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(There will be mentions — in vernacular but not actually vulgar terms — of male-male sexual practices that some will find icky, so this posting will not be to everyone’s taste; and it might stretch some kids’ horizons a bit, so a gentle warning) From back on 10/30, e-mail from Gadi Niram, with a video gift for me, saying: I found this video (and the young man in it) to …

One of the big current admin tasks is informing organisations that my Dad has passed away. I started on the utilities this week, calling BT to let them know, and to have the name on the account changed to my Mum’s name. (They do have an online form but it’s ambiguous in places.) That seemed to go OK. But then it was apparent the broadband at the house had stopped …

Harry Mulisch, one of the most significant figures in Dutch literature, recently came to my attention through Michael Orthofer’s Complete Review. Described there as “unquestionably among the leading authors of the second half of the twentieth century,” his work was entirely new to me. His personal history—a Jewish mother and an Austrian father with ties to the Nazi regime—infuses The Discovery of Heaven with a profound engagement with post-war history …

The White Reindeer (1952) was the first film made by Finnish cinematographer Erik Blomberg. It is set amongst the bleakly beautiful snowbound landscape of Finnish Lapland and tells the story of a newly married young woman called Pirita who becomes lonely, frustrated and desperate for affection due to her husband often being away herding reindeer, which leads her to seek out a shaman who gives her a potion which will …

I need an exactitude on the Ganni beanie athleisure mums. Beachy blonde hair. Sweaty betty. Puffer jacket. Dog with a bit of poodle DNA in it. I’ve joined Bluesky but I have nothing to say 🤷🏻. I told Chaz I don’t have a sense of smell and he suggested that maybe it just isn’t alive yet? Went to see Sam and Lizzy this weekend and spent 24h being fed and …

DEXX, a platform that advertises itself as the "first memecoins trading terminal application", disclosed that it had been hacked when it posted a message on social media addressed to "Mr./Ms. Hacker", asking they return stolen funds in exchange for "destroy[ing] all information we currently have on the hack" and not pursuing further legal action.DEXX did not disclose how much was taken in the breach, but hundreds of victims have reported …

The weather has gone from freezing us to blowing us away. It’s been super windy and wet here in London all weekend. I caught up on a lot of things, did a lot of thinking and did a lot of tasks I’ve been putting off this week. Not bad. Repetition OTB Photo 365 The Ministry Of My Own Labour Terminal Access Dipping the Stacks Reading Music Remember Kids:RepetitionThis quote from …

I went to a sort of unconference, though I’m not sure what its formal categorization is if any. Back in the day when there were like 6 unconferences a week, open spaces, BarCamps, and so on in the Bay Area alone, it was semi hilarious to me to see the internecine battles over exactly what could and couldn’t be called “open” space. You can probably still find it somewhere, if …

Species / Count Canada Goose - 105 Gadwall - 2 Bufflehead - 2 Ruby-throated Hummingbird - 1 Great Blue Heron - 1 Black Vulture - 1 Bald Eagle - 1 Downy Woodpecker - 1 Carolina Chickadee - 1 White-breasted Nuthatch - 1 Carolina Wren - 1 Chipping Sparrow - 8 White-throated Sparrow - 16 Song Sparrow - 3 Swamp Sparrow - 2 Northern Cardinal - 1

I love music. I love playing music. I love making musical instruments and music software. I don’t have formal musical training. I’ve never taken lessons, and honestly, I’m a pretty bad musician. What I do excel at, though, is hoarding musical instruments. At this point, name any instrument, and there’s a decent chance I have it somewhere in my room. Some of these instruments never played anything better than “Twinkle, …

1. Who rules us? Google changed its rules on what kind of behaviour it regards as “spam” and, of course, the impact on some companies will be pretty negative. The behaviour it is targeting is so-called “parasite SEO”, where a publisher allows a third party to create content for part of its website in return for a large amount of money. Typically, this might be a subdomain or subsection which …

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. ***If you ventured into your local recording studio, this month in 1984, you may have encountered history being made.At least, you might if your local recording studio was in Notting Hill.That's because it was the month in which thirty-five of Britain and Ireland's mightiest pop stars - and Marilyn - got together …

LOL. Login to your My Account etc. (This is Amazon, obvs.)

Mark Twain? Oscar Wilde? Thomas Love Peacock? Algernon Falconer? Richard Porson? An open book with three roses from Pixabay Question for Quote Investigator: The complexities of the German language inspired the following comical statement: Life is too short to learn German. This statement has been attributed to U.S. humorist Mark Twain, Irish playwright Oscar Wilde, English satirist Thomas Love Peacock, and English classical scholar Richard Porson. Would you please explore …

I found the answer to the annoying bureaucrats who ask what percentage of the work on a publication was done by each of its authors, in the writings of St Bernard. He said, Grace is necessary to salvation, free will equally so—but grace in order to give salvation, free will in order to receive it. Therefore we should not attribute part of the good work to grace and part to …