The Scriptorium

Journaling: What is making you smile these days? Create a top 10 list of anything you want to talk about.

In no particular order.  Feel free to ask about any of them, I might even create a post about some of them next month.

1 - The Ferret  A creation of my own, based in the Sherlock Holmes (ACD) 'verse.  A song and dance mustelid.

2 - Werewolf!Lucas  Another of my creations.  Based in Spooks (MI5) where Lucas North is now a werewolf, and continues to work for Section D in both human and vulpine forms.  This is a party-loving werewolf, who likes to look smart.

3 - Cake  I have already posted about cake for Challenge #2

4 - Families at church.  We have a lot of engagement with local families, and apart from baptisms, we also have a toddler group and after-school club, a youth group, occasional Saturday activity mornings and in a couple of weeks we're running a Teddy Bear's Zipwire.

5 - Getting engrossed in my cross stitch while listening to something on the radio on my headphones.  Perfect for shutting out the rest of the world.

6 - My To Be Read list which is once more threatening to fall off the shelf and onto my head when I'm asleep.

7 - My total inability to resist the urge to 'complete' a list.  Recently I found two music programmes on the radio which have a number of series, going back several years.  So, of course, I need to listen to them all (or at least the interesting majority) over the next year.

8 - The thought of no_true_pair main challenge (with 8 characters) sign up coming next month.

9 - The fact that the skirt I bought some years ago and rarely wore still fits and was perfect to wear today in the heat.

10 - The sheer wonder of creation - how the sun is changing its poles between North and South; all the amazing galaxies out there (points vaguely in all directions at once).

FutureLearn

Italian for Beginners - Part 4 (Open University)
Much to my surprise I'm finding I'm able to complete the quizzes with fewer mistakes and understanding more, which is encouraging.

What do Popular Songs Mean? (University of Leeds)
Like the previous music course I've done with Leeds Uni, this was aimed at potential music students, which I imagine is only a very limited proportion of those taking FutureLearn courses.  Some things were interesting, some were a reminder of things I learnt on an OpenLearn course; at other times they would teach about analysis, but then when I came to work through an example for myself the answer would come up 'you may think xxx, but in this case yyy applies'.  And in at least one occasion there seemed to be a contradiction between something stated earlier and than later in the course.


OpenLearn

Egyptian Mathematics
I read through the course, but it lacks the presentation of later courses.  It was interesting to see a little about Egyptian mathematics, although very little has survived, probably because most of their maths had to do with practical problems they encountered rather than matters they deemed sufficiently important to save for posterity.

Babylonian Mathematics
Similarly with this course, although there was a small amount that was presumably kept for teaching purposes.  Unlike our modern maths, with a decimal system of counting, the Babylonians worked in 60s, so comparing then and now isn't always easy.

The Science of Nutrition & Healthy Eating
My latest badged course.  Definitely interesting and made me consider what I do eat.  Not sure it will change my diet - but I'm more aware of food labels and what I should be considering.