Also, it's around 100% of Labour activists. How do you run a campaign if you've alienated all the people who go out campaigning, deliver leaflets, volunteer in the office, donate to campaign funds, etc?

Please please please

I love it when two things combine...

Count birds - while drunk

Run for Top Job - without using the letter e

I reckon this is a lot easier to do (at least on average) for blokes.

Angela Gheorghiu can be a bit of a pain, I believe.

Like you say, opera in France becomes a huge thing under Louis XIV, particularly with Lully. The person who would really know all about it is Andrew Schneider!

Opera in the sense that it's used in English actually has a really specific start date. It was deliberately invented. The first opera was written by Peri, who you mention, in the 1490s. It's generally agreed that the first one worth listening to was Monteverdi's Orfeo, written a few years later.

I see no evidence that Marie had anything further to do with patronising opera after she moved to France, or that there were any opera performances in France during her time as queen.

Now this is interesting (if you're a music and history nerd 👋🏻)... She does have a connection to those two composers, but in Italy, before she moves to France. There was a Caccini opera performed at her and Henry's wedding, but it was their proxy wedding in Italy; Henry wasn't there.

With one child, it's lovely. With any more than one, it's tedious.

I'm confused by what you say about Marie de Medici being a great opera patron (and also your comment that the popularity of opera influenced an enthusiasm for larger ladies). I can't find any evidence of opera in France any earlier than 1645. Which composers and/or performers did she patronise?

Unless you count things like chatting to other families whilst walking the kids to school as socialising? I'm not sure if that should count or not.

I genuinely don't understand how this works, given you post about having multiple kids. Who looks after them while you're doing all this socialising?

Ooo excellent, I've been looking forward to Henry IV right from the start.

Such a moving piece. It took me straight back to when I was struggling with two tiny children, and my best friend was struggling to have one.

I'm still coming to terms with the word "television".

I found the half-Greekness of "nosectomy" unsettling.

Rhinectomy?

No, but I have downloaded and stored all my tweets elsewhere, in case changes there mean I can't get at them any more.