Funny thing? Potato salad is sometimes said to be very typically German. However... while it is a dish (or side) often found in Germany, there's nothing typical about it if you venture outside your own home, or region. There is a plethora of variations, and also a few larger regional differences on how to make it.

I had a lot of fun reading this reddit post that I stumbled across, regarding potato salad (and yes, it includes recipes, and it's all in English). Because... yes, the only typical must-have ingredient for a German potato salad is... potatoes. Everything else can (and will!) result in hot disputes at least. 

Especially amusing, to me, was the one comment about feeling not so biased, then reading other's recipes and shaking one's head. That is exactly what happened to me - I thought I was cool with most variations, and then found out there's people adding boiled carrots, or peas! What! 

(I have a few variations I really enjoy, by the way - including one quick, served-warm one that is fast enough to make for normal weekday lunch.)

The sun is shining, and the weekend is approaching - some few more tasks to take care of today, though.

Today I learned that there is a Middle English Dictionary freely accessible on the web, and there's also a collection of Middle English romances that you can filter by certain keywords.  Unfortunately, the keywords do not include "textile tasks" and the fulltext is not searchable - but if you were looking to read plot summaries of famous medieval novels... that's your place to go. (Unsurprisingly, five of the keywords have something to do with, um, close interpersonal relationships of the commonly horizontal variety. Some things never change.)

I received a slightly weird email yesterday with some inquiry about the ETF. The European Textile Forum. You know, this tiny, lovely, utterly historically-focused week of madness that I have the honour of organising.

Well... apparently, it somehow got to be listed on some weird event website, and now it's listed there as 

"The European Textile Forum, set to take place in the charming town of Mayen, Germany from November 3 to November 9, 2025, promises to be an inspiring gathering for professionals and enthusiasts in the textile industry. This week-long event will feature a diverse lineup of workshops, discussions, and networking opportunities, designed to explore the latest trends, technologies, and sustainable practices in textiles. Attendees can expect to engage with industry leaders, gain insights into innovative materials, and participate in hands-on sessions that highlight the artistry and craftsmanship inherent in textile design." 

Erm. You got the week-long right, but somehow missed a beat with the latest trends thing. Unless you got stuck in, you know, let's say the 11th century and are now surprised to learn about those new-fangled late medieval trends.

Also, industry leaders. You'll definitely find some really, really good people there. But... somehow I have the feeling that it's not the industry that website is talking about. 

And then, to make things even weirder, I found out that Mayen seems to have snuck over across the pond for our Forum in 2023, because it's listed as taking place in Birmingham, USA. (Apparently we also were quite schizophrenic, too, if there were more than 500 people there. I only counted a few more than a dozen, and I'm pretty convinced that I did attend exactly that event.)

Now I'm wondering if that listing explains the occasional very weird mails and registrations I had for the Forum in the past years, with people from far away proposing some presentation about some very modern process and how to make it more sustainable. 

Funnily, also, the link promising to explain how the event got to being listed there leads... nowhere. Well, to a 404, but basically the same.

I've put in a request to delete this event listing now. I'm all happy for the Forum to get exposure, and for people to know about it, but then at least add a link to our own website, and a correct description, thankyouverymuch.

I won't go into any speculation on whether liking to use old programmes is somehow linked to being an archaeologist or not (it might just be me being cheap and lazy, after all), but, well... I did the jump from Windows7 to Win10, which should tell you a lot already.

Now the end of support for Win10 is approaching quickly, and I'm here with a still perfectly functional computer that is, as the Win11 evaluation programme tells me, not good enough to run Win11. 

This, as you may have guessed already, irks me quite a bit. And not only for me and my system - after all, I bought this machine refurbished four or so years ago, which can be considered as quite a while in IT terms - but also for all the millions of computers that are now forced into obsoleteness. The amount of unneccessary trash that makes, it's mind-boggling.

For a bit now, I had already decided to draw out any change or upgrade to the OS for as long as possible. Today, I looked into possibilities of extended support, at least for security patching... and found some interesting things.

Firstly, if you have the latest version of Win10 installed, you might even be eligible for free extended-life support by Microsoft. This life extension with security updates was offered on previous versions of Windows, but usually just for companies, and at a price (quite hefty, too). It looks like they are now offering it to everybody, and in some cases for free. The some cases are either using Microsoft Rewards points, or syncing your Windows backup to OneDrive (5 GB are free). I have not found out if the sync option means you have to backup everything there, or just the Windows settings, but either way it's not an option that I personally find attractive. You can read more about the MS extended support here or here. The extension is planned for at maximum three years, although there seems to be a plan to extend Win10 support for some companies until 2032. (Don't ask me how you get this, I have no clue.)

In case that all doesn't sound attractive enough for you, I also learned that there is a company specialising in security support for outdated programmes and operating systems. It's called 0patch (pronounced zeropatch) and they have adopted Win7 before, and still provide it with security patches so the machines are safe to use. Now they will be offering the same for Win10, and their plan is to do that for at least five years.

I will definitely look into this!

Today was finally, boringly, mind-numbingly spent on maintenance and sorting (and deleting!) stuff. Old programmes, old private mails, old stuff here and there. It's not all finished, but it does look much better already.

Also, as there's now the end of Win10 maintenance looming over my head, too (and of course my computer is not able to do Win11 out of the box, big surprise), the find-a-new-photo-database thing has again gained a little bit more pressure. The Most Patient Husband of Them All, who's been using digiKam for a bit now and is quite happy with it, has worked some magic ask AI the right questions stuff and it looks like there's a possibility to have a script that processes the .csv with the export data into .xmp sidecar files that digiKam can use. 

So there's a high probability of that happening, since most of the other things I'd found have at least one killer problem. (Many of them are DRMs with the unstoppable urge to pull all files into their own folder. Collector's management systems will only support a few items in the free version, and are cloud-based. Same base applies to a lot of general DRMs. Tropy, which I had high hopes for, does not do the watch folder thing reliably.)

Now I only have to do some more clean-up and tagging in FotoTime and then the exporting madness can begin. With testing. On subsections and with template test exports first.

Sigh. Wish me luck. 

After pointing you to French articles last week, here's another wonderful piece of news regarding publications: 

The York Archaeology Trust is very happy to announce that the fascicules AY17/5 Textiles, Cordage and Raw Fibre from 16-22 Coppergate, and AY17/11 Textile Production at 16-22 Coppergate are now available on their Collections website by kind permission of the Estate of Penelope Walton Rogers! 

These are wonderful resources - so if you don't happen to have them already in printed version, go head over there and enjoy. And thank you, York Archaeology Trust! 

Sometimes I feel a little like the ball in a pinball machine - something happens, so I roll to a specific something, and then three pings and one bing later, there I am, having discovered something entirely different and very nice.

Today, I pinballed to this French journal special issue: Se vêtir au premier Moyen ÂgeActes des 41^es Journées internationales de l'AFAM. Chartres (Eure-et-Loir) – 29 septembre au 2 octobre 2021. Vol. 1. It's a supplementary volume, it's all in French, and it is available to read for free online (if you want to download, you will have to pay). I've not gotten around to reading it yet, but the articles definitely sound interesting, so it's on my list now...