Alastair Horne

Hope you make it home soon!

Thanks; certainly closer to Stirling than most of the teams!

Turns out that there’s a shinty team based in Stirling that’s just entered the fourth tier of competition, so if I hag on until next weekend, I can just cycle to an outlying village and watch a match there.

Good idea!

Impressive that my social awkwardness has now branched out into being unwilling to unfollow people on here because it might be awkward.

A small girl wearing a rabbit costume and blue coat carries a book as she walks to school. Her mother (head out of shot) wheels her baby brother along in a pushchair. The baby says "Peter Rabbit may be the 'Hero' of the story, but surely the obedient, widowed Mrs Rabbit is a more effective symbol of the oppression inherent within Mister McGregor's regime" The girls looks furious and snaps "Mum!! He's critiquing my world book day costume from a marxist perspective again!"

A cartoon reminder that tomorrow is World Book Day (In the UK anyway). Originally for the @theguardian.com

The river Tweed seen through a ruined window: half the image is black; the rest includes blue sea and yellow/green banks.

Tweed/Frame.

I know my downstairs neighbour is back after a week away because she’s singing. :-)

Spent a few minutes this afternoon deciding I wanted to watch a shinty match this weekend, and trying to work out where the nearest one might be. (The answer appears to be the outskirts of Glasgow.)

Well, Fash Nige’s Labour defector was as obscure a nonentity as everyone predicted.

Nailed-on for relegation Wolves beating champions Liverpool? Is it 1983-84 again?

Telegraph censured for story of fictional family’s struggle to pay school fees Watchdog upholds complaint it breached code with article about impact of VAT on banker who did not exist

Telegravda caught lying again.

www.theguardian.com/media/2026/m...

Thanks - done!

@matthewpb.bsky.social Thanks for your offer on LI yesterday. Could I possibly DM you about that, please? Assuming you’ve been to Bologna in the last couple of years. Thanks!

I’ve read three books now by Seicho Matsumoto and each one has done something intriguing and different with the murder mystery genre. I keep seeing him described as Japan’s Agatha Christie, but I can see very little resemblance beyond their respective popularity.

Train booked too!

Hotel booked for LBF this year! :-)

Was rewatching Line of Duty series one and completely forgot it only has five episodes. Was all geared up for a double bill this evening, but now it’s over.

ANNOUNCEMENT: The Game Narrative Kaleidoscope launches this Wednesday!

Over 100+ essays on the craft of game writing and narrative design; affordable priced.

… AND we’ll also launch with the first two episodes of the podcast series, where we talk to the article writers about their craft.

@agincourtgirl.bsky.social Thanks for sharing that. A friend has just got back to me with all the info I was after, so I've deleted the post (just in case you were wondering why it had disappeared).

An illustration of a lantern against a blue night sky, the cover of A Quiet Place.

A Quiet Place by Seicho Matsumoto. This is my third novel by him, and it’s another intriguing take on the crime novel, fascinating both for its twists and its depiction of mid-century Japan.

Reform are so used to getting away with cheating the system that they assume that anyone who beats them must be cheating too.

Fourteen books, including two Penguin Anthony Powells, a 1938 Penguin book on Czechoslovakia, a saucily-covered Kingsley Anis, the last Julian Barnes, a British Library Crime Classic, and some pulpy genre fiction I read in the 80s.

Yesterday’s book haul from Berwick-upon-Tweed.

Two points dropped apiece; I'll settle for that.

When Dennis Potter wanted to write for Doctor Who “Blossomiest blossom”, says Jodie Whittaker’s thirteenth Doctor moments before she regenerates in The Power of the Doctor. This snatch of dialogue references a famous remark by Dennis Potter from his ...

New on my blog today, an article about the time Dennis Potter tried to get into writing for Doctor Who in the 1960s, what his story would have been about, and the other times he crossed paths with the series. Hopefully this will interest a few of you.
thehiddenplanet.substack.com/p/when-denni...

Remarkably generous of Celtic to pick for their defence people who’ve clearly never played football before.

A poster for an event at York Literature Festival. The text reads: "Let's get philosophical, writing philosophical fiction with Rachel Handley, 6th March, 2 pm to 4 pm, York Medical Society". The background of the poster is of a pile of books stacked on top of one another.

Come write some weird and philosophical fiction with me at the @yorklitfest.bsky.social in March! You know you want to!

Tickets: www.yorktheatreroyal.co.uk/show/lets-ge...

@uoyenglishrl.bsky.social @livunienglish.bsky.social @sotauol.bsky.social @uoyphilosophy.bsky.social @yorkstjohn.bsky.social

It's the Glasgow derby shortly, and I can't be the only neutral hoping for a massed brawl, suspensions all round, and points deductions for both sides, to improve Hearts' bid for the title.

Thank goodness we didn't recently have a 'foreign-born' prime minister. The Mail and Mail on Sunday would have hated that, wouldn't they? They certainly wouldn't have campaigned relentlessly for him, and excused his every failing, would they?

Oh, but he was white, so it's fine.

Excellent news; it looked rather fun.