A tasting platter of linkspam
Why do old musicians always think the kids have lost their way? (Not just ageing rockers, surely): [W]hen people want to sniff at the inherent banality of modern media they almost inevitably fixate on cultural phenomena with predominantly female fan-base.
....
Your failure to pay attention... does not cause the rest of the world to wink out of existence.
(The latter might well make up into a nice sampler motto.)
Come back, Cabinets of Curiosities - feel that this is perhaps response to artsily over-curated exhibitions: A two-headed lamb and ancient dildos: the UK's strangest new museum.
Walk on the mild side: why Wild and Tracks turn the wilderness into a walk in the park: These sightseeing, navel-gazing projects have a few traits in common. They leave the impression, in some cases, that the writers were thinking less about spiritual enlightenment than a hefty publishing deal.
We have, indeed, mused along these lines ourself. The point is that when the protagonists of these films lace up their hiking boots (ill-fitting or otherwise), they’re not doing so for the good of mankind, or even the good of one other person. Their only goal is to cheer themselves up, and they’re fortunate enough to have the resources and the time to do it. What’s worse is that they see their majestic surroundings as a medicine that exists solely to treat their psychological ailments. They’re looking at mountains and forests, but they’re thinking of themselves.
Today's flashback to the 70s, when this was called Zero Population Growth: How to save the planet? Stop having children.
Ronald Hutton (fangirls madly) on Halloween.
The hidden world of rare plant theft: In January, an endangered plant was taken from Kew Gardens - only a few years after scientists saved it from extinction. Sam Knight investigates what happens when plant obsession turns criminal. Though I do rather think of Stephen Potter's recommended gambit for botanical gardens: 'Pyrenean Iris. Oh, yes, yes, yes, but terrible. Terrible if one has ever been overcome by the miracle of this thing bravely clasping the crevice of the perpendicular cliff-face at Luchesse - terrible to see it here, tamed and humbled by man.' I like and recommend this gambit.
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