TUI have been aggressively advertising a hotel at me on Insta for a couple of weeks so I decided to click through. I think I understand why they might not be getting that many UK tourists...

So, Slot's gone. Been clear that it's not working for some time now, & I'm relieved that we're not going into next season with the negativity of it all. So right thing to do. Winning the league isn't forgotten. Need to careful and considered about what we do next.

Didn't really have dinner tonight because it turns out that our local butcher's chilli sausages are the spiciest known to man 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️. Even Chris, who loves his spice, was struggling. Far beyond my level. Mad stuff.

This has been my go-to "first day of summer" record for over 20 years. Thought to myself this morning, driving to work with the top down and this on blast 🌞, how many hundreds of times have I listened to it? Yet it's still the perfect soundtrack for a day like this.

Was not prepared for how much saying goodbye to these two actually hit me yesterday 😭 End of an era and I can't say I'm full of confidence for what happens next

This sort of content is why I've been following LMNC for years before ESC. Hard to capture in 3 minutes on a major stage how geeky, specific & interesting the videos of moving this pipe organ here from a small house were. youtube.com/shorts/TNeee...

Very glad I didn't put myself through that split screen. Made up for Bulgaria, an incredibly charismatic performance of a catchy, fun song.

I've gone to bed. I said I wasn't putting myself through this. But I can't look away even though it seems to be heading in a certain direction....

Go on, I'll bite: I've read 40.5 of these. The .5 is Ulysses, one of the only books I've ever given up halfway through. Others have been finished out of bloody-mindedness rather than enjoyment. www.theguardian.com/books/ng-int...

Got invited to a Talking Heads tribute show for today. I don't even like Talking Heads that much. But said yes so I had an easy way to swerve The Contest. Turns out it's an afternoon show. So I'm going to a tribute for a band I'm not into *and* still have the dilemma of tonight. What a Saturday.

Might book next week off to lie in a darkened room and recover from the emotional shitstorm of everything this week has been. Not that it's over yet either 🫠

It all feels completely directionless. I can't see what the plan is. When it goes wrong, it seems like there's not even the concept of a plan of how to change things. This season has had mitigating circumstances. It's had injuries. But the thing that it feels to me like it's never had, is an idea.

As if this week wasn't bad enough for my nerves already, this is embarrassing stuff from the Reds. The worst part is that it's not even a surprise though.

Didn't watch SF2 as I was at Stewart Lee but glad to have seen Bulgaria go down so well. I was explaining tonight (with ALL the context) to the office earlier and Bangaranga was the whole team's firm favourite.

Haven't made the same mistake twice - off to see Stewart Lee instead tonight.

Meanwhile at EBU headquarters…. (At this point I’m doing this mostly for @messylines.bsky.social )

Really, I ended up in the worst of all possible worlds last night. Didn't watch the show, but couldn't keep myself away from updates and opinions. Feel like I'm setting myself up to go through the pit-of-stomach dread on Saturday that I was hoping I could step back from this year.

Ooooh I've found myself a *perfect* on-brand distraction - getting mad about how actually, Man In The High Castle S4, there is absolutely no fucking way the Nazis were copying THAT Vera Mukhina sculpture to replace the Statue of Liberty!! (yes I'm well behind on my TV habits, when am I not??)

Wish I'd had the foresight to make proper plans for tonight. But I didn't, so now anything I do is gonna feel like I'm doing something to "avoid the obvious" rather than an action in itself.

It's lunchtime on the Monday of Eurovision week and I'm already exhausted by all this. (Partly because I didn't sleep great last night, being kept awake by anxiety about what the week might bring). Gonna be a long one.

Seen a few people trying to argue that Malta are also advertising, and this was no different. But I just got this ad and, I dunno guys, asking me to just listen to a song doesn't seem quite the same as "vote for my country 10 times". Just me? I do think all contest ads should be binned off like.

Wasn't good that, Reds.

First home game of the season when I've been in the UK, but am not at Anfield for. Bit odd to still be watching it on the TV still. But know how lucky I am for not being there to feel odd. Let's just win eh Reds? 🔴

This nonsense* is why I can't get invested in next week. I genuinely hope everyone I know who's heading to Vienna has fun, but for me the shadow of this shit remains. They've been called out this time, but I won't be at all surprised if they find a way round still. (*And the genocide, of course)

Joining the chorus of praise for this by @4hundredblows.bsky.social. TBH I've never been that interested in the JFK assassination, which made this the perfect book to learn from. Less concerned with conspiracies than with the people, & what we learn about ourselves from that 1963 day. I recommend!

What I've been listening to this week: this is bloody great. Beyond the media noise, they're just a very good band (and really fab live). Looks like it's going to number 1 this week too. tidal.com/album/519187...

May is usually my favourite month of the year because it's full of my favourite things: football and Eurovision. Except this year the footie is unspectacular and full of goodbyes, and Eurovision is a clusterfuck. So going into the month with more complicated feelings.

Just been reminded in this process that in 2016 I saw exhibitions by Jeff Koons and Yayoi Kusama in the same *day*. Apparently I was really in the mood for shiny surface things with commercial appeal but little other substance 10 years ago.

My favourite difference between Tidal & Spotify is that the classical playlists seem to have been made by ppl who actually appreciate the genre, rather than what's easy, or good for the algorithm. E.g. somebody's put a 30-minute Mahler movement as track 4 on Classical Classics. And it's fab!

Yellow card was shown.

One of my favourite things about weather like this is observing the extreme differences in what people wear. Bundling up in a thick coat and woolly hat, or keeping it simple in a strappy top and sandals, are both equally valid. 🌞

"I wasn't being racist, I was being homophobic so it's fine actually" is an incredibly depressing view. And 3 of the games being a suspended ban shows that apparently, frustratingly, he was right that Uefa wouldn't care. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...

Need to make room in my photos storage, so in the process of deleting all my pictures from exhibitions I saw 6-10 years ago. Not many that have stuck in my memory, but every so often finding one which still holds up. Hope those ones are still serving their artists well.

One of the underrated things about working in an art gallery is that when you're a bit overwhelmed and been staring at a computer screen for too long, you can step away and come into a room that looks like this instead.

It's more than two weeks later and I'm still thinking about how good this performance was on a daily basis 🪽 Broke my usual rule on taking just one video/picture at a gig to take quite a few and very glad I did because they're giving me joy.

Back at Spanish lessons tonight 🇪🇸 getting better, but more & more aware of using the habits Russian's given me that don't apply in Spanish. 1: 🇷🇺 barely ever uses "the". Eg чай на столе = [the] tea [is] on [the] table. 2: 🇷🇺 also doesn't use the verb "to be" much. Я учителя= I [am a] teacher.

This follows on nicely from my Angine de Poitrine point the other day, that just because a thing is getting talked about doesn't make it bad or a scam. Getting Killed is a great album, and they're fantastic live. You might find a band through marketing, but that's not the reason you keep listening.

I'm more frustrated that we played really well for lots of that second half. Because where was that performance for the rest of this tie? Makes it extra disappointing. If we'd had more guts we could've got a lot more out of both legs. The fact that we withered the moment they scored speaks volumes.

Was more optimistic than I should reasonably be anyway. This team, which is a bit mad but definitely attacking, has made me even more unreasonable. Let's just go for this. 🔴

Today I've mostly been thinking about the Angine De Poitrine discourse that my Insta is full of. My take: they're great! Sure they've got attention for their look, but that doesn't keep people listening. They're being well received b/c it's a sound that not many other bands are doing right now (/1)

🇭🇺 More than a little gobsmacked that Orban just conceded. Politics nowadays had me expecting the worst. Delighted for Hungary!!

No longer consider this a spoiler as she's put a version of this moment on her own Insta. My version is not the best resolution, but I still love it.

Happy Easter Sunday little guy. (By Lucas Cranach, spotted in the Thyssen-Bornemisza earlier today)

That might well be the greatest show I've ever seen. I won't post spoilers because I know people here who are going to later dates but...you won't be disappointed.

It turns out that the arena is behind a certain square that is *very* familiar from 2019. Feels sad knowing we won't be having scenes like that again anytime soon.

Also a child actually cried in the pub when it went 4-0 which is honestly the most understandable reaction.

Well that's two hours I could have spent in the sun that I'm not getting back 🫪

I'm giving up time in the Madrid sunshine to sit in a dark little pub for them. So I need them to be good to justify this.

It's Rosalia day! 🤩🪽