Recently updated blogs

I’ve been unsatisfied with how entity creation works in Dinghy (now renamed “Zinc”) for a while. I said as much a few months ago on the forums and I’ve been mulling it over ever since. Specifically, the more you lean into using ECS, the more the requirements around interfacing with it tend to grow like a virus in your codebase. Especially for “real” ECSs where you shouldn’t ever really be …

Dear readers: I appreciate your patience as I navigate some life changes (some negative, ultimately positive), which have taken much of my time away from listening and reviewing. I do hope to return to the ECM fold soon enough, as the universe allows. Those who’ve been following me for a while may know I’ve been known to moonlight as an academic, and my latest book is a testament to all …

Never in my life have I been so violently confronted by my brokenness than in the first year of separating from my husband in early 2023. My body and mind, both of which had historically existed as a kind of backdrop to my life thus far, suddenly took centre stage as grotesque, malfunctioning vessels of pain. I began looking for answers. I scrolled through hours of TikTok, desperately browsing the …

​The 21st century has been referred to as “the Chinese century”, a reflection of Beijing’s increasing political, economic, and cultural influence. China’s rising prominence is making waves in the antiquarian book world, as more people become interested in collecting works which can speak to China’s fascinating and complex history. Where once the rare book trade focused on a select group of famous antiquarian titles, dealers are now offering collectors access …

People don't respect sleep. They think of it as "wasted time," repeating stupid phrases like "you can sleep when you're dead." People drown themselves in caffeine and make themselves work through the night with some unfounded certainly that this will somehow get them ahead of a Sisyphean workload. But all of our experience and all of our science tells us that sleep is crucial to any semblance of a decent …

I had a great life as a pilot but back in the day "real men" didn't wear hearing protection. It was not just ramp noise but airborne with a pair of TIO 540's next to your ears and a incanal ear piece for the radio, I'm now profoundly deaf to high frequencies. I other words I can't hear female voices, the left ear is worse than the right and the …

Ensure your message not only reaches but deeply engages your audience. Drive transformative change efficiently with these five practical storytelling tips.As a leader, the ability to communicate effectively is crucial particularly when it comes to engaging stakeholders and driving transformative change within your organization. Making your key message tell a story and rise above the details of change to engage the hearts and minds of your audiences is a learned …

I did an excellent course on Strategy for Directors. On Monday, I shared some models we learned about and in this post I pull those together. Whether you are in leadership or not, you can use this process and the models to help your strategic thinking. If you prefer to watch rather than read, I covered a lot of this in my talk Analysing, Deciding, Doing: How to develop and …

So I’ve been trying out this app called Structured for planning my day more productively. It’s pretty cool — it basically combines your calendar and to-do lists into one place. But the way I’ve mainly used it is to block my time for different things I need to do each day. That way I can actually see my daily schedule laid out visually as a timeline, which really helps me …

Back when I started this, the Internet was a lot more promising. You could assume that your words would be indelibly etched forever into the conciousness of humanity. I’ve seen the future, I can’t afford it Turns out, that’s not quite the truth. Corporate greed has overtaken the thirst for knowledge, one could write up a detailed passage of a certain Rock Group’s album developments or release dates, but for …

Interference patterns from LED street lighting creates pixelated shadows.

Hello everyone, this is a short housekeeping update episode. I wanted to point your attention to a new podcast project I've started. It's called CREATIVE JOURNEYS, and it's not so dissimilar to Travel Writing World. However, instead of focusing on travel literature, I'll be talking about creativity more broadly and interviewing different types of creative individuals from historians to photographers to artists and authors. We'll talk about process and practice …

for students | for scholars | for pleasure This blog is no longer being updated regularly with fresh content. Here are some self-study resources (including text and video) for those who would like to improve their academic skills, whether they are students or scholars (or dilletantes like me). For Students I have written a short paper that explains my approach here: “How to Write at University” (PDF). It is also …

I seem to have accidentally come up with a method for duplicating a centuries-old terrain representation technique. From a 30m DEM of Churfirsten, Switzerland. If you’ve looked at old maps, you’ve probably seen hachures: lines that run up and down along the slope of terrain features. There were a wide variety of approaches to doing hachuring, with different rules. But, in all cases, they attempted to give a reader a …

The PIGUM (which is an acronym for Porth I’r Gymru Ultra Marathon) is a 30 mile race with around 1700m (5500ft) elevation gain/loss, starting in the market town of Abergavenny, Wales. Porth I’r Gymru translates to “Gateway to Wales”. The PIGUM, 2024 route profile Last year I deferred this race due to scheduling issues, and this year I wasn’t originally going to do it either, as I had booked the …