Why elephants don’t dance.

With just 5 days to go until Christmas and with most of the preparation out of the way its time to focus on relaxing for a few days.  One of my husbands Christmas traditions which dates back to his school days is sitting down to watch the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures.  These are aimed at children but are still very well worth watching.  It’s always a pleasure to see complex concepts being explained really well and the next generation being inspired by what they are seeing.  For some reason a few years ago the RI lectures moved from the BBC over to C4.  They did their best but with the constant adverbs and their attempt to bring what was already an excellent format ‘up to date’ I felt that they had dumbed it down a little.  This year The historic Royal Institution Christmas Lectures will return to their home on the BBC airing on BBC Four on 28, 29 and 30 December at 8pm. As well as explaining why an elephant wouldn’t make the grade on Strictly Come Dancing, the science lectures will reveal why hamsters can skydive without a parachute, why an ant can lift over 100 times its bodyweight, why chocolate is so amazing and how we could build a lift to the moon.  We’ll certainly be sitting down to watch these programmes and look forward to seeing how the BBC treat them this year.