It's nice and bright and sunny outside, though it is still quite cold, and it was freezing (-4°C) during the night. Life still feels weird, we're still nice and secluded, but I will have to do a post office run now.

While I will do that, enjoying the sun, and later enjoy a cup of coffee (at home, of course!), you might enjoy a laugh with this German telling the difference between Germany and the US:


Laughing, after all, they say, is good for your health :)

Also... is there something I can do on this blog to help getting us all through this crazy time? Suggestions are very welcome!

Pantone decides on a "Colour of the Year" each year, and for 2020, their choice is "classic blue". As a blue-loving person, I do approve... though I like all kinds of blue, not only classic.

Science has a little news article about what our modern civilisation will leave behind for future archaeologists. (Or alien xeno-archaeologists, if humans go extinct.)

This link will bring you to an image of a tablet-weaving frame in a medieval manuscript. Just because.

The Museum of London has a post about pointed shoes (and sodomy!).

Storm Sabine has passed, and here in our spot, she was quite gentle - there was wind, yes, but I've seen stronger winds, and more rain, so altogether there was much less of a storm than the warnings and predictions had indicated. There even were bouts of sunshine inbetween - it was a little like April on speed.

I spent the past two days mostly indoors, which I would have done storm or no storm - I had a nice sunny quarter of an hour for my trip to the bakery yesterday, and today was mostly nice again, with one shower of snow in the morning. Altogether there was actually more sun during these storm days than on many of the previous days this winter; enough sun to heat the main part of our living space via the wintergarden. Go figure.

There might be more stormy weather coming up during the next days - we'll see what happens, and I hope it won't be too bad...

I confess I'm rather fond of these silly, slightly arbitrary International Thing Days - and one of the funniest among them is today:

Hug A Medievalist Day! Today's more general, though, it's Hug a Scientist Day.

So in honour of that, here's a medieval hug, brought to you courtesy of the Rijksmuseum:



This, by the way, is the Meeting of Joachim and Anna, dating to about 1470. Go to the Rijksmuseum page to learn more about this statue.

Just in case, now that the time of manger scenes is approaching, you'd like to take a look at some impressive bovines, you might want to click your way over to the Auerrind-Projekt. It's a try to backbreed to the wild Auerochs which went the way of the Dodo in the 17th century.

Though what is lost stays lost, trying to re-breed to a wild form is a way of trying to get more diversity in species - something which is always a good thing. The Auerrind-Projekt is also part of the larger project "Rewilding Europe", which is aiming to conserve and promote animal wildlife across Europe - and their site is also worth checking out, not only for the spectacular pictures of wild animals.

Here's a few links for you, in hopes you'll find something enjoyable!

The new Knitty is out - Winter 2019 edition, with several patterns for sweaters and cardigans plus, of course, the seasonal hats and mittens.

There's a half-hour video online, in German, about cargo bikes in Nuremburg.

John Scalzi is, as every year, doing the Gift Guide Thing on his blog - Day Five is charities, but you can also find four other threads with books and craft-related gift ideas.

ancienttools.net is a blog about experimental archaeology, mostly concerning metalworking - but there's quite a bit of textile stuff inbetween.

When I have work that does not require my full concentration (or when I'm doing things like cooking), I love to listen to podcasts. Especially my favourite one - Escape Pod. (Part of the reason why this is my favourite is that it's how I discovered podcasts, and especially fiction podcasts.) There's always a long list of podcast episodes lined up on my phone so I can enjoy them offline; most of them are fiction podcasts, though I do have a few nonfiction ones (about history, philosophy, and bouldering. Yes, it's a weird mix.)

Recently, there was a story that I liked even better than I like most of their stories - "Martian Chronicles" by Cory Doctorow. It's a longer story, so it comes in two parts, and I loved both the story itself and the narration (by Adam Pracht, who does a splendid job). So if you have some time on your hands (or on your ears?), and would like to fill it with a good story - I'd recommend listening to Martian Chronicles.