A photo of my gloved hand holding a CD copy of Rod Stewart's Fly Me To The Moon: The Great American Songbook Volume V while I'm sat on a bicycle.
Been a long time since I found a CD in the gutter so I was excited to indulge a passion for finding weird CD-Rs ( www.rockpapershotgun.com/i-kinda-miss... ). Alas, no mystery, no romance: it's a regular CD, and one which takes little imagination to guess why someone would hoy it out their window.
I probably won't play until it leaves early access but a new Cosmo D game is buy-on-sight for me. One of my favourite developers for years now, colourful and loud and quiet and curious and delightful games which commit to their style with striking confidence. store.steampowered.com/app/2778210/...
A terrible mass of fabric, metal mesh, and ropes hauled onto a riverbank. It is the size of a fat dog and makes you feel like you're looking at what remains of a drowned witch after her sludge boils away.
I touched it. Oh god, I touched it.
Today at my volunteering I pulled this horrible object out the riverbed ok talk to you later bye
On Friday I cycled 408km/253 miles from Edinburgh to York, through the night, as part of a wee team in the Easter Arrow event. Lots went awry (up to our leader sadly needing to drop out) but going gently loopy with great folks while riding dark country roads under a big moon into dawn was perfect.
Considering becoming a dot-com millionaire by founding some sort of website named Pick 'n' Clix.
I have been cursed of late by an earworm smooshing the Sisters of Mercy's Temple of Love into the Bonanza theme song.
We chased Lady Luck till we finally struck
Bonanza!
With a gun for a lover and a shot for the pain, we planted our family tree
You run for cover in the temple of love
Bonanza!
Etc
Roses are red
Violets are blue
What's up, gamer
Ready Player Two
I keep umming and ahhing about this but I don't think I'd ever fully trust it again, and I really want to trust my downtube.
A close-up photo of a bicycle downtube, with a crack almost the whole way through.
On one hand, it's probably a bad idea to ride 400km in one day without gears. On the other, it's a FUNNY bad idea - and a lot cheaper than buying a replacement frame. I'd be mega-upset if I hadn't decided my quads must be so mighty that they cracked steel, and therefore it's funny this happened.
A distant farmhouse illuminated by a sunbeam across a dreich Scottish hillside.
Two cyclists pushing their bikes across a patch of solid ice.
A sunny road through a Scottish Borders landscape.
A line of cyclists down a sunny country lane.
I got into cycling longer distances over the winter, with a couple 230k rides complete then a 300k last week I had to abandon after my frame almost cracked in half. So now I'm uh getting into distance on my backup singlespeed, doing a 160k day last week and half-thinking about a 400k event in April.
You'll never guess what.
A Screwfix virtual shopping basket containing 55 10-packs of zinc-plated lock rings.
Probably just hit the Screwfix and get a ton more rings. I think 550 zinc-plated lock rings would be quite pleasing.
Ah, WSYPTYSSSYPTW!
I'm glad to see these nerds writing. Too good to have become management!
You know, I sometimes fear I accomplished nothing and left no legacy in 15 years of writing about video games, and this is greater than I could have hoped.
Your job is photograph safety hazards! Such a strong vintage Source look! Tricky optional puzzles! Dial phone numbers for funsies! Parts are frustrating or hostile! There may be a secret underground civilization! Great feeling of being lost and alone! You're such a weird dude! youtu.be/Y4OAZfG4iQQ
I still think about Infra, and wish I had pushed more people to play it when I had a platform. It's nobbly and weird and surprising, a first-person explore-o-puzzler which opens with PowerPoint then tumbles into conspiracy and catastrophe. Down to £5 for a bit: store.steampowered.com/app/251110/I...
If you need a Cyber Monday movie recommendation, Nemesis is free (with ads) on Plex and endlessly pleasing. l.plex.tv/wbbBNKRt
"The bag of Doritos as big as meee?"
A neon yellow pager whose screen reads "GRAND CENTRAL HACK THE PLANET", a pair of mirror shades, and computer control doodad with lots of sliders and buttons with on a backdrop of black leather, zips, and chains.
Wishing you a very merry Cyber Monday! Whatever your A/S/L, may you and your closest webring enjoy a day of mulling Jolt Cola and singing Front Line Assembly carols, free from trolls, lag, and power-tripping channel ops.
The winner is whoever en route finds and starts wearing the most bebuckled leather coat. Fashion show in the final pub.
Congrats on the next phase in your career as a professional Tomboss!
Aw that's grand!
Ah that's very kind, thank you! And I'm delighted to hear there was a WAWAPATWAPAW meetup of sorts.
A clown accepts a toilet brush from a clown.
Anyway, the best thing at the festivals for a second year running was the Clown Olympics, where clowns from around the world compete in clown sports in the park. The winners take custody of the Clown Olympic Flame (a toilet brush). Dominating victory from Japan, who hadn't even planned to take part.
I only noticed because I was in the front row and recognised the flash of metal tape from the guts of the Doom Piano. It's such a tiny detail but so pleasing. And yet: at times I wondered if the technoaccordion was doing anything at all, because we're all wearing headphones with a soundscape so
Like, you don't carefully conceal copper tape inside paper letters if you don't intend for them to have an effect when alligator-clipped into the guts of a technoaccordion, do you. Do you? No one would notice if you faked it and only a few could even recognise you're doing it for real. Agh it's cool
I would love to know more about the tech because I spotted some edges that could be such cool and clever ideas but I don't know if you'd bother because the effects would be easy to fake and who would notice anyway, so I'm left wondering how much actually is real, and if it matters, and why.
A photo of a theatre stage where white plastic sheeting covers several mysterious boxes.
I won't reel off Edinburgh festival picks but if you're following me because of PC games, Stampin' in the Graveyard makes magical transformative use of trashed PCs. I was delighted by each turn as they were variously worn, illuminated, gazed into, held aloft, more. www.edfringe.com/tickets/what...
I am admittedly torn between "Oh god" and "Wait why does that sound like something I would have done, oh god."
