I’ve been slowing reading, backing up, and re-reading the novel The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad. It came out in 1907, and it turns a 120 years old in a little under a year. It came out in September of that year, though on the 12th, not the 11th. The book’s depiction of politically motivated violence is so intense that Conrad saw fit to pen, a year after its publication, a non-apology (“I do not regret having written it”), and that statement appears as a preface to the edition I’ve got on my…

I am useless on airplanes to airports. Before a trip I tell myself, “bring a book”, “work on this project on your computer” etc. But as soon as I get to the airport or plane my energy is depleted, gone. It doesnt matter if I have lounge access, or if I’m sitting in business class with a little extra leg room, I have no energy for deep/real work. And I have had to accept that regardless of what I think before hand, those travel days are “dead days”.

Between working/studying, visiting relatives, going out, beach, countryside, and bureaucracies I had to fight, there's not much time left to sketch during this trip to Brazil. Before coming, I thought I'd be able to sit everyday, to take the notebook everywhere, to sketch while drinking a caipirinha. Well. Maybe next time. But at least I'm trying to sit down once a week to sketch from photos or from imagination! Here's a small sample of things we ate during our first week in my hometown.

A cute high school romance. Usually I get bored with high school romances like this. But this one managed to keep my interest through the end, mostly by introducing multiple pairings, all of which are pretty adorable together. I think it also helped that the characters acted like kids. I hated the ending of Horimiya and this did not make the same mistake. Also, I just generally like the setup of the opposites attracting. There’s something to be said for people encountering each other, not…

We take our kid to some concert, like the Wiggles but it isn’t the Wiggles. That band does their thing and leaves, and then They Might Be Giants comes on! My wife and I are very excited. The kid is nonplussed. (It’s funny because my wife actually doesn’t super care about TMBG, but anyway.) TMBG play a few songs, and my kid wants to leave but they bring out that big stick that John womps on the ground. I don’t know the actual name of it but I say, “We can’t leave—look they have the Wompin’…

Most people would think Maggie is just another 26-year-old who hasn’t found herself yet. Post-pandemic she has drifted from job to job, and is currently delivering groceries. And, like many of us, she has escaped from a bad day at work by immersing herself in her favorite series - in her case, two fantasy novels set in the city of Kair Toren, focusing on the power struggles of eight royal families. Maggie has read them so many times she knows them as well as their mysterious author. Read more »

There's something wonderfully nostalgic about a homemade pan of macaroni and cheese, and this Spameroni & Cheese takes that comfort to a whole new level. Rich, creamy, and budget-friendly, it's the kind of cozy casserole that comes together using simple pantry ingredients, yet tastes like a true family favourite.Tender elbow macaroni is folded into a velvety cheddar-Parmesan sauce, brightened with a kiss of Dijon and hot sauce or extra depth. Then comes the fun twist - savoury cubes of Spam…

Starting this new project, I’m going in blind. I have thought about where I wanted to go and what I expected at the end of it, but I haven’t really made a detailed plan of what exactly I was going to do. I don’t even really know how I’m going to present things. I’m winging it. One thing I’ll add to the remit is that I won’t change the photos I take in any way. As the purpose is to show things as they are, the photos will be straight out of the camera using predefined, fixed settings. There are…

Yesterday I went to Forest Hill, Ewell, Cheam and Norbury. It's only been a year since WH Smith's high street stores rebranded meaninglessly as TG Jones, but they've already started closing. This is what happens when venture capitalists rationalise their portfolio via a restructuring plan, they shut things, because it's not about community service it's about value for investors. Uxbridge went in July, Brixton in August, Greenford and Worcester Park in September, Pinner next Wednesday and…

Collins, Jackson Debate Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and Democratic challenger Troy Jackson met in their first debate last night: Click here for full story

Every form that the ghost takes is an outline, and every outline wears a mustache. That is a rule of the lore, and it stays. Will the outline and mustache always be white? I'm leaving that one open.

What’s a song that grew on you over time? I’m sitting here in my Paul’s Boutique t-shirt trying to figure out what changed in the three years between 1986 and 1989. In ‘86 my 13 year old self was, musically, driven by Radio 1, The Top 20 and, of course, Top of the Pops. It was a diverse time for music, rock was fading as hip hop and dance started to appear. By ‘89 I was 16, music was still somewhat Top of the Pops driven but I had discovered NME and my musical tastes were rapidly widening. The…

In this conversation, I speak with Dr. Dominic McIver Lopes, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and University Killam Professor at the University of British Columbia. In a dozen books and around eighty articles, he has offered new conceptions of aesthetic value, art, and the relationship between art and technology, especially new information technologies. He advocates for pluralism about artistic and aesthetic value and is currently writing a book about value pluralism in the global…

Imagine the sight: on a foggy February morning in Milan, the modest and apologetic narrator of the title story of this long overdue translation of short fiction by the enigmatic Argentinian writer Ángel Bonomini (1929–1994), is surprised to see two elephants emerge from the mist on the Via Manin. As a visitor passing through this … Continue reading "Of dreams, memories, and the imagination: Slow Elephants of Milan by Ángel Bonomini"

The good thing about podcasts -- the format, not the genre -- is that anyone can make a podcast and distribute the programs. It is not controlled by a small number of platforms, and if you don't like any particular platform, you can go to someone else. The bad thing about video podcasts, on the other hand, is that there is one extremely dominant platform: YouTube. As Jason Snell detailed on his Six Colors web site, he is offended by Spotify's disregard of the legal concept of fair use. Jason…

If there are parallel worlds, and I have doppelgängers in these worlds, I hope they are all happier than me. In Exit Party, the doppelgängers in these parallel worlds appear to have free wills. Even though there are still parallels, perhaps fated, we still see the characters making choices willingly. On the other hand, by labeling the two outcomes as Side A and Side B, like a vinyl records or cassette tapes, it seems that countries only end up in two scenarios, both nowhere near idealistic. Is…

Phil Baker, Fast Company: When I hear politicians demanding that iPhones be built in the U.S., it’s clear they have no understanding of how products are created and built. You can’t just wish it to happen. You would need to create much of what China and Taiwan have built over the past 30 years. It’s not just setting up factory buildings filled with assembly machinery and workers. You would need the entire infrastructure of suppliers and manufacturers of the parts that go into the products: the…

I have written before about how to link to a specific segment of a youtube video, and how to link to specific words or paragraphs within a webpage. I even knew, vaguely, that you could link to pages of PDFs. But, all in the course of a normal workday researching a blogpost, I found myself wanting reference a specific ~30 second chunk of a Marx Brothers movie from 1935, and the last page of a PDF about a piece of public art. The PDF was easy, using the #page=n syntax. As for the scene from the…

Couple of early morning hours exploring more of The Lugg, and around every bend lurks another fantastic looking swim. Clearer water today and although I didn't spot any barbel, I did spot some gudgeon - noted. Took the lure gear, bit of a chuck about as I wandered to see if I could find some more perch. Storm Curl Tail and braid this time - far easier to feel the bites - would struggle to go back to mono. Well 2 hours turned into five - and 41 perch (plus a bonus chub) landed. Hectic morning.…

I think one of the things I struggle the most with, in the modern Internet, is the relic of the past that are static websites. See, I have very low object permanence: out of sight, out of mind. For blogs, news media, and so on, the solution is very simple: a solid RSS reader. But on static resources, which are often super valuable (probably more than most blogs on some accounts, sorry fellow bloggers), I don’t have this. I have bookmarks, which I basically never open. I have the Resources page…

Delicious in Dungeon probably has an excellent recipe for "Door Lobster Steamed in Dragon Venom." On to the ninth floor. That grate is also unlocked. I hadn't been down this far to investigate. Lower levels all take the key. I know there are 12 levels, and the elevator spans them all. All of the doors are weird here. The handles appear to be alive and skitter away from your hand when you try to click them. Even if you pin it in the corner it won't open, but sometimes clicking the handle seems…

I recently learned that an acquaintance had lost his job and my reflexive reaction was to laugh. The people I was with were offended. How could I be amused by another person’s misfortune? Easy, I thought but didn’t say. Our newly jobless friend had been earning an enormous annual salary, more than I made in my three or four best years. But that wasn’t what triggered my laughter. Rather, it was his spendthrift ways. He’s the sort of guy who will penny-pinch and complain about the small,…

In November, it’s time for the Global Day of Code Retreat. That’s usually a day where surprisingly many (senior) developers leave their caves and congregate for Pizza and some TDD. In 2026, participation in live events for anything job related, and especially for anything software, has declined a ton. Global problems and local problems compound. Local to my community, pressure on the dev job market is unprecedented. Automotive software dev leaves the country (Germany), manufacturing and…

Editor’s Note: Post originally published on October 10, 2017. October 5th marked the Feast Day of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska. Venerated by the Catholic Church as the “Apostle of Mercy” the Polish saint influenced the world arguably more than any other individual in the 20th century. I have mentioned this previously and I will mention … Continue reading Faustina’s Faith: How A Simple Polish Nun Changed My World The post Faustina’s Faith: How A Simple Polish Nun Changed My World first appeared…

(Twenty Years Ago on FITK) … and now I know. The thing about love is that yes, I am certain I was in love before, but it was never like this. Before, I was always stressed, and panicking, and acting, and the reason for that was simple. There was no trust. I did not trust him, and I did not trust myself, and to be honest, I think he trusted me even less and himself not at all.And I thought

A few weeks ago, I went to CppCon 2026. Unsurprisingly at a C++ conference this year, one of the most prevalent topics was AI and how we should use it — better — in our industry. There were ten talks mentioning AI or LLMs in their titles - excluding pre/post conference workshops: AI is UB with Better PR — Matt Kulukundis, Andy Soffer C++ in an AI World — Jody Hagins C++ in the Age of ...

This issue takes a trip to Switzerland with the stunning 'Helvetia' Gauge 1 layout, proving that world class modelling can fit in surprisingly small spaces. Also inside: Build your first Gauge 1 locomotive with the latest beginner-friendly G1MRA kit.First test of Garden Railway Specialists' new Hudswell Clarke live steam locomotive.Create realistic water features to bring wildlife and extra interest to your railway. Build a Tin Turtle armoured Simplex from recycled parts. Explore the history of…

With a theme of toys that focus on the holiday of Halloween for this year's 31 Days of Toy Terror you just know that Michael Myers will make more than one appearance. Today I'm excited to check out another figure from Plastic Meatball's retro inspired Halloween action figures though this time it's from Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers. This 1988 sequel continues the story from Halloween II and introduces Michael's niece, Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris) and is the first part of the…

Violent, gritty and unrelenting, Action comic was the brainchild of Pat Mills and Geoff Kemp. Tasked with creating a new anthology comic for the IPC’s boys adventure division, the pair rapidly developed a winning formula: reimagining existing story ideas from fresh perspectives and infusing them with a health dose of modern realism. With strips such as Hookjaw, Dredger, Look Out