Wednesdays in the Archive📜 The countdown to Halloween is on! Today we're sharing the recommendation letter Bram Stoker, author of Dracula, supplied to gain admittance into Marsh's Library 🦇
John Connor
@lordloophole.bsky.social
Retired Irish Department of Finance, slow runner, awful climber, trying to play the guitar
Another great piece by @samfr.bsky.social on the route back into the EU for the UK. That said, one thing that is massively underappreciated in the UK is the EU's own appetite to begin membership talks with the UK. samf.substack.com/p/the-route-...
The route back into the EU
Back in 2022 I wrote about the long-term prospects for undoing Brexit and made two predictions.
samf.substack.com
A spider with a skull pattern on its abdomen, from Conrad Gessner's Historiae animalium (1621) #RareBooks #Specialcollections #Libraries #Halloween #Spiders #Woodcut
How sheepish is Europe? This map shows the distribution of sheep across Europe. Source: buff.ly/dSfHDOe
Billy Wilder's wonderful grave, at Westwood Village Memorial Park — L.A.
U.S. Treasury yields climbed Wednesday, trading back around multiyear highs, as traders braced for the sale of 10-year notes at a time when rising yields have rattled investors around the world. Full details: cnb.cx/4zjaPRN
Being pro-the UK joining the EU and being pro-EU are not the same thing. The challenge for UK leaders is to turn the former shallow preference of the population into the latter deeper sentiment & belief. Then the UK can convince the rest of Europe that it would be a force for the good of the EU.
After thirty years in London, I moved back to Ireland. Whilst clearing through my flat, I was feeling reflective and felt the urge to write about my Dad. The resultant piece went viral on X. Now, I’d like to share the thread here...
Another west of Ireland #painting "Kylemore Boats" came out of a day cycling in north Connemara where my bike and I were discussing how lucky we were. The sun was on its way down so before cycling on the length of the lake and on to Killary I resolved to paint this view later. #SpéirGhorm #ArtYear
I don't want tax cuts. I want services that work for all of us. What good is extra money in my pocket if I'm terrified to go out to my local hospital in an emegency. Or if a large proportion of people in my city are living in poverty or homelessness or with addiction.
RTÉ News@news.rte.ie · 5d agoThe Government has emphasised income tax changes to "give people more of their own money" as it revealed Budget 2027
The rise in US yields is one of those Occam's razor things. Of course it's true that growth is much stronger than many thought it would be and the AI thing is real. But the elephant in the room is the 7.5% of GDP deficit. My live stream on this from Sunday: robinjbrooks.substack.com/p/how-the-us...
This ancient Greek figure from the 2,500 year-old Douris Cup looks uncannily like someone working on a laptop! 😲 💻 He’s actually writing with a stylus on a hinged wax writing tablet! The technology has changed, the posture has not! 😂 Altes Museum, Berlin 📷 by me
In today's edition of our free #MonumentMonday newsletter, we head back in time to the Bronze Age as we visit Kenmare Stone Circle in County Kerry. #Ireland #SpéirGhorm #DiscoverIreland #Travel
A west of Ireland #painting, "Connemara Waters" came out of an idyllic day cycling in south Connemara when I stopped for a while to look across the bogs to the mountains of north Connemara. And to watch a family of swans because how can you not? #SpéirGhorm #ArtYear #MountainMonday
This police officer is doing an epic job of keeping a straight face 🤣
Chris Grey has a post I missed last week on the Burnham speech to the Labour conference. This is vital reading. Firstly, the significance is this confirms the political failure of Brexit, albeit not what comes next A 🧵 chrisgreybrexitblog....
![That, in turn, means that, quite apart from any other ways in which Brexit has failed, it has failed politically. On this blog, I have several times quoted David Frost’s criterion for the success or failure of Brexit because it is perhaps the only time a leading Brexiter has actually articulated any meaningful test. He said that “one piece of evidence of failure [of Brexit] would be if we are still debating this in five- or six-years’ time in the same way. I think [if] it is to succeed it needs to settle in the British polity.” That was in June 2022, and although technically that means there are still six to eighteen months to go, it has been obvious for a while that Brexit would fail this test. With Burnham’s announcement, that is not just obvious: it is certain.](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:zqz7slgkfgy5srkfebhlp7xx/bafkreigqt75i54zh7s7gmgcvvo74l7zgps3pvl6pmvmyuotw7pjwhwkuwe)
This animated map by @AaronJBecker shows the average colour of Europe from September 2024 to September 2026 based on satellite images. It's fun to look at your region changing colour through the seasons.
A west of Ireland #painting, "Mayo Bog" I painted following a day where I had cycled north through Ballycroy and kept stopping just to enjoy the bog. There's not a lot else to say except I think we're quite lucky in Ireland to have the bogs that we do. #SpéirGhorm #ArtYear
TAKE URGENT ACTION! Save Northern Ireland’s badgers protectthewild.substack.com/p/take-urgen...
TAKE URGENT ACTION! Save Northern Ireland’s badgers
The badgers need your voice, and time is running out.
protectthewild.substack.com
A walk in the Ulster Folk Museum. A fine way to spend a morning. #ulsterfolkmuseum #cultra #countydown #northernireland #pentaxphotography
Back to an Irish landscape #painting "Muckish from Falcarragh" Once upon a time I regularly had a 12 km cycle to buy milk when I'd made a pot of tea and realised I was without milk - again. This was a view on the rush back to the waiting pot. I lived in a cottage beside the gap. #SpéirGhorm #ArtYear
Poets, if they're lucky, end up having signature poems. But they don't choose them for themselves. Instead, certain poems take on lives of their own once they're published. The Last Carry is one such example. When I first posted it here, I didn't have a clue it would reach so many people...
Matthew Stewart@roguestrands.bsky.social · 2y agoAs parents, we're supposed to remember the first time we did stuff with our kids, but the last time is equally as significant, if not more. This poem is from Whatever You Do, Just Don't (HappenStance Press, 2023), my second full collection...
