‘[W]e might have to wait two years for the conclusion’ I wrote almost six years ago.

The conclusion of The Book of Dust arrived the other day. I haven’t started it yet, and now I’m thinking I might go back and reread the previous one first.

Spent yesterday at the Battle of Ideas festival, from the Academy of Ideas. Lots of panels on various subjects around politics, society, literature, and more. I mostly went to literature-related ones. why has fantasy fiction become so popular? How fantastic is Jane Austen?

Going back for day two today.

Watched: Mission: Impossible 🎥

Went back and took a half-star off after posting, because of the betrayal. Honestly. It’s hard to get over that. I don’t really know why I went on and watched the second one last night.

Watched: Sliding Doors 🎥

I already posted about this, but I’m trying out Micro.blog’s new movies feature here.

What the hell was that ridiculous picture Letterboxd sent for The Italian Job? Nothing to do with anything that happens in the film. Guy in a chair with a machine-gun and a half-naked woman with a street plan drawn on her back?

Deleted from my post, but the Letterboxd link above has it.

180 pages in, and it’s only publication day. My local bookshop got my preorder in early and let me collect it.

Took the dustjacket off because it’s fiddly to hold.

August, so my daughter tells me, slipped away like a bottle of wine.

Minute Cryptic - 25 August, 2025

“Forger’s initial on map - it shows treasure spot! Buried gold is fake…” (4)

🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣🟣

I scored: 2 under par

www.minutecryptic.com

I find this kind of horrifying: Denmark’s state-run postal service will no longer deliver letters. And I can see Britain’s Royal Mail going to same way.

It feels like we’d be cut off, in kind of a way. I mean I don’t know when I last sent a letter, but still.

I mean, Christmas cards!

I read Doc Searls’s piece, How about ASO, for Attention Surfeit Order?. I was sure I had used that expression, or one like it, on my blog. A quick search led me to a 2006 post about attention in various senses, which has ‘Attention surfeit disorder?’ as a subheading. The amusing part was that in that subsection, I referenced Doc Searls.