Of Romans, boffins, whales, hogs and the Sunshine Band

It's another snippets post, dear reader:

• Historical discoveries news: The remains of London’s earliest Roman basilica - dating back almost 2000 years - have been discovered under an office block in Holborn.
• Another festival season we won't be going to news: London rapper Little Simz has been announced as the curator of the 30th edition of the Meltdown Festival at the South Bank Centre. Sigh. It'll be dreadful. Again.
• Precocious teen you love to hate news: Aged just sixteen, a teenager from Twickenham has landed a $1million deal in Silicon Valley for his self-coded AI program. At his age, my preoccupations were mainly Blondie, Tubeway Army, Not the Nine O'Clock News and masturbation (not necessarily in that order)...

• Boffin birthday news: Alongside fellow celebrants Peter Gabriel (75), Kim Novak, Stockard Channing, Robbie Williams, Peter Hook of New Order, Joyce DiDonato, Kevin Bloody Wilson and Sonia, and on the same date as the late George Segal, Peter Tork, Jerry Springer, Oliver Reed, Tennessee Ernie Ford and Emanuel Ungaro, it happens to be the 80th birthday today of the marvellously erudite Sir Simon Schama, stalwart of BBC history documentaries and house fave here at Dolores Delargo Towers; indeed, we have not one but two of his series lined up on iPlayer to watch.
• He made his home in that fish's abdomen news: A kayaker in Chile was swallowed - and then spat out - by a humpback whale!
• Another day, another load of wild beasts on the loose: 20 feral pigs, believed to have been deliberately set loose in Scotland's Cairngorms National Park, have been caught and killed. Hog roast, anyone?
• And, finally... How old?! news: Unbelievably, it is fifty years since KC and the Sunshine Band first dominated our discos and the charts - and by way of a celebration, the faboo DJ Cummerbund has come up with this [almost 15-minute long] slice of brilliance!

DJ Cummerbund - Everybody and The Sunshine Band [mash-up]

Wow!

And the weather? Dankness continues.

Don't fight the feeling, give yourself a chance

Another (particularly fractious) week drags inevitably to a close - and it's time to start thinking about letting our hair down [in my case up and out - I'm starting to look like Doc Brown in Back to the Future]!

Who better to get the glitterball rolling than the marvellous KC and the Sunshine Band?

Thank Disco It's Friday!

KC & The Sunshine Band - Shake Your Booty

Have a good weekend, dear reader.

I Like It, uh-huh, uh-huh

Britain enjoyed a full minute of optimum sunshine this morning before everyone started moaning about the heat.

The moment happened when everyone was either commuting or already in work, giving nobody opportunity to actually savour it before being stuck inside for a long, sweaty day.

Marketing executive Tom Logan said: “Sunshine’s great in theory. But when it’s nippy getting into work then a slow-roasted hell by lunchtime, I have to question the point.

“It’s basically treason if you’re British and don’t spend every single available second outside when the temperature exceeds 20 degrees, but I’m sweating cobs and my sandwich tastes of suncream.

“It’ll be baking when I finish work. It’ll be stifling when I go to bed tonight. And tomorrow’s Saturday, so it’ll be raining.”

The only people able to enjoy the balmy minute were old men on their way to buy a newspaper and schoolchildren playing truant.

72-year-old Norman Steele said: “Ah, wonderful to be out here with the rays playing gently on the sun-dappled pavements.

“Oh, minute’s over. Now it’s too hot.”

The Daily Mash

Of course.

Some of us Brits adore the sunshine, however...

...and we also adore The Sunshine Band!

KC & the Sunshine BandThat's the Way (I Like It)

It's a Bank Holiday weekend, too - so it's goodbye to the office till Tuesday. Yay!

Thank Disco It's Friday!

Don't fight the feeling

Phew. Thank heavens another week is out of the way, and fingers crossed the weather for once doesn't look to bad on the weekend...

To get us into the party mood and to lead us into that two days of freedom (and pottering in the garden, no doubt), here's the faboo KC & the Sunshine Band!

I think I need a pair of bell-bottom embroidered flares like these...

KC & the Sunshine Band - Shake Shake Shake (Shake Your Booty)

Thank Disco It's Friday!

Have a great time...

Uh-huh, uh-huh

We assembled en masse (fourteen of us!) and had a grand evening in the company of Dame Angela Lansbury last night (more of that later, no doubt!) - but meanwhile back at the ranch, there's another day to get through before we welcome in the weekend...

To help us get in the party mood, who better than those brassy funksters KC and the Sunshine Band, resplendent in the most lurid non-fireproof synthetic fabrics on the market back in '75, and their uplifting classic That's the Way I Like It?

Thank Disco It's Friday!

KC and the Sunshine Band - That's the Way I Like It [Soul Train]

KC and the Sunshine Band - still going in 2014!

Just to boogie wit choo

At the end of what feels like one of the longest weeks of my life, I am looking forward to celebrating the finale of Lesbian and Gay History Month tonight at Camden and Islington's "Winter Ball" gala, and to a springlike weekend.

Be assured I will be digging out my yellowest wide-collar shirt, my powder blue rhinestone tail-coat and stuffing a sock down the front of my flares - just like KC and the Sunshine Band!

Enjoy - and Thank Disco It's Friday!

KC and the Sunshine Ban - Boogie Shoes