A couple of years ago there was a small folk music festival in the grounds of Bradgate House. The house is a ruin now but it was once the home of a former queen of England. Lady Jane Grey was queen for just nine days but she spent her early childhood in that house surrounded…Read more Europa’s Fall
Track
Newgrange
Today we have something old and something new. This track-of-the-week is called Newgrange, but that's a highly anachronistic name for an ancient Neolithic monument. The song is Clannad's response to the large burial mound with that name in County Meath, Ireland. Dating from around 3200 BC it is older than both the stone circle at…Read more Newgrange
Sleepwalk
It's a sleepy Sunday here in Crotchety country. Mrs C has gone away for a few days, all is quiet in the neighbourhood and the late summer sun is bathing the house in its warm lazy rays. No-one is around. No children play outside, no cars drive down the street. No sounds break the silence…Read more Sleepwalk
The Sad Story of Lead and Astatine
Lead is the stable end-product of three major nuclear decay chains. In fact, it has the highest atomic number (82) of all the non-radioactive elements. Astatine, on the other hand, is so unstable that it is the rarest naturally-occurring element in the Earth's crust. Its nucleus is so fragile that only microscopic quantities of the…Read more The Sad Story of Lead and Astatine
Then Again
Crotchety Man has just returned from a one-week holiday in Cornwall, a county in the far south west corner of England. The map app on the household Mac says it's about a 5 hour drive from here but the journey home took twice as long. That was partly because we chose the slower, leafier A-roads…Read more Then Again
Billie Jean
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair! The King ruled over a great empire. He had built magnificent temples as monuments to his wealth and power. The inscription on his statue proclaimed his dominion over all the known world. Pretenders to his throne could only marvel at what Ozymandias had built. Marvel and despair,…Read more Billie Jean
Zoom
Things to do, places to go, people to see.¹ Last weekend it was the Humanists UK Convention, this weekend it's the annual village Open Gardens weekend, next Sunday there's the Farmers' Market, all of which require my presence and not a little preparation. So, I shall be wearing my Crotchety Man hat only briefly again today.…Read more Zoom
Annobon
Crotchety Man has never been religious. He found the prevailing Christian teachings unconvincing and with so many other religions peppered across the spiritual landscape, all offering the One True Way™, it seemed foolish to commit to any one of them. Then, back in 2010, he came across the website for the British Humanist Association. The…Read more Annobon
Mathematics
In 1972 the American meteorologist Edward Lorenz was to give a talk at the 139th meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. As Lorenz had failed to provide a title for his talk, one of the organisers of the meeting concocted this attention grabbing headline: Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings…Read more Mathematics
La Vita
This week I'm inviting you to listen to another song I've chosen for my funeral (which, I trust, is still a long way off but it makes sense to plan well ahead for that particular commemoration service). If you cast your mind back to November 2016 you may remember the Archipelago post in which Flight, an instrumental…Read more La Vita
Crotchety Man 