2026-09-21 16:27:19
A thousand curses on whoever decided to reorganise the main navigation on Github so that "Agents" comes before "Actions".
While I'm not a fan of "Agents" in the first place, I reluctantly accept that they're a part of Github. However, I am also old man shakes fist at clouds dot gif.
On mobile, the navigation collapses into an overflow menu. I am not convinced this is a good choice anyway but that's the trade-off they decided was best for them. What it has resulted in though, is that on my phone "Actions" is pushed into the overflow menu when it wasn't before. Curses!
I often have to check why my scheduled builds have failed on me (I say "often" like my code breaks daily but that's not entirely true). I never have to look at the "Agent" page.
Now my most common reason for going to the website is hidden in an overflow necessitating two clicks instead of one. At a time of stress ("OMFG build failed!") this is an annoyance I could do without.
And, yes, I am aware I could "just" not use Github.
2026-09-21 03:36:31
The Red Creep™ has started making its way across the maples in the graveyard, the sweetbriar has produced rosehips, days have tipped to more than 50% rainy and, most telling of all, I put the heating on one afternoon. Autumn is here a week early.
If you've read these long enough you'll know how much I hate PowerPoint. I usually write a blog article and drop section summaries on slides for someone more visual to, er, visualise. However, I think I've pulled together my best deck ever this week.
It's an extremely complicated piece of work around "user accounts" which is proving a headache of conflicting concerns from compliance, marketing, and technology.
There are essentially three ways to skin this particular cat and each one pisses off at least one group. My deck exists to point that out to them nicely and gain concensus on compromises so we can take the project forward.
Halloween tat is surfacing in supermarkets and discount stores; more often than not alongside the Christmas tat giving Tesco a very "Nightmare Before Christmas" vibe.
I used to use this time of year to buy a metric fuckton of "spooky" crap to decorate my house year round but, in recent years, I've been much more restrained.
However, this year I succumbed to the lure of a heavy woven cotton blanket in cream with black bats that feels soft and lush, looks equally goth and cottagey, and will keep me warm at my desk. It's on my knees now and I'm living my little old nanna fantasy.
I was pretending that I did not speak their language; on the moon we spoke a soft, liquid tongue, and sang in the starlight, looking down on the dead dried world.
Shirley Jackson, "We Have Always Lived in the Castle"
2026-09-20 05:30:15
I didn't go to uni, let alone Oxbridge, but I know people who did and their anecdotes track with a lot of the vibe in Thompson's debut.
There's a lot of lived experience throughout the book I have absolutely no hope of truly understanding — I am not a Black woman — but I find it fascinating. Obviously Thompson doesn't speak for all Black women, but I feel like I'm being educated through the unlikely medium of a cosy revenge thriller.
Given the genre, it should be no surprise there's some bad murders. The cover blurb slightly undersells how violent the book is. The violence itself isn't graphic, but it's clearly there, unashamedly so — not exactly fade-to-black, but not gory and gratuitous either.
History that's relevant to the plot is drip-fed through hints and asides, letting the reader feel clever for putting two and two together and working it all out. The prose swings from abstract sentences conveying the passing of time to somewhat dense, metaphysical philosophy.
A well-written book that makes several very important points, backs them up with evidence, and drives them home.
If there's any criticism, I'd say the ending felt a little rushed. But I am eternally grateful to Thompson for introducing me to the concept of the "cosy revenge thriller".
2026-09-19 04:50:41
Opening with my favourite character introduction of all time, Jackson sets the tone for this odd thriller that defies expectation.
Young Mary Kate Blackwood lives with her sister and uncle in the spacious family pile. The actual location and time are largely irrelevant; this book is deliberately timeless. They pootle through their offbeat but pleasant existence, Merricat (as Mary Kate os affectionately known) dropping enticing breadcrumbs of backstory as we go, until a visit from their long-lost cousin upsets the balance of their insular life.
This reads like a classic tale of the supernatural in the vein of Herbert's "Haunted" or Amenábar's "The Others". Even though the book is set in Spring, it feels fitting to be picking it up at the start of Autumn.
Merricat's narration is brilliant; a child-like naïvety infuses her blasé renditions of the bizarre events that is this family's normal. Her magic (or is it superstition?) adds another layer to this all encompassing mystery — how much of this is even real?
The real magic here is Jackson's effortless ability to make the "weirdos" so very sympathetic. I am 200% Team Merricat and fuck those villagers!
2026-09-14 03:49:04
I spent the bulk of the week struggling through a TJ Klune novel. There's nothing wrong with it — it's well-written with an interesting premise — it's just not clicking with me at the moment. So I made the difficult decision to just stop reading it.
I don't often DNF books, but there have been a couple of occasions recently. Like when I picked up "The Left Hand of Darkness" on holiday, and it just wasn't a good fit.
That's been demonstrated by starting to read "We Have Always Lived in the Castle" and blasting through more in one evening than I did in an entire week of the other novel.
I hopped on a call with a colleague earlier this week to get onboarded into a service blueprint project. They asked how my day was going, and I instinctively glanced at my notebook — on the desk next to me — to find "Wednesday" written at the top of the page and nothing else.
Turns out I've been too busy to even write a task list.
Service blueprints are an interesting artefact to work on because, as we know, the closer you get to delivery, the more complexities are uncovered. Trying to document everything in detail before you start building is a fool's errand.
But also, part of the purpose of a document like this, when you present it to a client, is not so much what we're going to do, but that we know what we're doing — it's there to instill confidence.
Reviewing a document like this from a technical standpoint is an interesting exercise too, because you can see where other people's confidence areas are by the level of detail that's been put in certain places, and where things are a bit thinner.
A lot of the task has been about structuring the document — organising the flow and specifically wording tasks so that it's detailed enough to instill confidence, but vague enough not to get bogged down in detail that's likely to change once we get to implementation.
It's a fine line to walk but I feel like we achieved that by the end of the session. I'm looking forward to seeing the final flows when I get back next week.
One of the interesting things about having children is that when your kid makes friends with another kid, you kind of have to meet the owners1. That happened this weekend — we had a playdate/pizza party which, despite a little trepidation, was actually really, really good fun. Nice people, I liked it.
Me and the dad got talking about System of a Down. He told me a story about how, a few weeks ago, he went to see them and lost his wristband in the mosh pit, and got thrown out by security. In turn, I told him a story about how I had tickets to see them when they supported Slipknot on their first UK tour, back in 2001 — but the gig was postponed because of the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center, and System of a Down being flagged as persona non grata over their (alleged) anti-American views.
I usually say my Silent Sunday images have no people in them. This one does because sticking to the rules isn't very punk.
1: © Dylan Moran
2026-09-11 16:22:02
Welsh metalheads Dream State dropped a new single of sparkling synths cut through with dirty guitar and Jessie's voice builds from naive cut glass to the shrieking of avenging angels — "Forever in View".
From the warping bass opening note to the sustained wash synth that closes "I've Never Felt So Hated", Chloe Slater pulls out something a bit darker than her last couple of singles. Maturing into her sound comfortably.
A new EP from Emma Blackery is always welcome. Four tracks in that inimitable style that hovers in the Venn intersection of "bedroom indie pop", "Warped Tour", and "Cure labelmates", "Shame" will likely be an insta-buy for her fanbase.
Crawlers "Cool" pairs a sludgy bass line with a furious staccato delivery that brings to mind Zach de la Rocha.
Pink Turns Blue are one of those bands I really should have heard of before now. 1987's "I coldly stare out" is sublime; a post-punk masterpiece.
The Warning comprises three Mexican sisters serving sleazy metal-adjacent poppy alt-rock. Confident and pleasant enough, "Why Do You Like It When I Cry?" from their latest album is a good introduction.
Pig, not to be confused with Pigface, Apes Pigs and Spacemen, or Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs, are a NIN-adjacent industrial act from London town. "The Merciless Light" (and cleverly named remix album "The Merciful Night") are exactly what you'd expect from my description: glitchy, sleazy, distorted but accessible industrial. Shades of Marilyn Manson and Depeche Mode.
Luckily Traitrs exist for everyone who's wondered what it would sound like if Robert Smith fronted Editors and listened to a lot of And One. Brand new album "Possessor" wears its influences on its sleeve but that's no bad thing.
LA nu-grunge outfit wilt's "bundy" is so very Nirvana making them the Dead Sara it's OK to still like.
Angie McMahon has a solid line in bold Aussie cabaret pop that put me in mind of Carol Hodge (affectionate). "Light, Dark, Light Again" is introspective and vulnerable with an undercurrent of defiance and quiet feminine strength.