Jonathan

We have come full circle, people.

+1 to this - espresso lengthened with water has a really different flavour to water infused with coffee!

The implication is that the ISC may publish parts of documents, with rédactions, rather than the government's implied preferred position of not releasing the document at all

In Ireland, messages are hidden in queues of tall and short women. This is called Saoirse code

The Vetting Myth Understanding the realities of Mandelson's pre-appointment checks

A fair amount of nonsense has been written and said about the "security vetting" process for Mandelson's appointment. I wrote about what "Developed Vetting" really involves and why it's perfectly possible that it found nothing useful about Mandelson.

arthursnell.substack.com/p/the-vettin...

A diagram of the evolution of whales, from land dwelling mammals to the ocean giants we know today.

Whale evolution makes me uncomfortable

Keep seeing this Copilot ad in which a woman pulls off a shit-hot 'business negotiation' by tapping away at Copilot to ask its advice every 20 seconds, as if that would put you in a position of strength rather than implying that you didn't have a fucking clue what you were doing.

"Switch off"

I'm convinced AI is our generation's radium - a discovery with genuinely useful applications in specific, controlled circumstances that we stupidly put in everything from kid's toys to toothpaste until we realised the harm far too late where future generations will ask if we were out of our minds.

Me, shopping at the book store: "excuse me, sir? which of these books was written the fastest? I'm looking for a book with as little thought and effort put into it as possible."

old man comment, but i think a lot of people say ‘performative’ when they mean ‘hopefully transmutive’. an event is only performative if the words or actions create a change.

it’s similar to how people describe something as ironic when really they mean coincidental.

Me in school: the two things I hate most are homework, and presentations

Me today: *writing a conference talk in my spare time* I sure love doing homework for this presentation

People kept telling me this is exactly the old Muppet Show and they were absolutely correct. A pure joy to watch. (And I'm VERY picky about my muppet canon.)

Honestly think handkerchiefs are the trad accessory that is most need of a widespread comeback. Very positive vibes in the post-Covid era, much more tender on the old schnozzle when you’ve got a cold, immediately useful when you have to investigate a corpse hanging from a tree in Martinaise.

Do you have a link to the proposal, by any chance?

i love european olympics opening ceremonies. the second the ioc names a european host city the prime minister calls the culture minister into their office and says "find me your strangest homosexuals. give each of them a period of our great nation's history, a kilo of cocaine, and Ten Million Euros"

A small but very deep thing that bothers me about generative AI as a shortcut to practice and work and skill is the basic assumption that it’s impossible to take pleasure in a creative pursuit that you aren’t very good at and I assure you that is not the case

*nods wisely* like sheep

I public speak for a living and consider myself pretty good at it.

On my best day I could not hope to pull off an unflustered speech incorporation half as well as this.

This is the sort of stuff you see comedians who specialise in crowd work do, and half of them aren't this smooth.

Dude is GOOD.

𝐈 𝐡𝐚𝐭𝐡 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐝.

𝐄𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐛𝐮𝐥𝐛 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐲 𝐭𝐮𝐥𝐩𝐞𝐧, 𝐯𝐚𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝. 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐞𝐝, 𝐛𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐋𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐚𝐢𝐝 𝐦𝐞.

being this genuinely delighted by little childrens dumb antics is such a huge green flag

Coriolanus is quite an easy solve (it mostly just gets cut down - my objection with Coriolanus is I don't think it's that good and I could live without every bloody year there being a British actor in combat fatigues on half the posters in London in another production of it).

GUIDANCE ON WHAT TO DO IF YOU SEE A FIRE AT YOUR INSTITUTION

1) Form a fire committee
2) establish terms of reference and appoint a chair
3) invite fire to join as a stakeholder
4) discuss next steps with internal comms

What the fuck

I think that when the days are shorter we should have shorter workdays, for our mental health but, get this -

when the days are longer I think we should have shorter workdays also, for our general wellbeing

This ad! The semiotics! (I can only assume their ad agency has done its audience research)

Francis Bourgeois implies the existence of Germanies Proleteriat

YouTube video by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert "There's Nothing I Enjoy More Than Acting In The Theater" - Ian McKellen EXTENDED INTERVIEW

This is superb. Ian McKellen delivers a blistering pro-immigration monologue written by Shakespeare, that makes you want to punch the air with exhilaration. Wow, wow, wow.

An absolute must-watch. (Starts at 20:10 but the entire interview is a joy.) youtu.be/2l2RqzVG4ag

Look, I know you hate to engage in counterfactuals. But what if you didn’t?