Philobiblon

Welcome to the Britblog roundup, the all-singing, all-dancing carnival that brings the best of the blogosphere of these islands to you in one easy show – as nominated by you, the readers. Do send your favourites to britblog AT gmail DOT com for Westminster Wisdom’s edition next week.

Section 1: Getting the keyboard dirty

I always like to read about people doing things, getting out and about. Journalists might be, as Flat Earth News points out, increasingly chained to their desks, but there’s no reason for bloggers to be.

So I’m going to start with a collection of bloggers seeing and doing things for themselves, which will also take you on a small but perfect formed tour of the nation…

What could be more evocative of England la profonde than “Whipchicken Farm, Dog Drove South, Dog Drove North and Powder Blue Farm”. They’re on Unmitigated England’s route through the fens It turns out the last name does make more sense than it sounds – but I’m still puzzling about the others, although there’s more on driving dogs right at the end of this roundup, which might shed some light on the subject…

Also walking, if soon not to be, is Dr Sean in West Sussex, who’s found his sensible pedestrian path into town is to be cut – although as is so often the case, the council “consultation” was invisible to those affected.

And walking for a purpose is Adrian on Green Reading, who provides a photographic account of the Japanese peace walk to Aldermaston.

Bibbluemeanie is seeing first hand in London the inhumanity of the asylum system – some minor officials throw their weight around – and a few days later the subjects are back at work…

Also seeing heavy policing is fellow Britblog host Suzanne Lamido, who lives just up the road from me (but not all the hosts are north Londonites, promise) found herself on the fringes of a major police operation. Helmets, massed ranks, screaming sirens. Seems they found lots of dodgy mobiles and forged documents, with 35 arrests. Let’s see – 1,100 police, divided by 35 arrests …

At the real front line, Random Acts of Reality meets a genuine victim of life.

Which kind of puts all of the fuss about Terminal Five in perspective, still Diamond Geezer had the sense when visiting on day one, with camera to always have the intention of leaving by Tube.

Finally in this section, you can go with Julie on Londonist, who braved the rain and the drinks tent to see the boat race. Okay, maybe it’s just because I’m antipodean, but I just don’t get the excitement…

Section 2: History and media

(Unashamedly pandering to my own interests here, but they’re all great posts…)

Sharon on Early Modern Notes is braving the depths of a minor feud to explain just how to get extra points in an academic pissing contest. It runs along the lines that “to get this piece of information I had to crawl over broken glass,scrambled over barbed wire and….

On Early Modern Whale, Roy is analysing two accounts of the explosion of Mt Etna in 1670. As a shorthand, one might be from the journal Science, the other from the Daily Mail.

On Mind the Gap, Peter Tatchell’s use of Sylvia Pankhurstis questioned.

But Anna on Inklings has no problems at all with a BBC account of Edwardian mourning – and she looks further into its nasty health effects for women. (Men just got to wear a ribbon on their hat!)

The Magistrate, like lots of people, does, however, have problems with the Daily Mail. Well don’t we all – but in this case it either doesn’t grasp the nature of the law of common assault, or thinks there should be a special law for “financial advisors”. Well so might many of us – just not in the direction the Mail is pointed.

And finally, if Shakespeare wrote 884,647 words with a quill, how can we generate millions of items between computer backups?

Section 3: Politics

Our own Matt Wardman has instituted roundups of the Scottish, Welsh and Westminster parliament. Given the government’s sudden desperate enthusiasm for constitutional reform, how long before there’s a “English” to add to the collection?

And Amused Cynicism has turned serious to back a campaign to get parliamentary bills published in an accessible form. Whatever will these supporters of democracy think of next?!

Perhaps serious analysis of bills, as Spy Blog has done to the Draft Governance of Britain – Constitutional Renewal Bill. It is your democracy the Spy is trying to defend, so you really should read this.

Because of course legislation is the solution to all problems, as Feminist Avatar notes on An Open Letter by a Feminist about suggestions that the legal drinking age in Scotland be raised to 21.

Elsewhere in politics:

• * My heart sank when directed to a post making comparisons to Nazis (usually not a good sign of sensible argument), but on Prison Law Inside Out, the jailhouselawyer assembles an account of our disappearing civil liberties.
• * Blood & Treasure looks back to the Eighties with fond nostalgia – not for the music but the personal freedom.
• * A short sharp take on how the terminal five kerfuffle could enter the Guinness Book of Records.
• * What would really doing something about child poverty cost? Antonia has some calculations.

Section 4: Miscellaneous

Finally, to the uncategorisably curious. Into which class the Blog of Funk’s celebration of the bendy nature of cheese definitively falls.

As does Liberal England’s account over the row over a an advert in which a song goes for a drive and sings – in this case with genuine music nostalgia.

And Onionbagbloggers solution to the disappearing wheelie bins.