waiting for the next one for a while.

Books

Fiction: Still reading "The Bonehunters" by Steven Erikson - nearly at the end of the book, and currently hoping that one of the characters isn't as dead as he seems (it was off screen? and anyway not everyone who dies stays dead ...).

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - finished off the chapter on the 3rd Millennium BCE (ish) with the western part of the Mediterranean which has been fairly isolated from developments in the eastern part so far. But just at the end of the period this chapter covered the level of contact starts picking up, and the sea starts shrinking (metaphorically).

Listening

Podcasts: ep 5.5 of the History of India - telling the story of the kingdom of Kashmir during (I think, I'm a bit adrift with the dates) the 8th Century CE.

ep 103-110 of The History of China - after wrapping up the An Lushan rebellion he did a retrospective of the Tang dynasty so far, and now onto more Tang Emperors who are failing to solve the same problems with the economy & their subordinates that their predecessors also failed to solve.

ep Eleanor 9 of The History of England Shedcasts - Louis and Eleanor finally get divorced.

ep Marshal 3 of The History of England Shedcasts - William's early life, including the bit where King Stephen threatens to kill him in order to get his father to surrender but his father calls Stephen's bluff.

ep 214 of The China History Podcast - first part of a biography of V. K. Wellington Koo (who was a mover & shaker in Chinese diplomacy when WW1 was ending).

Sunday podcast: Listened to an episode of In Our Time about Papal Infallibility - which is rather more recent as an actual defined thing than I'd realised, and also a lot more restricted than the pop cultural impression.

Music: While running I listened to The Monkees and ABBA, still quite into the pop. To drown out the TV sounds so I could write I listened to another Dreamboats & Petticoats CD (more Bill Haley), and something by Bill Laswell called "Lo-Def Pressure" (instrumental, two long tracks filling a whole album, and surprisingly enjoyable).

Watching

ep 3 of Guitar, Drum & Bass - guitars this time, presented by Lenny Kaye. Mostly concentrating on the history of the different effects & sounds that the guitar can be used to produce. Really enjoyed this series.

ep 2 of Icons - this covered Explorers, which I first thought might be a bit lame when I read it was one of the categories, but actually it was still interesting. Tho it did stretch the definition of Explorer a bit to include Jane Goodall who I'd put into Scientist, myself. (The other three were Ernest Shackleton, Gertrude Bell & Neil Armstrong).

ep 1 of 100 Days to Victory - two part series about the ending of WW1, aired last year around the centenary of the end of it. Very focused on what the Australians & Canadians brought to the ending of the war.

Towards Tomorrow: Robot - a 1967 programme about the future of Robots, which included Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke as talking heads. Mostly interesting for how wrong they (all) got it.

ep 3 of Animals with Cameras - finishing off the series, which we'd almost forgotten we were watching. Fairly lightweight and fluffy, but fun to watch.

Jazzology with Soweto Kinch - a look at the history & philosophy of jazz with a strong focus on its African-American and/or Caribbean roots. Interesting, and an insight into a different way of engaging with music than mine.

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.

Books

Fiction: Finished "Midnight Tides" Steven Erikson - which had a much darker ending than I remembered! One thing that's struck me with these recently is that although they are really rather dark there's still a lot of humour to them which helps to make it feel less crushingly awful at times, and there's also a sense of optimism about the essential nature of people (human/non-human both) - there's a fair amount of people being nice to each other despite the general dreadfulness of the world.

Started "The Bonehunters" also Steven Erikson - I think I've read this one before, tho there's a lot of stuff I don't remember at all and I'm not that far in yet, so maybe I haven't. Definitely haven't read the four that come after this one tho!

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - just read a bit about the Hyksos, their capital at Avaris & their defeat by Ahmose I (as he founds the New Kingdom) but not from the "usual" perspective of the Egyptian idea of their history.

Shakespeare: Love's Labour's Lost: Act 4 Scene 1 - yeah, still going too slow, must up my game here.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 5.3 of the History of India - an attempt by a later Gupta family to make history rhyme and build themselves a great empire, only they don't quite pull it off.

ep 85-97 of The History of China - more of the Tang dynasty, including the reign of the Empress Wu who was the only woman to ever reign as the Divine Sovereign (Emperor) in her own right.

ep 181 of The History of Byzantium - another emperor who marries the neice of the late Basil II. No reigning in her own right here!

bonus ep of The History of England - an interview with Elizabeth Chadwick about William Marshal, about whom she's written a book (fiction, but well researched).

ep Eleanor 7 of The History of England Shedcasts - the attempt by Louis & Eleanor to support a marriage for Eleanor's sister that the Pope disapproved of, and their eventual climb down.

ep Marshal I of The History of England Shedcasts - beginning a biography of William Marshal in 15 minute chunks to go along with the Eleanor of Acquitaine one.

ep 213 of The China History Podcast - wrapping up the story of the Jewish refugees in China, as with the end of the Second World War they mostly leave again.

Music: While running I listened to Sarah McLachlan "Fumbling Towards Ecstacy", Emily Portman "The Glamoury" and The Raveonettes "In & Out of Control". To drown out the TV sounds so I could write I listened to a couple of compilations - finished off "Mojo Presents The White Album Recovered CD1" (which had a Big Linda track on it), and started "Now 29 CD1" which is full of nostalgia and will have a Big Mountain track on it.

Watching

ep 4-7 of The Hairy Bikers Home for Christmas - still making us hungry, and gathering some recipes to try (tho a surprising amount contain beetroot which J is not keen on so not those ones).

ep 3 of the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures 2018 - Alice Roberts and Aoife McLysaght finishing off the lecture series by talking about diversity within the human species, touching on a whole bunch of ethical issues along the way including whether or not one wants to find out about genetic susceptibility to different diseases. A good set of lectures, really enjoyed watching these.

ep 2 of Earth's Greatest Rivers - this one about the Nile, and the main reason I was recording the series. Less Egypt than I had quite expected, obviously it was focused on the wildlife but even so.

ep 1 of Guitar, Drum & Bass - this'll be a three part series covering the titular instruments, this one was about drums & presented by Stewart Copeland (i.e. of The Police). Interesting look through the history & impact of the drum kit on modern Western (rock/pop etc) music.

ep 2 of The Art that Made Mexico: Paradise, Power & Prayers - we'd almost forgotten we were watching this series as Christmas had gotten in the way. Glad we remembered. This episode was about art associated with power - a lot of murals featured.

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "Midnight Tides" Steven Erikson - themes of debt & freedom/enslavement ... and be careful what you wish for. It feels like a story from the distant past of the rest of the books, but it's really happening at much the same time (or rather just before) but in a sort of bubble that's been isolated from the rest of the world (universe?).

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - looking at the eastern part of the Mediterranean during the 2nd Millennium BCE.

Shakespeare: Love's Labour's Lost: Act 2 & Act 3 (both single scenes) - I'm being too slow reading this I think, I've lost the narrative thread and it seems just to be a succession of people being witty at each other.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 5.1-5.2 of the History of India - the rulers of Patliputra after the collapse of Harsha's empire, also briskly trotting through the history of Nepal up to this point in the narrative.

ep 82-85 of The History of China - the first couple of Tang Emperors, including them fending off Turkic invaders. Also bringing Tibet into the narrative as their kingdom is powerful at this point in the story.

ep 179-190 of The History of Byzantium - resuming the narrative with the first emperors after Basil II (who'd been successful in many ways as an emperor but arranging for the succession was not one of those ways!).

ep 265a of The History of England - an interview with Nicola Tallis about Jane Grey (as Tallis has written a book about her).

ep Eleanor 4-6 of The History of England Shedcasts - continuing with the biography of Eleanor of Acquitaine we're up to the first years of her marriage to Louis VII (the King of France).

bonus episode plus ep 104 of The History of Egypt - the bonus episode was about the environment and animals living in the region of Egypt during the time of the dinosaurs. Rather neat but not quite what I was expecting! :) The next real episode looked at the life of wealthy men during the 18th Dynasty.

ep 212 of The China History Podcast - continuing his Jewish Refugees in China series, looking here at the situation c.1941, including some more mini-bios of people who helped the Jews escape Europe.

ep 120 of The History of English - the narrative has got up to the Black Death, which actually helps to re-establish English as a primary language in the country for the elite.

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about The Poor Laws, of the 19th Century - which were a switch from the very localised situation that existed before which had an emphasis on Christian charity, to a centralised top-down imposition of a punitive regime to make sure no-one claimed to be poor unless they really really had to. It sounded like despite several scandals it was more punitive in theory than in actual implementation, but it did instill a fear of ending up in "the workhouse" in the average person and in sweeping away the localised ways of organising things like this (which does then lead to a country where things like the NHS can be implemented).

Music: While running I listened to a metal compilation called "Corrosion", plus a 2-disc U2 best of. To drown out the TV sounds so I could write I listened to a selection of compilations - "The Later Lounge" (had a Big Boss Man track on it, and reminded me of a club night called Harry Palmers that we used to go to in Ipswich nearly 20 years ago), "Pre-Fab: The Songs that Influenced The Beatles" (a Big Joe Turner track, selection of 50's-ish rock & roll songs), "Mojo Presents The White Album Recovered CD1" (only the first couple of tracks, there'll be a Big Linda track, I'm not overly fond of this as I'd rather listen to the originals).

Watching

ep 2-3 of The Hairy Bikers Home for Christmas - figured we should watch these fairly close together so we see the series near Xmas. Some of the food looks really good :)

ep 1-2 of the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures 2018 - Alice Roberts and Aoife McLysaght talking about human evolution & diversity. Aimed at kids, of course, but nonetheless interesting and rather fun.

ep 1 of Earth's Greatest Rivers - this'll be a 3 part series about rivers, starting with the Amazon. I had no idea there were any bits of river that boiled, let alone a couple of mile stretch of the Amazon.

ep 10 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Books

Fiction: Finished "House of Chains" Steven Erikson - I think I said anything I wanted to say about it already, I just had about 5 minutes of reading left.

Started "Midnight Tides" also Steven Erikson - this book in its entirety is a flashback, the story that the Tiste Edur Trull Sengar is telling his travelling companions about his past. So there are none of the familiar characters, except Trull himself, but there are definitely still connections between this story and the ongoing one, some subtle & some less so.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - I've now started the chapter about the 2nd Millennium BCE, which is an era where a lot of the more spectacular finds from the pre-Classical world date to.

Shakespeare: Love's Labour's Lost: Act 1 Scene 2 - a servant outwitting his master.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 5.0 of the History of India - scene setting for the next era of Indian history that he'll be discussing (the "medieval era").

ep 79-82 of The History of China - through the short Sui dynasty & into the early Tang.

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about Sir Gawain and the Green Knight - discussing the plot of the poem, as well as the language of the poem & how it fits into the culture & literature of when it was written.

Music: While running I listened to a metal compilation called "Corrosion".

Watching

The Balfour Declaration: Britain's Promise to the Holy Land - looking at Britain's involvement in the creation of modern Israel and how the ramifications of it resonate through to the present day.

Pubs, Ponds and Power: The Story of the Village - a multipart series about the history of various villages where they showed all the parts simultaneously on the different regional channels. So I went and hunted about for which one I thought was most interesting, and we watched the episode about Warkworth in Northumberland and how the Norman Conquest affected it.

ep 1 of The Hairy Bikers Home for Christmas - more cooking show & less travelogue than the other series by them that we'e watched.

ep 4 of Digging for Britain - a special on Iron Age excavations, including an upright chariot burial where the chariot was buried attached to two ponies.

Egypt: Secrets of the Dead - looking at New Kingdom beliefs about the Pharaoh's afterlife, based on the texts in Seti I's tomb (and illustrated with CGI vignettes). Rather good, I think it's quite old tho.

The Egyptian Job - programme about tomb robbery in Ancient Egypt, in this case of the pyramid of Amenemhat. The gimmick was having a team of specialists reverse engineer how the heist was done from the evidence that remained, including more than just Egyptologists. A bit shallow, really, but I think I liked it more the first time I watched it.

Bandersnatch - the most recent episode of Black Mirror. We've not watched any Black Mirror before, but as it's all standalone stories we joined in with Ed & Tash to play/watch this episode collectively on New Year's Day. This particular episode is a choose-your-own adventure story in TV form, about a kid who is a game developer in the 1980s, so it hit a lot of our collective nostalgia buttons. We spent about 3 hours exploring it, and thought it was very well done. None of the possible storylines went quite where I thought they would, and all of it was pretty fucked up. There's a lot of breaking the fourth wall going on, and making the viewer complicit in the events in a disturbing way. And various different ways to interpret the "reality" of what was going on, including popping right the way out in two very different endings to remind you it was all a game/programme except obviously that wasn't real either coz it was still part of the show...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "House of Chains" Steven Erikson - almost finished though, I'm into the mop up bit after the climax of the book. The Crippled God's assumptions about how he'd set up the House of Chains haven't gone quite the way he'd anticipated... Several more of the loose ends from the first three have been tied up in this book, even as it opens out the story in other ways. I think I started reading these the first time while the Wheel of Time series was still in its "never going to end" phase of ever widening storylines with ever increasing numbers of characters, so I inevitably compare the two while I'm reading because these books provide a sense of forward momentum and of stories coming to conclusions despite the widening story overall.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - didn't get much read this week, the bit I did read was talking about how in the early 3rd Millennium BCE the society of the northern Mediterranean shores underwent a fragmentation from big-ish villages into many smaller hamlets with maybe just a couple of families. And that that then drives increasing inequalities.

Shakespeare: Much Ado About Nothing: Act 5 Scenes 1-4 - and the whole play wraps up with villainy found out and couples marrying after all. And as has been the case reasonably often in the plays I've read so far, I'm left wondering why she'd still want him (in the case of the Hero/Claudio pair). Quite fun though, I enjoyed this one.

Love's Labour's Lost: Introductory Material & Act 1 Scene 1 - the intro material makes me wary of this one as it was saying it was the connoisseur's play and full of witty jokes that we now need footnotes for. But this first scene amused me with its immediate puncturing of the king's pretentiousness.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 265 of The History of England - the few months left to Queen Jane after Mary deposes her, and her poise & bravery as her father's blundering brings about her execution.

ep HoS31 of The History of England Shedcasts - Jameses I & II, and their attempts to reassert royal authority, also the beginnings of Scotland's parliament.

ep 69-79 of The History of China - he's finished up the Southern & Northern period, and China is finally reunited under the Sui for the first time in 300 years, which of course involves reintegrating parts of the country that have drifted far from each other in their idea of what it is to be Chinese.

bonus ep of The History of Byzantium - covering Jews in the Byzantine empire who are actually better off there than in other parts of the Christian world at the time (not a high bar) and better off than any other non-Orthodox Christian group within the empire (also not a high bar).

ep 103 of The History of Egypt - a tour of the palace of Amenhotep III at Malqata, which is the best surviving Egyptian palace from Pharaonic times.

ep 211 of The China History Podcast - continuing his series about Jewish refugees in China including looking at the ways that the "Jew secretly rule the world" conspiracy theory was part of why the Japanese weren't as down on the Jews as their German allies in the run up to World War II.

ep 119 of The History of English - returning to the narrative history where we're up to Edward III and the start of the Hundred Years War. Things I didn't know included how the word "gun" ultimately derives from the name of a ballista kept at Windsor which was the Lady Gunhilda.

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about The Fable of the Bees - the book by Bernard Mandeville in the 18th Century which postulates that the economy depends on people's private vices and on them being consumers, so encouraging everyone to be frugal and virtuous merely encourages the ruin of the country. At the time it was scandalous.

Music: While running I listened to a metal compilation called "Corrosion". While writing I listened to more Beth Orton EPs (I'd forgotten how much I liked her stuff), the X-Files album (a track by Better Than Ezra on this, which passed me by a bit), an EP by someone called Bettie Serveert which I don't think I'd ever heard before but J has had since uni (perfectly pleasant but didn't grab me), a Biffy Clyro album "The Vertigo of Bliss" (first couple of tracks didn't grab me but I enjoyed it overall) and a compilation album called "Big Blue Ball" which is mis-tagged with that as the artist as well, but it's actually got tracks by people like Peter Gabriel on it.

Watching

ep 4 of the Mediterranean with Simon Reeve - Morocco, Spain, Corsica and the south coast of France through to Monaco. Good series, though even for Simon Reeve it was a depressing look at how the world is fucked up and it's all our fault.

ep 6 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - finishing up in Korea. Enjoyed the series, even if they were a bit over intense for bits of it.

ep 4 of The Lakes with Paul Rose - finishing up with Eskdale. A bit of an odd series, mostly quite fluffy and enjoyable.

ep 2 & 3 of Digging for Britain - the west & the east respectively. The one about the east was the best of the series so far, I was particularly intrigued by the prehistoric earthwork/water feature discovered near Woodbridge.

ep 1 of The Art That Made Mexico: Paradise, Power & Prayers - this episode was looking at art of the Mexican landscape throughout the sweep of Mexican history. The presenter, Alinka Echeverria, wasn't someone I'd heard of before, but I am enjoying her style so far. Entertained in particular by the description of the Aztecs as the "last of the great empires to rule the Mexican valley".

Primal Scream: The Lost Memphis Tapes - not quite sure what I expected from this programme, but it was interesting. Apparently Primal Scream's second album as released wasn't at all what they initially recorded, this programme was both a history of that album (and its eventual release as originally intended) and a history of the band.

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "House of Chains" Steven Erikson - much of which is actually to do with populating the new roles of the new House in the Deck of Dragons, but also generally about mortal tools of immortal/more powerful purposes and how that comes at a price.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - moving on from the Levant c. 3500 BCE to 2200 BCE to the northern Mediterranean shores in the same period, and how their societies were also changing but not driven directly by the rising superpowers of Egypt and Mesopotamia.

Read all of "Making Time: How to Focus on What Matters Every Day" Jake Knapp & John Zeratsky - read an excerpt somewhere and got the book from the library, quite a slight read but a set of tactics for being more focused & finding more time. Some obvious, some less so - and an interesting approach for this sort of book where they are absolutely upfront that nothing works for everyone, so you should experiment (rather than the more didactic approach of "do this and only this for success"). Not sure I would've paid money for it, but interesting enough from the library.

Shakespeare: Much Ado About Nothing: Act 3 Scenes 1-5, Act 4 Scenes 1-2 - finding this quite fun to read, although I don't share Shakespeare's fondness for malapropisms as a humorous device.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 264d-g of The History of England - and this wrapped up most of the short reign of Lady Jane Grey, with just the aftermath to come.

ep Eleanor 3 of The History of England Shedcasts - her early life.

ep 63-69 of The History of China - continuing with the many assassinations of & by Emperors that seems to characterise the Southern & Northern period, he's got up to the collapse of the Northern Wei which is the beginning of the end of this period, but is back tracking a bit to get the South to the same point before continuing.

ep 178 of The History of Byzantium - more listener questions about the state of the Empire c.1025 CE.

ep 102b of The History of Egypt - covering Crete, in the time period of Amenhotep III's reign, through the eyes of an embassy from Egypt (fictitious in detail but there was definite contact between the cultures).

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about The Thirty Years War - much less of a conflict about religion than I had always assumed (knowing little about it), and more about secular politics, also some resonances with the First World War.

Music: While running I listened to Bon Jovi "Cross Road", Roxette "Don't Bore Us - Get to the Chorus!" and Arctic Monkeys "Whatever I Say I Am, That's What I'm Not".

Watching

ep 5 of Dynasties - Tigers to round out the series. And a bit less gory death, although still some pretty gory stuff. This felt like a very different angle for a nature series, some iconic species and beautiful imagery of course, but a focus on the brutal realities of their lives. Good, but uncomfortable viewing at times.

ep 3 of the Mediterranean with Simon Reeve - moving through Libya and Tunisia to Sicily, with a theme of migrants this time. Although also the Mafia for added depression.

ep 5 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - more Japan, away from Tokyo this time and included some daftly expensive beef.

ep 3 of The Lakes with Paul Rose - a slightly more meaty feeling episode than the first two, the lake was Coniston so of course it included Donald Campbell.

ep 10 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Finished "Memories of Ice" Steven Erikson - it actually wraps up in a pretty satisfying fashion, the long term issues that drive the story don't get resolved but if the series had stopped here as a trilogy you'd not be left with a feeling of unfinished business. Presumably he was initially contracted for three books and it was the success of those that meant he got to carry on with the series.

Started "House of Chains" Steven Erikson - this book starts with what seems to be a completely unrelated narrative thread but gradually it becomes clear how it interweaves with the events of the previous three books.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - he's now also covered Mesopotamia c. 3500 BCE to 2200 BCE in brief as well, and is moving on to the Levant during this period & how these two increasingly powerful states (Egypt & Mesopotamia) affect it.

Shakespeare: Much Ado About Nothing: Act 1 Scenes 1-3, Act 2 Scenes 1-3 - we've set up the two couples in whose lives other people are to meddle (maliciously in the case of Claudio & Hero and not so in the case of Benedick & Beatrice).

Listening

Podcasts: ep 264-264c of The History of England - he's covering the reign of Lady Jane Grey in a series of mini-episodes released every day over the next two weeks. Not actually a day per day but that gives the feel.

ep Eleanor 2 of The History of England Shedcasts - more scene setting, in this case for Eleanor's family & lineage.

ep 59-63 of The History of China - moving on through the Southern & Northern period, which appears to involve an awful lot of murder in the royal families of both powers (the Northern one institutionalising some of it by having a "family tradition" of the mother of the Crown Prince having to die when he gets the title).

ep 177 of The History of Byzantium - some listener questions about the state of the Empire c.1025 CE.

bonus episode of The History of English - a talk he gave where he was giving an overview of what the podcast is about, using the proto-Indo-european word wer (sp?) as an example of changes through time. It ends up in English in many forms, including things like beware and regard.

ep 210 of The China History Podcast - continuing the story of Jewish Refugees in China, moving into the late 1930s.

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about The Long March - the long retreat of the forces of the Red Army in the 1930s and how that march became an integral part of Communist China's foundation myth and a part of Mao Zedong's rise to power.

Music: While running I listened to Guns'n'Roses and Bon Jovi. In the evenings I listened to more Beth Orton EPs plus her album "Trailer Park".

EEG Talk: "The Coffins of Nespawershefyt and Pakepu at the Fitzwilliam Museum" Helen Strudwick - she took us through the construction & decoration of each of the coffin sets, and also talked about what is known about the people whose coffins they were.

Watching

ep 4 of Dynasties - Painted Wolves this time. Perhaps the least charismatic of the animals who have been main features, tho more charismatic than the hyenas who were also featured in this episode.

ep 2 of the Mediterranean with Simon Reeve - continuing round the Mediterranean visiting Cyprus (both sides), Lebanon, Israel and Gaza. Continues to be really rather depressing.

ep 1 & 2 of Egyptian Tomb Hunting - Tony Robinson (of Time Team) visiting several archaeological digs in Egypt which are investigating tombs of various eras. Very enthusiastic television, and made us smile a lot whilst also giving more of an honest flavour of how archaeology works than some Egypt series.

ep 4 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - Japan this time. Still making us hungry ;)

ep 2 of Animals with Cameras - watched the first episode ages ago but had almost forgotten we had it on going. The hook in this series is that they are putting cameras on the animals and so we (and more importantly the scientists studying them) can see how they behave with no humans around. Highlight of this episode for me were the cheetahs.

ep 1 of Digging for Britain - it's Digging for Britain time! Tho that episode wasn't as good as they sometimes are, it covered the north and we felt like only a couple of the digs were really interesting. But still some neat things, including some well preserved wooden household objects from the Iron Age dug up from the peat of the Black Loch of Myrton

ep 9 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "Memories of Ice" Steven Erikson - coming up towards the end of it now. If the relationships foregrounded in Deadhouse Gates were all travelling companions one might not've chosen (and betrayal) this book is all about mothers and children (and betrayal). With a strong helping of good intentions being the road to hell.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - moving on now to the period from 3500 BCE to 2200 BCE. Starting off with the developments in Egypt (which gets unified and runs through to the Old Kingdom in this time period) - even though it's outside the remit of the book he's covering Upper Egypt because it'll have that knock on effect on the Nile Delta & thus the Mediterranean cultures. One thing I'd not realised is that Egypt gets agriculture relatively late (compared to the Levant, for instance, which is only next door). He's stressing the nomadic pastoral origins of Egyptian culture, and how the increasing desertification of the Sahara was a driving force in their cultural development.

Shakespeare: The Comedy of Errors: Act 4 Scenes 3-4, Act 5 Scene 1 - and we're done, the last scene there's finally both pairs of brothers on stage simultaneously so the whole thing unwinds to its conclusion.

jesuswasbatman suggested it fails as a play to read because you need the actors' body language, and that's right I think ... but it's also still one of my least favourite types of comedy.

Much Ado About Nothing: Introductory Material - which (among much else) points out the innuendo in the title, where "nothing" is a euphemism for vagina (no thing, ie no penis).

Listening

Podcasts: ep 263 of The History of England - looking at Edward's plans for the succession now that he's fallen ill, and considering if he was firmly under Dudley's thumb or acting on his own thoughts.

ep Eleanor 1 of The History of England Shedcasts - he's starting up a series of mini-episodes serialising the biography of Eleanor of Acquitane, this one setting the scene a bit.

ep 52-59 of The History of China - which covered the rest of the 16 Kingdoms period, and is just starting on the Southern & Northern period where China is dominated by two large powers.

ep 176 of The History of Byzantium - an interview with the podcaster from The History of Philosophy Without Any Gaps podcast about Byzantine philosophical thought in general and Michael Psellos in particular.

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about Hope, or more descriptively about the philosophy of Hope. Which is more complicated than one might initially think. The programme started out from the Greek story of Pandora's box, where hope is left behind in the box after the evils are released - so is it a caged evil, an evil kept for mankind, a caged good, or a good kept for mankind? The Greeks were inclined towards it being an evil that Zeus intended kept for mankind to run afoul of. The Christians made it a virtue but then there's a tension between Hope & Faith because hoping for one's eternal salvation implies one doesn't have faith that it will happen. And Nietzsche thought it was a delusion that kept one alive (early Nietzsche thought that was a bad thing, later Nietzsche thought it might not be so bad after all).

Music: While running I listened to the "Greatest Mod Ever" compilation. In the evenings I listened to a couple of Beth Orton EPs plus the second disc of the "INCredible Sound of Jo Whiley" compilation (as there's a Beth Orton track on it).

Study Day: "Egypt's Shifting Capital" was the title of the Egypt Exploration Society's Study Day:

"Predynastic 'Central Places': Naqada and Neken at the Dawn of the Egyptian State" Grazia A. Di Pietro - she's been re-examining data from previous excavations and has put together a timeline for how both sites were used over time.

"Amarna (Akhetaten)" Barry Kemp - an update on what's going on with the Amarna excavations, he seems to've been focusing on road networks, and thinking about how the Egyptians conceived of the layout of the site (and the roads).

"The Memphis Survey After Thirty Years - Where Now?" David Jeffreys - I found this a little incoherent and struggled to follow the thread between the various sites he's excavated at Memphis over the last 30 years.

"Ancient Egypt in Islamic Cairo" Doris Behrens-Abousif - how the ruins of Ancient Egyptian culture around them did & did not have an impact on architecture in Islamic Cairo. On the did side, building in stone was clearly the way to be remembered, on the did not side was any detail of decoration or architectural style (unlike the re-use of Greek & Roman columns in mosques which had a bit impact on later Islamic stone work).

Museums

I Am Ashurbanipal exhibition at the British Museum - looking at the life & times of Ashurbanipal, mostly his conquests (gleefully recorded in his palace wall reliefs in gruesome detail) and his library (preserved by fire at Nineveh and now (mostly?) in the British Museum). Very well done, I particularly liked the use of lighting to colourise some of the reliefs and to tell the story on one of the large battle scenes. I'm now wondering if entertainments at the palace would include storytellers who used the reliefs as visual aids.

I, Object exhibition at the British Museum - fun, but rather slight. I'm glad we didn't make a particular trip to see it but instead tacked it on to another visit, but I'm also glad we did make it in to see it.

Early Egyptian room at the British Museum - I had a couple of objects I particularly wanted to see, and I also like looking at the Predynastic stuff, so I hung out in here for a bit while J looked at coffins.

Watching

ep 3 of Dynasties - Lions this time. The overall theme really is "nature red in tooth & claw". No pussyfooting around with cute shots of fluffy animals here, instead a tale of life on the edge between survival and disaster.

ep 1 of the Mediterranean with Simon Reeve - new series where he travels round the Mediterranean coast, starting in Italy and Albania. His normal format is to show you something cool or beautiful or awe-inspiring then tell you how humanity is fucking it all up. This episode was mostly skipping straight to the "how we're fucking up" stage. For instance the bit of southern Italy that is pretty much not part of the state of Italy and the local mafia "governs" it as a separate fiefdom.

ep 2 of The Lakes with Paul Rose - Derwentwater this time, still mostly a piece of fluff.

Discovering ... Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue - I think this will be a series, but not shown all at once. First 3/4 of the programme was talking about the piece - putting it in context, talking about the structure etc and listening to bits in rehearsal. And the last part was a full performance of the piece so you could hear what you'd just learnt about. I rather liked it.

Egypt's Lost Princess - about the tomb discovered in the Valley of the Kings in 2012, which didn't contain treasures like Tutankhamun's but did have all sorts of interesting things. It was originally the tomb of an 18th Dynasty princess and had been robbed and reused after that in the Third Intermediate Period. Voiceover man made me wince a bit at times, but it was a well done & interesting programme in general. (Tho as we'd heard Susanne Bickel talk at the EEG about the same tomb earlier this year there was nothing I didn't already know.)

ep 8 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "Memories of Ice" Steven Erikson - this book is building up some of the actual problems of the series. A lot of the action so far has been human scale stuff, empires and rebellions and wars and assassinations. This book starts to shift focus to a larger scale view including questions of why the goddess Burn is sleeping? who or what is the Crippled God? And we're beginning to see how the magic system, the Deck of Dragons and the gods (and Ascendants) are linked.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - rounding out the chapter on 5500-3500 BCE looking at the Levant which is in a unique position both geographically having contact with several other cultural groupings and also having developed farming earlier was now beginning to develop more complex farming strategies than the basic suite which was exported so successfully to the rest of the Mediterranean.

Shakespeare: The Comedy of Errors: Act 3 Scenes 1-2; Act 4 Scenes 1-2 - still not really my cup of tea, and not really letting me suspend my disbelief either (surely someone by now would've said SOMETHING that made it clear that one brother was newly arrived from a different town?).

Listening

Podcasts: ep 262 of The History of England - continuing Edward VI's reign with Dudley being in the ascendant and gathering Protestant reforms to the religion.

ep 102 of The History of Egypt - telling a story of a diplomatic trip to the Aegean visiting the Mycenaeans in Amenhotep III's time. Based on evidence that there was some diplomatic contact of some kind at this point.

ep 44-52 of The History of China - coming out of the Three Kingdoms and into the 16 Kingdoms period, with a lot of child "emperors" and a lot of regents scheming against each other.

ep 209 of The China History Podcast - the second part of his look at Jewish refugees in China, concentrating on those arriving from Germany, Austria & Eastern Europe during the 1930s.

ep 118 of the History of English - looking at the origins of surnames based on trades that can be traced back to the 14th Century or so.

ep 175 of The History of Byzantium - looking at the Turks who are about to become a threat to the Byzantines during the next part of the narrative (from 1025 CE onward), and why they were moving off the steppes and towards Byzantium.

Sunday Podcast: ep 3 of I, Object - wrapping up by looking at the whys of satirical and rebellious objects, how it's not always an expectation that one will change the world but one will at least have made a statement.

Music: While running I listened to Everything But the Girl "Home Movies", Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip "Angles" and just started the first disc of the "Greatest Mod Ever" compilation. Drowning out a game J was playing so I could concentrate to write I listened to "BBC Music: Christmas Through the Ages" (has a Berlioz piece on it), "Kill Bill Vol. 1" (has a Bernard Herrmann track on it, and is generally always more fun to listen to than I remember) and some of "NOW 32 CD2" (has a Berri track on it, and is generally full of nostalgia and rubbish but fun music).

Watching

They Shall Not Grow Old - the Peter Jackson film using WW1 photographs, film footage and voices of veterans to tell the story of the war. The in-war footage was colourised and animated in a way that made it all so much realer. Very well done, and rather sobering.

ep 3 of Origins of Us - Alice Roberts rounding out the series by looking at brain evolution. Good series, I enjoyed re-watching it.

ep 3 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - more Thai food (more feeling hungry).

ep 2 of Dynasties - Emperor Penguins this time, and actually rather depressing viewing. I wouldn't want to be a penguin, it seems a life full of hardship and death.

ep 7 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Finished "Deadhouse Gates" also Steven Erikson - the story is gradually widening past the narrow focus of the first book, with more non-human characters and a greater sense of time. It's one of the things I remember fondly from reading it in the past - Erikson has an ability to convey how short human lifespans and memories are compared to the age of the world (OK, it's a fantasy world not the real world, but this is one that has history on geological timescales).

Started "Memories of Ice" also Steven Erikson - not very far into this yet, just the prologue & a return to some of the characters of the first one.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - not very much this week though. He's just starting to talk about evidence for possible trade networks c.5-7 thousand years ago.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 261a of The History of England - an interview with Diarmaid MacCulloch about his new book about Thomas Cromwell.

ep HoS 30 of The History of England Shedcasts - catching up with the Western Isles, and looking at the beginnings of the highland/lowland divide in Scottish culture which really takes shape during the 14th Century.

bonus ep of The History of Egypt - the full interview with Campbell Price which moves beyond Amenhotep son of Hapu and into talking about Price's new book Pocket Museum: Ancient Egypt.

ep 40-44 of The History of China - more of the Three Kingdoms period.

Music: While running I listened to Tracy Chapman "Tracy Chapman", Laura Marling "Alas I Cannot Swim" and a little bit of Everything But the Girl "Home Movies".

Talk: we visited the Ashmolean Museum with the EEG, and Liam McNamara gave us a tour of the Early Egypt Gallery, focusing on the items they have from the Main Deposit at Hierakonpolis, in particular the ivory figurines and other items. Afterwards J & I also looked at some of the other things in the museum including the Mesopotamian gallery.

Watching

ep 3 of A Dangerous Dynasty: House of Assad - covering the period from the Arab Spring onward, basically the civil war, how it started and how appalling it's been. A good series, in the depressing current affairs genre. Tho I'm not sure I learnt anything really new about either the Syrian civil war nor the Assads, just a few details but still a good overview of the situation.

ep 1 of The Lakes with Paul Rose - a series of short programmes about the Lake District, very fluffy (mostly) and a good antidote to the gloom of the Syrian situation.

ep 1 of Dynasties - the new David Attenborough series, each episode will look at a family group from a different species starting with chimpanzees. Followed a few months in the life of a group where the alpha male was challenged. Very good, tho as always with nature documentaries I do wonder how much the story was the real story and how much the story was what they could put together from the footage they had.

ep 6 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Finished "The Gardens of the Moon", Steven Erikson - I think I said most of what I wanted to say last week, it sets the scene for the rest of the series, while still being a satisfying story in itself.

Started "Deadhouse Gates" also Steven Erikson - so far it's all travelling, generally a forced journey and each group with companions they might not've freely chosen. And perhaps "be careful what you wish for" as a theme too. I remember not being so fond of this one when I first read it, coz I wanted more of some of the other characters from the first book and at least one of the plot threads from this one is rather grim & dark ... but it's grown on me as a book.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - the current chapter looks at the period from 5500-3500 BCE, and his theme is how varied the cultures of the Mediterranean were during this time and the sense that it's merely historical accident that leads us to the world we know rather than inevitability.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Comedy of Errors: Act 1 Scene 2, Act 2 Scenes 1-2 - a constant stream of comedy based on one man being mistaken for another, so far we've had one master beating both slaves in turn as he mistakes them for each other, and the other master's wife thinking this one is her husband. I'm not overly fond of this sort of comedy, and do rather feel that dear old mum or dear old dad should've told their respective children that they had been half of a set of twins before disaster struck ...

Listening

Podcasts:ep 261 of The History of England - Mary in fear for her liberty but not quite decisively fleeing England, which will have consequences for Dudley's future actions.

ep 174 & a bonus episode of The History of Byzantium - continuing his 1025 CE round up of the state of the empire with a look at the economy.

ep HoS 29 of The History of England Shedcasts - a look at the Wolf of Badenoch and what his "career" as a rapacious lord tells us about the political society of Scotland at the time (c.14th Century CE).

ep 101b of The History of Egypt - mostly an interview with Campbell Price, about statues of nobles set up in temples, and in particular the statues of Amenhotep son of Hapu.

ep 32-40 of The History of China - out of the Han, who descend into bickering factions behind increasingly powerless emperors, and into the Three Kingdoms period (which is exactly what it sounds like, a divided China).

Sunday podcast: ep 2 of I, Object - looking at satire, both modern western things like Spitting Image, and also from other cultures & times.

Music: While running I listened to both the Travelling Wilburys albums, and also The Ting Tings album.

Talk: "Papyrology and the EES: Riches from Rubbish Tips" Margaret Mountford - given at the EEG November meeting. A mix of the history of the EES and some examples of texts from the Oxyrhynchus Papyrii (discovered by an EES funded expedition) showing the variety of sorts of things that were found. Also a practical demonstration of the difficulties of piecing together fragments of discarded papyrus.

Watching

ep 2 of Origins of Us - looking at how our gut & our food preferences have shaped our evolution. Definitely remembered some of these one from a previous watch through, in particular the demonstration of the effect cooking has on how long it takes to get calories out of food.

Simon Schama's Rough Crossings - a documentary about a piece of history I'd never heard of before: the settlement in Sierra Leone of some ex-slave Africans who fought on the side of the British against the Americans in their War of Independence. Mostly, sadly, the story of their betrayal time after time by the British who promised them independence & freedom and failed to keep their word.

Indie & Beyond with Shaun Ryder & Alan McGee - part of a set of programmes again trawling through the BBC's archives of music footage, this time the format is two people from the subculture in question picking music and talking about it. Some good tunes. Funniest bit was Shaun Ryder watching the Happy Mondays playing Kinky Afro on Top of the Pops (one of Alan McGee's picks) with a dumbfounded expression all the while muttering "I don't remember playing this on Top of the Pops".

ep 1 & 2 of A Dangerous Dynasty: House of Assad - the story of the current Syrian president, focusing on trying to unpack how he went from an unassuming eye-doctor in West London, to a dictator responsible for the deaths of thousands of his own people.

ep 5 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "The Gardens of the Moon", Steven Erikson - the climatic battle has happened and I'm into the wrap up. Don't think I noticed on any of my previous reads about how it's all about being used/being tools of other people/powers/whatever ... despite it hitting you over the head with the theme repeatedly.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - something I'd not consciously thought before is how the rise of farming is a clear demonstration of how evolution is driven not by what is good for the individual but by survival of offspring to breeding age. Broodbank says that there's little evidence for hunter-gatherer groups taking up farming (other than the initial development obviously), it spreads round the northern Mediterranean by farming communities moving into an area and settling there. And why would the hunter-gatherers do so when times are good - it looks like an awful lot more work for a less healthy life. But as it supports a larger population, more children survive to breed and so the farmers out compete the hunter-gatherers.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Comedy of Errors: Act 1 Scene 1 - the father of the twins who'll drive the comedy tells his tale of woe & separation.

Listening

Podcasts:ep 260 of The History of England - the fall of Somerset, the background & early career of Cecil and the rise of Dudley.

ep 17-32 of The History of China - in which he's finished off the Warring States period, covered the Qin (important but short lived dynasty) and has gotten to about halfway through the Han.

Sunday podcast: ep 1 of I, Object - to tie in with the current BM exhibition which we've not been to yet, Ian Hislop looking at objects of dissent throughout history & the world. This one about objects that hide their dissent in plain sight.

Music: While running I listened to some of Little Boots "Hands". And to drown out something J was watching I listened to the rest of "Greatest Mod Ever CD3" (which has two Benny Spellman tracks on), "BBC Music Vol 10, No. 9: the Romantic Cello" (which has a Berg piece on it) and started "BBC Music: Christmas Through the Ages" (despite being out of season, as it has a Berlioz piece on it - not, I'm sure, the only Berlioz we have but the only one tagged quite like that I think).

Study Day: made a last minute decision to go to the first study day organised by Ta-wer, "Aspects of Abydos". Well organised & interesting :) All four talks were given by Paul Whelan & covered a great sweep of Ancient Egyptian history:

"The Foundation of a Cult Centre" - looking at the predynastic & early dynastic cemeteries, and how Abydos developed into the religious centre of Ancient Egypt

"The Symbiosis of King and Cult in the Old Kingdom" - looking at evidence for whether or not Abydos was important in the Old Kingdom, and how looking at it through a royal lens gives you one story and through the non-royal evidence gives you another one. Also the first mentions of Osiris and some interesting discussion of Whelan's idea that Osiris is a deification of the process of mummification.

"Middle Kingdom Pilgrimage to Abydos" - Abydos is definitely a key place in the religious life of the Middle Kingdom, covered the shrines and stelae created to overlook the processional route for the festival of Osiris.

"Taharqo and his Nubian Osireion" - skipping over the New Kingdom and looking at how the 25th Dynasty Pharaoh Tarharqo wasn't just a promoter of the cult of Amun but also had reverence for the cult of Osiris at Abydos, down to building his own copy of the Osirieon for his tomb in Nubia

Watching

ep 2 & 3 of Magic Numbers: Hannah Fry's Mysterious World of Maths - continuing through the 18th & 19th Centuries and up to the modern day still looking at each development of mathematics through the lens of whether maths is something we discover or something we invent. An interesting series, I enjoyed it (and it made me want to re-read Hofstader's "Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" due to the discussion of Gödel's ideas).

ep 2 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - in Thailand, still making us hungry, still making us note that they're a lot more hyperactive in this series than the only other one we've watched.

Roots, Reggae, Rebellion - Akala looking at the history of Reggae and of Rastafari and its connection with rebellion and political activism in both Jamaica & the UK.

ep 1 of Origins of Us - an Alice Roberts series looking at human evolution and what we're adapted for (like long distance running). I thought we hadn't seen this before, but J was sure we had right from the start of the episode & he's probably right coz I did get deja vu at some bits. Still enjoying the re-watch though :)

ep 4 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Includes some spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Still reading "The Gardens of the Moon", Steven Erikson - despite being about 3/4 of the way through this book it's still the preamble for the series as a whole, it's satisfying as a story in itself but with the benefit of hindsight you can see how he's introducing a lot of stuff that's going to be more important later.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - just read the chapter looking at how modern humans spread round the Mediterranean at the end of the last Ice Age and am now in the chapter about how the warming climate & the development of farming increase the human populations and change their lifestyle. Two things I was surprised by were the late development of seafaring in the Mediterranean (no signs of it till 10s of thousands of years after we know other humans were colonising Australia) and also how gradual the development of farming was.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Measure for Measure: Act 5 Scene 1 - the Duke takes great delight in making everybody think that Claudio is dead, Isabella deflowered & Angelo will get away with his behaviour but then reveals the truth to end the play. Whilst casually punishing the foolish fop who'd insulted him whilst he was disguised.

Comedy of Errors: Introductory material - mostly talking about the play/trope on which this is based.

Listening

Podcasts:ep 101 of The History of Egypt - starting up the narrative again with a discussion of Amenhotep son of Hapu.

bonus ep of The History of Byzantium - looking at the question of how the people on the ground would've thought about the changes of empire ruling them.

ep 4.K of The History of India - another supplementary episode looking at the art & architecture of a historical site relevant to the period the narrative has got to.

ep Sea 4 of The History of England Shedcasts - pirates (mostly from Devon and Cornwall).

ep 208 of The China History Podcast - starting a series of podcasts looking at Jewish Refugees in China from the 18th Century onwards.

ep 11-17 of The History of China - moved on to the Eastern Zhou period, including a couple of episodes on Confucius and on Sun Tzu.

Sunday podcast: an episode of In Our Time about the historical plays of Shakespeare "Is Shakespeare History? The Romans" which was a companion episode to the last one (both special episodes to celebrate 20 years of In Our Time). This one considered how historical Shakespeare was (and was aiming to be) with his Roman plays.

Music: While running I listened to some of U2 "U22" which is a live album from 2012. And to drown out a film J was watching I listened to the rest of "The Very Best of Jazz Funk CD1" (it has a Benny Golson track on it), "Swing Brother Swing" (two Benny Goodman Orchestra tracks) and started "Greatest Mod Ever CD3" (which has two Benny Spellman tracks on).

Live Music: we went to see U2 play at the O2 in London - this is the tour for the album "Experience" and is effectively the second half of their autobiography (the first half being the "Innocence" album & tour three years ago). I really enjoyed it, they're great live.

Study Day: "Amenhotep III & His Funerary Temple: A 'House for Millions of Years'" - Petrie Museum Friends study day, concentrating on Hourig Sourouzian's excavation at the site of Amenhotep III's funerary temple (best known for the Colossi of Memnon, which were once thought to be all that was left). 5 talks during the day:

"Amenhotep III: Reign of the Sun King and His Building Programme through Egypt and Nubia" Anna Garnett - gave us the context for the funerary temple both in terms of Amenhotep III's position in history and the other things he built.

"Beyond Memnon: Milestones to a Dramatic History of a Site" Hourig Sourouzian - the site of the funerary temple through history including its destruction by an earthquake in Merenptah's reign, the Colossi of Memnon as a tourist attraction in antiquity, and an overview of her own excavation.

"Rebuilding the King: The Revival of Scatter Statues" Hourig Sourouzian - a reprise of the second part of her preceding talk, but in the form of a TV documentary (made by the team but not, I think, picked up by any channel). A good counterpoint to the more academic talks before it.

"Interconnected Cultural and Floodplain Lanscapes of the Holocene Nile Valley at Ancient Thebes" Willem Toonen - looking at what the geography of the site was through history, using evidence from soil cores. Once the temple would've stood on a hill next to a branch of the Nile, quite a different setting to the more flat modern landscape.

"The Colossi of Memnon & Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project: Archaeology & Challenges of Conservation" Hourig Sourouzian - more detail on Sourouzian's own excavations.

Watching

ep 3 of Can You Feel It: How Dance Music Conquered the World - about the cult of superstar DJs, an eyerolling end to an eyerolling series. Once again traced the history of the phenomenon and described in approving tones how the scene had sold out and become all about the money instead of the music. I normally like the BBC's music programmes, but this series felt like the accurate subtitle was "Everything That's Wrong with the Music Business".

ep 1 of Magic Numbers: Hannah Fry's Mysterious World of Maths - start of a series about maths and the history of maths, thinking about whether maths is discovered (and inherent to the universe) or invented by us (so all in our heads and thus possible to do differently). Rather good, not sure we agreed with all of it but we also kept pausing it to talk about it.

The Pharaoh in the Suburb - documentary about the recent discovery of the torso & head of a colossal statue in Cairo, dating to the reign of Psamtik I. Tried a bit too hard to sell it as a game changer in Egyptological studies, but did provide a nice overview of the founding of the 26th Dynasty by Psamtik who pushed out both the Assyrians and the Nubians to do so.

ep 3 of Doctor Who - ( some spoilers )

Two weeks worth as we were away last week, includes minor spoilers for Doctor Who at the end...

Books

Fiction: Finished "The Long Hunt", Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald, also read "The Stars Asunder" and "A Working of Stars" also by Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald which finishes off the series. The middle two books of the seven ("The Gathering Flame" and "The Long Hunt") were by far the weakest, being just the generation before & the generation after the initial trilogy and not really having that much of a story to tell. The last two ("The Stars Asunder" and "A Working of Stars") are the strongest and I remembered as my favourites last time I read them. Rather than being generic space opera they develop the magic system of the story's universe. There's also a theme of how burning everything down because you don't like the way things are isn't a terribly good idea if you don't have a strong sense of how to get to something better. Which resonated rather with modern politics, I thought.

Started "The Gardens of the Moon", Steven Erikson - the first of The Tales of the Malazan Books of the Fallen, a secondary world epic fantasy series. I've been looking forward to getting to these books, we own all the main sequence tho I don't think I've previously read the last couple, and I remember thoroughly enjoying them. So far so good, which is also good as I remember them getting better after the first one. One thing I like about them is that there's a good sense of deep time to them, and also that there's a lot of ambiguity - a sense that no-one is the villain in their own story.

Non-fiction: Finished "The Mind in the Cave", David Lewis-Williams - I just had the epilogue to read, and I think I said everything I wanted to a couple of weeks ago when I'd nearly finished it. Interesting book, tho I don't think I completely buy his thesis.

Started "The Making of the Middle Sea", Cyprian Broodbank - I'd originally intended to read something fluffy and lightweight next but I couldn't decide what to read before this one but I knew this was the one after, so I just went for this one next. It's a history of the lands around the Mediterranean from the earliest hominids to live round it through to the beginning of the Roman Empire. The first couple of chapters set the scene - first by setting out the reason he is writing this history and secondly by looking at the geographical & climatic peculiarities of the Mediterranean. Chapter 3, which I'm nearly finished, takes us up as far as c.50,000 years ago at which point there are Neanderthal populations to the north and modern humans to the south and it's the separation of the Neanderthals from the African population by the sea that has driven the divergence.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Measure for Measure: Act 4 Scenes 3-6 - in which the Duke manipulates everyone and the scene is set for Angelo to be exposed as a hypocrite.

Listening

Podcasts:ep 256-259 of The History of England - which is taking us through Edward VI's reign, still in the period where the Duke of Somerset (the king's uncle) was exercising most power.

another 4 mini-episodes of The History of Egypt - again heavy on the poetry, which has been interesting.

ep 171-173 of The History of Byzantium - continuing the end of century (c.1025 CE) episodes looking at things like the military and also an interview he did on another podcast about the Varangian Guard.

ep 116-117 of The History of English - moving the narrative on a bit and looking at how the status of English in the surrounding countries of the British Isles developed (falling in Ireland & Wales, rising in Scotland), and starting to look at surnames & how they developed.

ep 3.L-3.M of The History of India - more supplementary episodes, in particular looking at the life & journeying of a Chinese monk Fa Xian who came to India to copy Buddhist texts to take back to China and whose account of his journey provides a lot of information about the India of his time.

ep HoS 28 of The History of England Shedcasts - the tale of David Bruce's reign.

ep 9-10 of The History of China - I'm now back up to date with all the ongoing podcasts I'm listening to so I've gone back to catching up with the back catalogue of this one, currently he's talking about the Western Zhou dynasty.

Sunday podcast: an episode of In Our Time about the historical plays of Shakespeare "Is Shakespeare History? The Plantagenets" which looked at that run of the history plays and how they matched up with history, both as we know history and as he knew history.

Music: While running I listened to part of the second Ladykillers compilation. And to drown out a film J was watching I listened to the rest of "The Best ... Album in the World .. Ever. Vol 5 CD 1", and started "The Very Best of Jazz Funk CD1" (it has a Benny Golson track on it), which wasn't quite what I was expecting - more songs & less twiddly bits.

Watching

The Byrd Who Flew Alone: The Triumphs & Tragedy of Gene Clark - a biography of Gene Clark, about whom I knew nothing before. The archetypal story of how fame is a double edged sword, with Clark repeatedly self-sabotaging almost as soon as he achieved any sort of recognition for a project. A rather sad story.

Horizon: The Lost Tribes of Humanity - a couple of years old, this was Alice Roberts talking about the evidence that we have for the other species of hominids that overlapped with our own species, and just how much we interbred with them. Interesting, particularly in the context of both the non-fiction books I've read in this two week period.

ep 1 of Great Canal Journeys (series 9) - Prunella Scales & Timothy West go on boat journeys, this one wasn't on a canal (unlike most of them) it was on the Nile from Luxor to Aswan. Rather well done, included most of the obvious places (like Karnak) plus some less often seen on TV (like Gebel el Silsila). I'd not seen any of these before, so I hadn't been aware that Prunella Scales has dementia - it is explicitly brought up during the programme but before it was made clear I was gradually realising why I was being reminded of conversations with my mother back when she was still "presenting well" but it was obvious there was no longer as much "there" behind the presentation. So the programmes are also about how the couple are dealing with her gradual decline and there's an air of melancholy to the whole thing.

Made by Machine: When AI Met the Archive - rubbish, utter rubbish, we only watched through to the end because there was a hint that it might pull together into something good but that didn't happen. Basic premise was training an AI to use different techniques to stitch together clips from the BBC Four archives to make mini-programmes of its own - like visual similarities or using the subtitles to find matching topics. Each of the computer edited sequences were pretty rubbish, and went on for too long. There were three techniques, and we'd assumed the fourth one would use all three (it did) and change it from being rubbish to being halfway decent (it didn't). The take home message was that actual human TV editors have no need to worry about their jobs.

ep 1 of Animals with Cameras - fitting cameras to animals to see their behaviour when there aren't humans there filming them (like when meerkats are in their burrows or chimpanzees when humans aren't present to influence them). Fluff, but good fluff.

Mechanical Monsters - Simon Schaeffer looking at technological developments in the Victorian era and how they responded to the changes in society that these wrought. Not what I was expecting, the blurb seemed to promise automatons, but this was more wide-ranging. And better, I think.

ep 1 of The Hairy Bikers' Asian Adventure - this one in Hong Kong. A series from a few years ago, and rather more manic than the most recent one (which is the only other one we've watched). Still had lots of food to make us hungry though.

ep 1 & 2 of Doctor Who - new Doctor, new show runner, new Companions, which makes it a nervy buildup to a new season: can they pull it off? So far so good. I like the new Doctor and think she feels very Doctor-y. I liked that this is a Doctor who builds things, and I think they're doing a good job of showing she's clever (the sonic screwdriver is built from what was available so presumably one could build one oneself if only one knew what one was doing ...). Like the new companions, and definitely like that it's an ensemble cast and being set up explicitly as a team not the Doctor & his/her "significant other"-esque special friend. A nice change of dynamic. So far they all seem to have the same characterisation from episode to episode, which is good as that's one (but by no means the largest) of my major criticisms of Chibnall's Torchwood. It was Chibnall as showrunner I was most worried about in advance and although it's early days yet I'm optimistic after those two. I guess we are getting a through arc to the series, which is good as I like that aspect of New Who, and it also seems less in your face & convoluted than the Moffat era. Well, I suppose the Stena (sp?) as a series bad-guy (or at least tying together some of the episodes) is rather in your face, but I'm more interested in the reference to The Timeless Child and how she doesn't even know it. Loved the custard cream dispenser in the TARDIS :)

Books

Fiction: Finished "The Gathering Flame", Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald, and started "The Long Hunt", also Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald - from the generation before to to the generation after. This is the book I hadn't read before, it seems to be fairly standalone which is why it didn't cause me problems having not read it before the next two. The theme seems to be the consequences of past decisions coming home to roost.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Mind in the Cave", David Lewis-Williams - didn't have much chance at the weekend to read otherwise I would've finished it, and I'm pretty much through the drawing of the whole thing together with just an epilogue to go. Essentially his thesis is that there was a change in type of intelligence between Neanderthal and modern Homo sapiens, and that this change involved us remembering and thus having to make (communal) sense of altered states of consciousness (which includes dreams). And the cave art of the Upper Paleolithic is a way of fixing and and making permanent visions induced by trance states (like shamanic rock art of more modern times). So not drawing a representation of reality but using paint as part of the vision experience. He's convincing (to someone who's not got expertise in this area), but I'm always rather wary about explanations of anything that start by postulating some qualitative difference between us & other animals, so many of those have fallen by the wayside after further observations of the rest of the world. And how do you know if Neanderthals could remember & talk about their dreams?

Also still reading "The Rise & Fall of Ancient Egypt", Toby Wilkinson - the current chapter I'm on is about the changes in afterlife beliefs during the First Intermediate Period & the Middle Kingdom, which is when a lot of what we think of as Ancient Egyptian afterlife beliefs were actually developed.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Measure for Measure: Act 2 Scenes 3-4, Act 3, Act 4 Scenes 1-2 - Angelo is both harsh and easily tempted, and the Duke meddles while approving of the harshness.

Listening

Podcasts: changing up how I catch up with the podcasts I'm following that are on going, so this week has been rather bitty as I attempt to get up to date with everything at once.

ep 253-255 of The History of England (plus a couple of bonus episodes) - this has been an overview of the European situation of the 16th Century so that we have Henry VIII's successors in proper context.

4 mini-episodes of The History of Egypt - the theme for this run of mini-episodes is music & poetry. Particularly interesting was the interview with a composer who has written music intended to be evocative of ancient Egyptian music, he talked about things like working out what sort of scale they probably used by counting strings on ancient harps between the octaves strings (which you can tell as exactly half the length is one octave up).

ep 206-207 of the China History Podcast - a biography of Robert van Gulik who wrote the Judge Dee detective novels, and a discussion of the Chinese labourers who worked for the French & the British during World War I.

ep 169-170 of The History of Byzantium - he continues his tour of the empire c.1025 CE, moving to the east & into Armenia.

ep 115 of The History of English - a look at words for measurements, which are very often words for body parts, and how the measurements were beginning to be standardised during the 14th Century.

ep 3.K of The History of India - a look at the life of an Indian monk who translated Buddhist texts into Chinese (at the end of his long life).

Music: While running I listened to Wham!'s greatest hits, and The Cure's greatest hits, in the same run just for a bit of mental whiplash.

Watching

ep 3 of Oceans Apart: Art & the Pacific with James Fox - looking at New Zealand and the Maori, which was the most optimistic story of the three as the Maori weren't completely wiped out or marginalised. A good series, although more depressing history than I'd originally expected (but in retrospect I don't know why I didn't expect it, you can't tell the story of the art without the story of how the artists' cultures were treated).

ep 3 of Romancing the Stone: The Golden Ages of British Sculpture - and modern sculpture to tie up the series. Including the Angel of the North, which J & I have been planning to visit on our upcoming adventure in the NE. I enjoyed the series, tho I think J was less keen, but much of the sculpture was not my cup of tea.

ep 8 of Andrew Marr's History of the World - the 20th Century, with the horrors of the World Wars and the Cold War. I like this series, some of it is clearly oversimplified, but it's well presented with the little vignettes to go with Marr's narrative generally entertaining rather than cringe-worthy.

ep 2 of Can You Feel It: How Dance Music Conquered the World - this one about clubs & club culture, and it really felt like the narration and the things they showed us did not match. The narration was the upbeat tale of how British club culture took the club scene of the US and through the entrepreneurial spirit of the 80s & 90s went on to become a global phenomenon that underpins the modern world. And the things we saw felt to me much more like how the club scene of the 80s & early 90s (i.e. raves & "private parties" in warehouses & fields, all about the music, dancing & the drugs) sold its soul to the capitalist devil and is now parading about like a zombie with £100,000 tables for nights in Vegas and big luxury "shows" as clubs in Ibiza.

BBC Proms: Pioneers of Sound - featuring music by Delia Derbyshire (who is best known for her arrangement of the Doctor Who theme music) amongst others. Not really my cup of tea, but interesting.

Hyundai Mercury Price 2018: Album of the Year Live - featured a performance by everyone on the shortlist before the announcement of the winner. I think Nadine Shah should've won, she stood out from the rest for me. Tho J has since listened to her album and to the winning one (by Wolf Alice) and says the Wolf Alice one is more varied when you listen to the whole thing whereas the Nadine Shah one feels a bit more samey by the end.

Books

Fiction: Still reading "The Gathering Flame", Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald - it's not just a direct prequel to the first three books but also contains within it interleaved backstories up to that point for the three main characters of this book, definitely definitely not Star Wars with the serial numbers filed off now, as the character that I assume was Luke once upon a time has a much darker backstory than that.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Mind in the Cave", David Lewis-Williams - getting near the end of the book now, the bit I've just read is about how somatic rather than visual hallucinations might be the source for some of the imagery in the caves.

Also still reading "The Rise & Fall of Ancient Egypt", Toby Wilkinson - just read about the 1st Intermediate Period, and the way that the concept of single kingship for Egypt was so ingrained after a thousand years that the forms were still nominally observed for some time after the centre had no effective leadership.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: Measure for Measure: Act 1 Scenes 2-5, Act 2 Scene 1 - the various bits of the plot are being set up, and thanks to

jesuswasbatman's comments I've paid a little more attention to the Duke than I might otherwise have done after the longwinded opening speech.

Listening

Podcasts: ep 27-30 of The History of England Shedcasts - (which was actually a lot of episodes as there's different numbering for different strands) and I'm now up to date with those for now. I'm enjoying these, definitely worth the membership for me :)

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about Automata - not robots, not AI, but a more medieval concept of mechanical things (although of course it began to overlap with the other categories). Not just what examples there are, but also how they fed into questions about things like "what is a living thing?".

Music: While running I listened to the rest of the Ladykillers compilation, and Voice of the Beehive's "Let it Bee!".

Watching

ep 3 of Ancient Invisible Cities - Istanbul in its many incarnations. A somewhat shallow series but still interesting, a shame that the Cairo episode was the weakest of the three.

ep 2 of Ocean Apart: Art & the Pacific with James Fox - looking at Polynesia this time, with a theme of how it's been fantasised about by Western culture as a paradise whilst exploited and destroyed by those same people.

ep 2 of Romancing the Stone: The Golden Ages of British Sculpture - looking at Victorian/Industrial Revolution era sculpture this time, with a certain amount of puncturing the tendency of the interviewed academics towards pomposity by Sooke.

Sylvia Plath: Inside the Bell Jar - a look at both the book and Plath's life (tied together as the book is semi-autobiographical and it is published not long before her successful suicide). In our depressing TV slot and as anticipated it was pretty depressing, I'm not particularly interested in Plath myself (tho J owns a collection of her poems) but it was still an interesting programme presenting a different side of 1950s/60s USA.

The Secret Leopards - a piece of fluff to lighten the mood, a Natural World special presented by someone who was quite clearly the biggest leopard fanboy ever. A charming look at all the reasons why leopards are the most awesome big cats that exist.

ep 7 of Andrew Marr's History of the World - the Industrial Revolution, the opening of Japan to the outside world, we're nearly up to modern history.

ep 1 of Can You Feel It: How Dance Music Conquered the World - this will be a three part series looking at the influence & history of dance music through a variety of lenses. This was the 4/4 beat as the soundtrack to our era. Of course as someone who was more of an indie kid by the time we got to "my era" I (and J) was muttering a bit about how that wasn't the whole story of what was going on then. But then that wasn't the point. Rather good so far.

The Joy of AI - Jim Al-Khalili doing a primer on the field of AI, what AI is and the various sorts, the history of the field & where it goes from here. With the main theme being how far we have to go before getting anywhere near the sort of AI that science fiction imagines.

Books

Fiction: Finished "By Honor Betray'd", Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald - the end of the first trilogy of these books, didn't go where I thought it would at all. And continued the Star Wars flavour by ending with a big party.

Started "The Gathering Flame", also Debra Doyle & James D. Macdonald - this goes back a generation and tells the story of the parents of the main protagonists of the first three books. Continues the Star Wars flavour tho definitely the one-to-one mappings for characters are broken at this point.

Non-fiction: Still reading "The Mind in the Cave", David Lewis-Williams - he's now considering the layouts of particular caves in the light of his hypothesis that the art is to do with shamanistic beliefs.

Also still reading "The Rise & Fall of Ancient Egypt", Toby Wilkinson - into the 5th & 6th Dynasties & their increasing disconnection from the people they ruled.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare: The Merry Wives of Windsor Act 5 Scenes 2-5 - finished this play, finally. Not particularly keen on it, but the humour (as I think I've said several times already) was mostly lost on me due to having to keep on reading the footnotes to spot the jokes.

Measure for Measure: Introductory material plus Act 1 Scene 1 - haven't read enough yet to have an opinion (tho the Duke is awfully long winded but I think he spends most of the play off-screen as it were).

Listening

Podcasts: ep 17-27 of The History of England Shedcasts - up to David I in the History of Scotland thread & more biographies of Tudor court figures in the more general one (including the one of Thomas Cromwell that I was particularly looking forward to).

Sunday Podcast: an episode of In Our Time about The Iliad - I was particularly struck by the idea that one of the things it's about is the gods learning they need to be more divine & stop caring so much about mortals, and the semi-divine like Achilles learning to be more mortal.

Music: While running I listened to Marillion "F.E.A.R", Paul Simon "Graceland" and some of the Ladykillers compilation.

Heritage Weekend

There were several buildings open in Ipswich for the two weekends of the Heritage Weekend, we only visited a few:

Freemason's Hall - I think J wanted to see if there was any Egyptianising decor inside and we've walked past the building often enough to be vaguely curious. Sadly nothing Egyptianising at all, and personally I found the evangelising from the Freemasons that were hanging about to be deeply tedious not only because evangelising of any sort tends to annoy me but also because of the deep disconnect between the fine sounding words they used and the institutional culture they described. I was spluttering for ages afterwards.

3-5 Silent Street - a late medieval building that used to be part of Curzon's Lodge, and more recently an antiquarian bookshop. Not much to actually see, but it's a building I've wanted to see inside for ages just because of the age of it.

Unitarian Meeting House - built in 1699, so slightly newer than 3-5 Silent Street. Managed to seem peaceful and welcoming, even full of a whole bunch of slightly nosy residents of Ipswich. Doesn't appear to've been modernised much, still a room full of high-sided pews arranged around the pulpit.

Willis Building - much much more modern, it's basically an office building but designed by Norman Foster & Grade I listed. We saw the garden on the roof, which freaked me out as I don't like heights and found the juxtaposition of the height & the garden a bit difficult. And the room where the swimming pool used to be, but now covered over with a false floor (and apparently the cause of the Grade I listing, obtained by the architect to stop them from removing the swimming pool in the 90s, or so said our tour guide).

Watching

ep 2 of Ancient Invisible Cities - this episode was about Athens, and so much more Scott's area of expertise & more suited to the format of the series too as there were underground aqueducts and mines to map out.

ep 2 of Burma with Simon Reeves - we kept putting this off, as it was sure to be depressing and indeed it was. Glad to've watched the series, I knew pretty much nothing about Burma beforehand, but still it was rather depressing.

Horizon: Jupiter Revealed - a look at what we now know about Jupiter after the most recent NASA mission, which included that it has a huge rocky core and that there may be a lot of water in there too (contrary to some previous results).

ep 1 of Ocean Apart: Art & the Pacific with James Fox - this episode focusing on Australia with an emphasis on indigenous art, both the stuff from before Europeans came along and after including much more recent art made by living people.

Workers or Shirkers? Ian Hislop's Victorian Benefits - another of Hislop's programmes that looks at a modern political issue by examining the history of the issue, in this case how the Victorian idea of the "deserving poor" and the "undeserving poor" still reverberates through the debate about benefits today.

ep 1 of Romancing the Stone: The Golden Ages of British Sculpture - Alastair Sooke talking about British sculpture, from the Middle Ages in this episode.

Pump Up the Bhangra: The Sound of Asian Britain - programme about the history of Bhangra music with its roots in the working men's culture of Punjabi immigrants to the Midlands in the 1960s through to the present day.

King Arthur's Britain: The Truth Unearthed - Alice Roberts looking at recent archaeological evidence about life in the Dark Ages (specifically c.400-600 CE). The framing device of King Arthur was a little tedious because they spent too much time building up the "was he real?" question (no, no he was not), but the archaeology etc was interesting.