Oh, and by the way, my daughter is featured both in this BBC article about the new Aardman website on mental health, and in the website itself, where she voices Tai, an overcompetitive treadmill runner.

I'm proud, of course - but not in a competitive way, oh no!

As we know, everything that ever happened, happened in 1973. Beyond that obvious truth, however, it's always interesting to dig down into details. I've been repeatedly struck by the weird similarities between these two scenes, both taken from films of that year set in unusually temperate places within a wider landscape more associated with ( Read more... )

I'm putting these links here for my own reference, but they may be of wider interest. As you can imagine, I've been following the whole Rowling situation fairly closely, and I've seen many responses to it, some good, some not so much. I thought it might be useful to curate some of the more helpful and informative ones and put them in one handy ( Read more... )

I've made a couple of posts in the past about Lucy Boston and Hemingford Grey, notably this one, describing my night spent in Tolly's room some two and a half years ago. If, like me, you're a fan of the books, take 15 minutes to see the author herself in her habitat, some 37 years ago. This video appeared on Youtube just yesterday, from a programme ( Read more... )

I can't say I exactly recommend watching the opening episode of Survivors, which I just watched for the first time since it was broadcast, forty-five years ago, but it is very good:

Click to view

One thing I meant to mentioned in my last post is that, driving through the New Forest naturally took me and Haruka to Lyndhurst, and that as we were waiting to turn at a junction she remarked on the White Rabbit Cafe over the road. "Why is it called that?" she asked, recognising the Lewis Carroll reference (because Alice is Big in JapanIt took me ( Read more... )

Well, it's now April in Japan, which means that today is the day they will announce the name of the new era that's due to begin with the current (Heisei) Emperor's abdication in a month's time. The name has been kept under wraps, which must have been a real headache to everyone who needs to prepare for the change: e.g. by updating computer programs ( Read more... )

Those of us of a certain age will remember Ridley Scott's famous Hovis ad, which shows a flat-capped baker's boy pushing his bicycle up a steep hill to the accompaniment of a brass band playing the New World symphony, while the voice of the (now grown) boy reminisces fondly about the old days. But where is the ad set ( Read more... )

The trolley problem is not just a thought experiment - it's a practical issue, at least for the AI programmers charged with teaching self-driving cars whom to spare and whom to kill in ticklish traffic conditions. That, at least, is the premise of MIT's Moral Machine project ( Read more... )

Does reading make you a better person? A few days ago I posted this video to Green Knowe appreciation group on Facebook. Watch it: it's about a Syrian refugee who was offered shelter in an English stately home, not unlike (it seemed to me) the way that Ping was offered shelter by Mrs Oldknow ( Read more... )