Brian's Friends

Dept rus in urbe: A prickle of hedgehogs and an armada of newts: wildlife settles in at London’s new Queen Elizabeth garden

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Dept of, why not work with creating opportunities for the mute inglorious already there....? (sigh): Creating Baby Geniuses to Thwart the AI Threat? (Yes, Really.) Honestly, these people.

Possibly relevant here....: State school kids do better at uni

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The Rise and Fall of Jukeboxes: where are the grooves of yesteryear?

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Women artists in the Georgian era: a constant, delicate calibration to keep the balance between personal reputation, artistic success and the need to earn a living.

On the other hand, I am thinking of the times when I was dealing with a fairly professional set of meedja people either coming with their gear to interview me in my Former Workplace, or else having me in a studio nicely set up for the purpose.

Not recording a podcast from my own front room on my own computer and having to set up my own headphones and mike and feeling that the instructions about Settings could pertain a little closer to what I find there....

And adjust the curtains so that there was not a glare off the portrait photo of Dame Rebecca and all that sort of thing.

- the fact that the connection to Headphones was no longer saying Headphones might have been a clue that all was not entirely as it should be -

So anyway, when I got connected there was total silence and had to do a certain amount of jiggling around and changing the settings and anyway, did finally get to the stage where I was both audible and able to hear everyone else.

Though when I spoke the effect was, roughly speaking, of a 45 rpm single being played at 33 rpm, no, I have no idea why, they were fairly hopeful this could be sorted in editing.

The actual discussion went okay I think - other person who was there to be Nexpert is old(ish) mate who has just writ a book of relevance which cites me quite a bit.

But lo and behold, had a subsequent email from them expressing concern over the slurring issue in case it was Health Thing and should I see my GP, which was thoughtful, but really, it was TECHNOLOGICAL ISSUE. (I did not respond, hey, your image was looking really blurry and faint, are you feeling well? because I assumed that was their camera.)

Am feeling mildly knackered now, unlike the days when I would jaunt down to Broadcasting House, do my chat on Woman's Hour, and then go and do my normal day's work.

Of course, I was Younger then.

What I read

Finished Never After, I can see that there are good things about it, but it was just not really what I was looking for at this particular time. It's historical novel, rather than romance.

Latest Literary Review.

I then finally got stuck in to Edward St Aubyn, Parallel Lines (2025), but although I did finish it, did not think it came up to Double Blind, found it hard to keep track of the various characters, and was a bit disappointed.

Started SJ Fleet 'The Secret Barrister', The Cut Throat Trial (2025), which is that ?tapestry-style novel of a trial where it gives you the viewpoints of the various parties involved, and even though I could see (or maybe because I could see?) it was not going to turn out as clearcut a case as it looked, could not get involved, gave up.

Also started and gave up, Rebecca Yarros, Fourth Wing (2023), because I was getting vibes of a kind of narrative I have been there and done that many times over the years and this was not bringing the over and above that would have kept me reading.

Decided that I wanted to read some more Arnold Bennett and found that I had Mr Prohack (1922) on the ereader and not sure I'd ever read it. Not by any means one of the top Bennetts but still quite acceptable.

On the go

Project Gutenberg have only just released Naomi Royde-Smith's The Tortoiseshell Cat (1925). I have been wanting to read something, anything, by Royde-Smith for ages, and this is showing very promising. Our protag starts out as teacher in a girls' school with rather more ambitions than those in which D Richardson's Miriam finds herself, but has just been fired.

Up next

No idea. What do Tiggers eat?

Have just out of the blue had an email from a meedja person about what a cause of death on early C20th certificate MEANS, a colleague of theirs contacted me - what must have been in days of yore - and I was really helpful. I think that may have been a case in which Sid was involved, this was not, but we do our best in posing as a Nexpert.

I was able to flash a bit more relevant knowledge in the question portion of online seminar this pm (even though I dozed off, did not sleep well last night, during part of the actual seminar).

Have got off my desk and conscience something that has been hanging over me, to wit, second review of article I did a previous review of some weeks ago. Was somewhat prejudiced about it (it is actually not at all bad doing what it does) because it rather glances over the amount of work that went into getting the archive used into usable condition (personal interest there noted) and role of archivists in between the creators of the records and the end-users.

Think I mentioned some while ago possibility that longtime academic friend and self may be editing for publication Important Work on Significant and Highly Relevant Subject of friend of ours who died very unexpectedly last year. We have now received the draft manuscript and it seems more of a manuscript (rather than notes and materials) than we had feared.

Still have review that has been hanging over me and keeping getting put off to do.

Have podcast to record later this week.

Also must begin to turn my thoughts to being instructive yet entertaining on the history of ye baudruche (and finding illos, fortunately I already have quite a few).

Including flashbacks to a visit (that did not take place) during the early stages of lockdown.

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I am seeing a troubling pattern of people dispersing collections or not treating collections as they should be treated as research resources -

(BBC Written Archives Centre, I'm looking at you - 'structured content releases' - WE direct what you should be researching....)

There was that guy recently, an actual history professor, who uncovered a hoard of Roman coins and was about, yay, auction rooms (thought I linked this, but can't find it).

Then there is this daisy: Woman to sell hundreds of treasure pieces she found:

Her detecting skills have been so successful that her cabinet at her home in Wilden, Bedfordshire, is now full and she needs to make some space.
So on 16 May her collection of hundreds of items found in fields in Bedfordshire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Norfolk will go under the hammer and is expected to sell for about £11,000.
She says she is not auctioning her items for monetary reasons but hopes her finds will go to "someone who loves history".
....
She says since she started in 2006, she has collected "hundreds" of items, from all over the country, including her friend's garden, but will not reveal the exact locations.

And this is maybe just as sad a case of material getting dispersed into the ether when, should it be kept together in some place for the benefit of future historians, it would not only be the individual items but the synergy of the critical mass of material: The $100m pop culture collection now being broken up at auction:

Jim Irsay, the man who bought these artefacts, died last June at the age of 65. Over the past few days the billionaire’s collection was sold at Christie’s New York in a series of auctions. Irsay cared greatly about the memorabilia. You can tell that not by the most valuable items, but by the least. Buying the handwritten lyrics for Hey Jude does not prove you are a true fan. But an unused ticket from a 1966 concert, worth a few hundred dollars? That does.
Now that many of the objects have gone to the highest bidders, their fate is to be apart. That is how they began their lives, imprinting themselves on the American psyche from all corners of the world. But the shared story they tell, decades later, raises questions about who they are for, where they will go next, and to whom they truly belong.