Great bit of dialogue in #RiotWomen last night. “We’re sixty next year and you know what comes next... seventy!” It reminded me of When Harry Met Sally and "I'm going to be forty!" #CarpeDiem

@naomialderman.bsky.social's new book: "A friend - who’s read the book - texted me yesterday to say “I see they’ve decided to burn Tim Davie at the stake today”. And so I thought it was probably the right time to put this extract on Substack." naomialderman.substack.com/p/the-bbc-an...

Can't disagree with that.

Today's Nice Thing

"The ghost of Malcolm McLaren hovers over Adam And The Ants on stage" My latest Substack is a 1980 review of Adam and the Ants at the Royal Court theatre in Liverpool. pennykiley.substack.com/p/adam-and-t...

HEY if you are reading Patti Smith’s new book BREAD OF ANGELS & want more, my book WHY PATTI SMITH MATTERS is on sale for 40% off right now (use code UTXGIFTS) utpress.utexas.edu/9781477320112/

It’s 5th November which means it’s Firework Night. It also means it is exactly three months until my book Atypical Girl comes out on 5th February. There’s a chapter in the book called Fireworks. It quotes from this song by @ianprowse.bsky.social. youtu.be/QnQpc5vl1zg?...

Excellent. I wish the alt text had the actual text of the letter, though.

Read a book. Got cross. Wrote this. #autism #ActuallyAutistic crimesagainstenglish.wordpress.com/2025/11/03/h...

That's what I've been thinking, too.

Books I read in October. Not as many as usual in this photo because I also read a 600-page book about punk (pdf only so didn't make it onto the pic). And a very bad book about autism which I am not even going to include. These four were all good though.

Very well argued. TLDR = no, sack McSweeney.

One for @remembrancewatch.bsky.social. In local @thebhf.bsky.social shop.

It's not a grassroots working class movement. "Wherever we looked for prominent flaggers and leaders of this movement, we found people smugglers and sex doll salesmen, people with dubious criminal pasts and people willing to put in a good word for Adolf Hitler." manchestermill.co.uk/the-men-who-...

This morning's earworm. youtu.be/O_KF-LdHK8Q?...

Monthly comms and content blog, in which I share interesting new words, phrases and ideas. This month: tactical frivolity, organic literature and ultra-processed information. pennykiley.com/2025/10/30/c...

Just switched my phone to @ecotalk.bsky.social. Lovely customer service people and instead of horrible hold music you get birdsong!

Big accounts On Here that get loads of traction and shared thousands of times but don't use ALT text in their images. Why? It's such an easy thing to do that makes social media more usable for more people. Takes no time at all. Truly cool, suave and debonair people use alt text every time!

Being reminded of Sue Townsend's novel 'The Queen and I' where the royal family are abolished and have to move to a council estate. Not that it would be appropriate to put Andrew to one, considering the risk he'd pose to any children and young folk who live there.

If you're a National Trust member, it's that time of year again: Midnight tonight is the deadline. It's a shame people have to keep doing this to keep a toehold on historical truth in this country, but here we are. Voting link: www.nationaltrust.org.uk/who-we-are/a...

It was always a bad idea. Glad it's over.

Why can no one say, "Oh yes, you should be sitting in F28 on the 0833"? Because so often digital transformation is an austerity, money-saving measure that pushes more responsibilities on to service users - they aren't equalising or "people first" but a way of putting technologies in the middle

Just voted in the National Trust AGM. Keep the "anti-woke" lot out. #SaveOurScones

It's been a thing for ages. I wrote this 11 years ago: olderthanelvis.blogspot.com/2014/11/this...

So Facebook are inviting me to pay them money to stop seeing ads. But the ads don't bother me. The "suggested" content does, cos there's more of it than the people and things I choose to follow. Does anyone know If the fee will stop these?

Latest Substack is a 1990 Liverpool Echo interview with the new line-up of Echo and the Bunnymen, proving they still had plenty of attitude. #MusicArchive #Bunnymen pennykiley.substack.com/p/echo-and-t...

“Are you the farmer? We’ve gone on holiday by mistake.”

Enya videos always look like someone is very slowly hitting a wedding cake with an Athena print. #totp

If you're really centring preventative healthcare, you'll have policies around - clean air for indoor public spaces - cheap/free dental care - free vaccines for working-age people - supporting active travel Do the boring but useful work first and until you have, shut up about obesity.

One of the strangest, greatest, queerest hit singles of all time. Still jaw-dropping even now. RIP youtu.be/vdH_xOIlbbk?...

quite depressing that choosing to belittle a bona fide medical condition for....fun? profit? attention? makes you an award-nominated journalist these days pressgazette.co.uk/press-gazett...

Cnut. He's forgotten about Cnut, who went on pilgrimage to Rome in 1027. Oh, and Edward I, who spent 2 months at the court of Gregory X in 1273. Otherwise, all over the detail, as per.

yes. defending the BBC is not about a specific piece of bad content. it's about the principle. just like the NHS. we're not defending Harold Shipman. we're defending the principle that we *need* publicly-funded information and media systems (not just ones owned by US tech billionaires).

these days I find AI writing easier and easier to spot and I hate it more and more. The self-help essays are painfully obviously AI to me. It’s like a weird chemical smell in the air, once you notice it you start to feel like you’re choking.

I enjoyed the many stories over the last fortnight of people purchasing Kraftwerk tickets online being required to prove they weren't robots. #forgotten80s

“Grandpa, what does ‘awesome’ mean?” “Well, back at one point, it was a word used to describe the planet’s great unfathomable wonders, although now it generally means ‘Thanks for emailing me that PDF’.”

ICYMI: UK start-up Books By People has launched a new certification – the Organic Literature Certification – with a group of independent publishing houses to “counter AI-generated books” 👇 #BookSky

I read something recently that was absolutely chock full of comma splices. Whenever a writer uses one of those, a copyeditor somewhere chokes on their Breakfast Tea.

Lovely city break in Paris that was.

There’s a signed copy of Wild Twin in this year’s Children in Read auction. All proceeds are in aid of the Children in Need appeal. Lot 281, get your bids in! @childreninread.bsky.social @littletollerbooks.bsky.social www.jumblebee.co.uk/auction/deta...

This is hopeful

Proud papa moment: my son J published a letter in the @nytimes.com today (in print tomorrow) on the need to think our definitions of autism.

Enjoying the #NoKings posts tonight. Signs of hope.

Nice of BBC2 to remind us that 1975 was 50 years ago. And also to remind us that pop music in 1975 was mostly rubbish. #WhyPunkHadToHappen

This👇🏼 is exactly my point Reform’s much publicised “success in the polls” is massaging of “surveys” masking the true sentiment of the public who voted for LibDems 7 times as more than Reform Purely Propaganda by MSM to depict Farage as a political heavyweight not the lightweight chancer he is..

Kraftwerk on Tomorrow's World! #WorthTheLicenceFee

Just noticed that one of the editions of Time Shift I worked on is on BBC Four this evening. I remember this being really good so do make sure you tune in!

Looking forward to this.