"Let's use AI to write and design an embroidery stitch book, what could possibly go wrong"

Did medieval people buy each other Christmas gifts? New Year's Day was the main gifting day, but little is known about everyday people's present giving. Our project on London's customs records has uncovered a wealth of affordable items imported around this time: gloves and hats to toys and rattles🧵

I'm a dual US-UK citizen. This past summer, I was prevented from boarding a flight with my husband back to the UK because my citizenship was questioned. It took me nearly a month to get home. It made me feel like no matter what, I'd never truly be seen as "British."

I lived in one of these houses as a student. They were poorly maintained and often overcrowded then. The physical conditions are worse now, much worse. People are being failed so badly and also families are at risk of being evicted so their landlords can convert their homes to this model too.

We went to visit what I'm reliably told is the last mortsafe in Wiltshire, at the ruined St Leonard's in Sutton Veny. The chancel is the only remaining intact part and was once used as a mortuary chapel - hence the old bier on display.

Have to stay awake until the bottles are cool enough to go in the fridge. I can guarantee the baby will wake up (probably having peed out of a 4th nappy since lunchtime) as soon as I am allowed to close my eyes.

This is what building resilience looks like - it's creating networks and pathways as well as creating art and it's also what I'm up to at the library

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Okay, I need your help. If everyone buys my book on Kindle today (for 99p), it could push it back to number one on the Music chart and I'd HAVE A CHRISTMAS NUMBER ONE. I would really, really, really like that for Christmas. 99p! www.amazon.co.uk/Story-Christ...

The Christmas food vortex starts early when you are 12 days post partum. Just had half a box of cheese twists and a kiwi for breakfast at 11.30am. Washed down with a few swigs of the lucozade I was planning to take to the hospital before the Gestational Diabetes got me.

Someone ask for a snowball? ❄️🥶 These little floofs (𝘔𝘶𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘢 𝘶𝘴𝘴𝘶𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘴) hibernate in the snow! Snow provides good insulation and protection from predators -- which is important when you weigh just 4-8 grams. 😮 🦇 Ussuri tube-nosed bat 📸 Yushi & Keiko Osawa

Anyone else ever get the postpartum chills/shakes not immediately after birth but day 4 onwards?

Wildcats migrated into Europe ~10,000 years ago, pre-dating the continent's first farmers. This suggests that, true to form, they came independently, without human influence. It truly is impossible to herd cats! #CatHerdersDay 😼 🔗 from 2022 🆓 doi.org/10.15184/aqy... 🏺 #Archaeology

This is awful www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

What is the socially acceptable British punishment for a dad who leaves their phone on loud WITH FLASHING LIGHT and gets a call at 6.45am when they are on a postnatal ward? And puts it on speakerphone when he answers? No, I wasn't asleep (25 hours and counting), but I would quite like to murder him

Not sure which is stupider- my 3 year old laptop dying totally the second it's unplugged because what is battery life or my printer (which is admittedly considerably older) failing to detect that it has actually got paper in it every 2 pages...

Trying to find an APPROPRIATE album to for them to play in theatre while my child is evicted. With my music taste this is hard. Even the mainstream stuff I like is tricky e.g. Biffy Clyro-Puzzle opens with a track called 'Living is a Problem because everything dies' which might not be the vibe TBH.

Thinking of studying for a PhD? I'd be happy to hear from anyone considering research into British or Irish prehistory, monuments, radiocarbon dating, heritage. Part-time, distance options. There are funding schemes here at @uniofexeterhass.bsky.social - but be quick, deadlines are in Jan/Feb!

Reading Rooms at the British Library are closed *all week* because so many of its workers refuse to work for pitiful wages in a contemptuously authoritarian and obliviously managed environment. We need leaders who get it and are big enough to sort it out! It’s a mess and a disgrace. Lift it up!!

Popped into the Kidderminster Museum of Carpet that is unfortunately closing down soon. It will be a great loss to the town and another symptom of the general lack of care for heritage in this country

This is a bee appreciation post. 🐝

Help us provide A voice for bats 🦇 - Our @biggive.bsky.social #ChristmasChallenge campaign is 75% there. Every donation is still currently being doubled, so every £1 gets turned into £2 without any extra costs to you. Thanks for all your support donate.biggive.org/campaign/a05...

Pregnancy has brought me one final gift. I have developed Gestational Diabetes. I absolutely can't do finger prick tests (2 blood draws for the GTT was HARD) so had to buy a continuous monitor. Watching the numbers is oddly fascinating but I'm also constantly worried about knocking it out of my arm.

I think this just about captures what I've been struggling with.

Opportunities to transform nature don’t get much bigger than this! We have the opportunity to conserve 340 acres (138 hectares) of biodiverse countryside surrounding the Cerne Abbas Giant, Dorset.

"the issue isn’t that we need more 'boy-friendly' reforms. It’s that boys are socialized to compete only with boys and to read girls’ success as illegitimate or emasculating. The result is dissonance, resentment, and disengagement for boys—and hostile climates for girls." time.com/7335723/auto...

Possibly my favourite 'modern' chest tomb with an effigy. Lady Eleanor Methuen who died in 1958. She was an artist and the small stature at her feet is of her as a young painter. Corsham, Wiltshire.

it's advent you know what that means

The good news is that my 6lb+ 37 week baby who spent the last two days chilling sideways across my womb using my left kidney as a pillow has gone back to being head down. The bad news is that he's therefore resumed poking my cervix sharply with alarming regularity.

An exciting fully #funded #PhD opportunity at Nottingham Trent University in partnership with Birmingham Botanical Gardens and National Trust, that will explore the co-productive and decolonial potential of photogrammetry and extended reality (XR) in botanical #heritage. For more details 👇

I found a flowchart which helps you navigate the IT landscape

Eternal Silence in the snow, this morning at Graceland Cemetery

Does anyone want a survivorship bias shortbread

Something ancient and wonderful for the weekend! 🤩 The world’s oldest known sculpture of a horse! This tiny figurine was carved from mammoth ivory by an Ice Age artist some 40,000 years ago! 📷 by me #Archaeology

A stark reminder that trans healthcare in the UK is an ongoing battle based on ideology not safety and that the stakes are extremely high. Without access to hormones, for those who can't make their own, the ultimate risk is of death. Trans patients deserve evidence based care from their doctors.

Your universe is a photocopy of a photocopy of a… on.ft.com/4ahkNKa

FREE Shipping is GO! Get your paws on some excellent books with free delivery 28 Nov-1 Dec. Support independent bookshops, indie booksellers (and their cats.) Bookshop.org [Site-wide | UK only | Standard shipping]

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'm constantly shocked (but not surprised) by how little we discuss the additional financial burden placed on young people by the Clegg-Cameron student loan regime. @rmcunliffe.bsky.social is one of the few journalists who brings it up continuously - once again in the wake of the budget 👇

My baby who is bigger than feared is squashed and appears to be trying to break out of my womb by pushing his feet through my navel. It's intensely uncomfortable, but I'm also not entirely sure I want him to work out where the exit actually is and derail our planned c section, 2 weeks early...

Let's try this again... Glad tidings we bring to you and your quim! We are fundraising this festive period. Earlier this year, the future looked bleak for the Vagina Museum. But we're still here, and there's many reasons for you to become a vital part of our future... www.gofundme.com/f/btscc2

"Let me get this straight. Your lab has bred a dragon?" "A wyvern, director. It has two legs, two wings, whereas a-" "Which flies, breathes fire, and is intelligent?" "About as intelligent as a border collie." "So, intelligent. Why?" "You asked us to invent measures to take down small drones."

Had a burst of nesting energy. Then sat down on the floor in the nursery. I think I might just have to live here now. Also, how is there still stuff to wash?! How?! Need to wash both the swing and play mat covers because they came to us from other babies. Not even sure how to dismantle them...

Are you a PhD student & interested in using museum collections in your teaching or research? We're running a *free* doctoral training programme for students at any institution to learn about working with collections. Find out more: collections.reading.ac.uk/whats-on/

Bracing analysis of the rise of the far-right in Germany: "there are widespread right-wing extremist networks within the security services, the police, and the armed forces. Europe-wide networks of fascists are operating unhindered. Something is brewing. If we don't react now, it will be too late."

#MementoMoriMonday 💀 📍Cefn Golau Cholera Cemetery 🪦 #Wales #History

Two seasons collide at Fountains Abbey ❄️ 🍂 As winter ushers in the first frost, autumn clings on to its last few leaves.

Don't buy 'curiosities' made of dead bats! Online stores including Amazon and Google shop are still openly selling these items, a year after we highlighted the problem. Trade in Endangered species needs to stop. #wildlife #bats #nature 🌍 www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I’m in touch with a medical team in Gaza who described the situation, and I quote, like so: “this ceasefire is less of a ceasefire than the last ceasefire”

Making plant based hotdogs for dinner and I have 2 complaints 1. This brand of veggie sausages did not come with oven instructions- pan, bbq or air fryer- so I'm guessing the timings. 2. They appear to be bleeding while they are cooking.