Well done Hotpants. 🔥

Debbie McWiilliams was a guest judge on the Great British Menu this week. A couple of thoughts:

Wordle 1,710 2/6 🟨⬛🟨🟨⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 It's a two!

It always catches me off-guard that the Post Office sponsors drama on ITVX.

"If you go to a restaurant and you order mains and sides, and only the sides come, you're not going to be expected to pay for something that you asked for and didn't get," she said. Repeat the false equivalency in the hope it eventually sounds less weird. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

My hometown. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Secret intelligence tells me Debbie McWiilliams will be on The Great British Menu on 24th Feb. Anyone asking her who the next James Bond is should be fired out of the ejector seat.

So this recent report on the National Minimum Wage is pretty startling.

(1/3) It is with deep sadness that we mourn the passing of Teresa de Lauretis (1938–2026), an internationally renowned feminist and film theorist whose work reshaped the fields of cinema studies, feminist theory, and queer thought.

Speaking from the Teaching and Scholarship underclass, I have one message:

A couple of winter Olympics thoughts. That drone shot that follows skiers downhill really conveys how terrifyingly fast they go. Snowboarding lingo sounds unnecessarily suggestive #MilanoCortina2026

Niantic confirmed they have removed the Pokestop from the game. www.gamingbible.com/news/pokemon...

He went on to Aberystwyth University in Wales, where studying drama was the making of him: “I became camper and more flamboyant". I am reliably informed that his habit of wearing jeans with a flame motif on them earned his the nickname 'hotpants' www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

That was Kevin from Fame Academy backing Cher, wasn't it? #totp

Brrrrrrrrrrrp-ing live isn't for wimps #totp

Everyone's fallen over backwards into the dressing up box like a proper pop star #totp

This Spandau performance is my Roman Empire #totp

Send more ska to Eurovision! #totp

Oh dear. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

One does not simply finish watching Yes, Prime Minister.

For true 70s vibes, you need the BBC orchestra to rerecord this #totp

I can't remember how old I was when I first saw the cover of Aladdin Sane. It was certainly after I had an operation as a child, which left me with a scar just over my collar bone. I'll always feel uncannily 'seen' by this image (as the kids say).

Incoming urge to get a watered down beer from the student union #totp

This one was... chewy. Wordle 1,659 3/6 🟨🟨🟨🟨⬛ 🟨🟨🟩🟨⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

I'd love a night on the town with Morten Harket #totp

The vision mixing on that Erasure number was something very special #totp

The happiest of new years to you.

[From deep down an Irish genealogy rabbit hole] Sorry, what?

Will I know any songs in the 2025 #totp review? No.

I’ve spent this morning morbidly watching the MTV channels close down and the final songs played were: MTV Music - Video Killed the Radio Star (Buggles) Club MTV - Don’t Stop the Music (Rihanna) MTV 90s - Goodbye (Spice Girls) MTV 80s - Together in Electric Dreams (Oakey and Moroder)

Thinking of some spicier mitigations than making the court 9% smaller at one end... #BattleoftheSexes

RIP to an incredibly complex star. Brigitte Bardot (1934-2025).

Sometimes I need a bit of public service paternslism. Channel4 app: you're using mobile data, are you sure you want to stream this show without WiFi? TikTok: *also notices there's no WiFi* Your data allowance is none of my business. Let me hoof more nonsense into your eyeballs.

I hate this game.

I went to see The Cure's Wild Mood Swings tour and somehow outran the crowd to the barriers right in front of where Perry Bamonte was playing. He smiled in my general direction and made an incredible night even more memorable. RIP to a lefthanded legend.

What a cracking gift @whenisbirths.bsky.social

So I was coauthoring a paper about lad mags. The National Library of Wales wheeled out a trolley-load of FHM and Loaded for me to peruse in main reading room (filled mostly with revising 6th formers). If I recall correctly, @clairejhines.bsky.social had use a special bit of the British Library.

And this mainly focuses on older, unpublished material. I work on 20thC Irish media history and while the newspapers are mainly digitised, a full 99% of magazines aren’t. And that’s successful, long-running publications from within living-memory!

Glad to see Karen and Carlos's gender trouble in the final #Strictly

The #1 movie when you were 10 years old is how your 2026 is going to go. I think we all knew I'd put my resourcefulness to something ike this in the end.

I learned the word 'vibocracy'. doi.org/10.3390/ency...

I'll be spending the rest of the weekend cruising into Christmas #totp

1998 feels simultaneously a very long time ago and just like yesterday #totp

Lovely afternoon watching Scandal in Bohemia (1921) scored by Joseph Havlat, The Golden Pince-Nez (1922) scored by Neil Brand and The Final Problem (1923), scored by Joanna MacGregor.

“An extraordinary piece of work.” Those aren't my words (or those of Top Gear magazine) but Elis James from BBC 5Live. The perfect Christmas gift for the Goth or Curehead in your life, CUREPEDIA is now fully updated in a paperback second edition. geni.us/Curepedia A GUARDIAN MUSIC BOOK OF THE YEAR

First time I saw Halloween, during the scene where Jamie Lee Curtis is asking her neighbours for help and they respond by turning off their lights, someone in the audience loudly said "Bastards!"

Noob question about the #REF2029. Strategy, People Research Environment. How will the statements be assessed? Like, from the point of view of fact checking.

I love how when you search for the REF on here you mostly get furry artwork.