I'm prepping for the Nadelwelt fair - checking all the things that need to be checked, charging all the batteries, topping up the stock stuff that needs to be topped up.

Also, of course, packing the overnight things - which always include the Three Magic Wellness Things: the travel yoga mat, my current knitting project, and something to read (which usually means the e-book reader). It also always includes, of course, the washbag... which this time around put me in front of a slight problem.

As this is also what goes with me on cycling and paddling holidays, and has to fit into rather small bags for that, my washbag is supposed to stay as small as possible. Unfortunately, over the years, it has grown a bit, due to my wanting to take some additional stuff. Such as a pair of glasses for when the lenses are out. Or more skincare products. Age, here, is definitely leaving some traces!

So in the quest of keeping it small and manageable, most of the things are packed into small containers. Which means my soapbox is an old small box for peppermint candies, and it will only fit a very slim piece of soap. Which, in turn, means I occasionally transfer a piece that has shrunk enough into my travel washbag, and replace the shrunken piece with a new big one.

This time, the small piece came from the soapbox that I take with me to the bouldering gym... but the new piece of soap, bought from a soapmaking manufacture, was so large that it didn't fit that box either. A quick internet search later, and now I know how to divide a piece of soap.

The easiest way to do this without the soap splintering is to heat it up in the oven, at about 100° C for at least half an hour; this softens the piece. Then you can either cut it by pressing through it with a very sharp knife, or try using a piece of thin, strong string, or - probably the best method - cut it with a thin wire. I used the wire from a cake cutting device that hangs out in our kitchen, and it worked very well indeed.

So now my soap round-robin is done (and I have three more pieces that will fit the box, too) - on to the rest of the packing!

The Most Patient Husband of Them All has a few days off, so I'm going to be slacking a bit, too - and that means a bit of time off the blog, too.

So have these flowers:

and I will be back again next week on Wednesday!

Notre Dame, that wonderful cathedral in Paris, has burned on Monday. It's a very sad thing - and it does bring home again how devastating fire can be, and how hard to bring under control, even with modern firefighting equipment.

No lives were lost, though, which is a good thing. Another good thing is that the statues from the spire that fell had been taken off for conservation works just a short time before, so they are safe as well, as are a good part of the treasures that were housed in the cathedral (among them, luckily, the garment of King Louis IX - whew!).

It's not clear yet what caused the fire, and no matter how it came to be, the damage done is huge. Though, again, it could have been worse. The roof is gone completely, as is the spire, and there may be structural damage done to the stones due to the heat, but most of the building is still standing, and a lot of the inside is still intact. Plus, for the restauration works, Notre Dame was the subject of many research works, so there is a good number of documentation about it. There's also a lot of donating going on already to help with rebuilding and restoration.

If you are looking for more info, this BBC article provides links to footage of the fire and to several other articles about the topic.

Sometimes, making a ruckus by getting a lot of people to sign something does actually help. The "save the bees"-Bürgerbegehren that was running a while ago had a huge lot of people sign, and as a result, the contents of this petition will actually be turned into laws. Nice, isn't it?

So, since there is hope of things changing to the better if enough people speak up, here are links to some petitions currently running that seem like a good idea to me.

First of all, and for Germans only: The Elbe river is scheduled for works to deepen the river bed, starting very soon in 2019. Unfortunately, this deepening means a lot of excavators removing matter from the river bed, killing everything that lives in there - the microbiome in the river bed soil doesn't withstand sudden changes in its environment. The excavated soil will then be dumped in the North Sea, where it doesn't belong and in turn causes more death of local fish and crustaceans, as their habitat is disturbed.

A petition against this is currently running on the petition site of the German Bundestag. If you are a German citizen, you can register and sign. Unfortunately, it will only run for a few more days, until and it is very far from reaching the quorum number yet - so please do sign, quickly, and spread the word!

Another petition, also regarding stupid things planned in Germany, is against a mountainbike park in the Saar-Hunsrück-Region. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against mountainbiking and MTB trails - but the plans are for a huge beast of a park with lifts, ramps, and other fixed installations. The forest that this is planned for, however, is home to wild cats and technically under protection as a natural reserve. Not a good idea to get about 27000 people per year in there, mountainbiking...

Third thing's the charm, finally - Greenpeace is asking for signatures for better protection of the high seas. That protection is necessary, as the high seas are in danger of overfishing, there's plastic floating around, and that together with the climate changes is damaging animal and plant life in the sea. Which, in turn, will bite us humans in the butt - so it's high time to have some more protected areas in the sea.

If you're interested in inks or ink corrosion, there's a conference planned about just that topic - ink corrosion - in October 2019, on the 24th and 25th. Right after this conference, there's a three-day workshop (October 25-27) on making and using historical inks.

The webpage OpenEdition offers a number of open source books and articles from the humanities and social sciences. The website, for me, shows up as an odd mix of German, French, and English, but it seems to be natively French, and a high percentage of the texts are french. (Try searching for "quenouille" instead of "spindle", for instance.)

There's an old Egyptian rug that is made from cat hair.

And while we're at the topic of animals - the Rare Breeds Survival Trust has published the current watchlist with endangered rare breeds in Britain. There's quite a number of sheep on the list - so if you're in Britain and thinking about keeping some sheep... (or horses, or poultry...)

I know it's already a little late, but then, it is never too late to have some funny things, right? So here's a roundup of some nice April Fool posts...

First of all, did you know that the Bayeux Tapestry is a fake that was made waaay after the Middle Ages? No? Well, you can read all about it here on HistoryHit.

CurrentArchaeology has made a compilation of archaeology-related April Fool posts. My favourite is National Trust workers turning the clock forward for Daylight Savings time at Avebury!