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Dr Rich Boden FLS FRSB FRSA FRMS FZS

@bodenlab

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Aging hippy. Consultant. Bacteriologist. Educator. Editor. Writer. Artist. Crafter. Reader. Multi-instrumentalist. Chemist. Physiologist. Baker. Cook.

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I do not wear this outside of the house anymore at my age (mutton dressed as mutton!), but this is a VINAGE fishnet-adjacent knitted jumper made of faux-beetled black linen. I bought it in 2002 and in those days, I could wear it with nothing underneath and I didn’t resemble a net bag of satsumas! I used to wear it in the daytime as well, not just by night. Half my clothes were see-through black mesh-y stuff or open-knit crocheted trousers that bordered on obscene! I used to buy flesh-coloured dancers’ drawers from a shop in Covent Garden to heighten the illusion whilst showing nothing at all. I now recognise a bit in @cher Cher’s wardrobe from the 70s and 80s that she did what I did: wore see-through and flimsy clothes but as if they were just a pair of jeans. I didn’t see them as gratuitous or lewd, just interesting fabrics that looked good on me. I was far from promiscuous in those days too - practically a nun compared to many friends at the time! I mean, I had my moments… Back In those days I weighed about 8.5 to 9 stone (119-126 lb/54-57 kg) and was perpetually very underweight from having grown up with very little food and not really realising the amount of food one should have been eating as a grown up! Like all things in life, “you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone” - and middle-age is a bastard for what it does to your body though I would absolutely not really want to be in my 20s again, not least in this day and age. We didn’t have to content with social media, smart phones, always-on communication etc. No one had the internet about their person - if we desperately needed it, there were stand-up web-browsing kiosks in major train stations etc at £1/5 mins! We still wrote letters, emails replaced memos and letters and weren’t being used yet the way text-messaging was/is. Most social pressures re: weight/clothes/brands/style came from choosing to buy certain magazines or watch certain TV shows: we could switch it off. I knew no one who chased labels/brands - it was all about style not fashion and intuitively assembling pieces from both cheap and expensive shops, charity shops etc and trying to be you, not resemble others. by @bodenlab

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Unimaginably joyous to be wearing socks that are basically made out of the hide of a flayed Fraggle. So warm! My (extremely small, yet quite serviceable) feets are very happy today. by @bodenlab

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21 hours ago

I never listened to podcasts at all before the summer of 2022 when I finally discovered the interview-y kind and later branched out into other sorts. I probably have 30 “subscribed” up Amazonian Music - a good 1/3 of which are long-dead and I need to cull them (some really good podcasts have been nixed by their production companies for “not doing well enough” meanwhile some utter shite seems to flourish - I note that many of the former are done by minority podcasters with broad-church audiences and have had no marketing thrown at them - funny that!), and a good 5-6 that I religiously download on their respective update days each week and listen on the day they are out.

It is very rare that I remove a podcast from my overall suite completely, let alone those 5-6 regular ones but I have done so today after a week of thinking about it. It is one I had listened to for several years. Whilst the hosts may be very good friends off-air, it doesn’t change the fact that hearing a man from an upper-middle-class background repeatedly screaming “thicko!” at a dyslexic man from a working-class upbringing left a bad taste in my mouth. Whilst I’m the first to admit to be saying inappropriate things my friends in private, this was entirely one-sided and hearing that kind of punching down in public, mocking someone with a learning disability was really uncomfortable. I know it’s part of their conceit/schtick to take the piss out of one another and play up the class differences but those few minutes felt cruel and unnecessary. Since then, it just hasn’t sounded the same… and then I saw a whole Reddit thread of people who’d picked up on it as well, and previous stuff that had felt cruel, one-sided and uncomfortable. I can’t speak for what listeners with learning disabilities might think, but I don’t really want to listen to someone screaming such things at someone with a learning disability, even if done “in jest” or “it’s okay because they’re friends”. by @bodenlab

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5 days ago

Made an abundance of chili con carne this afternoon. Built on a Venezuelan aliño (red onions, garlic, green peppers and sweet chilli peppers cooked very slowly until soft), then minced cattle that was seasoned with oregano, marjoram, ancho flakes, cumin and coriander seeds (ground with my own fair hand), a fuck-off-massive bay leaf, salt, palm sugar, ground pepper (viz. me own mixture I make every few years with the black/white/red/green forms of black peppercorns; longpepper catkins; pink “peppercorns”, allspice, Java pepper and grain-of-paradise), garlic powder and onion powder. Bit of honey, bit of black alkaline-process cocoa powder, Henderson’s relish, bit of balsamic vinegar. Can of each red kidney and black beans, drained and washed. A vegetable stock cube. The tomatoes from a can of whole plum ones, drained and washed and crushed by hand. No tomato paste, no water. Yellow and orange peppers added last and cooked briefly so they keep their bite and freshness. Not as good as my all-singing-all-dancing version that is dark and sticky with both chopped cow and pig, a diced Mars Bar and a can of full-fat Coca-Cola, but very good indeed, still!
#chiliconcarne #chilirecipe by @bodenlab

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7 days ago

Some light Sunday afternoon reading, courtesy of @differentstrokesuk Different Strokes UK. Now 10 weeks post-stroke, I have realised on a few occasions I have become confused/disorientated when I am not getting enough sleep/maybe when a bit dehydrated, which did not happen pre-stroke. Example: today I was absolutely 100% sure it was Monday and that yesterday was Sunday and I only found out at 1300h when I noticed my phone said “Monday” just before I went to the shops. I had to google the date to be sure. Of course, I then instantly remembered that Royal Mail delivered a package yesterday so it could never have been Sunday! The post-stroke brain-fog and the post-stroke fatigue are real - I needed so much more sleep for the first month, ditto the “aftershock” headaches. The first week felt precisely like the day after having teeth out under halothane gas I the 80s! When it all first happened, I thought my face had not “dropped” really, but the left side had just become much stretchier/looser than the right and it never recovered. Having lunch with a friend 2 weeks ago, he said he could see it under my eyes, the two sides looking uneven. Having just shaved my beard off completely to get a proper look, I can confirmed I do indeed have a bit of a lopsided “stroke face”, but it’s not that bad and I don’t particularly care. Anticoagulants are now doing their thing, being anticoagulatory. Reducing cholesterol etc has been somewhat harder work than one had hoped owing to my gastroparesis and large amounts of fibre esp. in leafy greens being really incompatible (causing a night of “The Exorcist” vomiting and having to bin a duvet!). Managing it slowly via a plethora of pulses and eschewing my belovèd cheese, now. I am allegedly due to see the neurologists again “soon” but they have been buggering me about since early August trying to organise an appointment, ffs. Eating is still tricky as swallowing has never recovered and things get stuck, even if I’ve drunk water first. Still sticking to mostly soft food but have progressed from mashed potato and yoghurt to adding quite soft toast, various beans etc.

#strokerecovery #poststrokerecovery #differentstrokesuk by @bodenlab

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10 days ago

I have been stuck for what to watch tellywise for a few days but the sad death of Stephanie Cole (1941-2026) means it’ll have to be “Tenko” (1981-1985 - note that the useless BBC who now seem allergic to fact checking have called it a “seventies” show in their obituary article on her!). I’ve not re-watched it in at least 5 years so it is perhaps time. I’ve had it on DVD box set for nearly 20 years - summer of 2007 was the first time I had seen it since the 80s. I was living on a lake at the time and the background sound of coots and rails added to the atmosphere of the show, somehow! Like much drama of the 1980s, the casting was utterly perfect, the writing brilliant and even if it looks a bit “stage-y” by today’s standards with indoor sets having left/right exits with painted backdrops, the acting is absolutely top-drawer throughout. You can somehow feel the heat of the island near Sumatra even if it was shot in a sandpit in Dorset thanks to gallons of glycerine on the skin and hairspray on the clothes.

PICTURED CAST LEFT TO RIGHT:
Joanna Hole @joholeassociates as Sally Markham [now an agent]
Louise Jameson as Blanche Simmons
Ann Queensberry (1929-2026) as Judith Bowen/Cohen
Karin Foley as Debbie Bowen/Cohen
Stephanie Beacham @the.stephanie.beacham as Rose Millar
Emily Bolton as Christina Campbell [retired decades ago]
Stephanie Cole (1941-2026) as Dr Beatrice Mason
Veronica Roberts as Dorothy Bennett
Claire Oberman as Kate Norris [I believe she retired from acting]
Ann Bell as Marion Jefferson

My favourite characters were Blanche, Rose, the vile Miss Hasan [whose backstory I always wanted to know!] played by Josephine Lloyd-Welcome, Dominica van Meyer played by the late Elizabeth Chambers/Liz Riddington (1933-2018) and Sister Ulrika played by the late Patricia Lawrence (1925-1993).

I have long said the two people I would want near me in a crisis are Dr Beatrice Mason and Sister Ulrika! Both portrayed to perfection.

#tenko #stephaniecole by @bodenlab

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12 days ago

Rewatching “‘Allo ‘Allo” (1982-1992) - which I last saw early in the pandemic and that was the first time in nearly 20 years - on account of having stumbled on the @listenverycarefullypod Listen Very Carefully podcast last week. I am 30+ episodes deep in said podcast already. It is presented by Richard Gibson (Herr Otto Flick of the Gestapo), @guysiner Guy Siner (Lt Gruber) and Kim Hartman (Pte Helga Geerhart) - at the latter’s kitchen table. I always thought Ms Hartman looked like Dietrich in her Helga wig, hence the song! Not only a biting parody of “Secret Army” (1977-1979 - third image, look familiar?), but of war films in general and I think the later series had a bit of a “Wish Me Luck” (1988-1990) parody going on as well. I had really forgotten just how clever the conceit of languages represented by accents was, and the very theatrical, French farce nature of it managing to be extremely wicked parody whilst also have a proper plot line with story beats, jeopardy, conflict and threats. The late David Croft (1922-2011) and the late Jeremy Lloyd (1930-2014) were two of our finest comedy writers, and the casting was universally top-drawer, to boot. Farce only works if it is played 100% straight and not in the way most sitcoms are, for laughs. #alloallo #listenverycarefullypodcast #secretarmy by @bodenlab

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17 days ago

I never get bored of maps of Newfoundland: the fact that “Dildo” is near to “Spread Eagle” has been making me smirk for decades (and probably causing annoyance to Newfoundlanders!).
#newfoundland by @bodenlab

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20 days ago

Looking at random antiques earlier on (as is my wont de temps en temps) and was a bit startled to immediately recognise this 1923 platinum, coral and onyx art deco watch-back (it is the reverse of a chatelaine watch, designed to be worn on the lapel). As both a theatre buff and a costume-design buff, I recognised it as the original piece that the late costume designer Anthony Powell (1935-2021) copied for his design for Norma Desmond’s lavaliere pendant worn in her first scene of the 1993 production of “Sunset Boulevard” in London (and then used again in Los Angeles, New York, Toronto, Vancouver, Melbourne, Niedernhausen and US tours). I’ve never seen it before so it was quite pleasing to see. The second image is @glennclose Glenn Close (Los Angeles 1993; Broadway 1994; London 2016; Broadway 2017) wearing said costume with said lavaliere. All of Norma’s jewellery (and some of the prints on her clothes) were Mr Powell’s copies of original period pieces - including ones owned by Dietrich and so on - that a 1920s movie star could have owned and be still wearing in 1949/1950.
#sunsetboulevard #anthonypowellcostumes #1923jewellery #artdecowatch #chatelainewatch by @bodenlab

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22 days ago

I have - like many i am sure - rewatched “9 to 5” (1980) this past week. Directed by the late Colin Higgins (1941-1988 - died far too young during the AIDS pandemic) from a screenplay by the same and Patricia Resnick @patricia.resnick after an original story by the latter. She also wrote the book for the Broadway musical version (2009) that the late Dolly Parton (1946-2026) did the music and lyrics for, really showing just how much range she had as a songwriter. The title song for the movie has music and lyrics by her too and she played Doralee, the boss’s sexually harassed secretary, and was joined by @lilytomlinofflcial Lily Tomlin as Violet, the company veteran passed over for promotions in favour of men, and @janefonda Jane Fonda as the new girl, Judy. Said boss is played by the late Dabney Coleman (1932-2024) and aided and abetted by his assistant Roz, played by the late Elizabeth Wilson (1921-2015). The story is sadly still daisy-fresh and should not be, but workplace discrimination is still rife, it just goes under the radar and in ways that are harder to prove. Legislation always works to a point but then stuff goes underground. I think most of us know a Violet - brilliant at what they do but passed over for promotion time and again for shoestring “reasons”, only to have those they have trained leapfrog over them. Violets in the workplace aren’t always women - could be BAME people, LGBTQIA+ people, disabled people etc - it is very much still a 2020s story as much as the movie was a late-70s/early-80s one.

#9to5

I must have seen this movie 100 times - it used to be on telly all the time in the 80s and 90s, and I used to rewatch it on DVD a lot at one point in the many years sans TV early this century when I just watched DVDs on my PC and saw no TV whatsoever for years. by @bodenlab

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24 days ago

Have just rewatched a movie I’ve only seen twice before, “The Wolves of Willoughby Chase” (1989), directed by Stuart Orme from a screenplay by William M Akers after the 1962 Joan Aiken (1924-2004) novel that is the first in her Wolves Chronicles series of 12+ novels set in an alternate-early-1800s under King James III in which wolves have invaded from Russia, it snows a lot more and steam power has grown to the level that electricity one day would in real real life. The mid-90s BBC drama series “Black Hearts in Battersea” is based on the sequel novel which I only found out decades later. Tilly Vosburgh was fab in it.

With wealthy parents sent abroad “for the sun to warm [the mother’s] bones”, a governess is installed to look after the daughter and her cousin - said governess being their very distant cousin Letitia Slighcarp, played by a scenery-chewing Stephanie Beacham as the sort of camp-as-a-twat baddie that all children love. As she takes over the household and fires all the servants save for those played by Jane Horrocks and Richard O’Brien, she has a forger make a new will leaving the house to her and arranges to have the Lord and Lady’s ship sunk. The two girls are shipped off to an orphanage-workhouse-laundry in the nearby and deliciously named Blastburn, run by Geraldine James as Mrs Brisket and her teenage son Rupert (Abbie Dabner) who has a marvellous death scene that disturbed me for years after I first saw it! The denouement involves a steam-powered car, wolves and a bit of a “Home Alone”-y series of injuries to Miss Slighcarp (whose wig no longer seems to be a wig, somehow, in the final scenes). Most of the younger cast have left acting it seems which is a shame given Abbie Dabner as Rupert Brisket and Lynton Dearden as Simon The Goose Boy give two of the best performances! Both of them have very distinctive names but nothing shows up if you google them and neither has worked in acting since the 90s, and each time I have seen the movie I wonder what became of them.

I did try reading the novels about 10-12 years ago - got as far as the third one in the series and drifted away from them. May have another go one day.

#thew by @bodenlab

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24 days ago

Rewatched one of my very, very favourite movies today, “1947, Earth” aka “Earth” (1998), directed by Deepa Mehta @deepamehtaofficial based on her screenplay adapted from the late Bapsi Sidhwa‘s (1938-2024) 1988 novel “Ice Candy Man” aka “Cracking India”. Not long after the turn of the millennium, I first saw this movie on a portable telly in a kitchen in London Bridge with a view over 8 and 25 Canada Square rising up either side of the iconic 1 Canada Square at Canary Wharf: they were both still building sites! Three friends wanted to watch it - two first generation Hindus from North Indian families and a newly arrived Catholic from Kēraļam. I knew nothing about Partition until that point, I am ashamed to say. We were not taught it in school - we learned almost no international modern history and when we did e.g. learn about the indigenous population of the Americas, we didn’t learn about what WE did to them! I WAS taught about Holi and Diwali in infant school, and I had grown up around the odd Sikh kid, but the only Indian food I had eaten thus far were baafi, laddoo and jalebi via learning about Diwali. My parents would never have gone near an Indian takeaway, eschewing “that foreign muck” but I came to love Indian food via a restaurant in Elephant and Castle and later learning to cook it, and properly.

A deeply moving movie - middle instalment of Mehta’s “Elements Trilogy” - and one I think a lot of people in the world could benefit from watching at the moment, frankly. Set in a multicultural Lahore before Partition, viewed through the eyes of a young Parsi girl (Lenny, played by Maia Sethna) from a wealthy family that tries not to get involved as tensions grow between Sikh, Hindu and Muslim citizens. The servants cover all of the faiths and tensions start to grow within the house. The scene of Dil (the ice-candy man, played by Aamir Khan @amirkhanactor_) going to meet his sisters only to find everyone on the train has been killed stuck with me for a long time - as did the hate that took root within him as a result. The scene of the children trying to rationalise what they have seen through play, ditto. #1947earth by @bodenlab

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25 days ago