Behold the purrora.

Post a car picture you took.

“Any legal or political system built around trust in the integrity of the president is doomed to failure … Eventually the people will elect a bad and corrupt person to the presidency, and he will wield every tool … that was designed for good to build his own edifice of oppression and greed.”

Somebody gave my kid this Iron Man throw pillow and I feel like it nails the current geopolitical vibe just a little too well.

I don’t think people quite understand that the occupation by ICE in the Twin Cities has more or less erased non-white people from public life. They cannot safely exist in any space accessible to the public and moving between private places leaves folks vulnerable to kidnapping by armed masked goons.

Just got a peek at the design for the US edition of DATA EMPIRE. Swooning. 😍

You're right to be concerned. Yes, from what you've told me, your employer's wife likely *is* imprisoned in the attic. Here are some practical steps you can take now: - flee - await telepathic message - return *only* if the house is incinerated, leaving your employer crippled

Please join me in praying for my city's only synagogue, Congregation Beth Israel, which was set on fire in the early morning hours, yesterday. Nobody was hurt and a suspect has been caught and charged with arson, but not much is public. Beth Israel is part of JXN's long tradition of racial justice.

Horrible. Arson attack today at Mississippi’s largest synagogue, on Shabbat, destroyed multiple Torahs and left parts of the building in ruins

important message to all bluesky users

New book going to press: *Character Networks in Contemporary U.S. Fiction.* It’s about social networks as context for—and formal element of—the novel. For contemporary lit, novel/narrative theory, DH, lit and sociology, network analysis crowds. Here’s what it’s about: (1/n)

Vegetarian Greek food restaurant called Don't Meat Your Gyros

Utterly bleak news to wake up to: an illegal, unprovoked war; kidnapping of a foreign head of state; triumphant bloodthirst and jingoism. The US has no idea what chaos this could unleash, what totalitarian liberties it encourages. Absolutely terrifying.

Among the many reasons you don’t kidnap a foreign head of state at gunpoint even if you have the capability, is that it sparks consequences you can neither control nor anticipate.

#Poem of the day: Philip Larkin's New Eyes Each Year

What was the last movie or TV show you watched in 2025?

Baudelaire for the end of the year

We Wish You Baby, A Merry It's Cold Christmas Outside 🤝 not going until you get some

[Blushing as I look down at my glass] So… is there a Mrs Potato Head?

A wood engraving of lamplit carol singers in the snow in the village of Trunch, Norfolk by Claughton Pellew (1890-1966) for The Radio Times Christmas Number, 1930

the problem with machine that spits out answers is that when you do research to find a fact, you're also learning about the entire context around it as well as the conversations scholars have about it. all that "wasted" time is developing an actual understanding of how the fact fits into the world.

From the other side of the pond, one of the gems capturing that seamless slide between 1970s decline and the glitzy, faux promise of the Thatcherite 1980s is THE LONG GOOD FRIDAY

The relative usages of "[adjective] reading" in Anglophone literary studies journals, 1920-2020. Made for my "Prac Crit" course next term, "[Adjective] Reading". Interactive version here: public.tableau.com/views/Adject...

Time to get outside this pint (to paraphrase Bertie Wooster)

Horrifying news out of Sydney. Solidarity with all my Jewish friends.

At long last, Orwell’s Animal Farm gets the vacuous, celebrity-driven, pop-music-video treatment it deserves.

Dublin Christmas 2025 checklist: •Out of office: on. •Flights: booked. •Bags: packed, kind of, mostly. •Gifts: there’s still time, it’s fine. •Guinness: imminent.

Does this site work for recipes? If so can you send me your perfect vegetarian stuffing or gravy?

"Die Hard is a Christmas movie" Die Hard is a nostalgic allegory in which the mythical values of the American frontier triumph over technofuturist global capitalism. Grow up

Happy to report that today ended better than it started. (It started at 3:30am with a five year old puking all over me.)

Some personal news: I will soon be rejected for the position of DG of the BBC

An insane political move. One of the recurring complaints about immigration in the U.S. is that those seeking asylum jump the line. This is line-jumping — but for rich people, not those in need.

I would recommend anyone read the Kenova Report published today, especially ps 123-4 in context of the headlines stating there is no evidence of collusion between the British state and loyalist paramilitaries. www.psni.police.uk/sites/defaul...

My book, Realism after the Individual: Women, Desire, and the Modern American Novel, is now out with @uchicagopress.bsky.social! Use discount code UCPNEW for 30% off. I'm so excited! 🥳 press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

I’m still owed the settlement money for the book of mine Open AI plagiarized — the book I wrote while raising two babies

actual bluesky challenge: post your favorite work of art from fifty years before you were born.

Come to Oxford Brookes to do a PhD with myself or one of my fabulous colleagues - really pleased to be able to share this: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DPM937/p...

Who am I—or I—to demand oblivion? I must go out tomorrow as the others do And build the falling castle; Which has never fallen, thanks Not to any formula, red tape, or institution, Nor to any creeds or banks, But to the human animal’s endless courage. (Louis MacNeice, Autumn Journal)

Happy Holidays to all who celebrate

Sylvia Townsend Warner’s ‘The Corner That Held Them’ (1948) chronicles several decades of life in the English convent of Oby during the 14th century. It’s a rich and brilliant portrayal of the lives of medieval women at the time of the Black Death. Townsend Warner was born #OTD in 1893. #BookWormSat

On this National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, we remember the 14 young women who were murdered at the École Polytechnique de Montréal in 1989. We must renew our efforts to end all forms of gender-based violence.

CANNOT UNSEE

Watching the first part of Neil Jordan's film of The End of the Affair this morning and was reminded that Greene kept not only a secret diary, but TWO secret diaries. One was a bluff, so that his wife would feel she'd discovered his secret diary. The other secret diary was the real one.

They’re killing people as a twitter joke. It’s depraved. Can’t let yourself lose the capacity to be appalled and disgusted and outraged by this.

"a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection" buddy our fridges have ad screens on them

Early reports indicate that the drones “turn[ed] and turn[ed]” in what one witness described as a “widening gyre” above the vessel, before “slouch[ing] towards Bethlehem to be born”.

This is my first time encountering this delightful piece of microfiction. It's well worth a read if you have a couple of minutes (and who doesn't, really).

Good morning, friends!