I love this film so much. The whimsy, the characters, the fun of it. I always dance when I’m lying in a field in their honour.

A photo of the book Sweet Danger by Margery Allingham

I’m really enjoying Sweet Danger by Margery Allingham. It’s funny, madcap and I have no idea what is going to happen next.

Photo of knitted round leaves on thin stems and red flowers on a white background

Botanically-accurate knitted and crocheted sculptures of flowers by artist Tatyana Yanishevsky #WomensArt

We’re really looking forward to it!

Replacing Anxiety with Poetry Why Robin has turned to poetry to fill the cracks in his brain

Swapping anxiety for creativity - how making stuff can help us find ourselves and understand others

thecosmicshamblesnetwork.substack.com/p/replacing-...

Trying to make events happen is such a rollercoaster. An ongoing exercise in determination, graft, humility, surprise and unexpected generosity, all in the name of human connection. Heaven forbid people decide that staying home to watch telly is better. It’s never better.

It often did feel like torture to play…

Robin’s?

Ludlow launches a brand new mini-literary festival – Lit Bits! Ludlow’s very own literary festival, Lit Bits is a brand new weekend of words with a difference, centring on play and interaction with workshops and events for all ages.

Come and join us! Some fabulous writers coming up for the weekend. www.shropshirelive.com/entertainmen... @robinince.bsky.social

A photo of a violin sitting on my desk.

We’ve got folk musicians in this weekend and I mentioned I used to play the violin 30 years ago. Today this turned up. Many mixed feelings about my Nemesis as we meet again. My wrist remembers, my fingers do not.

Photo featuring a rotund black and white vase, wide in the middle, with a small neck and opening decorated in a repetitive diamond pattern, the vase is on a white surface

Paula Estevan, contemporary Native American potter born in Acoma Pueblo who learned the art of making pottery in the traditional way from her mother #WomensArt

Thank you so much! Every one of those writers is fantastic, we are so excited they are travelling into the middle of nowhere to be with us. @tiffmurray.bsky.social @londonbessie.bsky.social

We are running some lovely writing talks and workshops at Ludlow Assembly Rooms in February, brilliant writers including Michel Faber, Sita Brahmachari, Robin Ince all listed here under the Lit Bits label ludlowassemblyrooms.co.uk/events/categ.... A shout out would be much, much appreciated.

Photo of a created scene showing two women in a low level of cream coloured water which stretcges to the hirizon tova blue sky, one standing to the right facing left and one crouching to the left facing left standing, both are dressed identically in a long red dress and blue headscarf, both carry a white jug and the standing figure holds an open blue umbrella over her

Ethiopian photographer and artist Aïda Muluneh was commissioned to create a body of work highlighting water scarcity, 2018 #WomensArt

She had so many spectacular costumes. That dress from Some Like it Hot is one of the filthiest in existence. I long for costume designers to be this good now.

Successful integration into the new-to-me Zumba group of very local women achieved. They have established that I am longer-term local than they thought, they know where I live, we have found the people we know in common and agreed on features of another Zumba group led by someone else a while ago.

I agree, we don’t need to engage with everything all the time, that’s not possible or healthy. Acting with mindfulness and curiosity and kindness all round, regardless of opinion.

Yes, i worry about Cancel Culture at the moment. I think we should be engaging and discussing rather than falling into tribes that automatically just hate things and people that don’t agree with us. We are all mixed bags of good and bad, long live nuance and engagement and complexity.

A photo of the book Monsters by Claire Dederer

About to start Monsters by Claire Dederer. I probably fall on the side of appreciating the art, regardless of the creator, but looking forward to thinking that through more.

Monochrome photograph featuring a group of eight white women in Victorian style dark dresses, most are sitting, some at desks, working in an interior with papers and books, only one woman stands towards the back of the group, the room has a bookcase to the left a central door behind the group and patterned wallpaper

'Williamina Fleming (standing) supervises the team of (underpaid) women “computers” at the Harvard College Observatory as they help map the universe – one star at a time' US, 1875 (via Smithsonian Insider) #WomensArt

Mike Davis’s ‘Ecology of Fear’ Is Still a Ticking Bomb Twenty-five years since its publication, the correlations between power, wealth and ecology depicted in Davis's book remain utterly relevant

Like the author of this article I read Mike Davis’s Ecology of Fear when I lived in Los Angeles 20 years ago. I have been thinking about it a lot this week. I am so sorry for this tragedy. I wonder what will change now that so many rich people’s houses are burning? www.frieze.com/article/mike...

Welcome to WA on BS as requested by you!

Thank you for following x

A photo of the book Dele Weds Destiny by Tomi Obaro

Enjoying Dele Weds Destiny by Tomi Obaro. The book cover seems to suggest the book is a light romance but it’s really what I would describe as women’s drama - friendship, relationships, midlife changes.

Monochrome photograph of the upper halves of two women lying on the ground entwined together and laughing, one subject wears a jacket and has one hand on her head and the other across the chest of the other figure, the other figure wears a white patterned top and has flowers in her hair, she holds her hands over her mouth

Frida Kahlo with singer Chavela Vargas, 1945 #WomensArt

First day back at work and my new programme has gone live. You never know if it’s a good programme or not until it hits the public, no matter how good it is in your head. The test is when people you don’t know vote on it with their money. Today was a GOOD day. Regulars and new people. A good day. 🥳

Painting of a view of the roofs of a townscape with many houses under a dark blue sky filled with puffy grey clouds, birds and round moon

Through the windows, 2021 by UK painter Emma Haworth #WomensArt

Working my way through The Dark is Rising sequence for the first time. Finished Greenwich this morning, so next up, The Grey King.

A second vote for Orbital by Samantha Harvey. I don’t always agree with award-winners but this one is lovely.

Ludlow has pulled the fog over its head like a duvet. Go back to the sofa, it says. Go back to the sofa.