let's swash that buckle.

I initially saw this because somebody on Facebook posted the video: Boyfriend proposed during the marathon she trained 6 months for, and in the list of Inappropriate Times and Places to Propose, while she is actually running a marathon is very near the top, right? it's bad enough for bloke to be waiting with ring and maybe flowers at the finish line (for many observers, marathon proposals are about men stealing the spotlight).

Run, girl, run.

***

To revert to that discussion about The Right Sort of Jawline and Breathing Properly the other day, TIL that mouth taping is (still) A Thing, and Canadian researchers say there’s no evidence that mouth taping has any health benefits and warn that it could actually be harmful for people with sleep apnea.

***

Since I see this is dated 2020, I may have posted it before: but hey, let's hear it for C18th women scholars of Anglo-Saxon Elizabeth Elstob, Old English scholar, and the Harleian Library. I think I want to know more about her years in the household of Margaret Cavendish Bentinck (1715–1785), duchess of Portland, who I know better through her connection with Mrs Delany of the botanically accurate embroidery and collages of flowers.

***

I like this report on the 'Discovery of Original Magna Carta' because it's actually attentive to the amount of actual work that goes into 'discovering', from the first, 'aha! that looks like it might be' to the final confirmation.

What I read

Finished The Life Revamp - okay, not mind-blowing?

Having another bout of lower-back misery, re-reads of KJ Charles, Any Old Diamonds (Lilywhite Boys, #1) (2019), Gilded Cage (Lilywhite Boys, #2) (2019) and Masters in This Hall (Lilywhite Boys, #3) (2022). Still querying the understanding of the divorce law at the time.... (there seems to be an assumption at one point that spouse in prison was grounds??).

On the go

Started Upton Sinclair, Dragon's Teeth (Lanny Budd, #3) (1942). This is the one with spiritualism taken in the serious experimental fashion of the times along with New Thought, besides the whole international political situation. Also, spot-on fashions in child-rearing, though I don't think Truby King was actually name-checked over the strict 4-hour feeding regimen!

Set to one side as Vivian Shaw, Strange New World (Dr Greta Helsing, #4) came out yesterday.

Still dipping into Melissa Scott, Scenes from the City.

Still working on the book for review, which is rather dense: excellent work but not exactly light reading.

Up next

Should get to Anthony Powell, Casanova's Chinese Restaurant (1960) in preparation for online discussion group.

Discovered that there is a new work by Gail Godwin, Getting to Know Death: A meditation (2024), a memoir generated by a serious accident at the age of 85.

Still have not got round to latest Literary Review.

This week's bread: managed for the first time in yonks, to score a bag of Shipton Mill Three Malts and Sunflower Organic Brown Flour, so made up a loaf of that, v tasty.

Friday night supper: the hash-type thingy with the last 2 sweet potatoes cut up, boiled, and then sauteed with chopped red bell pepper and Calabrian salami.

Saturday breakfast rolls: Tassajarra method, strong brown flour, maple syrup, cranberries, nice.

Today's lunch: seabream fillets, rubbed with ginger paste and lime juice, salt and pepper, and left for a couple of hours then panfried in butter + olive oil, splashed with the remaining juice at the end; served with baby Jersey Royal potatoes roasted in goosefat, large flat mushrooms marinated in dark soy sauce (was meant to be tamari but I didn't have any) + mirin + tspn toasted sesame oil + star anise boiled up together, then healthy-grilled, and asparagus steamed and tossed in melted butter with lemon juice and lemon zest.

There’s no excuse for ugly people’: controversial dentist Mike Mew on how ‘mewing’ can make you more attractive:

The orthodontist’s strange mouth exercises are beloved by incels seeking a manlier shape – and a fast-growing TikTok trend in classrooms around the world. So why has he been struck off the dentists’ register?

But honestly. This is probably because I have an perhaps unusual knowledge of medical (including dental) quackery and its promotion, and common themes are:

There Is One Big Reason For All Your Problems

And

One Simple Trick (which I have) To Fix Them.

(Cites here, so that you know that I am not making this up all out of my own head, to Alex Comfort, The Anxiety Makers, Ann Dally, Fantasy Surgery, and a tip of the hat to Rob Darby, A Surgical Temptation.)

Okay, this is at the other end of the alimentary canal to Sir Arbuthnot Lane's Cure For All Evils (caused by Chronic Intestinal Stasis), but I think we can see the pattern repeating here.

Not saying that maybe, somewhere in this, there is something that may be helpful in some, specific cases, but let us consider e.g. radium in the 1920s. Yes, it was really, really useful in treating certain forms of cancer: it was not a cure-all and downing massive amounts of radium tonic just left a person, well, radioactive, if the tonic actually contained any active principle at all.

I am also boggled at the assumptions about beauty, and trying not to comment on this guy's own appearance, but to remark that the Hapsburgs ruled swathes of Europe for centuries without manly square jaws, hmmm, plus, has this chap ever been into an art gallery in his life??? Is there one pattern of beauty or are there many?

Just reading what he thinks the epitome makes me want to assert the true loveliness of consumptive pallor, heightened by just a touch of hectic feverish flush, wilting picturesquely on a fainting couch.