I did not know about Keillor or Eddings ffs (thank you)

I grew up with Alex Pretti The kind-hearted ICU nurse shot by ICE agents was my childhood best friend.

I wrote about my childhood friend Alexi Pretti. Please read it and share it and remember him as a human being. @theverge.com

“Please get the truth out about our son.”

Read and share the statement from the parents of Alex Pretti, the VA ICU nurse who was shot and killed by border patrol.

An accurate summary Of three key points.

“Are you okay?”

What words to die on.

What a life to have lived, that his last words were concern. Not for himself, but for a stranger.

May we all live with such honour. May no more have to die with such honour.

Detained by ICE, two women became first responders during agent’s seizure The women say they guided agents through the emergency, later raising concerns about medical protocols, weapons safety and accountability.

Two women trained as first responders were abducted by three ICE agents. One of the agents starts seizing. The other two don’t know what to do. The women jump into action and save the agent’s life, only to be re-handcuffed and processed.

www.startribune.com/detained-by-...

Trump’s Board of Peace logo is basically the UN logo, except dipped in gold and edited so the world only includes America.

“Leave Greenland alone!”

Heckler interrupts Star-Spangled Banner at NBA game in London, wins cheers from crowd. (Video via Reddit)

Clearly I don’t have enough to do as a quick(ish) and possibly inaccurate survey of the Wikipedia entries for the old colleges suggests Oriel’s official name (in English not Latin) is the longest by quite a stretch, ahead of Wadham in second and ChristChurch in third.

2025 was the third hottest year ever.
Trend is worrying and faster than expected a few years ago.

Only when we stop burning coal, oil and gas, temperature will stop rising.

www.ecmwf.int/en/about/med...

The first (and I hope last) time I have ever had a jump scare from an estate agent’s listing! Given I’m on the tube I’m glad I didn’t actually scream!

But the response of supporters of President Trump and of his administration has been neither of these. Instead, they have rushed to trash the reputation of the woman, depicting her as a “domestic terrorist” who somehow deserved to be summarily executed by an ICE agent who was acting in “self-defense”. There are also claims that the ICE agents in the footage were injured in the incident but are making “full recoveries”—claims that can be refuted by watching the video. An alternative—and official—false narrative is being created by which the ICE agents did nothing wrong, and everything right, in killing Good. This dishonest construct is one means by which the federal government wants to evade taking responsibility for what seems to have been an extra-judicial murder of a US citizen. Another means to this end is that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is not cooperating with local police for any investigation. By spreading falsehoods and hampering any independent investigation by Minnesota police, the federal government is seeking immunity for the violence its agents are inflicting on people in America. These tactics are part of a broader strategy to ensure that those with federal executive power can do exactly what they want, without any remedy to those affected: government outside the law.

NEW

Death in Minnesota

The significance of the reaction to the killing of Renee Nicole Good

By me, at @prospectmagazine.co.uk

www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/ideas/law/th...

We are Christopher Isherwood, watching the scenes in the Berlin street below from our apartment window above. Watching from afar further shift in a worsening polity

We are Christopher Isherwood, watching the scenes in the Berlin street below from our apartment window above

Watching from afar further shifts in a worsening polity

By me

Substack: emptycity.substack.com/p/we-are-chr...

Personal Blog: davidallengreen.com/2026/01/we-a...

Postcards! It is a way of integrating my habit of buying too many books and too many art gallery postcards. The idea is that each book has a postcard living in it permanently.

I imagine when the Death of the Discworld decides to modernise his house it will look like this.

Once came across a tour guide outside my then place of work (the Guildhall in the City of London) describing in great detail how it was haunted by Princess Diana.

Channel 4 has been doing it since the early 90s - about a third of the length of time the King’s Christmas message has been going. Probably fair to say it is now an established tradition.

Thank you!

In the groovy 1960s my parents’ youth club leader apparently did a setting to ‘Telstar’ which I would love to hear!

…floor tiles Victorian and bathroom and garage late twentieth century. I’m going for an early 1800s rebuild around some kind of medieval building (not much left) with a makeover/additions in the second half of the 19th century and assorted subsequent redecorations. You did say show your workings.

OK, I looked at all the pictures didn’t read the description but did read the etched window. There is the odd bit of window which looks medieval, a wooden fireplace surround which looks late medieval into 17th century. I’m in two minds about the buttressing. Fan vaulting looks early gothic revival..

…and the maid statue!

New and/or Corpus please!

Bronze plaque saying "A Letter to the Future. Ok is the first Icelandic glacier to lose its status as a glacier. In the next 200 years all our glaciers are expected to follow the same path. This monument is to acknowledge that we know what is happening and what needs to be done. Only you know if we did it. August 2019. 415ppm CO2"

TIL about a memorial ceremony in Iceland in 2019 to mark the end of a glacier, changing the place name from Okjökull to Ok (jökull = glacier). Uncompromising wording on the bronze plaque:
"This is to acknowledge that we know what is happening and what needs to be done. Only you know if we did it".

One of the very best as well.

Wait till you read the Countess of Arran’s obituary…

The obituary of ‘Boofy’s’ wife, the Countess of Arran in the Telegraph (7 June 2013) is possibly the best example of the genre.

I forgot the two St Andrews…

Shout out to the City of London’s 5 dedications to St Mary, 3 to St Botolph and 2 each to St Margaret and St Bartholomew.

I don’t know, in 500 years time maybe people will find it as charming as the dodgy bits in Ripon’s crossing… (I’m joking it’s terrible)