Feeling a little better
Thank you, Oxford, for bearing with me last night. Feel terrible not being able to sign, but I think it’s working: I seem to be on the mend. Plenty of hot water, lemon and honey, liquorice, whisky, Nurses Day- and Night-, Lansoprazole (for nasty reflux), and a B12 in my arm yesterday afternoon. Getting there. Am now sat in a nice Grismby hotel – yes, they do exist – sipping further lemon/honey blandness with Mr. Coops.
Sorry I missed some of you last night – thank you for the kind wishes sent along with objects to sign. Lemsip appreciated – blackcurrant too, nice move Rob: certainly tastier than the lemon. The Hot Berry and Orange ultimately gets my vote though. Harder to get, but sensational.
A particular thank you to a chap who had flown over from the US to see the show and spoke very nicely to Coops afterwards. Appallingly rude to not be able to say hello in person. I hope the trip was worthwhile.
I eagerly await that moment when you suddenly realise you’re back to full health – and the world bursts with colour once again. As it is, I look forward immensely to the shows even in poor health, as respite from the endless weariness, sweating and coughing. (At least from mine. I can’t do much about yours).
Your well wishes are much appreciated, and thank you again for coming to see these shows where I haven’t been able to thank you personally afterwards.
Think I’ve put on a stone with all this honey.
x
Penn says: Prayer Test
It seems as though other members of the magic fraternity are jumping on Derrens’ atheist bandwagon – just where will this end 
Evolution: There is no missing link
Again, the press are talking about “the missing link“. Let’s get one thing clear. There is no missing link. Rather, there are an indefinite number of missing branches. To have a missing link, you need to visualise evolution as a chain. If there’s a gap in the chain, then you have a missing link. But evolution, at least at the scale of animals and plants, is mostly a tree. And all we see are individual nodes of the tree, the extant species that form, in Darwin’s metaphor, the leaves of the living tree, and the extinct species that form branching points deeper in the tree.
Mysterious Skulls
This isn’t your most recent episode of Unsolved Mysteries. In fact, these are authentic skulls dug up and discovered from nearly every corner of the globe.
If the skulls are actually of human origin has been put up for debate by some. Either way, these anomalies will either give you a great costume idea, inspiration to go on your own Indian Jones-style adventure, or just provide a reason for some really freaky dreams.
Further examples at Cult Case
The Tree Man of Java
For 20 years Dede Koswara lived covered in warts with huge tree-like growths encasing his limbs.
Today Dede can once more use his hands and walk without pain.
He can see the outline of his toes for the first time in over a decade after medics cut more than 4lbs of warty horns from his legs and feet.
He has also become a sudoko addict now medics have cut growths from his hands allowing him to hold a pen.
Dede, 37, now hopes that he will resume a normal life after two more operations to graft undamaged skin onto his hands, feet and face. Speaking from an Indonesian hospital, he said: “What I really want first is to get better and find a job. But then, one day, who knows? I might meet a girl and get married.”
Last night – Oxford
Firstly and above all, apologies to those of you who wanted to come and say hello after the show. My few days off were beset by some non-porcine plague, in the way that bodies tend to sieze upon any quiet lull after an extended onslaught of sustained activity in order to punish the bearer severely for working so hard. I dragged myself to last night’s first night in Oxford, found I had to do an interview and photo-shoot for the Times, which I thought, like a ‘nana, was due to happen today, and was then amazed that the first half of the show went well and that I found a voice that seemed strong enough, given that I could barely speak a word during the day. In the second act it suffered, which is worrying: a few coughs and a dip in vocal energy may not matter much to that night’s audience, but without getting a chance to rest, the voice can just suddenly go, leaving us having to cancel a show or two as we did the other year.
So I had to skip signing, under sensible instruction from my company manager. Standing out in the cold talking and chatting is lethal for a damaged, suffering throat, so I hope any of you who were there can understand. A note was left on the door – if any of you have left anything for me to sign, I’ll see to them today, and you can come and grab them later on today – any time after 7.30 – from the stage door. I doubt very much that I’ll be signing tonight either, I’m sorry. If you have books or things – even programmes if you turn up early – that you can drop round to stage door before the show, I’ll sign them straight after and leave them there for you to collect. But I’ll be running straight off for Lemsip and beddy-byes right after the show, so forgive me if I don’t get to scribble my moniker on programmes and tickets bought too close to start time.
Please – anyone leaving anything – remember to put a note in with your full name on!
Now, to cheer us all up, here are some videos of some of the crew at the afore-slagged Novotel in Wolverhampton, when the hour was late and we were all rather tired. Firstly, dancing to ‘Woman in Love’ which playing quietly on the in-ceiling speaker system (so turn up your volumes please), is our own lovely Jennie:
and then, never to be outdone (although he clearly is), is our own ‘handsome’ Iain. One for the ladeez:
I note that Iain’s head looks too big for his body in this film. Rest assured this is his normal appearance, and not a perspectival glitch of the camera’s lens. Hope to be better for Grimsby x
Mystery worm attack!
An invasion of unidentified worms has forced 50 herdsmen and their families from their grassland homes, taking 20,000 head of livestock with them, in northwest China’s Xinjiang region, state news agency Xinhua said Friday. The worms are packed up to 3,000 per square meter and chew through the grasslands like lawnmowers, leaving only brown soil in their wake, Xinhua said.
The agency described it as the worst plague in three decades. Local experts could not identify the 2-cm (1 inch) long, thorny green worm with black stripes and samples had been sent to Xinjiang Agricultural University, Xinhua said.
“The pasture was green a week ago. But now the worms are creeping around, and they even come into my house. I have to sweep them out several times an hour,” Xinhua quoted one herdsman as saying. Xinjiang has in the past used chickens, ducks and other birds to fight locusts, which are also a menace on the grasslands, but so far they have shown little interest in the pesky worms.
Old Classics: Harry Blackstone
Blackstone was born in Three Rivers, Michigan, the son of noted stage magician Harry Blackstone, Sr. He received the Magician of the Year Award in 1979 and 1985. After his passing in 1997, much of his performance equipment was sold off in a highly publicized internet auction.
Many of the pieces went to collectors, scattered across the world and numerous of the props have made it into actual shows. Las Vegas performer Scarlett now owns and uses his Topsy Turvy. Touring illusionist Aaron Balcom now uses the Owen-built Clown Jammer. Washington state performer John Walton uses his menacing Buzz Saw.
Music affects how we perceive facial expressions
Music can be thought of as a form of emotional communication, with which the performer conveys an emotional state to the listener. This “language” is remarkably powerful – it can evoke strong emotions, and make your heart race or send tingles down your spine. And it is universal – the emotional content of a piece of music can be understood by anyone, regardless of cultural background.
Are the emotions evoked by piece of music similar to, and can they influence, other emotional experiences? The answer to these questions is unclear. But a new study, which has just been published in Neuroscience Letters, provides both behavioural and physiological evidence that the emotions evoked by music can be transferred to the sense of vision, and can influence how the emotions in facial expressions are perceived.
Competition – win some stuff
Derren has set up a chance for you to win some Alton Towers stuff – (OK Coops helped a bit too). Head over to the Competitions page and take a look or click here.
