Sara Maitland: 'Savour solitude - it is not the same as loneliness'

Admittedly, this is somebody who was a favourite novelist of mine (I probably would still enjoy her novels) and then I read A Book of Silence (2008), and see I concurred with Ursula Le Guin that there was an awful lot of privilege involved in her search for elected silence to sing ( Read more... )

[T]hird beaching of a dead whale on the Thames in two months: 8-foot minke whale made it as far as Battersea Bridge before expiring. British waters boast one of the most diverse ranges of cetaceans in Europe, with 22 species living around the UK - a quarter of all cetacean species in the world.
This does not, however, as far as I can see, include ( Read more... )

Can a friendship app, a digital neighbourhood noticeboard or Facebook really help me discover a new bestie?
Well, I'd think probably not, but what do I know, also I am a cynic that thinks that those cuddly friends groups that are always hanging out together and organising parties for one another are a sitcom/romcom trope and probably very seldom to ( Read more... )

(But at least I wasn't on any bus where total strangers were being exhorted to Talk To One Another, the horror).
I have been moderately social this week: lunch with an academic protege on Monday, a meeting on Tuesday, going into Former Workplace on Wednesday for yoga class and general seeing what's up.
And this evening I went to a book-launch.
It ( Read more... )

Apparently solo dining is becoming A Thing? (scroll down, it's the last thing) In New York, there’s a rising trend for eating alone and some restaurants have amended their menus and tables to cater for this. The restaurant booking site OpenTable has also reported a rise in solo dining.
That thing that that is that I have been doing, lo, these many ( Read more... )

I was not previously aware of the expression 'al desko' - is this because I am now out of the workplace, or because somebody made it up yesterday morning?
Anyway, as a well-known misanthrope, I feel I would run like hell did I find myself in this workplace culture - 'his team all have lunch - and afternoon ice-cream breaks - together at the cafe ( Read more... )

I was rather perturbed by reading this account of the production of Julius Caesar at The Bridge Theatre at which 'The production is staged in promenade, with some of the audience invited, in the words of the production webpage, to ‘become part of the action'. Count me an old fuddy-duddy that would rather watch than participate - it was quite bad ( Read more... )

I am really not sure that interesting people cut through small talk by asking questions that sound a) formulaic and rote and b) pretty much the sort of thing you might get asked in an interview:
9 Questions Interesting People Ask to Cut Through the Small Talk.
Just possibly, if people have 'genuine interest in the other person, they don't need to ( Read more... )

But I really don't think it's a uniquely millennial thing to dislike/shrink from making chitchat to random people such as hairdressers, taxi-drivers, etc.
Whatever Stuart Heritage thinks.
(Presumably he self-identifies as a millennial - opens by saying he is now going bald - is there now a post-millenial generation coming up - )
On the chatting to ( Read more... )

It's bad enough being got into conversation with by extroverts who think someone minding their own business must be gagging for somebody to talk to them -
- but really, preserve me even more from an introvert who is trying to cure their basic dislike of talking to strangers by, well, talking to strangers.
(Is this not rather involving people ( Read more... )