Best article in The Mail ever. I think I've missed my true calling, or milieu, or something. Dogs and ponies belong in the house, obviously.

Reading about Byron's groupies in The Independent: Byron

^ Proof of Ahmet's good taste.

^Well, I think my source was quite a reliable one...

Oh, it was only a last-minute thing (lie or whatever) on the part of the promoters--they announced it the evening before the show and had apparently known about it for weeks!

Actually, SC, he was very much out and about all over London, on foot, without any appearance of difficulty (of course he might have had the good pain killers). He had the surgery some time before the show, btw, not after. Furthermore, the promoters at Montreux apparently knew well beforehand that Pagey wasn't going to show, and the knee thing was indeed the 'spin'. That is the actual story--I was there (at Montreux and in Selfridges!!). Edited to add: and don't get me wrong, I'm sure Jimmy had his own good reasons for not wanting to be there.

^

Not to mention shopping the summer sales and such all over (London) town a few days later!

Christine Carpenter's The Wars of the Roses: Politics and Constitution in England c. 1437-1509, which is excellent. Park Honan's Christopher Marlowe, Poet and Spy, good so far. And re-reading The Aeneid, Fitzgerald translation, amazing as always.

Chariots of Fire Tess Notorious To Have and Have Not Persuasion Howards End Kingdom of Heaven Amelie 8 1/2 Bridget Jones's Diary (the first one) Monty Python and the Holy Grail Four Weddings and a Funeral Raiders of the Lost Ark Music ones (with TSRTS obviously at the top) 24 Hour Party People Velvet Goldmine A Hard Day's Night The Wall Pink Floyd Live at Pompeii

500th post! Had to be here, really: Three favs:

Sure! And me, too!!!

Jimmy Walking Offstage Even I am charmed by this at this moment of supreme disenchantment.

Herco!!!!!! Nice to see you!

There is a good deal about warfare, but its primary concerns are archaeological and cultural. Have you read Herodotus' Histories? The Waterfield Oxford translation is very good. You might also try Thucydides' The Peloponnesian War (Lattimore translation). And if you haven't read The Iliad, the Fagles translation is amazing--I'm on the last four books at present and it's been fantastic.

It's pretty great! I just finished Robin Osborne's Greece in the Making 1200-479 BC myself.

Both great! I've actually taught both of these and everyone really enjoyed them. I'm reading Charles Nicholl's The Reckoning: The Murder of Christopher Marlowe, which is quite gripping. Also just got Peter Trippi's book on J. M. Waterhouse--seems very good so far.

That's so cool! And I'm very honored to be the July girl

And a gorgeous one it is!

Thanks! Nice pics Charles and beatbo!

Aww, thanks, Miss H! Rather attached to the hair, though (so to speak)

^Nice one, Puck! And hello everyone!

All great stuff!!

Walter Burkert's Greek Religion, which is amazing, Iain Pears' The Dream of Scipio, which is really quite good, and Braudel's Memory and the Mediterranean, which is fabulous.

Looks like Charlotte to me--she's got the same hair and is wearing the same scarf as in the helicopter photo, plus she looks quite a bit like her daughter (if it is her).