2025-12-01 17:53:22
Happy December!
Here are a few photos from my phone from the last month with neither rhyme nor reason to the theme.
2025-12-01 16:18:25
"Lonely This Christmas" by ¡Los Campesinos!
Originally by Mud, this laconic miseryfest was an ideal candidate for a Los Camp cover.
2025-12-01 03:13:37
It's mid week. The temperature is skirting zero and the skies are clear and bright. Everything has a slightly ethereal tinge of frost and that wintery haze from evaporating ground frost. I've done the school run, dropped my wife at the station, and I'm stood in the driveway just looking at the world around.
Coffee? Or camera?
Camera won out this time. I went for a lovely tromp through the graveyard, over the fields, and back home via the farm road happily snapping all the way. Said hello to every single dog walker and a couple of mooching school kids like I'm not cripplingly shy!
I did the whole walk metering by eye so I hope everything comes out OK!
Not to get all tree-hugger but I saw the most beautiful rainbow. Close, huge, and vibrant; particularly in the blue/indigo space.
Work has been really good this week; a hard slog but worthwhile. The workshop we ran with a client was a massive hit — particularly the prototypes we pulled together to facilitate feasibility and desirability conversations within the groups.
It's not something I'd want to do every day because I don't cope with that level of pressure very well in the moment. Luckily I have a brilliant team to support. We managed to pull together something that feels like a real boon to the community not just to the client. Which is always the dream, right?
The trees went up over the weekend ready for ringing the bell to signal the start of Christmas. The parish council have started making preparations for the village tree to go up too.
I watched the first Christmas films of the year this week.
Why would a tennis racquet have a microchip in it?!
Rick Mitchell, The Mitchells vs The Machines
2025-11-30 20:13:29
Let the Dark Harvest begin!
Giant Furby
Sparkling dialogue throughout this animated adventure elevates this from a "Kids Movie" to something for the whole family. I know a load of childless adults who would love this film.
Tongue firmly in cheek, this brainchild of former Gravity Falls alum (Michael Rianda, Creative Director and Jeff Rowe, Writer), follows a typically dysfunctional family as they unwittingly become the saviours of the human race during a robot uprising masterminded by a disgruntled AI home assistant.
The animation is strong and the film is paced well; fast but not confusing.
The relationship between grumpy technophobic dad, Rick (Eastbound and Down's Danny McBride) and artistic daughter, Katie (Broad City's Abbi Jacobson) goes exactly how you'd expect.
I was fully behind kung-fu psycho mum, Linda (AKA The Lavender One), as she single-handledly wiped out an entire army of killer robots.
Also, bonus points for Monch the dog/pig/bread –voiced by internet sensation Doug The Pug in his movie debut– who plays a very important role… until he doesn't.
Katie's hand-drawn art style appears overlaid throughout the movie in a way that made me think of Scott Pilgrim.
As well as the effervescent script, there are enough nods to other action movies and childhood nostalgia to keep adults happy. It's nice to find a film that doesn't patronise children and leave supervising adults numb from boredom.
It's almost like stealing people's data and giving it to a hyper-intelligent AI as part of an unregulated tech monopoly was a bad thing.
Mark Bowman
2025-11-30 03:01:14
Poundland Chris Evans arrives in town with his adorable daughter in tow and sets up in a local dilapidated mansion. He asks the local contractor to recommend a good interior decorator who just happens to be his ex! Who doesn't know he's a billionaire dad or something. Will they get back together by the end of the film?
Meanwhile, let down by their usual Santa, the local hotel are visited by a timely replacement — the enigmatic Kris Kringles…
I have a sneaking suspicion I have seen this film before but it clearly didn't leave a lasting impression on me!
Netflix said this is one of their most "thumbs-upped" Christmas movies which is frankly worrying for the rest of the selection.
In conclusion, perfectly serviceable movie of holiday feel-goodness.
2025-11-28 03:47:05
"Greenwitch", the third part of Susan Cooper's beloved "The Dark is Rising" Sequence – marking the halfway point – sees us back on the Cornish coast with our intrepid city mice; Simon, Jane, and Barney, as they embark on another jolly hockeysticks cucumber sandwiches rip-roaring adventure.
What Cooper has done beautifully here is weave the two worlds together in a coherent way. Yes, it's very "Famous Five" but the addition of Will Stanton immediately darkens the tone in a way "Over Sea, Under Stone" just wasn't.
The juxtaposition of the sunny Cornish coast, the demented Dark messenger, the eternal optimism of the children, the pagan-adjacent moonlit hilltop ceremony, bright Gypsy caravans, and eerie ghost ships all work to blend the previous two novels into a coherent work.
The other standout of this book is how feminine it feels. Previously, women in the Sequence were evil or just kind of there. The focus here is on the women. Partly because Jane has a more important role but also the Greenwitch herself and the Lady Tethys. Magic through art, salvation through selflessness.
There are some nice learnings here — not everything can or should be solved with might and bluster. Sometimes strength isn't muscular, it's empathy, and power is simply caring.