Dan Alexander

P&V's Master and Margarita is full of annoyances, especially Ivan Bezdomny being translated as Ivan Homeless. Maxim Bitter (Gorky) and Boris Parsnip (Pasternak) want a word.

What perfect album came out the year you turned 16?

Share the last 4 games you played and expose your gaming habits (TTRPG only version)

DragonBane
Call of Cthulhu
Traveller
BRP

Movie you've watched more than six times using GIFS (hard mode: no Star Wars, Star Trek or LOTR)

A water vole beside a stream in Cambridge

A water vole in Cambridge. The first I've ever seen.

You didn't like my tabletop gaming anecdote? Huh. I guess you had to be pretending to be there.

Bilingual Welsh and English road sign: Walkers in Road. The "l" has been replaced with "n" in the English version

Here's another from Wales

They can’t park the bus

I was writing about deterrence today and remembered my favourite way of explaining it

Microsoft 365 renewals are auto-enshittified with AI and 30% more expensive. The classic version of 365 is on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying "Beware of the Leopard".

This is good advice that works.

He’s beaten me to it. I declare Christmas OPEN!

OpenAI's Video Generating AI Is Dead On Arrival - Better Offline Better Offline is a weekly show exploring the tech industry’s influence and manipulation of society - and interrogating the growth-at-all-costs future that tech’s elite wants to build.  Combining narr...

Good discussion here - there are surprising limitations pca.st/episode/4c78...

Humble Book Bundle: A Wizard of Earthsea and More by Ursula K. Le Guin Explore the worlds and stories of Ursula K. Le Guin with this ebook library, featuring <em>A Wizard of Earthsea</em> and more. Pay what you want & support charity!

For the next few weeks, you can pick up a pretty incredible ebook bundle of Ursula's work—up to 30 books!—and support Portland's Literary Arts in the process

Welcome John! Glad you're here. You'll find many folks are fond of the durulz

Bought by Waterstones in 2022 unfortunately. Before 2022 totally agree

Jack and Kate also heaped praise on Johannes Cabal the Necromancer in their best of 2023 episode. A superb recommendation - such an enjoyable book.

We only learnt of our son’s secret online life after he died at 20 When Mats Steen died from a muscle-wasting disorder, his parents believed that his life had been a tragically lonely one — until hundreds of emails from strangers arrived. It turns out that he’d found...

well I'm in floods of tears www.thetimes.com/article/5ecd...

This is so charming and lovely. Perfect Friday content and a good thing to share with those who may have been led, by cynical demagogues, to believe that multiculturalism has made London some sort of dystopian hell. ~AA

Morning Tom. Spellburn (my fave DCC podcast) looked into AP - links in the show notes spellburn.net/2020/03/23/e...

Enzittification with Cory Doctorow & Brian Merchant Episode · Better Offline · In the third live-to-tape episode of Better Offlive, Ed Zitron is joined in-studio in Los Angeles by Cory Doctorow and Brian Merchant to talk about the forces that have turn...

open.spotify.com/episode/16zy...

The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole - with Beth Morrey Episode · Comfort Blanket · Sunday Times bestselling author Beth Morrey (Saving Missy, Lucky Day) talks about Sue Townsend's definitive comic coming-of-age novel The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole Aged 1...

open.spotify.com/episode/5RJV...

First: Iron Maiden, Cardiff 1986
Last: Korn
Worst: The War on Drugs, Auckland 2023
Loudest: Slayer
Best: Gojira, Gdansk 2023
Seen most: Anthrax x10
Surprising: The Prodigy, Moscow 1995
Happy I got to see: Gil Scott Heron
Wish: System of a Down
Next: They Might Be Giants

One in Magnolia

Leviathan by Mastodon is an entire album based on Moby Dick. Blood and Thunder is irresistible "White Whale! Holy Grail!"

As another oldster recently reacquainted with the metal genre, I'd recommend Mastodon, Opeth and Kvelertak. A little more extreme yet brilliant: Gojira and Behemoth. All are worth seeing live. For something leftfield try Igorrr

It's a terrific book and I'll be forever grateful to MM for introducing me to Fritz Leiber and Gene Wolfe