Redux: What to Wear on an Ice-Age Sea Voyage?

  If you were one of the 14 (a made-up number) people who read this back when LWON was publishing wonderful posts but was otherwise just a baby staggering around on inept little feet, we apologize for repeating ourselves.  Anyway, you probably weren’t.  One of the 14. Several superb posts on one of my favorite […]

Guest Post: Sun, Sea, & Sauropods

I grew up in L.A., but 25 years ago I sold my car and moved to Paris. I’ve had few regrets since, although I do return every year to see my old friends. Each visit reminds me that Angelenos don’t have much to be proud of, especially when they have to sit in traffic for […]

Brewing Up a Very Good Time

It started two Christmases ago.  That’s when I learned that beer is the new wine.  My nephew, a film student, came home from McGill expounding on the finer points of Belgian Gueuze and German Dunkelweizen.  And since then, foodie-friends have all but abandoned the pleasures of the grape for the more arcane delight of hops.  […]

Redux: Survivor Woman

Heather posted this on July 16, 2010, a time when we had probably 13 readers so apologies to all 13. She’s referring to a post Ann wrote about being dead wrong about some science. She also testifies to the physically horrifying life of an archeology writer. Yesterday, my colleague Ann Finkbeiner fessed up to one […]

Guest Post: Looking for Moderns in All the Wrong Places

  When the British Museum puts together an exhibition of more than 100 pieces of prehistoric art from all over Europe, stretching back nearly 40,000 years, you want to go. And so I did, making the rounds of this spectacular show the day after its opening on February 7. You’ve got until May 26 to […]

What’s in a Tattoo?

                                    A few years ago, when I was working in a somewhat gritty part of downtown Vancouver, I spotted a tough looking man with an unusual set of facial tattoos. On the right side of his face, someone […]

The Shiny-Jewel Tree of Palenque

This story begins in darkness—darkness both literal and metaphorical. On a dripping wet day in 1952, an archaeologist stood in a small dank corridor deep inside a pyramid known as Temple of the Inscriptions, in the old Maya city of Palenque. In the shadows ahead, a massive triangular stone door blocked his way. For four […]