Steve Leahy

Discworld Bestiary: A Lifetime of Secrets from Mr Peng's Chinese Kitchen Discworld Bestiary: A Lifetime of Secrets from Mr Peng's Chinese Kitchen : Peng, Mr: Amazon.com.au: Books

I sometimes wonder at the strange workings that would produce this book title in Amazon’s systems: www.amazon.com.au/Hunan-Lifeti...

Oooo… for many years, my “organisation” on Usenet was set to “Cryptozoology Department, Unseen University”. I am most definitely the target audience for this book :-)

I watched a couple of YouTube videos about the discovery, and YouTube’s algorithm is now offering up a seemingly endless supply of other videos on the same topic, which I have no interest in watching. I’ll have to watch a whole bunch of funny staffy videos to tilt it back the right way…

Lost Doctor Who and the Daleks episodes discovered in 'ramshackle' collection The Doctor's assistant Peter Purves was invited to a screening of the episodes in Leicester.

Lost Doctor Who and the Daleks episodes discovered in 'ramshackle' collection www.bbc.com/news/article... via @bbcnews - two more episodes of "The Daleks Master Plan" have been recovered

🎵 I'm digging a hole where the words got in
Couldn't stop my mind from wandering
around airwars

Highway linking Sydney to western NSW closed for at least three months Extra rail and bus services will be rolled out after cracking on a convict-era bridge closes one of the main roads between Sydney and western NSW.

Great Western Highway to remain closed for at least three months www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03... via @abcnews

🎶 So when he was in the land of nod…

King penguins surfing on the 'good edge' of climate change — for now King penguins on islands in the Southern Ocean are breeding earlier and with a higher level of success than they did 24 years ago, a new study shows.

King penguins successfully changing breeding habits in face of climate change www.abc.net.au/news/science... via @ABCnews

I have noticed that google maps does have red outlines for demolished buildings when no new building has replaced it, at least in Suburban Melbourne Australia

“It’s my birthday.” The trigger for another of Granny’s oar-inspiring performances 🙂

Road linking Sydney to western NSW shut by damage to 194yo bridge The Great Western Highway between Lithgow and Mount Victoria is closed due to damage discovered on a historical bridge.

Great Western Highway shut in both directions due to defect at Victoria Pass bridge www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03... via @abcnews

This is how I access bluesky

What good intentions are carved into the stairs leading to onboarding hell?

Not to be mistaken for the Moodle East*, where small crossbred fluffy dogs battle over content management systems

*sounds like somewhere on Bluey’s planet

Second new Spirit of Tasmania ferry departs Scotland for Melbourne The second of the new Spirit of Tasmania vessels begins its seven-week voyage from Scotland to Australia. It will remain in Melbourne until a berth becomes available in Hobart at the end of the cruise...

Spirit of Tasmania V leaves Scotland for seven-week journey to Melbourne www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03... via @abcnews

Authors! Are your readers complaining because they don't like books written in the 3rd person? Are they demanding 1st person narratives? Meet them in the middle, and write in the 2nd person. Once their brains have dribbled out of their ears, they'll gain a new appreciation for omniscient narrators🙂

Argh. No one mentioned Octavia Butler. We should all be ashamed.

The scene: a montage of Ben assembling this episode, to a mixed soundtrack of "Under Pressure" by Queen and David Bowie, "Pressure" by Billy Joel and "Under Pressure" by Queen, Bowie and Annie Lennox.

The result: a brilliant episode, with or without the time constraints.

Probably too late for the podcast, but for younger readers* Tove Jansson's Moomin** books are a great read.

*and readers of all other ages
**auto-corrupt did *not* like that word

Yet no-one is smiling excessively

Washing has been hung out on the Siegfried Line

Distortion artefacts from poor digitisation process have not been corrected.

@dangolding.com I've just spent 40 minutes parked in a vacant Hammer Barn carpark. Initially to let the storm pass, but then to let Screen Sounds finish. That was a really great episode.

@dangolding.com I choose to believe that my yelling "on leather wings!" loud enough to drown out the storm I was driving through is a testament to Shirley Walker's brilliance, and not an indication that I've watched BTAS far too often

So here, as part of my random series "when stupid ideas take hold, and won't let go", I give you both dogs, as they would appear in the world of Bluey.

One rabbit-hole later, I was able to determine that, whilst there *are* staffies in Bluey, the number can be counted on the finger of one hand, with some fingers to spare. /3

After watching numerous reels where dogs are shown absolutely entranced by Bluey, the teen wanted to see if our dogs were interested. The answer was no, but the teen complained that there aren't any staffies in Bluey, so the dogs might not feel properly represented. /2

Historic NSW lighthouse recommissioned after three decades in darkness www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03... via @abcnews

50+ Steve thinks it’s the best thing she wrote, 20-ish Steve wasn’t anywhere near mature enough to get the message.

Maybe a word of warning for the young whipper-snappers who think reading Le Guin’s Earthsea novels sounds like a good idea. It *is*, but be aware that book 4, “Tehanu”, was written nearly 20 years later, and is quite different in tone to the first 3. /2