It’s time we had a de-lurk around this here blog! The last one was over a year ago. If you keep returning to this blog but rarely or never comment, you are a lurker, Dear Reader, and a most welcome one too. Please comment on this entry and tell us something about yourself – like…
Tech Note: Tagging Matters To Traffic
Posted by Martin R on February 2, 2013 I’m happy to note that Aard’s traffic is now back at its pre-Wordpress level: 880 daily uniques in January. I believe this is due to three factors: more frequent entries, a small traffic peak thanks to the Hårby valkyrie, and above all my return to tagging. I don’t know why I quit tagging. Just lazy…
January Pieces Of My Mind
Posted by Martin R on February 2, 2013 Some recent Facebook updates of mine: After four years’ living in this house I just stubbed my toe on the bathrooom threshold for the first time — painfully. Unusually, I was wearing semi-industrial hearing protectors on my way to the john — because also unusually two people were watching TV at the same time and…
Another Gold Foil Figure Die from Zealand
Posted by Martin R on February 1, 2013 
Another one of the rare production dies for 6/7/8th century gold foil figures has come to light, again on Zealand! This is an unusual design depicting a lady from the front. She’s wearing a long dress, a cloak and two bead strings. She seems to be cupping her hands around a ring at her abdomen.…
Let’s Talk About Kachingle
Posted by Martin R on January 31, 2013 The Kachingle social micropayment site has been nagging me periodically for the past year. It’s something along the lines of Flattr, and finally I thought OK, let’s try this out. All they want from me is my email address and my permission. And would you believe it – I just got a US cent. Micropayment…
Japanese Robot Development Driven By Xenophobia
Posted by Martin R on January 31, 2013 
Reading a term paper by one of my Växjö students, I learned something surprising. Being a well-read and erudite sort, Dear Reader, you may not be surprised. You already know that Japanese women have been having very few babies each since the 1950s, and that thus there’s a growing shortage of strong young people to…
Teaching 20-year-olds for the past term has begun to make me feel a little avuncular. But yesterday I had this sudden surge in my avuncularity. First, in the morning I finally took the step of shaving the sparse fuzz remaining on my forehead all the way up to the coronal suture. (That’s the lateral seam…
Fornvännen’s Summer Issue On-Line
Posted by Martin R on January 25, 2013 Read it all on-line, Open Access! Lars Larsson presents some Late Palaeolithic antler artefacts from Scania. Olle Andersson makes and tests lots and lots of spearheads to investigate how the Iron Age ones found at Uppåkra got all bent and curled up. Helmer Gustavson announces the confession of the man who faked the Sigtuna runic…
Retro Gamer Tattoos
Posted by Martin R on January 24, 2013 
Junior and I met this guy in the line to the EuroGamer Expo in London last September. Anybody know him?
New Dates for the Bronze Age
Posted by Martin R on January 23, 2013 When I was an undergrad in 1990 we were taught that all six periods of the Scandinavian Bronze Age were 200 (or in one case 300) years long. The most recent radiocarbon work shows that they all had different lengths and were more likely 130-280 years long. And the periods with the most abundant metalwork…
