2025 advent calendar. Day one. You run downstairs, excited to open the first door. A voice in the back of your mind tries to tell you that you didn't actually buy an advent calendar this year—and this wasn't in the house when you went to bed last night—but you push that aside.

it's advent you know what that means

He empezado ver Avatar: The Last Airborne en español, porque estoy muy familiar con el. Para, la voca de Zuko es más diferente! Él suelo como un hombre tiene 40 años. 😄

Heritage & interp peeps! I need evidence! #help Know of audience feedback/research on e.g. creative vox pops from historic figures? Ie rather than panel saying 'Brian the baker worked here in 1120s. Baking was important in the medieval household. He had a house by the gatehouse.' It would go 👇

This is often why I will search out a shop, if I find them on Etsy, to see if they have their own website, which might offer an alternative way to purchase (when I used to sell online I used a self-hosted shop, but then you don't get the reach of an Etsy search, even if you have decent SEO).

Don't forget! Teapots exist! Signed, sincerely, someone who had forgotten she had one and recently remembered and is very much enjoying having three cups of tea ready to drink one after the other without having to wait in between.

UNBOUND AUTHORS: Leftover copies of your books in the UK (MacMillan) warehouse will be pulped within the next week or two. DM me for a link to the warehouse stock list and contacts. If you have no dosh, another publisher (Wilton Sq) is willing to buy the books & distribute on a 50/50 profit split

I fucking love it when people are helpful. Like, it feels so good. You e-mail someone with a question and they just say, hey, yeah, we can help with that, no problem! It's the fucking best.

These are darling!

Society is a construct. You can just ask someone to do a ska cover of Faith of the Heart and they'll say "$300 please" and you give it to them and then you have it. Everyone, give @skatunenetwork.bsky.social your money. They deserve it.

Let's GOOOOO! Factual sketch comedy, for families! Made by the team behind YDTM plus great comedy sketch writers & performers! Out this Christmas on R4 (3eps) & Sounds (15eps) It's Ya Gal's 1st production credit! You're in for a good time, comedy fans! www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/...

come on folks surely the spillover isn't the last word on this. I'll take pophist, or even non-pop sci at this point! what're the hashtags I need for this? #Episky? 🧪

Use, and I cannot state this enough, libraries. UK/RoI authors get paid for library borrows. More than you'd think!

I saw a mouse! Where? There on the stair! Where on the stair? Right there! For #FindsFriday this lovely little Roman toy or joke mouse made from a scrap of leather at marvellous @vindolandatrust.bsky.social

There is one more post to be written here, about how AI is now often an austerity technology, inserted into a human process to compensate for the fact that there is just not enough time and money, and many workers are expected to do more and more with less and less.

an LLM poem will never match the delight that a @brianbilston.bsky.social poem can bring

When I read things like this, I'm reminded of how the play and poetry of language — even punctuation! —  are ABSENT from most of the purely functional discussions of "why + how we write" precipitated by LLMs. I wish students could see the fun, freedom + productive friction in the process

🧶

what an incredible use of free will

Sometimes it's really difficult to see/feel you're making progress with a new skill. But on a first read through I can get the gist of many Spanish posts now and with a little extra work I learn new vocabulary and grammar. Total bonus when linguistic/cultural gems come across your feed too!

🎬 We put Sh*t Chester in the dock! Join us for a special screening of Sh*t Chester: The Movie - asking all the hard questions you've been wanting answers to. Then stick around for a Q&A with the man himself + a few surprises! 📆 30 Nov 5.30pm 🎟️ FREE 👉 buff.ly/2BabLQX 📸 @Stuartrobphoto

yooo (good) dates are so freaking delicious, in case you forgot

Also - come and get my job! Which I’m still partially doing, but someone needs to take up the slack/ allow me to send them to far flung locations to retrieve mysterious ancient samples. See the World*! *mainly Britain. crick.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/Extern...

oh no, I'm about to have an opinion on the internet I think if you're not on your way to/from or at a sporting or sporting-adjacent event, dry robes look very silly

Every time I see stories like this I can't help but feel extremely fortunate to have gone through my education when I did. It was such a sweet spot of having access to computers, fairly advanced software, but also eventually digitised books and articles... and yet *none* of this utter bullshit.

What's the first recorded instance in art history of a sample -- a distinct and recognisable unit of another work, meaningfully incorporated into the totality of the new work?

It’s the exclusive everyone wanted, the story that will win next year’s Pulitzer… I can reveal London’s giant AI generated Christmas artwork, the subject of much online mockery, is being torn down - and I honestly *genuinely* think you’ll never guess why. www.londoncentric.media/p/ai-artwork...

This is a really interesting article about a horrifying distortion of sign language happening in the UK, and which its creators are now trying to export to other countries and their sign languages Learn actual sign languages from Deaf people, not from hearing people making their own weird versions!

For anyone interested in ancient diseases (either historical or prehistoric) here's an excellent, readable, comprehensive summary of where we are with ancient pathogen DNA. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Most popular cartoons will have been dubbed - so you don't have to know if it's available in Spanish. I'm just looking for recommendations of younger audience animated shows I might actually enjoy watching!

just learned we won an award for our blog post about Tom Holland and stormwater management. remember, when you see an article about stormwater management, you repost it. i don’t make the rules.

Mechanic [sliding out from under Optimus Prime]: I think I see what the issue is. This truck is also a big guy somehow

What are your favourite animated TV series aimed at kids between 5 - 9? *Your* favourite, not theirs. I'm looking for shows I can watch that have been dubbed into Spanish. Dubbed cartoons are much better than dubbed live action and frankly, that's about the language level I'm at right now.

I've just put this year's @chalkdustmag.bsky.social puzzle Christmas cards on sale at ko-fi.com/mscroggs/shop.

In common with every camera-wielding lifeform in Glasgow, I have seen the Rebel Bear's latest piece.

The witch made him hot chocolate. "They say I'm strong," he said. "And I am." He took a sip. "They say I can overcome any hardship." "Mm," said the witch. "And I can. I do." The witch said nothing. "But I shouldn't have to!" "No." The witch held the hero as he wept. "No, you shouldn't."

This is beautiful. It's poetry, but as an osteologist, your bones will only ever tell us a fraction of who you were - and your sex and gender will only ever be estimates, if studied. Even with the grave goods your loved ones leave with you, we'll only ever build a part of the picture of who you are.

“We turn our hearts into museums of the people that we love to keep them alive inside us.”

Join artist Haleema Aziz for a workshop to create an artwork for the @rcnlibraries.bsky.social's upcoming exhibition about migration and nursing. 📆 5 Dec, 4 - 5.30pm, Oxford Circus (Free) ⭐Particularly aimed at nursing and healthcare staff with experience of migration. Learn more: bit.ly/4oLAVYH

Partner with us! Planning a festival or community event in 2025 or 2026? We can bring stories, activities, and displays that celebrate migration and get people talking... Photos: Elzbieta Piekacz, Sopo Ramischwili

does nobody check/notice? or do they check/notice and just not care?

Someone just asked me “what’s the takeaway” from my book, A Passion For Passion, the most impossible question to answer. I guess the underlying message is that silliness is worthwhile and funny things are fun to make funny, but I don’t really know how to put that into optimiser-tech-bro-speak.

Really how they publish the evaluation of this. Folks have been trying to increase public interest in post ex for so long, will this openness and regularity get people intrigued? How will it interact with the work? Will the public pop down as hoped?

I'm giving a talk at my work this week that is being broadcast online via Zoom! Maybe you're interested in watching? "Archaeology of Ableism and Ableism in Archaeology: Building a More Rigorous Archaeology through Disability Studies" Wednesday, November 19, 12-1pm Pacific #academicsky 🏺♿

#3157 A helpful tutorial

Totally lovely story to heal your heart this morning

Hey! Northern hemisphere folks: this is my annual reminder to myself and perhaps also to you that if you have the schedule autonomy to permit it, get out for a walk or whatever during daylight hours! It's important! You can work more when it's dark but you need whatever sunlight is available!

did we all just get over hypno-boobs? can anyone tell me how they're feeling about that now? how, or even if, they're reconciling with it and moving on?