John Lappin

I love this.

Quelques Feuilles / Some Leaves

Quelques Feuilles / Some Leaves

New thing - this is a part of a much larger work. Each square comprises 4 of the colours of an actual leaf collected over a series of walks, and then photographed, uploaded, compiled and arranged in chronological order. The entire work has 144 leaves and 576 colours.

Ian McEwan talked recently about the statistic that the number of people reading for pleasure has dropped by 40% over the last decade. But let's not focus on the negative side and instead try to remember that over the same period the number of people reading for displeasure has almost quadrupled.

Some goats who grew up during the heyday of Slipknot, Linkin Park and Korn, and had always wanted to form their own band within the nu metal subgenre, but now, having finally been brave enough to commit and go for it, are trying to brave it out and conceal their concern that they might have left it too late to fit in with prevailing musical trends.

THREAD.

A collection of photographs of excellent goats I have met during walks in the British countryside.

You will find the captions to each photo in the alt text.

Asked by Sky News about Farage’s comments, Falkner said she felt “quite confused and disturbed”. She said: “You have a situation where, when you read these allegations in terms of what is attributed to him, it looks utterly ghastly on paper. And then you try and contextualise it, and you think, this is perhaps 50 years ago – you know, young people say all sorts of things at school.” There was, however, she said, an element that she did not understand: “The one thing that sadly confuses me about him, and I hear his contextualisation of it all: why can’t he just offer an unreserved apology for any distress?

Sometimes I wonder why people are so bad at apologising but here’s Kishwer Falkner offering advice to Nigel Farage on apologising and it’s terrible advice: an “unreserved apology for any distress”. (It should be obvious that’s self-contradictory; using “any” is itself a reservation!)

I think there's an economic inevitability. And a very difficult political conversation. It could be ten years' away but given the impossible to read global situation in economic terms and the extraordinary UK losses, it has to happen some time.

It sure looks like Russian intelligence attempted to use military drones to assassinate the President of Ukraine inside an EU country.

Looking forward to more thoughts from Belgium on why freezing Russian assets is an escalatory move that might compromise the peace process.

I did a wee review there. Nothing too over the top. You have been amusing with reasonable frequency recently. Maybe you're hitting a rich seam of form, Steve?

If you listened only to Gregorian chants on Spotify, would your listening age be 1000?

Was it funny? I presume it was. But gosh.

The cable, sent to all U.S. missions on December 2, orders U.S. consular officers to review resumes or LinkedIn profiles of H-1B applicants - and family members who would be traveling with them - to see if they have worked in areas that include activities such as misinformation, disinformation, content moderation, fact-checking, compliance and online safety, among others.

Holy shit.

Reuters reporting that new admin instructions on visas are if you worked at a platform in trust & safety or content moderation or on fact checking or online safety at an platform you *and your loved ones* are ineligible for H-1B visa.

www.reuters.com/world/us/tru...

www.economist.com/britain/2025... new guy just dropped

Cryptocurrency backed by Farage donor is used for Russian war effort, investigators say Tether tokens found to facilitate scheme that enables sanctions evasion and launders money for the Kremlin

Harborne has also donated heavily to the Tories and Boris Johnson

But he's now given more than £20million to Farage. This is *huge* amount of money

Harborne is also big into crypto...

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Today in weird life goals.

Doctor who supplied ketamine to late Friends star Matthew Perry jailed A doctor who pleaded guilty to supplying ketamine to Matthew Perry in the weeks before the star's death has been jailed for two-and-a-half years.

Doctor who supplied ketamine to late Friends star Matthew Perry jailed

New flying taxi story just dropped.

Now every time you pet a cat you have to think about the Roman Empire

Inevitable.

Oh hang on. Did you pass a thing Doctor? Congratulations. I missed that.

Ah.

Tall trees in the distance on the opposite side of the lake with blue skies above and cold calm water below

Some slush on the lake surface with blue skies above

A better look at the slushy water on Lake Garda

The sun shines down on a cold glass like lake surface with blue skies and whispy clouds above

The lake was a little bit slushy this afternoon.

Guests of the Nation.
Reading in the Dark.
The Picture of Dorian Grey.
Gull.
Good Behaviour.

There can't be any negotiating or compromise with people who hold or endorse these views, which includes those that voted for them. There is a line, and this is waaay over it.

I presume the categorising fools on Spotify wouldn't designate that yacht rock.

I did mean Chaminda. But you could have races.

Brutal. And we know he listens to Yacht Rock on his yacht. Dozing in the sunshine under his copy of the Telegraph.

"And so it came to pass that Jesus returned and was born once again, this time out of a bottle of olive oil. And the people cried, 'Well, that was certainly unexpected, and my salad is ruined, but okay.'"

If they have to, can they change Harmsworth's mind, I wonder?

The idiocy of the right wing media and almost all the broadcasters is off the scale. And, in fact, the Opposition by which I mean His Majesty's current version.
How on earth we start a debate on the EU? Can't see it happening even if we go bust in the meantime.