Jumping on the films/plays/books/gigs-I-loved-this-year bandwagon. Separate bookcentric post to follow presently.

I'm a firm believer that this liminal period between the holidays and New Year's is how we're supposed to live. It's peak existence. May the word "efficiency" die in 2026 and all its horrible relatives "innovating" to solve the perceived problems of rest, joy, creativity, and humanity.

Dune 3: If You're A Fan Of The First Two Dune Movies You're A Dickhead

‘It was that prolonged, flat, cheerless week that follows Christmas …’ One of the great passages on the interval between Christmas and New Year from Anthony Powell … #ADTTMOT

“Now here is the lake, and I still haven’t changed.”

My most beloved film ❤️

I love this in Ivy Compton-Burnett's MANSERVANT AND MAIDSERVANT. The 'HMM' at the bottom is the printer's way of identifying that this is gathering H of M[anservant] and M[aidservant] (pages earlier on are labelled e.g. GMM and FMM), but it looks like a sardonic commentary on the action.

PSA: How to pleasure a woman

When this guidance is published (given legal standing), as it almost certainly will be, as a trans man I will not be allowed to use non-unisex public toilets. Which is almost every public toilet. Just want that to sink in, there. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

“That’s a new silver fox! It’s stunning.” “Thank you.” “It must have been pretty expensive.” “It was.” "The Shop Around The Corner" Without Any Christmas or Romance Is Still A Pretty Good Movie About Luggage Inventory www.thechatner.com/p/the-shop-a...

They don’t, need it be said, make ‘em like they used to. boxd.it/c1dKpn

I feel like this should be the lead story on every news outlet. They're quick to tell us about the taxi rides that asylum seekers are given so waste is obviously high on their agenda

It’s maddening that I just heard this tribunal decision covered on BBC News, which led with “Sandie Peggie wins her case,” expanded with “Sandie Peggie secures a partial victory,” then only on listening further did it become clear she actually lost on most of the substantive points she was pursuing.

Stonehenge! Where a man's a man And the children dance to the Pipes of Pan

The thing about both the WI and the Guides is that transphobia is best countered by like, meeting trans people and talking to them. It is far easier to stoke hatred when you have shut down avenues for normal daily interactions.

Nothing says feminism like forcing women to do something they have been vocal about not wanting to do.

Once more preaching to the choir (I hope): If GC people were really concerned about women's safety and rights, they'd be focusing on this, not persecuting a minority in an effort to scrub them from existence.

Feminism is when you have to have a certain set of chromosomes to make jam! Given the WI has been explicitly trans-inclusive since the 1970s, I'd be interested to know if there is even one recorded instance of this causing an issue for cis members

This is a wonderful thread. Scholarship, creativity, a portrait of a generation.

A hermit who takes a newspaper is not a hermit in whom one can have complete confidence.

subscriptions >>> shop.viz.co.uk/viz350bs

Elon Musk (pointing his phone at a fellow partygoer): “Hi, I’m Elon. Wow! Seen a mirror lately? You look like the love child of a marshmallow and a shoe shine brush! HA! You look like Wallace Shawn let himself go! Or a bowl of tapioca got syphilis from a …Wait, am I on selfie mode again?”

When my wife left me it cured me of any fantasy that being "Left" was desirable

I wish I could remember how I first heard about this poem (Briggflatts, by Basil Bunting). Did somebody tell me about it? Or did I hear a bit on the radio? In any case, it's been one of my favourite things for many many years (especially if you hear BB doing it out loud: incredible)

I hope this won't mean the Telegraph goes really right-wing

Fixed it for you. Idiots! If the exclusion is based on appearance then it will certainly impact cis folks as well as trans folks.

Habe gehört, dein Vatis Lieblingslied aus Dichterliebe ist 'Ich hab' im Traum geweinet'

Featuring: 'Splinter Wonderland' 'Stoole Nacht' 'Deck the Chairs' 'Little Wonky'

It is weird how much travelling in this country is just making a short term interest free loan to a train company/government.

Conscious of not having heard anything of my hero Simon Russell Beale since he pulled out of Titus Andronicus in September, I turned to Google for news of his health. Nothing, but it did suggest another salient and knotty question.

All aboard for Passchendaele

This resets everything we've done. Incredible!

30 million dead, The Somme, painting created by Mary Bishop 1976 in the art therapy studio at Netherne hospital where she was compelled to live. Aged 4 when her father was killed in WWI, the reverberations of his death & her mother’s vast grief traumatised & distressed Mary for the rest of her life

I mean, look at that cream, look at that custard Detail from Pie Rows, 1962

Sitting there like Jeremy Bentham

Funniest Facebook comment I ever saw was by a friend of a friend riffing on 'HP Lovecraft' being how Harold Pinter referred to sex. PINTER: Buckle up, Antonia, it's time for some [pause] ...

Horrific, stupid news from @uniofnottingham.bsky.social — they are closing their music department. Apparently they all found out suddently in a meeting yesterday. It is one of the best music departments in the country — solidarity with my colleagues and their students www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

A movie you've seen more than seven times - with a gif

Quote with your favourite film and album from the year you were born

In 2008 I received a spam email with the subject line 'Michael Jakson glued up a person a plaster' containing a link to a video purporting to show Bred Pitt's birthday, and 17 years on whenever I have to glue or tape anything I still think 'Michael Jakson glued up a person a plaster'.

A gem of a painting from 1955 by Joan Eardley of a brother and sister outside a Glasgow tenement. I like the way she has managed to define the sitters; she knew a truly successful painting had to go deeper than a mere visual record.

If you see this, post 4 female characters you love

When you're whatever I am (which isn't interesting enough to have a label yet) coming out isn't a big deal. But this does remind me that I first came out at 6. Happened upon 'homosexual' in a dictionary and told my mother I was it. She kindly suggested it might be wise not to repeat it too widely.

I'd missed the sad news about Björn Andrésen. Lots of people are memorialising him with photos from Death in Venice, of course, and I had quite a thing for him myself when I was about 15, but you have to feel queasy. Attention must be paid. Ryan Gilbey gets it.

I've spent the last few nights watching TALKING TO A STRANGER while it's on iPlayer (another month to go; it's also on YouTube in lower quality). I was vaguely aware it was highly thought of but not prepared to be blown away as I was. It seems monumentally brilliant.

BBC obit of Prunella Scales really encapsulating the biting wit of Fawlty Towers

The youngest person in the house is old enough to drive

Yikes. This is getting on for 47 years ago. I remember it as though it were yesterday. I feel freeze dried from another era. youtu.be/EfQ5bNA6amQ?...

This is one of those moments (a bit like playing Connections) when a Brit beholds the chasm between US and UK culture. Those cereals: Oysterettes, Holland Rusk, Honey Grahams… meaningless.