As anyone who was at a typical archaeological dig knows, work safety is not always easy to achive. To be really safe, for example, it would be necessary to bank the sides of any trench after about 1.5 m of depth. Now this is unfortunately not possible if you want to document and analyse an archaeological profile... and there are many other conflicts between archaeology and perfect work safety like this.

Most archaeologists know about the risks. But since it's often a choice between take the risk or do not dig and document at all... the risks usually get taken, and most of the time luck is with them who wield the trowel and the showel. That said... situations like the one that you can see here (provided the link works - their server seems to be a little iffy) make me gulp.

So should you consider studying archaeology, or should you be one of the many folks who think they would love to be an archaeologist... it's not only hard and dirty work with not so much pay, standing in the exhaust fumes of big excavator machines sometimes, know that it often also means that you take quite a lot of risks - since you don't know what is behind a wall, or a trench wall, and you still go there and you still do the work.

If you are interested in learning more about the linen bras and underwear from Schloß Lengberg in Austria, you might consider to attend the Autumn MeDaTS meeting in London on October 27, where Beatrix Nutz will be speaking.

In this conference we want to explore ways in which we can approach craftspeople behind objects and find complexes in the archaeological record. How have craftspeople left marks on things, places, and times? What roles did they play within their communities, and can we trace their social status through the archaeological record? What methodologies are available to identify people behind material remains? How are craftspeople linked across geographical and temporal planes, how is knowledge and skill reproduced and transformed?
To this end, we aim to bring together a diverse group of scholars to discuss the nexus craft – people – archaeology across a range of materials (such as lithics, ceramics, metal, textiles, etc.), periods, and regions, incorporating evidence from prehistoric and early historic societies across Europe and the Mediterranean.

You can read more about the conference on their blog; CfP is also still open with a deadline of June 15. 

And finally, don't forget about our own Textile Forum in September - we still have some places left. A conference programme will come out shortly, but I can already promise interesting things like a sprang workshop.

 As promised, some pictures. First of all, a tulip from our garden - most of them are done with their blooming now, but a few last ones - the black ones, mostly - are still holding their own.


And this is the current market stall setup, with the new banner in place. This is how the stall looked at Freienfels, and I'm very happy with it!


And finally... Madonna, hanging out on the living room carpet...

I'm more in the mood for another Saturday or Sunday than a Monday, but I guess it can't be helped. It was a really nice weekend, though - we did a lot of grocery shopping and baking on Saturday and a little cooking on Sunday morning, and then spent time with a heap of friends eating and drinking and having fun.

Since Thursday, we also own a cat - or perhaps I should say, as usual, a cat has determined that we will be her staff now. She was found and brought to an animal shelter, and she's still getting used to her new life and surroundings, and we are getting used to our new flatmate... but she's a sweet and gentle cat, a little shy to try new things, and totally addicted to getting petted by humans. Any humans.

(And yes, I know that the Law of the Intarwebz requires me to post cat photos soon. Because I wrote about a cat living with us. They will follow.)

Summer season always starts with Freienfels for me, and probably always will - even if events like the IRM come before it. May 1 has been a fixture in my yearly planning for so long now.

This year, Freienfels was wonderful again. We had a terriffic time in our "WG" (that's short for "Wohngemeinschaft", people that share a flat) with relaxed but funny evenings and I got to know a few more wonderfully nice people. There was a lot of lovely and yummy food, among it plenty of Harry's Schokokringel from the Feldbeckerey - not authentically medieval with all the chocolate in them, but totally addictive - and Lotte in our WG went on a baking spree and made strawberry buns to die for.
The weather was also playing along, it was nice and sunny with only a few little showers - including one with impeccably bad timing on the last morning, just before packing the tents back into the car. So my free day yesterday contained a little work after all - spreading the tent fabric in the sun to let it dry and then pack up the two tents.

And today I have to finish unpacking and rearranging my stuff into the new, bigger basket for my goods that I bought at Freienfels. The old basket was getting too small, so it was high time for an upgrade. But first coffee and breakfast and paying of bills that came in during the last week...

If you ask me, Jim C. Hines is a hero. Really.

Not only does he write awesome books that I really enjoy (that also feature kickass women), he has a blog and he uses it. But not only for the lighthearted, fun stuff (though you find that there, too) or for plugging his books, or for reviewing others' books.

He also tackles serious issues, and he does so in an amazing way. He writes about rape. About his issues with diabetes. About how words can hurt people. About his depression. About privilege, and about sexism on book covers.

So while I'm in Freienfels and thus not blogging, go read his blog.
(I'll be back to regular blogging on Friday, May 4. Star Wars day.Until then... may the force be with you.)

Yesterday afternoon, when I set out to bake a cake, I realised I was really, really tired - things that are so normal that they should not need any brain capacity at all were sort of... eluding me. Like the proper sequence to put in eggs and flour (hint: eggs first), that the baking powder should actually be added (almost forgot that), that it's really smart to first stir the starch for custard with a little liquid, and only then mix this paste into the boiling milk (hint: straining lumpy custard is possible, but not fun) and other brainless stuff like that.

In spite of all my botches, the cake turned out really nice and now serves as my breakfast. Well, a small part of it only, obviously. (I have this... thing... for baking cakes that can feed a company of hungry cake-eaters. I have some normal-sized ones in my repertoire, but most of my cakes contain instructions like "3 jars of cherries" or "2 kg of rhubarb" or "2.5 kg bananas". Just lifting the baking sheet and carrying the cake around earns you the right to eat some, because we all know that weightlifting persons need a lot of extra calories, right?)

Apart from this, I have the article to finish (it needs some closing words, then one last go-over, tweaking the bibliography and adding in the pics), some mails to write, some money to wire away, and then it's time to pack for Freienfels so we can start early tomorrow morning.