Oxford Botanic Gardens, August 2021

I was on holiday in Oxford last week, so my things this week are nearly all Oxford-based. I definitely recommend visiting!

1. The Botanic Gardens were amazing. Lots of beautiful plants and information about the them and their uses.

2. You could easily spend a day at Blenheim Palace (the birthplace of Churchill). The exhibitions and Palace itself were interesting but my favourite thing were the gardens and grounds. Lots of beautiful walks!

3. The Ashmolean Museum was good and worth a visit. Full of so much stuff that it was almost overwhelming! I have no idea how long it would have taken to read all of the plaques but it would be a very long time.

4. Some foodie recommendations. Gees, The Cherwell Boathouse and Wilding were great dinner spots. We also liked the Independent Cafe.

5. Not in Oxford, but not too far away. Bletchley Park (home of the codebreakers in WW2) was great. Was great being able to walk around the huts where they worked their magic.

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Ipswich, August 2021

This week’s Five Things…

1. I just finished reading Tim Harford’s excellent book How to Make the World Add Up. Tim is great at explaining complicated topics in easy to digest ways.

2. Mesmerising matchsticks. Very cool!

3. Last year I switched from using Spotify to Apple Music. One thing I missed from Spotify was all of the playlists I’d made. Now I have them back, thanks to a clever little app called SongShift. This made me very happy!

4. Dorico, the fancy music writing app I use on my computer for making transcriptions, now has a free counterpart on iPad. It’s very good.

5. Nate Mercereau has released an album of duets in collaboration with… the Golden Gate Bridge. I wonder who was easier to work with, the bridge or Jay-Z?

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PS. There will be no Five Things next week, but usual service will resume the following week.

Deal, June 2021

This week’s Five Things…

1. Drs Chris and Xand van Tulleken’s podcast on ultra processed food is an eye opener. I knew UPFs were bad… just not that bad!

2. How creative are you?

3. The Alternative Olympics Medal Table. And talking of the Olympics, I thoroughly enjoyed the climbing. Bring on Paris!

4. Have you tried making yourself a more interesting person?

5. The Foo Fighters have released an album of Bee Gees covers under the name the Dee Gees.

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Valletta, July 2019

This week’s Five Things…

1. Which city in the world is furthest from you? Furthest City has the answer

2. “You’d need to use an organic cotton tote bag 20,000 to make it greener than plastic”. An interesting article on common myths and misconceptions on going green.

3. Curious cockatoos have learnt how to open bins by copying other cockatoos do it first. Hopefully they’ll learn how to clean up the mess they make raiding the bins soon too!

4. Another bird related thing. Here’s a funny twitter thread of Pelicans trying to eat other animals.

5. The video for Beck’s remix of Paul McCartney’s song Find My Way, features a young Paul McCartney courtesy of deepfake and de-aging technologies. Clever!

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Ipswich, July 2021

This week’s Five Things…

1. I just finished reading Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club. Absolutely loved it. Also, more books should have chapters that short.

2. Having a video go viral might seem like a gateway to riches, but success doesn’t come that easy! “For those curious about the internet economy – this vid got 15M views here, 28M on TikTok, 30M on an IG meme account. But I didn’t make a penny from any of it!”

3. This interactive NY Times about Adam Ondra and the Olympic climbing events is really good. Particularly the last bit.

4. Henry the vacuum cleaner, accidental design icon.

5. I’ve been on a bit of a Beck binge recently. His album Colors, is a current favourite.

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