Catch-up links for 21/8/2022

[andrewducker]

1. Around the world rivers are in crisis

(tags:water Doom )

2. The idea of the UK as a single unified nation is not historically accurate even for recent history

(tags:history UK Scotland England Wales NorthernIreland Ireland )

3. Michael Heizer's City, a vast art project in the Nevada desert 50 years in the making, will finally open to the public

(tags:art desert city cities USA )

4. Unraveling the linothorax mystery, or how linen armor came to dominate our lives

(tags:armour history materials clothing viaNancyLebov )

5. 2,553% increase over five years in raw sewage released into UK waterways and sea

(tags:waste water UK OhForFucksSake )

Comments

[marymac]

Regarding #2, my Twitter timeline, full to the brim as it is with Irish historians and political scientists, erupted as one with cries of "SEVENTEEN NINTEY FUCKING EIGHT!"

[calimac]

Indeed. The following Act of Union was designed to force Ireland and [Britain] to become one nation whether they liked it or not. And, of course, it didn't work.

[marymac]

Its genuinely astonishing, either he IS that ignorant, in which case what is even the point of Oxbridge or he thinks everyone else is, and while I can see how having the DUP around would give the impression, the rest of the world does exist and he's met quite a lot of them.

And once more I marvel at how Simon Coveney has not smacked any of the British Government yet.

[calimac]

3) This intrigued me as a possible thing to go see, until I looked it up and discovered just how remote the location is. I've been out in some pretty remote parts of the Nevada desert, but not quite that remote, and I wasn't looking to surpass my personal record.

[zz]

the sewage in the sea is clearly a tory policy to keep migrants away from britain because it stinks

[skington]

Just one caveat about "around the world, rivers are in crisis": the Loire is unusually shallow for a major river, to the extent that you're warned not to go swimming in it because you might get stuck in a sand bank and drown.

[andrewducker]

Absolutely - but scroll further down and see examples from the Danube, Rhine, Yantze, and Colorado rivers.

[ng_moonmoth]

4. A very entertaining read. Absolutely charmed by the bit about why their Labrador Retriever and their project should not occupy the same space.

[anna_wing]

The linothorax project is absolutely fascinating. I've heard of a similar thing having been used by the Chinese (the so-called "paper" armour), but made with multiple layers of silk and resin, instead of linen and rabbit glue.