microblog
You can’t leave it there, Star Trek! I mean, you totally can; it’s a great place to leave it. But when’s season 2? 🖖
I’m on an Edinburgh-London train that seemingly has no power sockets (here in coach H, next to the café, at least). What?!? What decade are we in?
Luckily, phone, iPad, headphones, and Kindle all have enough charge for the journey. And I have the season finale of Star Trek: Discovery downloaded. Off we go, then. 🖖
A year ago today I was on a train to Edinburgh. It was snowing at Peterborough.
Today I am also on a train to Edinburgh. No snow, but it’s so crowded that I can’t get to the buffet car. Well, I could, but I’d have to push my way past so many people that I can’t face it. This is why you should buy your sandwiches before you get aboard.
Why is it so crowded, though? Is there something going on that I don’t know about? Or is it something to do with the fact that Virgin run the franchise now?
Marina Hyde has been on fire at the Guardian lately, but this headline is just something else: A-hole in a K-hole: Katie Hopkins’ ketamine adventures
Newspaper journalists don’t usually write their own headlines, but whoever came up with that one deserves an award.
I’m reminded by last year’s post (though really by Facebook: that’s one thing it’s good at) that Feb 7 is recognised by some as International Clash Day. Doesn’t feel like a year, etc. 🎵 #internationalclashday
Feersum Endjinn by Iain M Banks (Books 2018, 3)
The Great Banks Reread picks up again. I was prompted to read this, despite the pile of Christmas books next to my bed, because of Facebook.
I must have Liked the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction on there at some point, because a post popped up linking to the entry for Parks and Recreation. Whose very existence is surprising (the entry, that is), but it’s just because the last season or so takes place in the near future.
Anyway, the article refers to something called a ‘slingshot ending.’ This is not a term I had heard before, so I tapped through. To be honest even reading it again now, I don’t really understand what they mean by it.
But the article includes the assertion that Feersum Endjinn has such an ending. I’ve just finished rereading it, and inasmuch as I do understand what a slingshot ending is, I don’t agree that this is one such.
Which doesn’t matter at all. I still loved it. And as with many of these rereads, I was surprised by how many details I didn’t remember. Most notably I had totally forgotten that it is set at a time in the far future when Earth’s survival is threatened by an astronomical phenomenon (a dust cloud that will eventually occlude the sun).
The ending… well, that would be to spoil things. Just read it if you haven’t already.
I have job news. Or I will, soon, I hope. Just waiting for some paperwork…
(OK, Mr Mysterious, that’s enough.)
Why does using psychic powers always cause nosebleeds?
(Still watching Stranger Things.) 📺
12:00:00: Hamilton tickets go on sale. 12:00:01: Ticketmaster site grinds to a halt.
(12:10-ish: I book six tickets!)
I don’t suppose the government will listen, but this Brexit poll is interesting.
I just heard the harmonica on ‘Garageland’ for the first time. I’ve heard that song thousands of times over… err, nearly forty years.
These Beats X headphones are really quite good. 🎵
I’m wildly behind the TV curve, in that I’m just watching Stranger Things now. But I’ve got to say they’re killing it with the music choices.
They were never quite my favourite band, but were always there or thereabouts
In Legend of the Fall: Mark E Smith kept swinging to the end, Dave Simpson sums things up well. 🎵
The Fallen
2018 is working hard to be the new 2016. First Ursula Le Guin; now Mark E Smith has been taken from us.
The Fall were one of the great bands, no matter what lineup. It’s just sad that the last time I saw them, about two years ago, they were terrible.
Sadder, of course, that Smith is dead.
So it goes.
The science-fiction community is dispossessed tonight. Ursula K Le Guin RIP.
Croydon looking colourful and futuristic, yesterday
Clarke Kickstarted
The Kickstarter for the Arthur C Clarke Award is already fully funded, but now they’re pushing for a stretch goal.
What you get already is pretty good: an anthology of original SF stories of exactly 2001 words each, by a host of great names including past Clarke winners.
But the stretch goal adds a specially-commissioned soundtrack, which is a great idea.
Why are you still reading this? Go and sign up.
Maybe this change to Facebook’s feed will take it back towards just showing what family and friends post, as I was asking for back in October.
My guess is it still won’t give us what we want: all the things our Friends post, in reverse-chronological order.
If only there were a special word that described posts presented in that way… or a special protocol, or feed format, that made it easy to share the posts…
I love that, on Touch Bar MacBooks, you can set things up so that you use your fingerprint to authorise sudo in the Terminal.
Happy New Year from firework-drenched London Town.