So... I've started, every so often, to use our home espert machine to make myself a mocha.

And I'm not ashamed to admit it.

Anywhere I Lay My Head

Did you know in 2008 ScarJo recorded an album with multiple Tom Waits covers?

open.spotify.com/album/2bBRv5...

My long-held conviction is that U2's Songs of Innocence is (apart from 'California') a really good and interesting album.

My recent Wild Idea is that Songs is Experience might be, too. What if they knew what they were doing, but I wasn't on their wavelength?

Patrick Freyne: Is U2’s new EP Easter Lily almost ... cool? The band offer us a record about friendship, faith, art, meaning and, appropriately for Easter, death and the possibility of rebirth

Many good descriptions here

Patrick Freyne: Is U2’s new EP Easter Lily almost ... cool? – The Irish Times share.google/N1c59tNFYPBw...

Sincerely honoured and proud to have a short story, 'Once a jolly swagman came through these parts', included in ISLAND issue 177.

My local literary journal!

Thankful to attentive editorial input from Kate Kruimink and Jane Rawson.

"the sea itself had become a gaseous, voluminous, screamingly hot malformation of its proper self, out of which was ejected a writhing column of angels."

WATERBLACK by @alexpheby.bsky.social

@galleybeggars.bsky.social

Characteristic chilling irony from Jarvis Cocker on Pulp's glorious new album:

"And life's too short to drink bad wine and that's frightening."

Second half of WATERBLACK has returned to Nathan Treeves... and I'm struggling. I preferred the origin story of Sharli much more to the methodical activities of demigods and the (meta)physics of the Weft universe.

STRANGER THINGS finale: they did it!

So thrilled and relieved that they pulled off the ending.

And now a pig farm.

Finally getting around to WATERBLACK by Alex Pheby.

A nice change of pace from Malarkoi: the first sections featuring long detailed first-person scenes of camp, factory, brothel and kitchen.

Finished À la recherche vol 2: À L'OMBRE DES JEUNES FILLES EN FLEURS.

Seaside hotel is closing up for winter. Time to go home.

Third last page he says he's now going to have to get used to sleeping in his old room in Paris. Poor guy.

THIS is the real poetic tragedy of the passing of time.

Bing Crosby, David Bowie - Peace On Earth / Little Drummer Boy YouTube video by BingCrosbyVEVO

David Bowie and Bing Crosby doing 'Little drummer boy/peace on earth' is one of the most AI things ever (that isn't).

youtu.be/lCpXMy5GalI?...

Okay but hear me out:

A book club, and everyone brings a cat.

Great year to be a Tasmanian buying books as Christmas gifts.

Sure. And as I said, Dylan already got one... and one Dylan-adjacent.

The same people hating on DELIVER ME FROM NOWHERE also raving about A Complete Unknown mystify me.

They're both guilty pleasures and flawed films in pretty much the same way...

If anything, Unknown is worse, because I'm Not There and Inside Llewyn Davis make it so redundant.

Trent Dalton's GRAVITY LET ME GO book tour event in Hobart was a fun night. He's definitely a showman!

Liked the 10-up green Docs, too.

The 10 Best Horror Movies of 2025 and ‘Black Phone 2’

"Is horror too good now?"
"We have an insane between greatness... and everything else."

pca.st/episode/89fe...

This intrigues me, because I first think about "indie" with music, then film. In both those settings, I have no issue calling self-produced LPs or films indies.

If anything, those industries have big so-called independent companies/productions that stretch the definition that direction.

sweaty
#rollerblading

What is an independent publisher? What isn't? The meaning of 'independent publisher' is becoming less clear. Self-publishers are also using the term. Does that matter?

"There’s no shame in self-publishing. There should be considerable pride. So much so that I’d suggest there’s no utility in self-publishers calling themselves independent publishers. They already have a term that is more than good enough. And it doesn’t hurt to be clear about these things."

What does it cost to produce a book? Why small presses in the UK are struggling - and what can be done about it.

On book publishing costs

open.substack.com/pub/samj/p/w...

Tasmania/Lutruwita based folk, this is next week! Tickets (possibly) selling fast. Would love to see you there.

World building in horror fiction: Julia Armfield on Private Rites

"The horror is not in the jump scare. The jump scare is relief. The horror is in the dread."

pca.st/episode/7f7c...

The end of Meanjin after 85 years is as sad as it is infuriating | Ben Walter MUP says it is ‘no longer viable’ to make the literary magazine – but almost none of them are financially viable. That’s not their purpose or value

Here's me in Guardian Australia on the total debacle with Meanjin.

www.theguardian.com/books/commen...

Really not sure why so many recipes talk about oxymoronic 'sourdough discard'.

That's just 'using your sourdough starter'.

If you regularly use and feed your starter, there's no need to discard.

And if you're using some of your starter, by definition you're not discarding it.

‘The Marvels’ Is Here. Is It Too Late for the MCU?

Good to hear Norwegian director Kristoffer Borgli make the case for public arts funding.

The arts ought not only be conceived as a commercial product but a public good—like libraries and parks—and so worthy of public funding.

pca.st/episode/078c...

The Angel in the House An experienced senior editor explores the dire state of the publishing industry.

This was a good grim funny read.

www.killyourdarlings.com.au/article/the-...

WEAPONS is so fabulous. So glad I saw it at the cinema.

Naruto running was never so frightening.