Haunted by Neanderthals

So feeling a tad brighter. Covid test was negative. Not poked one of those bad boys up my nose for a while. Unhappy memories. I sloped about doing nothing much, instead of meeting up with Mark Hartley and Peter Hoibak today, my old school pals, as I had planned.  

Finished The Naked Neanderthal, by Ludovic Slimak, which was better about what the author thought was erroneous in the study of Neanderthals than on what was actually true. Nevertheless, deeply interesting. The thrust was that we should stop looking for ourselves in Neanderthals and try to see them on their own terms for what they were. He thinks they were creative people, with less of an ego compared to Sapiens. Their demise was brought about by Sapiens simply, he thinks based on his his work in a cave where Neanderthals lived for millennia and then were replaced in the space of a year by Sapiens. A nasty business first ethnic cleansing. 

A weird side effect. I am interested now in going to Jersey, as there is a Neanderthal site there at La Cott de St Brelade. When the sea there was dry land,  Neanderthal Jerseymen used to chuck rocks off what is now a cliff onto the unfortunate fauna below or, in one disputed theory, stampede them off the edge of the cliff.

Lorraine busily cooking and gardening and taking care of me, plus sorting things out prior to Amanda coming next week to paint some walls. We watched The Great British Bake Off this evening. People watch it as a comforting escape. Alison Hammond who is warm and lovely, has replaced Matt Lucas who was never a great fit for the show. It has helped them rediscover the magic ingredient: warmth.

The charismatic Ludovic Slimak outside his favourite Neanderthal haunted cave in France.