MrsDoyle

Shetland is an archipelago, but ok. Historically populations in the Scottish islands moved around a lot more than you would think. Sick of the tiny village you grew up in? Hop in a boat and go to Orkney, or Skye, or Lewis. Travel by land was difficult, by sea was comparatively easier. There was also a lot of incomer traffic, from Ireland, Scandinavia, even the Baltic. So yes, there might have been a tiny fraction of genetic connection, but unlikely to be significant.

In the National Museum of Scotland there’s a bronze-age skeleton curled up in a recreation of the person’s grave, surrounded by their grave goods. While I was stood looking at it, a woman was explaining to her granddaughter that the skeleton had been found in Shetland, where she herself was from. The girl turned to her and said, “Was he a friend of yours, granny?” We all laughed, but I think we all had the same uncomfortable thought - this wasn’t just dry bones, it was a person. What if it was a friend of granny’s? What amount of time makes it ok?

Looking at this body in the British Museum was even worse: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-28589151

Big pass on a one-way ticket. I’d quite like to see a dinosaur though…

I was in West Berlin in 1981, we had a picnic by the wall and rode the metro through the ghost stations. Which were a bit meh to be honest. You had to change a certain amount of currency to visit the east and we couldn’t afford it, so we just stayed in the train and went back again.

We hitched to Berlin, and the freakiest part was driving through the corridor that linked West Berlin to West Germany.

“The proof is in the pudding.” It makes zero sense! The actual adage is, “The proof of the pudding is in the eating.” It means that a dessert can look perfect and enticing, but if the cook used salt instead of sugar it will taste disgusting.

I don’t know what people even think they’re saying with “the proof is in the pudding”.

I once had a passenger criticise me for indicating a turn when there were no others cars around. She said it showed I was driving without thinking, automatically signalling when it wasn’t needed. I think I said something like “fuck you” or maybe “I’ll drop you off here then if you don’t like my driving”. I’m signalling my intentions to the universe! Behold my blinking lights, for I am voyaging leftwards!

There was a bit of tech around at the time - telegraph. The flare sparked fires in telegraph offices and shocked some operators. As in electric shock, not a big fright, though no doubt also that. Some operators disconnected their batteries and were able to communicate by the auroral current alone.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event

The descriptions of the aurora are wild.

Your immune system gives some protection against botulinum, but it doesn’t fully develop until about six months to a year old. This is why you should never ever feed honey to an infant. Bees will occasionally end up on the ground, picking up botulinum. There’s a very small chance of a trace of the bug ending up in honey. It’s not enough to harm an older child or adult, but even thst tiny amount can kill a baby.

https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/botulism

Cold baked beans straight from the tin, eaten with a spoon. I’m grinning thinking of my dinner guests’ faces as they contemplate their tins.

I got a gift card to a steak restaurant as a thank you for a huge favour. It was the last place I’d go for a meal. I’d rather have had a book token - I could have bought half a dozen books, and instead it was a not very enjoyable meal for two.

Card games. We used to have card nights every week back in the 70s. One of the most fun games was something called Racing Demon. Each player has a full pack and all play at the same time. We would have 15 people sitting on the floor in a circle, all screaming. It gets CRAZY. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nerts There are hundreds of card games, with a huge range of skill required. There are a lot of trick-taking games similar to bridge where you play with a partner - euchre, whist, 500. All you need is a few packs of playing cards. (Everyone brought their own pack for Racing Demon, lol.)

God, me too. I thought I was too dumb to “get it”.

https://youtu.be/s-mOy8VUEBk

I’m happy just to know they’re there, living their lives.

I saw takahē in captivity too, in Zealandia. You can sort of see why they almost went extinct - their big defence move is to sit reeeeally still. Big silly chooks.

https://www.visitzealandia.com/About/Wildlife/Birds

https://www.doc.govt.nz/our-work/takahe-recovery-programme/

This is it. Yes, spinning HDDs may be cheaper, but replacing mine with an SSD made my PC faster and quieter, especially on boot.

A couple of times I’ve travelled Air NZ route that goes London-Auckland via LAX. The plane has to stop to refuel I guess. All the passengers are forced to queue up to be fingerprinted and have their eyeballs scanned, while a security guard walks up and down screaming “STAY IN THE LINE!” Then they’re herded into a lounge barely big enough to hold everyone (first class passengers have their own little pen next to the toilets). Apologetic air crew distribute apples, crisps and bottles of water. For hours. Through a glass wall is a view of the rest of the airport: shops, cafes, bars, space to stroll. But hey, at least you get to not miss your flight, and the US is safe from Kiwi tourists.

I don’t know if they still do this, I avoid the route.

At least they still exist somewhere, albeit hidden. In the early days of television, the BBC routinely taped over episodes, even of really popular shows, because the tapes were expensive.

Example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who_missing_episodes

Every now and then a box of old VHS recordings turns up in someone’s shed or attic, and can be added back in to the archive. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-67218634

I regularly shop at a supermarket built on a site where people were burned as witches in the 17th century.

A ship’s captain was away at sea and died after his ship was wrecked in a storm. Back home, his housemaid was accused of having created the storm and was burned at the stake. And there I am buying lemons and ice cream and toothpaste. It blows my mind.

I’m going with beekeeping as my “field” because it’s my main hobby now I’m retired. So. Many. Misconceptions. The Bee Movie was not a documentary, people! The mating process for honeybees is horrifying and you don’t want to know. Male bees have one job, and then they die. If they don’t do that job, they still die; their sisters kick them out at the end of summer. Plus, I was talking to someone the other day who didn’t realise we let the bees just roam around.