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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 1h

Friday evening hits the sweet spot for me - it's often a time when I'm in the mood for more thoughtful reading.

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Brian Bilston @brianbilston.bsky.social · 5h

It’s Bookshop Day so here’s a poem in celebration of all those amazing bookshops out there.

Never Judge a Bookshop by its Cover

It may call itself a bookshop, but don’t be fooled by that.
There may be books in the window, on the tables and shelves,
but really, it’s a travel agent selling all-immersive holidays,
weekend breaks, first-class tickets to other worlds,

with a low carbon footprint. It’s a pharmacy as well,
dispensing medicines, pick-me-ups, balms: if symptoms persist,
please consult your local bookseller; it’s a tailor’s, offering
a made-to-measure service to achieve the perfect fit;

and a hardware store, with a range of empowering tools
to fix you up, recharge your batteries, switch on lightbulbs.
Its walls are lined with treasure as precious as any jeweller’s,
and twice as bright. Spines shine gold, silver, sapphire, emerald;

there are diamonds amongst them. It’s a garden centre,
a place where ideas get planted and a thousand stories bloom,
and a greengrocer, selling fresh, locally-sourced produce,
as vital as your five-a-day and more readily consumed.

It’s a multiscreen cinema. Peek behind the curtain
of each jacket and you’ll find a movie waiting silently to begin.
A stationer’s supplying notepads, reams of paper,
with the words conveniently filled in

to save you both the time and bother. A wholefood store
and a fast-food joint. A cosy haven from the cold.
A friendly, family restaurant: Today’s special will revive
a flagging spirit and restore a lagging soul.

It’s a tourist information centre equipped with maps
and helpful guides to steer us on our way.
A busy square in which a whole town gathers
or just a place to hold the world at bay

for a few untroubled stolen minutes. It’s itself,
and yet it’s something larger, a universe so vast
you could spend ten thousand lifetimes there –
it may call itself a bookshop, but don’t be fooled by that.

Brian Bilston

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Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 5h

It would be helpful to have 6+ people willing to share a shockingly egregious example of having a report rejected.

It would also be helpful to hear from MPs & other public voices willing to add their voices to calls on Ofcom (new powers Nov) and EHRC (new chair Dec) to act
bsky.app/profile/sund...

Sunder Katwala (sundersays) @sundersays.bsky.social · 1d

If I had 6-12 people who had reported something unlawful & obviously indefensible, get the report rejected, and be willing to speak/advocate about it, that would be a good basis for asking a wider group of people - eg MPs - to support the call for an intervention & investigation of legal duties

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 1h

Unsolicited chick pic.

A light brown chick with darker markings on its head, leaning against a traditionally fluffy yellow chick.

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 1h

I had no idea Davison was mixed race. Fascinating thread. Did you see this reply?
bsky.app/profile/spin...

Spinky’s Mama @spinkysmama.bsky.social · 17h

Great thread. I can add Peter Davison writing about his father:

Extract from Is There Life Outside The Box? An Actor Despairs
Autobiography by Peter Davison

I more like him than I cared to admit while he was alive. I stand like he did, sit like he did, I look at my hands and see his, I look in the mirror and see his features, even though our colouring was so completely different. While I longed to look more like him, I realise I turned out as perfectly as he could have wished.
Here was a man from the Caribbean who wanted nothing more than to be accepted as British, who had a son who had made a name for himself playing the typical Eng-lishman.

Extract from Is There Life Outside The Box? An Actor Despairs
Autobiography by Peter Davison

But of course it did matter. What to us was a taste of the exotic was, to my father a bothersome distraction in his quest to be accepted as an exemplary British citizen.
The fact that his only son was born with blond hair and blue eyes, courtesy of inheriting my mother's dominant Caucasian genes, unlike my sisters, made the transition complete. Over the years however, his West Indian heritage became more than a distraction, and while we never knew of it until later, there's no doubt he suffered discrimination and rejection at the hands of Mother England that he loved. When Enoch Powell gave his 'Rivers of Blood' speech and my father had to stand in line and register as an alien, having been eventually accepted by my mother's extended family and friends, probably did nothing to soften his feelings.

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Elsa Williams @elsawilliams.bsky.social · 12d

‘Real friendships felt mythical to me’: On autism, reading and growing up

Some people liken autistic girls to an iceberg. Personally, I prefer the analogy of a rotten log: overturn any one of us and there’ll be…

medium.com

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SwearyMess @swearymess.bsky.social · 1h

Well this was a ride.

Nome @nome.bsky.social · Mar 12

I have been doing entirely too much earnest posting about deep things recently, I need to do a proper thread about hippo testicles or something just to keep myself sane.

Oh by the way hippos have migratory testicles.

a statue of a hippopotamus with its mouth open and teeth showing .

Alt: A hippo being tossed a watermelon, which it crushes in its massive jaws.

media.tenor.com

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 1h

Wow. I knew hippos were dangerous, but this is mind-blowing. Thanks for sharing.

SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 1h

Thank *you* 🥰

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 11h

Surely that's what it must be. Either AI slop or footage from George Floyd and older protests.

But this is brilliant from The Daily Show:

darren32359.bsky.social @darren32359.bsky.social · 15h

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Guy Walsh/Wah @aguynamedguy.co.uk · 13h

Whatever your politics - please, listen to this. Isn't it refreshing to hear a politician speak with hope instead of fear?

The Green Party of England & Wales @greenparty.org.uk · 15h

“Britain is a nation of neighbours, not strangers — and it’s time we built a politics of hope that reflects that.”

Zack Polanski with a message of unity and hope having been out door knocking Handsworth today.

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 12h

Oh, it's devastating, isn't it? What an amazing series.

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Philip Purser-Hallard @purserhallard.com · 19h

It occurs to me that the Doctor's polyethnic identity in recent times recontextualises Peter Davison's casting in quite an interesting way.
(For context, although you'd be unlikely to guess it by looking at him, Davison's paternal family is Guyanese. He has close relatives who are visibly Black.)

Peter Davison, a fair-skinned blond man, as the fifth Doctor, circa 1982.

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 12h

What a fascinating thread. Thank you.

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 12h

Gosh, I never knew any of this!

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Mike Masnick @mmasnick.bsky.social · 12h

Always can use some more joy in the timeline, so check out this year's FISM close-up card magic winner (technically tied for 2nd place due to scoring, but still had the highest score - don't ask). www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrGg...

FRANCESCO FONTANELLI - FISM WINNER - WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP OF MAGIC - Card Magic

YouTube video by Francesco Fontanelli

www.youtube.com

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 12h

That's amazing! Thank you for sharing.

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 12h

The whole book is wonderful! Well worth getting, even if you don't have children.

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Nomad🇿🇦🇨🇦✌️🏳️‍🌈🧑‍🍳📚 @cosmopolitanrdw.bsky.social · 2d

A lot of people are asking what they can do. Here’s something, old school style. Start reproducing these pictures, either black and white photocopies, or screen printed, by the 100s and 1000s. Give them catchy headings and captions, meme-style, and stick them up EVERYWHERE.

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darren32359.bsky.social @darren32359.bsky.social · 15h

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 12h

Yes, this one 😊:
bsky.app/profile/clai...

SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 16h

There's also the beautiful The Mousehole Cat, which gives the correct pronunciation of the village.

Cover of The Mousehole Cat, written by Antonia Barber and illustrated by Nicola Bayley

It shows an enormous storm cat formed of blue and green waves, cradling a fishing boat with a cat on its deck

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 13h

Btw, the video sent me down a lovely rabbithole, including various videos of the festival, this Wikipedia article, and the song, which names all the fish: murgy broth, fairmaids, lances, scad, hake, ling and of course stargazey pie 🥰
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Baw...

Tom Bawcock's Eve - story and song

YouTube video by Thomas C Richards

youtu.be

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Thinking Person's Guide to Autism @thinkingautism.com · 4d

"Autistic people do not form a fixed spectrum with clear segments of 'high functioning' and 'low functioning' and 'profound.' Hope this helps." @ejwillingham.bsky.social on the autism grievance parent campaign for a #ProfoundAutism label, in today's TPGA Newsletter:

buttondown.com/TPGA/archive...

Do some tall people have "profound tallness?" (This is an autism labels side-eye)

You can’t take the tallness out of someone, not in any ethical way. “Tall” is just what they are.

buttondown.com

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 14h

An excellent haul!

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SomersetWhovian 💙 🇺🇦 📎 @clairecopperman.bsky.social · 14h

That's lovely! Thank you for sharing.

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