5 d. ago I see time as a grid in my mind. I remember the birthdays of friends I haven’t seen for 65 years

Judy Stokes, a retired GP, shares her experience as a spatial-sequence synaestheteRead more stories of synaesthesia in the way I feel seriesDid someone with spatial-sequence synaesthesia design the calendar app on mobile phones? Because that’s how time and dates look in my brain. If you say a date to me, that day appears in a grid diagram in my head, and it shows if that box is already imprinted with a holiday, event or someone’s birthday. Public holidays and special events like Christmas and Easter are already imprinted for the year, and the diagram goes backwards to about 100,000BC and then forwards all the way to about the year 2500 before tapering off.It was only in my 60s that I discovered there was a name for this phenomenon – not just the way time appears in this 3D sort of calendar pattern, but the colours seen when I think of certain words. Two decades previously, I’d mentioned to a friend that Tuesdays were yellow and she’d looked at me in the same strange, befuddled way t...

Politics

7 d. ago Giannis Antetokounmpo boos own fans during Bucks’ dismal loss to Timberwolves

Milwaukee fans show displeasure with team’s form‘When I get booed, I boo back,’ says two-time MVPGiannis Antetokounmpo couldn’t remember hearing boos from his home crowd during his brilliant 13-year career in Milwaukee. But it happened on Tuesday midway through the Bucks’ 139-106 loss to a Minnesota Timberwolves team playing without Anthony Edwards and Rudy Gobert.“I’ve never been a part of something like that before,” Antetokounmpo said after the game. “Something new for me.” Continue reading...

Sport

8 d. ago ‘Uncomfortably relatable’: writers on their favourite unlikeable movie characters

With debate still swirling over the unlikeable nature of Marty Supreme’s careless protagonist, Guardian writers have picked their all-time love-to-hate leadsSpoilers aheadI can remember seeing As Good As It Gets in theaters as a teenager and being pleasantly startled by the sight of Jack Nicholson’s Melvin Udall, romcom super grouch. Here’s a bestselling romance author who disdains love, an OCD sufferer who weaponizes his affliction, a New Yorker who hates crowds (who can’t relate?). In one scene, an adoring fan asks Melvin his secret to writing women. “I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability,” he says, an epic burn forever seared in my brain. Of course Melvin’s anti-charm offensive only goes so far in a James L Brooks project. Before long, the rudeness erodes as Melvin is forced on to a journey of self-discovery with the nextdoor neighbor he can’t abide (Greg Kinnear) and the diner waitress he can’t live without (Helen Hunt). Melvin comes out a changed man in th...

Politics

8 d. ago ‘Uncomfortably relatable’: writers on their favourite unlikable movie characters

With debate still swirling over the unlikable nature of Marty Supreme’s careless protagonist, Guardian writers have picked their all-time love-to-hate leadsSpoilers aheadI can remember seeing As Good As It Gets in theaters as a teenager and being pleasantly startled by the sight of Jack Nicholson’s Melvin Udall, romcom super grouch. Here’s a bestselling romance author who disdains love, an OCD sufferer who weaponizes his affliction, a New Yorker who hates crowds (who can’t relate?). In one scene, an adoring fan asks Melvin his secret to writing women. “I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability,” he says, an epic burn forever seared in my brain. Of course Melvin’s anti-charm offensive only goes so far in a James L Brooks project. Before long, the rudeness erodes as Melvin is forced on to a journey of self-discovery with the nextdoor neighbor he can’t abide (Greg Kinnear) and the diner waitress he can’t live without (Helen Hunt). Melvin comes out a changed man in the...

Politics

3 w. ago 'I was so angry': Queen Camilla speaks for first time about sexual assault on London train

‘When I was a teenager, I was attacked on a train I remember at the time being so angry,’ recalls the Royal

Politics

3 w. ago My weirdest Christmas: I was 11 and braced for tension. Then I found my parents and step

It was our first joint family Christmas, and I watched fearfully as my mum walked into the kitchen she had once called hers. The next 48 hours were full of surprisesThere are still moments I pinch myself: when, over the remnants of turkey and red wine, my divorced parents regale us all with an in-joke from their previous life. When, on the pre-lunch walk, my dad and stepdad stroll in lockstep and talk about finance and even feelings, occasionally. When we’ve all exchanged gifts, and the most thoughtful gifts are not between husband and wife or parent and child, but ones the divorced and remarried couples have given each other.We’ve been doing this for 25 years now, this joint family Christmas, complete with step-parents, parents and siblings. But every so often, I remember how weird it all once felt. The first time, when I was 11 years old, I watched fearfully as, on Christmas Eve, my mum walked into the kitchen she once called hers. Despite her initial efforts to pretend otherwise,...

Events

3 w. ago I'm in a sexless marriage and can't remember the last time we made love. It's taboo to admit but I'm happy about it: ANNIKI SOMMERVILLE

My partner Paul and I are sitting on the sofa watching a couple passionately make love on a kitchen counter. It's that classic unrealistic kind of sex that you see only on TV.

Politics

last month Test your Scottish football knowledge with our annual festive quiz

How well do you remember the sporting year? It's time to test your knowledge against the Record Sport's bigwigs.

Politics