A Christmas Carol. My Brexit “take” on a popular seasonal tale. Happy Christmas everyone @mrjamesob @campbellclaret @chrisgreybrexit @rafaelbehr

1) The Temple of the Divine Claudius was a vast temple complex on Rome's Caelian Hill, overlooking the valley that would later be occupied by the Colosseum. Though almost nothing now remains of the structure, its scale and grandeur once rivalled anything in the city.. #LostRome

2) The 'Claudium' was intended as a sacred complex to revere Claudius and the imperial cult. Construction began soon after the death and deification of the emperor in 54 AD, initiated by his widow Agrippina who was likely responsible for his supposed death by poisoning. #LostRome

3) The sprawling temple complex sat on a gigantic podium that spread across the Caelian Hill, measuring 180 x 200 metres; with towering retaining walls of travertine that raised the structure 20 metres above the valley below. #LostRome

4) The elevated sacred area was likely entered by steps facing the temple on the west side. The temple itself had a projecting hexastyle porch and was surrounded by gardens and a grand portico, probably the 'porticus Claudia' mentioned in Martial's 'On the Spectacles'. #LostRome

5) Statues of both Agrippina and Claudius’ ill-fated young son Britannicus, sculpted in sumptuous dark Egyptian greywacke, were discovered among the ruins on the Caelian Hill in 1651 – and had almost certainly been displayed in the temple precinct. #LostRome

Spent a quaint half hour in a cafe listening to a guy yell at his dad after his dad said that the women Trump molested wanted it: "Dad, that's like saying the Jews who died in the Holocaust were asking for it!" ENJOY YOUR TERRIBLE FAMILIES THIS WEEK!

"Mom, has a man ever touched you without your consent?"
"Of course."
"Did you report it?"
"No."
"Dad, your WIFE has been through this!"

Dad was unmoved and told the guy to stop arguing with him.

At this point we learned the boy child has allergies.

I forgot to remark upon the presence of the very cute grandson, who was very small and gave not one shit about the yelling. I believe a sister or aunt was present and feeling very stressed. I wanted to hand her a Xanax or seven.

It was really hard to not jump in and say, "Sounds like you guys are going to have a fun meal tomorrow!" so they could unite in hatred against me, the outsider, and stop squabbling. Instead I exchanged glances with a nearby fellow lady patron, who also emotionally ate a cookie.

Anyway, I want to thank the random family for yelling about rape and the Holocaust in an Israeli cafe in the US of A today because it reminded me that while this country isn't the greatest, it is inevitably my stupid favorite and I am never, ever bored.

November is here, and that means a massive shift is coming. And by "massive" I am of course referring to the redefinition of the kilogram unit of mass that the world has been building up to for more than 100 years. Let me explain:

1/ I've had an unhealthy fascination with metrology (the study of measurement) ever since my 2nd year as a physics major when I took a class devoted to duplicating historic physics experiments, so please indulge me for going into heavy detail (get it?) about the kilogram.

2/ So what actually *defines* a unit of measurement? If you're American, you probably know a mile is 5280 feet and a foot is 12 inches and an inch is 2.54 centimeters etc. But where does this chain of definitions end? Is it turtles all the way down?

3/ It's actually not! For all units (even the imperial units used in America) the answers all end with the Système International (SI) unit definitions established and maintained for over 100 years by the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (BIMP) in France.

4/ At the base of this tower are the SI base units. Just 7 SI base units define every other unit in existence. They are:

Kilogram, kg (mass)
Meter, m (distance)
Second, s (time)
Kelvin, K (temp)
Ampere, A (electric current)
Candela, cd (luminous intensity)
Mole, mol (quantity)