Screenshot of the Uber app listing the Berline, Comfort, UberX, Van and Uber Fashion tariffs with prices in euros.

NB! · Observations · Pop Culture · Humour

The Berline tariff in the Uber app and the popular Uber Fashion tariff

I travel Berlin class, black cars. But what proves popular is the “Uber Fashion” fare

Aristocracy · Monarchies · Observations · Humour

Physical resemblance of Princess Beatrice, Princess Victoria of Wales and Queen Victoria

A Case in Which There Can Be No Doubt of Aristocratic Descent. Princess Beatrice, niece of King Charles III and daughter of the notorious Prince Andrew, was born in 1988, and her distant relation Princess Victoria of Wales, daughter of Edward VII, was born in 1868. The same shadows beneath

Black and white photograph of an elderly man in a flat cap and coat lighting a cigarette, with a canal lock and bare trees behind him.

Books · People · Humour

French writer Albert Simonin lighting a cigarette beside a canal

The Earth Is Round, but There Are Idiots on Every Corner. The French writer Albert Simonin

Observations · Society · Paris · Nature · Humour

Even the Paris City Hall Is Now Asking: Girls, Please Stop Behaving Like This

On the fence of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, as at other historic monuments, there are posters with the plea "Stop the rats!" and an explanation: waste left on the ground attracts rodents. On the whole, it is just like private life: the more waste you leave behind, the

Archive · Art · Books · Observations · Humour

Raise your hand if you, too, can account for your early-morning awakening only by an assault of demonic swine hordes

Illustration from the 1463 book Speculum Historiale [The Mirror of History] by the medieval French chronicler Vincent of Beauvais

Architecture · Heritage · Paris · Humour

Gilded bulls temporarily vanish from old butcher's facade on Paris's Rue Mouffetard

An amusing story. In Paris, on the Rue Mouffetard, the "golden" bulls that were the trademark of an old butcher's shop, which operated from the 18th century until the 1970s, vanished from its historic façade, a listed monument of architecture, in the course of restoration work.

Stone statuette of a veiled woman holding a book, seated on the edge of a tomb with Gothic niches.

Faith · Observations · Humour

Stone figure of a veiled woman reading a book on a tomb

The Nun of Guisch Abbey Keeps on Reading Even After Death. If you happen to know one, do forward her this post

An elderly white-bearded man stands on a windowsill looking outside, in a room with framed pictures, a wicker chair and a wooden armchair.

Archive · Books · People · Humour

Bernard Shaw, aged 61, standing on a windowsill in a photograph of 1906

George Bernard Shaw Has Climbed onto the Windowsill. There is absolutely nothing to see here, move along. The photograph dates from 1906; Bernard Shaw is 61 in it.

Books · Saint Petersburg · Humour

Böll tells of Dostoevsky's grandson, a Leningrad engineer

Böll tells of Dostoevsky's grandson, a Leningrad engineer. Having retired, he became a tireless, meticulous researcher and biographer of his grandfather. He made us count the steps from "Raskolnikov's house" to "the pawnbroker's house", and showed us the door behind

Art · Observations · Humour

The Artist Émile Friant as the Embodiment of Readiness for the Trials of the Coming Week

Portrait in the studio interior, 1882

A blue horse with three eyes on green hills under a pale sun, with a ladybird sitting on its back.

NB! · Art · Observations · Society Pages · Humour

Work by Syugir Buluktaev with a three-eyed horse at the Sistema gallery opening

Syugir Buluktayev's horse at the opening at Sistema gallery, all three of whose eyes have popped out of their sockets at the art on view. To make sense of the sheer quantity of art events now taking place, one requires the serenity of a blissful ladybird

NB! · Nature · Humour