Quiet Days, Vogon Poetry and Impossible Creaters After spending so many years surrounded by chaos at home, it always feels a little bit odd when travelling to find life suddenly becalmed. So much so that I slept in this morning. I can’t remember the last time I slept through until 9 in the morning - especially
The Journey West After a wonderfully unplanned night out with friends last night, we scraped ourselves out of bed this morning, threw clothes into travel bags, and set off towards Wells in Somerset - a small town near Glastonbury. After a somewhat eventful journey spent partly behind a tractor for ten miles of
An Accidental Writer Today's Wordpress writing prompt asks what alternative career paths you have considered, or are interested in. I’ve always loved the act of writing. I would never claim to be particularly good at it - passable maybe - but have always loved the act of sitting down and
Long Weekend The clock ticked into Friday ten minutes ago, and you find me almost giddy with the prospect of not returning to work until Tuesday next week. A long weekend away. Don’t get me wrong - I love the project I’m working on at the moment, but it’s
While Making Other Plans In early 2006, after discovering I have a rare genetic defect, after a third and final unsuccessful attempt at IVF, and after gazing into the yawning crater that had once been our bank account, we resigned ourselves to either never having children, or perhaps, maybe talking about adoption. We had
Round in Circles Earlier this year - at home - I switched my phone from a Google Pixel to an Apple iPhone, my desktop computer from a PC to a Mac mini, my laptop from a Chromebook to a MacBook, and my tablet from a Fire Tablet to an iPad. I wrote about
Half Past My Bedtime The clock ticked past midnight ten minutes ago. You find me sitting in the dark of the junk room, perched in front of the Mac with a mug of coffee while Joni Mitchell sings “Both Sides Now”. Scratch that. Tony Bennet is now crooning his way through “The Way You
One Foot in Front Of The Other Today’s writing prompt asks what principles define how you live. I wouldn’t say I necessarily have many principals – but I have coping mechanisms. I don’t tend to look back, and I don’t tend to panic too much about what might be. Sure, I might have the
A Step Back in Time We attended the party of a wonderful friend yesterday evening to help celebrate her 50th birthday. The invitation requested 80s themed fancy dress. Her costume resurrected her exact look from a student photo during the era - wearing a Wham t-shirt, denim jacket, huge plastic jewellery, and layers of various
One Virtual World Today’s WordPress writing prompt asks who you might give a million dollars to, if you had a million dollars to give away. I wouldn’t give it to an individual, and I wouldn’t give it to an organisation or charity, because I see far too many top-heavy charities
Decompression I’m having a “night off” tonight. Trying to slow down. Listening to music. Noodling around with this and that on the Mac. Not really achieving anything, and not worrying too much about that. It’s harder than it sounds. So much of my life is dictated by struggling from
Be Careful What You Wish For Aviation has been a common thread throughout my life – from the giant red encyclopedia that was ever present in our house, to the balsa Tiger Moth my Dad made at the kitchen table when we were small (the smell of dope still brings that memory back), and my brother building
Sunday morning in Spoons I’m sitting in Wetherspoons this morning, feeling incredibly smug to have bagged a table in a booth. Doing so seems to depend on arriving before 9:30. I had planned to be here for breakfast yesterday morning, but overslept. That seems to happen when you work 18 hour days
One computer to rule them all I’m sitting, writing this post while holed up in the junk room at home. I’m sitting in front of a desk with two monitors on it – one connected to a hulking PC that can out-perform most supercomputers, and the other connected to a svelte brushed aluminium slab – a
Taylor and the quiet rebellion Taylor Swift’s new album “The Life of a Showgirl” arrived this morning. As a fifty-something guy that invariably listens to retro radio stations targeted at people of a certain age, I probably have no business listening to songs sung by a girl twenty years younger than me. Or so
Life without Computers Can you imagine what life would be like without a computer? I’m old enough that I don’t need to imagine it – I can remember it. Our family’s first computer arrived when I was about 11 years old. I was part of the 1980s home computer boom in
The Need to Slow Down While racing from one thing to another throughout a typical day, I rarely give any thought to what I might not do – I’m invariably consumed with what I have not done – or what others might be able to accuse me of not doing. It never occurs to me to
An Evening at the Theatre After spending much of the weekend hiding from the world with a nasty cold, we ventured out tonight rather than waste the theatre tickets we bought over a year ago and promptly forgot all about. If the theatre hadn’t sent an email reminder yesterday, there would have been two
Six Days Six days have somehow passed since I last wrote - there’s quite a lot to unpack. I’m not really sure where to start, if I’m honest. Somehow a visit to London last week completely escaped the blog. The company I work for has moved offices - to
Pottering How on earth did I get from listening to tunes and hanging washing out to tip-toeing around the edge of gender politics and hate speech?
Cult Movies and Atomic Apparel None of the principal characters ever died. The robot almost always malfunctioned. The suave leading man always kissed the girl.
Favourite foods I'm pretty basic. I don't like fussy food - I can't be bothered with it. I like warming, filling food. Home cooked food.
An Adventure in London It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.
Everything, everywhere, again The blog to end all blogs I stood up about six months ago, before quietly shuttering it in a fit of “why am I doing ANY of this?” has been resurrected, and has essentially become the “source of all things”.
Escape Escape has become a theme recently. Escape from obligation, escape from expectation... escape from lots of things. It's a temporary escape, but sometimes needed.
