This is a post in a series appearing each Friday, setting out some articles, videos, podcasts and the like that contributors at Slaw are enjoying and that you might find interesting. The articles tend to be longer than blog posts and shorter than books, just right for that stolen half hour on the weekend. It’s also likely that most of them won’t be about law — just right for etc.
Please let us have your recommendations for what we and our readers might like.
Salon – Tottenham Gel – Helen Smith – Adele won a raft of Grammys and thanked her mum (and wiped away "snot"). Only trouble was she spoke in North London, so a bunch of news media got her wrong. Smith parses her Totenham talk here. And you can see/hear it for yourself (right at the very start, so prick up your ears)—if the Grammy that Stole Christmas hasn't snatched this vid off the net the way it has all the others of the event.
The Morning News – How to Say I Love You – Paul Ford – If you love Adele's voice, and who wouldn't, you might want to tell her; and the writer, Ford, has a hundred . . . interesting ways to 'fess your love.
Vimeo – DLR Dog World – David Lee Roth – I confess to a real admiration of border collies. Here's a video of a fine pair of sheepdogs doing their thing at the behest of David Lee Roth (yes, that David Lee Roth).
New York Times – New Life, From an Arctic Flower That Died 32,000 Years Ago – Nicholas Wade – While we're out of doors, we might as well take a look at what those Russians are up to. This time it's not a wooly mammoth but a flower that they're reviving from ancient, recovered material. And unlike earlier claims, this one might well hold water. But not too much . . . and from the bottom . . . every couple of weeks.
traubeck.com – Years – Bartholomäus Traubeck – Speaking of millennia past, this video, which is really a sound file, lets you listen to music composed by using data derived from the growth rings of trees and played with piano sounds.
Vulture – Print Out Vulture’s Downton Abbey Paper Dolls – Kyle Hilton – Wood's good for making paper, too. And paper dolls can be fun. Now that Downton Abbey's wrapped up for the season, you may want to have these handy on Sunday nights in case you experience withdrawal symptoms.
FlavorWire – 20 Beautiful Private and Personal Libraries – Emily Temple – Withdrawal is what you can't do at any of these libraries, alas. But you can look at the library porn. "Scholar's library" for me, I think. On the other hands . . . .
Intelligent Life – Which is the Best Language to Learn – Robert Lane Greene – Seems it's not just in Canada that Anglophones are failing to pick up a second (or third) language; Britain, too, is finding resistance. This column makes a case for learning another language even so (a case that's easier in Canada, one supposes), and asks which one you'd encourage your kids to pick up. Greene plumps for French. What for a third, then? Spanish or Portuguese? Mandarin? Hindi?
YouTube / BBC, Full Lecture: A Night with the Stars – Professor Brian Cox – Britain's pop star physicist tackles the universe, quantum theory, and all the rest in an hour-long lecture at the Royal Institution of Great Britain.
BBC News – The myth of the eight-hour sleep – Stephanie Hegarty – You might want to catch that hour long lecture during your two hour wakefulness period just after your first sleep and before your second sleep. It's not insomnia: it's natural.
