Curse you @birmo.bsky.social and your endlessly riveting cliffhangers and plots. Moving onto book 3 now. Rupert Degas was a top-notch narrator of book 2 - glad he’s back for book 3. app.thestorygraph.com/books/000f4b... #booksky #audiobooks

I was just doing my quarterly BAS for the tax office when I realized, as I was putting the form into the envelope, that it’s not even reply paid anymore. They make us pay for the stamp. For some reason, I’m angrier about this than I am about the massive amount of tax I owe them.

I like the way he smacks his fist into his hand before he punches the troll/bigot. That’s like a superhero origin story move.

Because I grew up in QLD in the ‘80s, I’m more often surprised when police *don’t* attack demonstrators. So I’ve had that familiar feeling this week of watching people come to a difficult truth: when you see a demo turn ugly, it’s almost always because the cops decided that’s how it was gonna go.

Really want to finish this book, but really have to write this column.

Been doing final edits and checks of World War 3.3. Should drop next week. It’s really fucking good.

Is it on?

Perhaps if the Herzog protesters had turned up dressed as Nazis the cops would have left them alone

Just once I’d like to go to a protest where the protesters had all the batons and pepper spray and the cops weren’t allowed to do anything but suck it up when half a dozen punters dog piled them

I’m very sad about Kudelka. It fucking sucks.

Holy shit. I could finish writing this book tomorrow! Huzzah for Sunday chapters!

This is a great short story by my old mate, Murph. It’s nominally sci fi, but the broken robot stuff is really about our broken humanity. Give it a read if you’re a fan of the golden age. Or robots. Or you’d just like to escape the horrors of this timeline for a while

I'd forgotten just how fucking insanely good John writes, is there a bookshop at this Airport?

This would be spectacular.

Lmao it’s good

This is brilliant and MUST be done! @film-authority.bsky.social, I see a solid 5/5 here.

I decided to write a movie for Jason Statham in which ICE invades the small midwestern town of Tinyville and EX-DELTA FORCE SAS NAVY SEAL SHERIFF MASON MCKILLCHAIN must choose between the law and revenge, but not for long.

This is a fantastic story world. Amazing work. Also, tbh, some of these stories freaked me the fuck out

This was pretty fun however - from a UQ relic of the era - www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

Cracking good read @birmo.bsky.social. Moving onto book 2 now. app.thestorygraph.com/books/ea2116... #booksky

Is there anything better than getting into bed? No, there is not. I will not be taking answers at this time.

Jeebus, iOS 26 is garbage. Besides the shit design it is a battery vampire

We’ll know this is all over when Jason Statham plays a small town sheriff with a dark past, probably in some kind of special forces outfit, who defends his tiny Midwest town against an invading horde of ICE goons who want to arrest the town’s popular but undocumented taco truck guy

Status unlocked. New favourite.

JB is in fine form today…

I was always taught that if you cut the head off the monster, filled its mouth with salt, and buried the carcass at a crossroads at midnight, everything would be tickety-boo. Yet somehow Scott Morrison came back from the dead this week.

...What’s turned me off isn’t the increasingly shitty software or the endless price hikes. It’s Apple’s gross collaboration with the Trump regime. I thought the worst so far was their public donation to build the Orange Czar’s new ballroom. But it wasn't...

Hitler sacrificed a lot of brownshirts on his way to the top.

Thinking of cheering myself up a bit by watching Alex Garland’s Civil War. Especially the last bit.

The rot began when they told me I had to stop calling Scott Morrison a cunt.

I got so invested in this piece that I forgot to write a ‘kicker’, the easily extractable paragraph you can use to sell the piece as a note. So, it’s about what happens when everything breaks down.

Wondering if I have time to write a quickie thriller novel about the failed American invasion of Greenland before the failed American invasion of Greenland kills us all.

If he gets Greenland, he’ll try Canada. (Even though I think Greenland is part mental illness, part looking for an excuse to suspend the midterms. But mostly mental illness).

This is a fascinating thread. Especially having decided my own Axis of Time trilogy needed to be at ten or maybe eleven books long.

Sounds like someone who doesn’t have enough books

"I just needed to stand up and stretch my legs. These chairs are uncomfortable. We need better chairs next time!"

So good. The silver lining to a ridiculously ill-prepared proposition. “I am looking forward to sharing a cell with Rupert Murdoch because, despite all of the uncertainties arising from the hate speech bill, one thing is certain: it criminalises the old Sith Lord’s business model.” #AusPol

This post is hilarious. Worth a read.

“The only thing everyone seems to agree on about Albo’s new Hate Bill is that everyone hates it… Personally, I’m looking forward to the inevitable Chernobyl at Holt Street, when Rupert’s top editorial warlocks realise they’re legally adjacent to the neo-Nazis of the National Socialist Network.”

As somebody who has spent more than 30 years carefully writing his way around Australian defamation law I can confirm that this guy is going to need a second or maybe a third mortgage on his house.

It’s a pretty unremarkable cartoon. Must be some wretched soft cocks running the paper these days. If I was the editor I’d be calling in all the cartoonists and telling them I wanted a new illo everyday telling these whiny cunts to fuck off.

Whenever I open the app and see anti-regime protests now, I’m never immediately sure whether it’s in Iran or America.

I have the best internet friends. Fast waddling penguins, playful rhinos, a great Khe Sahn cover and all the dogs. If you need a break from the sorrow of the world, this thread is for you.

I would like some happy things in my timeline, thanks.

The southerly has started blowing in Sydney. Might finally be safe to leave the apartment and walk across the street to the pub

Kind of hoping the Adelaide Festival invites me to pinch hit so I can laugh out loud when I say, “No.”

A wake up call: “…any policymaker who is not preparing to deal with the US as an extractive fascist superpower has an existential Oh-No Moment coming in their foreseeable future.” By @birmo.bsky.social open.substack.com/pub/aliensid...

Honestly sounds like some people thought Bibi Netanyahu was going to run the Royal Commission.

I'm seriously starting to question the credibility of the FIFA Peace Prize.