Turning worn collars—years added to favourites, and ££’s saved. 👍

You get all the best carols on the first Sunday of Christmas. And, if lucky, a cracking Daquin noël for the voluntary. #twelvedays

'"Evangelizando", A Sermon: the Angel himself calls it so, "I come to Evangelize": that first. And presently after he had done his Sermon, there is the Hymn, Gloria in excelsis, taken up by the Queere of Heaven. The whole Service of this day, the Sermon, the Anthem, by Angels, all.' (Andrewes, 1610)

Christmas morning light. (St Mary’s University Church, Oxford)

That’s it—tree’s up! Happy Christmas to all near and far.

Nut roast isn’t half a faff to make, but satisfying in its own way if you aren’t rushed. And I’m assured that it’s appreciated.

USA has come to this. I want to say unbelievable, but if I think back over my life there (1965-94) I can recognise, with the guilty shudder of hindsight, every step that led it here. And my UK home since then now heads in the same ominous direction.

Less than 2 days left to listen to 'Lo He Comes' on repeat. Here at 1:30:32 (complete with percussion and brass no less, plus killer descant) 👇 www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsUd...

vicesimo tertio die Decembris, Minimus aquifolium invenit. (On the 23rd of December, Minimus finds holly.) #latinadventcalendar

It’s almost like those with vested interests in companies ruining the planet and harming working people don’t want a party in power who’ll hold them to account.

One of those paintings you see for the first time and think, ‘How have I not seen this before?’ (Or not known that Leamington Spa has a free, council-funded art gallery?) 👍

I love seeing impromptu collaborations like this. 👇

There. The garden-scrounge wreath is up. A bit more free range than usual perhaps, but I like.

Lebkuchen piling up. Have to mellow for a few days—agony.

Grinding lebkuchen spices really clears the head.

Just deleted all bookmarks for what used to be BBC Goodfood recipes, given bossy new choice either to suffer the ads or pay monthly. Eff off.

With friends like this, who &c. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

And in sermon mode: 'The eye of the Lord upon mee, makes midnight noone, and S. Lucies day S. Barnabies; It makes Capricorne Cancer, and the Winters the Summers Solstice . . . and turnes the jealousie of the sad soule into infallibility.' (Sermon on Ps. 32.8)

Glad I read it. But glad it’s all over.

I now want a terracotta bread pot that produces a personalised relief image with motto.

Wonderful.

2nd century AD tombstone of Regina from the tribe of the Catuvellauni & wife of Barates from Palmyra. The tombstone is bilingual in Latin and Aramaic - the only known example in Britain. Part of the collections at Arbeia Roman Fort in South Shields. 📸 My own #EpigraphyTuesday

Wonderful to find shade cast on the Murdoch press in an unexpected place; cheers to @simoninsuffolk.bsky.social www.suffolkchurches.co.uk/westleym.htm

Given this seemed to involve us picking up the electricity bill for a lot of data centres I suspect we’ll cope.

Gaudete.

Great to hear @kieranchodgson.bsky.social on Dead Ringers.

I was sure that this was @coldwarsteve.bsky.social . How appalling.

This is important.

No words.

Oft’, as the mounting larks their notes prepare, They fall, and leave their little lives in air.

Look guys, if the gays can boycott the Eurovision, the very very very least you can do is boycott FIFA

Yessss.

‘Adverbs please God more than verbs . . . the manner of the doing of it, more than our doing itself.’ (Lancelot Andrewes)

Woo hoo ! Last tutorial of term done. Out with a bang.

'Make of the Signe what ye will; it skills not what it be; never so meane: In the nature of the Signe, there is nothing . . . all is in the thing signified. So it carrie us to a rich Signatum, and worth the finding, what makes it a matter, how meane the Signe be?' (Lancelot Andrewes, Christmas 1618)

Treated ourselves to Magdalen Chapel for Advent Sunday this a.m. and realised I went to the same service, jet lagged, 32 yrs ago on first visit to Ox, for a post-doc interview. Tempus &c.

Such a shame (crime?) that this is going to be separated from the work that completes what is a stunning double-portrait.

Nothing like the new Radio 3 to ruin Advent Sunday..

These black days are at least good for unsubscribing from retailers' mail lists. Whole swarms in the inbox just sitting there to get systematically zapped.

🇺🇸

I’m here for that frontal.

Fun fact: Alleyn, earlier famed for title roles in Dr Faustus and Tamburlaine, became John Donne's son-in-law (m., as his second wife, Donne's eldest, Constance, 3 Dec. 1623, at Camberwell). #earlymodern

For the original setting of Dryden's Ode to St Cecilia, premiered #otd 1687 at Stationers Hall in London. Great background listening for Handel's more well-known setting of 1739.

For truth is strong, her rightfull cause to plead,

Good. Universities take note please. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Approaching the starting line . . .

So good to see @nationaltrust.org.uk not pulling its punches.

Such an honour to have had Samantha Ege @lincoln.ox.ac.uk as an ECR some years ago, as her research and performance careers gathered such strength. A remarkable force.