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With my brainfruit

Signed copies of Lime Pickled and Tropical Madness, now available at Gerakbudaya bookshop, Penang.

A story from @connla-stokes.bsky.social connla.substack.com/p/somewhat-f...

Be there, or be somewhere else

If you happen to be in Penang next Friday, or know someone who is.

Well this aged well. My razor is still going well. Meanwhile Lecornu's prime ministership is already over. I could have bet a lettuce.

Some great photos here kathmandupost.com/visual-stori...

Happy Birthday Steve Reich appy Birthday Steve Reich H ppy Birthday Steve Reich Ha py Birthday Steve Reich Hap y Birthday Steve Reich Happ Birthday Steve Reich Happy Birthday Steve Reich Happy irthday Steve Reich Happy B rthday Steve Reich Happy Bi thday Steve Reich Happy Bir

E. Macron's latest pet prime minister S. Lecornu (who I wager will be outlasted by my disposable razor) has announced he will lower income taxes for couples earning minimum wage. Sounds good. One slight hitch. Couples earning minimum wage don't pay income tax. www.ouest-france.fr/economie/imp...

@unamullally.bsky.social on the Irish language. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Got kids?

I know I won't be the only one waking up in tears to this news today. So authentically himself that there really was no one like him. A beautiful man who intrigued, schooled and inspired us all. I'm heartbroken for him & for those who loved him. He will be so missed. www.rte.ie/news/2025/10...

The publication of Lime Pickled and other stories was somewhat complicated by a certain virus. I never got around to making a proper page on my website for it, so here it is, with lots of buy links. There will be a belated book launch later this month in Penang. www.marcdefaoite.com/p/lime-pickl...

Finally, there is an unsubstantiated claim that mitigation action for Irish agriculture would cause carbon leakage and increase emissions elsewhere - this is a bizarre claim and I don't know why it is still advanced. Ireland's agriculture sector is the most GHG intensive in Europe.

‘Solar power is reshaping economies, industrial systems and geopolitics, largely under the radar of mainstream debate. We are living through an energy transition that, for once, feels exponential rather than incremental.’ @hannahdaly.ie www.irishtimes.com/environment/...

Mark Zuckerberg has a vision for how A.I. could be used in Meta's universe. But the actor and filmmaker Joseph Gordon-Levitt is here to point out a flaw in the technology: an apparent lack of guardrails around how the company's chatbot interacts with underage users. nyti.ms/3ILwCNo

Pour écrire l'histoire, il faut d'abord la déchiffrer ✍️

You know the way you get the chorus of the Fine Young Cannibals 1986 top-ten hit cover version of the Elvis Presley 1969 chart-topping hit Suspicious Minds (which in itself was also a cover) stuck in your brain all day? Yeah, well that.

We are thrilled to announce that our NEW Large Language Model will be released on 11.18.25.

Une "dévastation". Les glaciers suisses, très touchés par le réchauffement climatique, ont perdu un quart de leur volume en seulement dix ans. La fonte de 2025 est la quatrième plus forte depuis le début des mesures, après les années 2022, 2023 et 2003 www.france24.com/fr/info-en-c...

"In one of the more unintentionally hilarious sequences, Ms Guinness visits a village in “Connacht, Co Mayo”, and is shocked to discover that a famine took place several years earlier and that everyone speaks Irish." #speirgorm www.irishtimes.com/culture/tv-r...

Switzerland's glaciers melted considerably over the past 12 months to log their fourth-largest reduction in ice volume on record, monitoring body GLAMOS has said.

We're all on the spectrum, or so they say, some of us more than others. Aithníonn ciaróg ciaróg eile.

"We forget what it is like, to be young and still open to experience. Gradually, life closes off all avenues, until it seems that the road we are on is the only one that has ever shown itself to us ..." The Searchers — @robrubsam.bsky.social minorliteratures.com/2025/09/30/t...

CBC lists 10 pieces of lost canadian art, every artwork suggests a branch of cansdian art lost forever: www.cbc.ca/arts/10-lost...

A ridiculous little run of luck on the poetry front this week. Thank you, Jamie Poissant, for several benisons: giving this poem a spot in Aquifer & for nominating it for the Best of Net anthology. And thank you, Dean Ward, for letting me borrow this sweet corn & pet moth.

quote of the week just dropped

@roisinlanigan.bsky.social on Irish accents on the screen. After more than 35 years away, my accent is apparently so diluted and distorted that I've lost count of the times my fellow Irish ask me what part of Germany I am from. (I have never lived in Germany). www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Bad title, good article. It's not the people eating soya that are the problem, it's the people eating the animals that eat the soy who are the cause of this deforestation. Just say no to beef. Better still, all meat. We are destroying eco-systems with our mouths. www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

I wrote about Underground Brussels, the result of 1,000 years of digging, building, filling-in and forgetting. A hidden second city for which there's no proper map. www.brusselstimes.com/1765462/laye...

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"Nature. The assessment of nature is very poor, with 85% of Ireland’s protected habitats and almost one third of protected species of flora and fauna having an unfavourable status. Over half of native plant species are in decline ..." www.eea.europa.eu/en/europe-en...

Bicycles 1 vs Fascists 0 My heart was in my mouth watching this. I'm so sad that we are all living in this time in history. Without a bicycle this person would almost certainly have been disappeared.

ICE attempted and failed to disappear a food delivery guy. It needed to be scored.

The Sunday sermon from Dave Borlace #JustHaveAThink www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcNh...

Quelques milliers de manifestants en France pour le climat, mais aussi pour Gaza et la justice sociale

“Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you’ve got a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies—’God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.’” – Kurt Vonnegut

If you view your writing as work, then you'll be okay with using AI. If you see it as essentially play, you won't. Work can be delegated; play can't. Why would you want something inhuman to have all your fun for you?

Autism doesn't need to be cured, because neurodivergence is not a disease. New essay: open.substack.com/pub/lauriepe...

My colleague - I think your phone keeps ringing. Me - No, I'm just listening to Steve Reich.