Graham M.
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graham-m.bsky.social
Graham M.
@graham-m.bsky.social
270 followers 430 following 930 posts
Bread, jam and marmalade maker
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Reposted by Graham M.
lemoustier.bsky.social
🧪🏺🦣 Strong case for *oldest fire-starting* 🔥 capacity, before 400 Ka, suggested by multi-stranded analysis: geochem, magnetic, sedimentary evidence of anthropogenic burning, + heated lithics + remains of iron pyrite.
Behaviourally heading towards #Neanderthals.

www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Photosgraphs showing refitting lithic pieces of flint objects. CAPTION: Extended Data Fig. 2: Heat shattered handaxes from Barnham.a. Central part of heat-shattered handaxe with 25 refitting pieces excavated from within a small zone (35 cm across) in Area I East. b. Top part of heat-shattered handaxe from Area I East. c. Heat-altered handaxe from Area I East. Images showing two pyrite pseudomorphs analysed with various methods. CAPTION: Figure 2.2. Pyrite pseudomorph specimen 3818. (a–e) Photographs and (f–g) focus variation microscope images of fracture surfaces; (h–k) textural features of the oxidised pyrite fragment observed under the scanning electron microscope. Photos of heat-altered handaxe and two pieces of altered pyrite. CAPTION: a, Heat-altered handaxe from palaeosol in Area I East with close-up of fractured surface caused by fire. b, Fragment of pyrite found on the surface of palaeosol in Area IV(6). c, Fragment of pyrite from palaeosol in Area VI, found in association with concentrations of heated flint. Photos showing excavation in Area 1 East, from different angles including a close-up of section. Reddened sediment layer is visible. CAPTION: a, Before excavation in 2022 from north–west, showing truncation by commercial excavation of RCS within palaeosol complex. Sections A–A′, B–B′ and position of sampling column are indicated. b, Adjacent area from north under excavation in 2024. c, Partly excavated RCS within palaeosol complex in 2023 from north-west showing sampling locations and column.
December 10, 2025 at 5:47 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
mattpope.bsky.social
BBC coverage of breaking news announcing the earliest evidence for humanly made fire. From Barnham, UK.
Quite probably early Neanderthal people with a late Acheulean culture 🦣🏺🔥
www.bbc.co.uk/news/resourc...
The moment the earliest known man-made fire was uncovered - BBC News
Archaeologists in the UK have discovered the world's oldest evidence of humans lighting fires
www.bbc.co.uk
December 10, 2025 at 5:59 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
oddthisday.bsky.social
That documentary also features the blurry shot of the headline at the top of this thread – one of those rare ones which defies Betteridge’s Law, because it is a Question To Which The Answer Is Yes
Headline: Does art to you mean a ferret down your trousers?
December 10, 2025 at 12:36 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
oddthisday.bsky.social
...because it’s 10 December, which can mean only one thing – today would have been the 84th birthday of actor, writer, director, caperer, mischief maker, and “one of the strangest people in Britain”, Ken Campbell
A middle-aged bald man in a suit with huge eyebrows looks quizzically at the camera
December 10, 2025 at 12:28 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
drjennings.bsky.social
Journalists are desperate to write 'young people are voting for Reform stories' even though the data simply does not back it up.
December 6, 2025 at 9:29 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
peterkellner.bsky.social
Suddenly the talk at Westminster is of the government wanting a closer relationship with the European Union. What should we make of this? My latest Substack crunches the numbers.
kellnerp.substack.com/p/the-majori...
The majority opposed to Brexit has reached eight million
Ministers need courage to keep it that way
kellnerp.substack.com
December 8, 2025 at 7:03 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
levparikian.bsky.social
Advent bird No. 11

Tufted Duck

Scientific name: Aythya fuligula

Alternative names: tuftie, ponytailed floater

Finnish name: tukkasotka

Song: kwik kwik
A tufted duck, close up. Dark back, darker head, with racing green iridescence on one side. Yellow eye.
December 10, 2025 at 8:15 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
twmcltd.bsky.social
Wednesday is Day 1386 of the needless and illegal war in Europe.
Ukraine's territorial integrity is now threatened. not only its invader Russia, but also by the former leader of the free world, the USA.

Welcome to THE Daily thread, all the important news, all day, every day...
December 10, 2025 at 8:17 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
garius.bsky.social
Nazis always obsess over fonts.

In Germany, the Nazi Party initially pushed Fraktur and declared Futura 'un-Germanic', with designer Paul Renner going into exile.

Just before the war they flipped, adopting Futura for its modern feel and declaring heavy types like Fraktur as suspiciously Jewish.
phillewis.bsky.social Phil Lewis @phillewis.bsky.social · 1d
Marco Rubio ordered diplomats to return to using Times New Roman font in official communications, calling his predecessor's decision to adopt Calibri a “wasteful” diversity move
Rubio Stages Font Coup: Times New Roman Ousts Calibri
The secretary of state called it a "wasteful" diversity move, according to an internal department cable seen by Reuters.
www.huffpost.com
December 10, 2025 at 8:16 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
jamesrball.com
Absolutely amazing chart from @peterkellner.bsky.social's piece in @thenewworldmag.bsky.social today:
www.thenewworld.co.uk/peter-kellne...
A flow chart shows 17.4 million leave voters in 2016, vs 16.1m remain. In 2025, 5 million of those people have died, and 3 million new voters have come of age. The result (plus some people changing their mind) is 19.8 million voters now back rejoin, versus just 11.7 million wanting to stay out.
December 9, 2025 at 9:58 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
c20society.bsky.social
BREAKING NEWS: Sheringham Town Council have just voted 6-5 to withdraw support for the planned demolition of their now nationally famous Bus Shelter!

A crucial victory for the local protesters who’ve staged a remarkable 8 day occupation of the shelter.

People power for modern heritage ✊🏻
December 9, 2025 at 9:00 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
jpwarchaeology.bsky.social
Just got my official work PPE and now off down the secret passage to my paid government job hiding the evidence for all those ship timbers, swordfights on spiral stairs, and Britain's oldest pub.

THEY don't want you to know but the truth can be found in Youtube comments...
December 9, 2025 at 12:02 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
laurenleek.eu
I wanted dinner recommendations so I scraped 13,000+ London restaurants and accidentally discovered Google Maps is running a shadow economy. Anyway here's a dashboard and a political economy thesis: open.substack.com/pub/laurenle...
How Google Maps quietly allocates survival across London’s restaurants - and how I built a dashboard to see through it
I wanted a dinner recommendation and got a research agenda instead. Using 13000+ restaurants, I rebuild its ratings with machine learning and map how algorithmic visibility actually distributes power.
open.substack.com
December 9, 2025 at 7:53 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
orkneylibrary.bsky.social
Storm's a comin'

#StormBram
Outside Orkney Library and Archive on a grey, stormy day. The author Bram Stoker is flying around outside in the wind.
December 9, 2025 at 11:03 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
scalzi.com
It's a longshot people will get this joke
A re-enactment of English Longbowmen at the Battle of Agincourt, with the words "All I Want For Christmas Is Yew" at the bottom of the picture. You see, my dear alt-text readers, Yew wood was the preferred wood for longbows, prized for its strength and flexibility. So it would make sense that the bowmen might want yew for Christmas. This is a pun, a terrible Christmas pun, playing off that Mariah Carey song, you know the once, yes you do. I'm a bad person for making this pun. I am so sorry.
December 8, 2025 at 9:05 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
dj-acid-reflux.bsky.social
An extremely short horror story I wrote, set in the future.
The year is 2034. 98% of the population of the planet is employed as a life coach. All the life coaches have life coaches. Life coaches decide to redouble their efforts, going in hard to all the last remaining outposts where people exist simply as people rather than life coaches or people striving to live their best life via life coaches. “Can I be your companion on your journey to yourself and give you the life advice that will make you a proper person?” ask the life coaches. “Can you get out of my kitchen, please?” say the people. “I’ve already had six of you in here this morning, trying to tell me how I can be the ultimate version of me and unlock my true potential. I never asked for this. I just want to be able to live my most average, flawed life in peace and finish cleaning the oven.”
December 8, 2025 at 8:08 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
tomgauld.bsky.social
'The best conspiracy books of 2025' for @theguardian.com
The best conspiracy books of 2025 This is too big for the mainstream media, so a network of independent thinkers do their own research. They never meet and communicate only via chalk marks on lampposts. The Guardian’s conspiracy correspondent (who even the editor has never met) compiles the list with red string on the wall of a secure off-site facility. Such incendiarymaterial cannot be published openly, so it is encrypted, minituarised, and hidden by a tame printer inside one of the full stops in today's newspaper. If you are reading this, you have already been compromised: leave at once, take nothing and live under an assumed name until further notice.
December 8, 2025 at 12:43 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
jjvincent.bsky.social
can't stop watching this clip of a tesla Optimus teleoperator taking his headset off before properly logging out the robot
December 8, 2025 at 9:29 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
wonderfullywyrd.bsky.social
these kinds of videos always prompt a certain Pratchett quote in my brain, from Thief of Time
One of Igor's former masters had made a ticktock man, all levers and gearwheels and cranks and clockwork. Instead of a brain, it had a long tape punched with holes. Instead of a heart, it had a big spring. Provided everything in the kitchen was very carefully positioned, the thing could sweep the floor and make a passable cup of tea. If it wasn't carefully positioned, or if the ticking, clicking thing hit an unexpected bump, then it'd strip the plaster off the walls and make a furious cup of cat. -Pratchett, Thief of Time
December 8, 2025 at 10:05 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
brianbilston.bsky.social
Annual reminder to water your Christmas tree poems …
This poem is written in the shape of a Christmas tree (well, most of it is) … Needles I wrote a poem in the shape of a Christmas tree but then forgot to water it and only a few days later [but the words beyond this point are scattered around the bottom of the page, like needles which have fallen from a Xmas tree) there were words all over the carpet
December 7, 2025 at 10:50 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
tomgauld.bsky.social
My latest cartoon for @newscientist.com
A small child approaches his scientist father who is working at a large, strange, contraption. His face pressed to a viewing tube. “Are you looking forward to Christmas, papa?” Asks the child. “Yes,” replies the scientist“ turning round, “that is exactly what I am doing” then he adds “Thank you for the socks.” We can now see that the viewing tube breaks the border of the comics panel, passes through complicated machinery and allows the scientist to see into the next comic panel: Caption: December 25th A Christmas scene. The child and father-scientist open presents before a Christmas tree. The father has just unwrapped some socks.
December 7, 2025 at 8:56 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
dieworkwear.bsky.social
The Nobel Prize committee should announce the World Cup winner tomorrow
December 6, 2025 at 4:29 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
tflpubcrawl.bsky.social
100%. I’ve been conversing with real people and they’ve all been nice. And not one has been a dick! Well done everyone
December 5, 2025 at 2:45 PM
Reposted by Graham M.
adamchapman.bsky.social
This is a slightly baffling case: it's a perfectly good, solid, bus shelter. It's been well-maintained and forms an attractive part of the local historic environment (which is otherwise blighted by the motorcar - if ever a high street would benefit from pedestrianisation it's Sheringham).
c20society.bsky.social C20 Society @c20society.bsky.social · 7d
⚠️ Stand-off in Sheringham: Local campaigners have spent the past three nights camping out overnight in an extraordinary bid to save a 1950s Streamline Moderne style bus shelter in Norfolk, thwarting council contractors who attempted to demolish the structure at 2am.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Images © Alan Raymond Palmer Images © Alan Raymond Palmer
December 5, 2025 at 10:29 AM
Reposted by Graham M.
c20society.bsky.social
⚠️ Stand-off in Sheringham: Local campaigners have spent the past three nights camping out overnight in an extraordinary bid to save a 1950s Streamline Moderne style bus shelter in Norfolk, thwarting council contractors who attempted to demolish the structure at 2am.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Images © Alan Raymond Palmer Images © Alan Raymond Palmer
December 4, 2025 at 10:53 AM