He once left a notepad in my store and the next day, when I saw him and returned it, he was so wide eyes and grateful. He offered me a reward, but when I declined, he thanked me profusely and left. From then on, Bill would come in almost every day. He was a big tipper and when we were busy, he’d open and close the door instead of putting his order in. Sometimes he would spend 30 minutes opening and closing the door for customers and saying hello to them.

Bill was a big guy, but moved very gently and spoke as if he were whispering. I only looked him up because I promised him years ago that I would read something he wrote and for some reason, he sprang up in my mind. Very sad news indeed.

Let’s not underestimate the scope of the “haunting” past!

Channel 4 in the UK got it right last night in their documentary called “The King in the Car Park” – [Link]

Setting – a car park that used to be Greyfriars Church in Leicester UK.

Presenter – mop haired Simon Farnaby – “comedian actor” as he described himself, and best known, if at all, from The Mighty Boosh and the TV version of Horrible Histories. Comment on the body, its bent spine and bashed in head – “If that isn’t Richard III, that is one unlucky monk.”

The star was not an academic or historian, archaeologist or Church official, but Philippa Langley of the Richard III Society – devoted, quite literally, to putting the record straight about her hero, proving that he wasn’t Shakespeare’s monster, but a good King. Have a scout round their Facebook page – [Link]. The society bankrolled this whole affair, and not least through Philippa’s energies.

She felt the vibes as she walked through the car park, even before any excavation – “And there, painted on the tarmac was a letter R!” – “It’s like Richard III wanted to be found” she said to UK’s Daily Mail – [Link] – “I absolutely knew I was walking on his grave”.

She was so certain of this that she insisted, against the protests of the embarrassed archaeologists that it was somewhat premature, given that no scientific tests had been performed, that the cardboard box containing the excavated remains be draped in his royal colors, before it was whisked off to the local CT scanner in a somewhat modest Vauxhall Astra.

Several times she broke down in tears, so moved was she by the presence of … well, Royalty, I suppose.

There you have it – another familiar aspect of personal connection – fascinations with fame, celebrity and royalty, especially when there’s the twist of this being a decent royal (and handsome too, according to the facial reconstruction) misjudged and unfairly maligned by the media, albeit that being Shakespeare.

PS Paddy Power the Bookmakers are offering odds of 4/1 that Philippa Langley will front a new Channel 4 archaeology series, after the scrapping of “Time Team”, the world’s most popular TV archaeology program.

The religious respect accorded the remains at the press conference;

The competing claims over where the remains will be reburied (Leicester, Westminster Abbey in London, York?);

all point to the primacy of this emotive and personal link with the past.

Contemporary Art between Time and History – Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal – [Link]

On very strange homes indeed – http://www.mshanks.com/2004/12/05/everyday-horror-repressive-normality-and-the-archaeological-imagination/

http://haecceities.wordpress.com/2011/04/19/the-uncanny-territory-of-the-home/

https://www.google.dk/search?q=like&hl=da&tbo=d&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=t5HLUOeABob0sgbkhoD4CA&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAA&biw=2087&bih=1027