I can’t necessarily offer an answer here, but I can give you a bound at least. I was able to find this 1703 geography of the Kingdom of Naples that explicitly calls Italy a boot, so “some time before 1703” can be said for sure

Forma una Penisola, à guisa di uno Stivale, fi come l’Italia tutta fù meditata da Strabone, e da altri Geografi di rigo

Machine translated:

It forms a peninsula, like a boot, just as all of Italy was studied by Strabo and other renowned geographers.

I’m fairly sure the Strabo bit means “we’ve known it was this shape since Strabo” rather than “Strabo said it was boot-shaped”

To speculate a little more, I think the style of boot that Italy looks like started off as riding shoes developed in 10th century Iran (heels are good for staying in stirrups, apparently). If that is correct then it can’t be earlier than the 10th century since there weren’t boots that Italy looked like

Didn’t they start handing blue checks to high-profile people that didn’t ask for them? Some time soon after they immediately became a marker of accounts run by warped knobheads

I definitely don’t think that they should be restricted, but I do find that weather significantly affects my tastes and some things are way better when specific ingredients are in season. I love cranachan but tend to go for it only when I can get good fresh raspberries, and I enjoy denser and heavier foods a lot more when I’m hiding from the cold

No. I don’t know if this is where you heard the story from specifically, but certainly here in the UK it was basically a lie spread by pro-Brexit figures. There is an EU regulation on the shape of fruits, but it’s only for classifying them; you can absolutely buy and sell funny-shaped fruit all you want. It’s just an easy way for buyers that do actually care about perfectly-shaped fruit to find that, such as wholesalers

It’s the day of Stonewall, so there are loads of pride marches, but also it was the last day of the first battle of Seoul in 1950 so the soul was slightly too early

There aren’t really good alternatives to the rare earth metals in terms of what they are used for, but there can be in terms of supply of them. Despite their name they are not actually that rare, just not very easy to extract economically. In terms of the percentage of Earth’s crust made up of them, most rare earths are pretty similar to such widely-used stuff as copper and tin. The problem is that they don’t usually gather up into high concentrations that are easy to mine, they’re all dispersed

China has a combination of really good reserves of them, a lot of industrial investment into the process of producing them, and a conscious strategy to be involved in other places with good reserves by doing the refining of their ores. There’s plenty of rare earth deposits elsewhere, but China has done it cheaper than everyone else for a while now. Brazil, India, Australia, and Russia have the next-biggest reserves, and I can’t help but note that China has made efforts to align with three of those four

Dvorak during the week to prepare for responsibilities, Beethoven at the weekend to celebrate freedom

I’m a cafetiere fan, but I’ve got a moka pot and a V60 as well because sometimes you just want something else. Getting a nice double-walled pot for ~£20 and some good coffee to put in it is some of the best value for money I’ve gotten. I don’t spend big on anything or go for any fancy gear. There definitely is space to treat it as a hobby/artform and go into all the tiny details if you want, but you don’t need to do all that to get great results

They are popular enough here in the UK, certainly, but I suppose we already had a fairly sweet tooth for our tea. Coffee that isn’t a sugary milkshake does remain the default if someone just says “coffee” though

Both

The companies are being investigated on suspicion of disseminating violent, pornographic or degrading messages accessible to minors, which can lead to up to three years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros ($87,465) for individuals involved, the office said. Shein and AliExpress are also being investigated over the alleged dissemination of images or representations of minors of a pornographic nature, which can lead to five years in prison and a fine of 75,000 euros, the prosecutor’s office said.

I thought I was being so clever making the connections of what I could do with that and it turns out I would actually have been

Anyway, have we tried selling them Opium again?

The UK is one of the world’s leading producers of morphine and codeine, so kinda yes actually

I haven’t played the Outer Worlds, but isn’t a whole lot of it about making fun of companies doing this kind of stupid shit?

Based on a quick look at some videos showing off the max settings, it doesn’t even look like it’s doing much with all that demand. It looks like a completely normal big budget game

the us should invite some Brits and learn to speak regular English again.

Every state has to pick a different British dialect though

Hah, that’s entirely fair

Seen Been, because I see him on the TV and he often no longer is

Is it not more likely to be from bàn (pale, fair-haired) than bean? I don’t know much about Irish, but certainly Scottish Gaelic speakers like to use hair colours as sort-of-surnames. Rob Roy is a good example, the Roy part being from ruadh (red, redheaded)

It’s a nice coincidence that Shawnbawn is blond himself, of course

If I had a lot more patience it would be cool to try to recreate one of those slide reels as panels around the pumpkin

It is, yes! I think I should have simplified the hearthian’s design more to make them clearer, but I’m pleased with it overall