Inside and outside the art gallery

“Goodnight. And please, don’t have nightmares”

@dannybate.bsky.social has sent me something!! Looking forward to getting into this

David Wilkie 1822 The Chelsea Pensioners reading the Waterloo Dispatch (detail)

Canaletto 1735 Venice: The Feast Day of St Roch (detail)

Garofalo (1520) St Augustine (detail)

Rossi Fiorentino 1514 portrait of a young man (detail)

Simone Martini (1320) St John the Evangelist (detail)

@airlineflyer.net might need this on his wall – I think this is how TCAS works?

Is it just me, or is the new tube map so complicated as to be unreadable? I can’t tell which names belong to which station

The cost of reflection – splitting our lives in two, becoming our own worst critic

Pecked and bruised but still crisp and tasty

One of the antiques shops we visited in Lewes at the weekend had a packet of Walker's crisps in a glass cabinet, signed by Gary Lineker!

By the Stream, Autumn https://botfrens.com/collections/44/contents/11789

A case of convergent evolution? The A320 develops an insectivore’s beak, possibly due to a change in diet

Herron! Flying away annoyed at me walking past as slowly and quietly as I could

One of those “Doh! Why didn’t we think of it earlier?” moments

Steel door. Reigate Fort

Portal

Things are looking up – well, I am looking up Spot the birdy?

When a good society ceases 'practical life becomes difficult, the sequence of events becomes entirely irregular' and when an individual acts 'the traditional result does not necessarily follow' – Mary Scrutton I don't know why this seemed pertinent

I never tire of pines in the sunshine - I like to pretend I’m in Rome Wrong species of pine, but near enough

3D depiction of rainfall distribution across Great Britain. England is a very dry place: London gets as much rain as Jerusalem. With climate change, the south will need to prepare for even more acute water shortages.

What I saw on Leith Hill yesterday

‘One thing you can say about nature is that it tends not to have much time for dichotomies, preferring instead the rolling landscapes of distinctions, graded to a greater or lesser degree’ Mark Rowlands

Working with Hanzi, seeing 㐬. "Oh, I know that one, it's three skins tied together and represents birth. No, wait. Dammit, that's the hieroglyph 𓄟." Looking it up "㐬 is ... an upside down baby. And represents birth."

meanwhile, in Caerphilly . . . flags, is it?

Well this is a much better way of spending a Saturday morning than doing the things that need doing

With admirable self-restraint @levparikian.bsky.social resists saying ’orchestras are like carthorses’ Although we know a way in which it is

A wild thing about having kids in your house is that sometimes you buy a cheap temporary something, or lift a thing off a curb, and then a few years later - BAMM it's a foundational memory of someone's childhood. The toys you always wanted to get rid of, the spoons you hope to upgrade. Nope. No way.

Things to look for in autumn 1) chestnuts

#FindsFriday: A #Roman amber flask, from Aquileia, dating 1st/2nd c. AD. Aquileia's position at the end of a main amber trade route resulted in its becoming a centre for the carving and distribution of Baltic amber across the Roman Empire. 📷: Museo Archeologico Nazionale, Aquileia

An autumnal Monet – a lily pond in the Surrey Hills

My tree of the day – the Scots Pine

Also this but it won't fit in my backpack

How to delete your account without agreeing to the new TOS: In the dialogue box asking you to agree, DO NOT click agree. Instead, click on the TOS link which will open another tab. In the top right of that tab you can go to your account settings and delete your account.

The buff-tip moth (Phalera bucephala) has mastered a very particular kind of camouflage. When they close their wings up, they resemble a broken twig. Native to large parts of Europe, there's regional pattern variation that reflects the local tree species. This one best resembles birch twigs?

The gold embossed decoration on old dark leather is delicious

After the Rain

This, with the little finger hook, is a study in economical functional form

Just two weeks on and already the rain has more than lost its welcome

It was a dark and stormy night . . . Sketch by John Piper

I saw this and suddenly social media came to mind Not this platform, of course

What makes science science and engineering engineering? Aerospace engineer Theodore Von Kármán on Scientists and Engineers: Scientists discover the world that exists; Engineers create the world that never was. — Theodore Von Kármán

I hope they celebrate with a display of wanton singing accompanied by trumpets and tub-thumping

Mood indigo

“People sometimes tell me that they prefer barbarism to civilisation. I doubt if they have given it a long enough trial…they are bored by civilisation; but all the evidence suggests that the boredom of barbarism is infinitely greater.” Kenneth Clark, ‘Civilisation’.

Interesting by @lswisnom.bsky.social that lament was central to temple worship in the ancient world, because any powerful being was going to cause you to grieve; respect was to defer to their power to harm you. A contrast with Christian ideas of God who only does good, where 'respect' is admiration.

I've written a blogpost for the British Association for Local History (BALH), about our scoria bricks research, www.balh.org.uk/blog-scoria-...

The garden is wet, but someone has come to enjoy the sunshine - perhaps a chance to dry out after the rain