Notes

Enjoyable and long overdue catch-up with @c_p_pearson and @mandr8. Roll on summer and more of the same, hopefully with @tobefrankj in tow too.

Sat on a park bench, only to have a dog throw up in front of me.

Pretty much sums up the state of things.

Heavy sigh.

Line of Duty is much harder to believe if you’re familiar with both Birmingham (where it’s heavily implied the series is set) and Belfast, where it’s been filmed since series two.

A fun and fascinating evening spent with Sarah, Rachael and Duncan. A good Good Friday.

Was seriously considering paying to watch Formula 1 this season, but the options available can only be described as extortionate. Will stick to the highlights and weekends spent avoiding any spoilers.

Goosebumps.

When a fund decides not to invest in a company due to the way it treats its frontline employees, if I were a designer working for that company, I might want to reconsider my own priorities.

It took a global pandemic and adding myself to a month-long waiting list, but it was lovely to finally catch up with @aizlewood earlier today.

One day I’ll get him to a pub. One day.

Brilliant, insightful and fascinating, @wordridden’s year-long journal of the plague comes to an end. As an important artefact in the social history of this pandemic, I’m convinced it should be placed in a library somewhere.

So sad to hear that Murray Walker has passed away. His unadulterated passion for Formula 1 transcended the screen and made every race an unmissable event. Watching a Grand Prix has never really been the same since he laid down his mic.

If you were wondering if no longer having an upstairs neighbour has given me licence to sing badly at the top of my voice, the answer is an emphatic: yes! 🙉

This is precisely the wrong week for me to be feeling fed up and depressed.

I have my uses. ☺️

…it seems reasonable to predict the full collapse of human civilisation will be immediately succeeded by a Facebook statement containing the words: “We know we have more work to do.”

Marina Hyde on point as usual.

Just spent 10 minutes swimming in the sea alongside Brighton Pier. Absolutely invigorating, and quite possibly a brand new pastime for me to enjoy.

Is it the banality of the photograph that’s brought me so close to tears, or @wordridden’s typically affecting and informative writing? Either way, this post has left an impression.

The photograph changed nothing, but that’s not to say it means nothing.

This scene from nearby Seaford concludes my second January photo series. Maybe I’ll do something similar again next year.

Having given Indiekit responsibility for syndicating posts in place of Micro.blog, a problem is soon revealed; any post not published via Indiekit will not get syndicated. Think I need to make feed.json the canonical source for what gets shared.

Saddened to learn of the death of Martin Lambie-Nairn, whose innovative identities could at one point be seen across all 4 terrestrial TV channels in the UK. His book Brand Identity for Television With Knobs On inspired my dissertation and interest in television graphics. Hero.

If everything is wired up correctly, this should be the first note on my website to be syndicated to Twitter via Indiekit. 🤞🏻

Adam Buxton doing lorra lorra ‘Queen’ at Live Aid on this year’s Christmas podcast with Joe Cornish had me in absolute stitches; the call and response with the ‘audience’ takes his characterisation of the Queen to a completely new level.

Have in no way spent a large part of Christmas Eve working out how to get Oh My Zsh to automatically load the version of Node.js listed in an .nvmrc file. I mean, that would be a sign of madness, surely.

Humble brag but lovely to see that Indiekit now has 100 stars on GitHub. Unsure yet if I’ll spend any more time on it over Christmas.

Am already behind on my advent calendar.

It’s been a year since we launched our little service. I’m so grateful to be working with such a brilliant group of people, and very proud of what we’re building together. Happy birthday Apply!

Mark Zuckerberg is a sociopath, pass it on.

The Crown, season 4. An incredible cast let down by lacklustre writing and perfunctory plots too often propped up by lazy exposition. Such a wealth of material available, yet it seems Peter Morgan has lost all interest in this series as it dutifully marches on.

The last #AppleEvent of 2020 was worth watching, if only for the John Hodgman cameo at the end. A reminder perhaps, of when Apple events were far less slick and much more fun.

Back to the 50s for this week’s classic movie, Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window. This might just be my favourite period in cinema and this film is an exemplar: crude yet stylish, straightforward yet captivating. They really don’t make ’em like they used to.

An enjoyable Sunday afternoon spent playing tennis with @fofr. Was comprehensively beaten 9-3, but seeing as this was the first time I’ve held a racket since about 1992, think I can live with that scoreline! 🎾

If I’ve got this all set up correctly, this post will be saved to the Internet Archive, thanks to Indiekit’s new syndication feature. 🤞

This year has ended up being bookended by colleagues moving onto “exciting opportunities” at Facebook. I honestly fail to understand how talented, empathetic people can make such a decision given Facebook’s adverse impact on human rights, democracy and information literacy. Fools.

A Guy Walks Into an Apple Store:

“Yes, removing the charging brick from each iPhone box will reduce waste […] But if you expand your view just a bit, you can really see how none of their other marketing backs up this goal, and in fact runs counter to it.”

This week’s film was certainly not a classic – which goes without saying given it stars Gerald Butler and Jay Baruchel. How to Train Your Dragon. What can I say? Vikings are Scottish, apparently.

Another milestone reached in the rollout of our service means another excuse to design a mission patch.