bsag's micro blog

Quirky doesn’t quite cover it, but this is a terrific film. Wonderful performances by all three leading women, but the chemistry between Olivia Coleman and Rachel Weisz was outstanding. I’m certainly going to to watch it again.

I'm of a similar age to many of these women, so I could relate strongly. Great, knock-about comedy from a very talented bunch of actors. It wasn't laugh out loud funny the whole way through, but there were some great moments.

I’ve just updated my Ergodox EZ with a new configuration. I’ve moved the Command, Option, Control and Shift to the home row on each half (as suggested by Xavier Noria), so that you type a normal letter if you tap the key, but holding the key down gives you a modifier. The organisation of the keys is mirrored on each half so that you can hold the modifiers on whichever half makes sense. For example, if I want to type Cmd-S I hold the ‘j’ key with my right hand (for Command), and ’s’ with the left. For Cmd-N I would hold the ‘f’ key with my left (again, for Command), and hit the ‘n’ key with my right. Ergonomically, it’s brilliant, as I already have my hands on the home row.

This has freed up the small keys at the top of each of the thumb clusters, so I have configured these to output Opt+Shift-left arrow (innermost key) and Opt-left arrow (outermost key) on the left hand half. On the right hand half, the configuration is mirrored, but uses the right arrow. This is fantastic in standard macOS apps, as it lets me move forward and backward by word when editing (Opt-arrow) or select the previous or next word (Opt+Shift-arrow). In Emacs, it also lets me promote or demote headings or subtrees in Org mode.

I still have to get fully used to this new layout, but I’m loving it.

I caught a bit of a conversation on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour the other day, which amazed me. Humans produce unusually sugary breast milk compared to other mammals, but many of the sugars in it cannot be digested by babies. Instead, these sugars are thought to feed the gut microbiome.

That’s pretty mind-blowing: evolution has tuned the composition of breast milk so that mothers feed not only their baby but the community of bacteria within him or her.

So much of the trouble that humans create between each other stems from making tiny distinctions between ‘us’ and ‘them’. And yet we are incredibly similar to other apes, other primates and even other mammals. And each of us has at least as many bacterial cells within us as we have human cells (not to mention the viruses, fungi and so on). There are layers and layers of communities, and we should worry much less about which of those communities is ‘us’.

Beautiful and heartbreaking. I loved ‘The Secret of Kells’ and ‘Song of the Sea’. This film is every bit as beautifully animated as either of those, but tells a much darker story. Parvana and her family are struggling to survive in Afghanistan under the tyrannical rule of the Taliban. When Parvana’s father is arrested by the Taliban and thrown in jail, Parvana is forced to dress as a boy to try to make money and buy food for her mother, older sister and infant brother.

It doesn’t shrink away from the violence and harshness of the regime, but it also beautifully portrays the tenderness between members of the family. I have seen criticisms of the ‘story within a story’ which Parvana tells her siblings, but I think it is a key part of the way that the characters can approach and deal with emotionally difficult things.

All of the Cartoon Saloon films have a moment that comes out of nowhere and grabs you right by the feels. This one is no exception, and it was heart-rending and stunningly beautiful at the same time. The film even managed to make me (eventually) pity the over-zealous young Taliban follower who harasses Parvana and her family. There’s a very subtle moment when you see that he is just a young lad who can’t even grow a proper moustache yet, and he’s scared when the reality of the situation dawns on him.

This is an amazing piece of work.

I’m a huge fan of C.J. Sansom’s ‘Shardlake’ books, and have read all the previous books in the series. His writing seems to get better with each book, and the Tudor world in which you are immersed gets richer. His characters have deepened and matured too. I’m glad Jack Barak is back, as I love his tough chippiness. It’s such a good foil for Shardlake’s quiet seriousness.

This book is set in 1549 and tells the story of the peasants’ rebellion in Norwich, lead by Robert Kett. My knowledge of history is not great, admittedly, but I had never heard of this rebellion before. The detail was fascinating, and the way that the plot strands of the crime that Shardlake has to solve weaves in with the historical events is superb. As ever, the plots are gripping, even over such a long book. It is also very moving in places, because we get so fond of many of the characters. I had a particular fascination with this book, because part of it is set in Wymondham and Hethersett, where I spent quite a bit of time as a child, visiting friends and relatives.

By the way, don’t skip the Historical Note at the end. It is fascinating to see how much of the action (and some of the characters) was based on historical facts. It is an incredible piece of work.

View all my reviews