* On the (pebble) beach this afternoon, an old bloke with a metal detector presumably looking for dropped coins; I’m not sure if that counts as desperation or simply persistence. He didn’t find any that I saw.
* On the steps of the Palais de Justice last night, a group of young men drinking. One of them accidentally kicked a bottle down the steps and it shattered at the bottom. He solemnly got a plastic bag and picked up at least the biggest of the piece before putting them in a bin – not what you’d see in London…
* Strolling along the pebbles under an almost full moon, I absent-mindedly picked up a sea-smoothed rock that would have made a perfect pestle, smooth and comfortable in the hand: when you think about it, while it is archaeologically unrecoverable, the first tool wasn’t those shaped by (semi-)human hands, but when a hominid, or an even earlier creature, first picked up an implement, found it good, and carried it with them with intent for future use. Probably a long way back – possibly even a dinosaur, this piece suggests.
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May i suggest that you read elaine Morgan’s “The Descent of Woman” – the most brilliant, funny and clear headed expostion of human evolution that i’ve ever read. Even the Tarzanists, after years of magisterial disdain, grudgingly acknowledge her point (Morris, Ardey, Leakey) The Sainted David Attenborough, though no specalist, recognised her good sense years ago.