Reading a book about some bleak events in Irish history and I'm unnecessarily distracted by a sentence where the author writes that "a handful" of people lost their hands.

They had to find someone this stupid otherwise their leader wouldn't be able to say anything at all in the current hellscape.

I've finished Against Nature. I enjoyed it a lot and it also gave me a lot of prose poetry recommendations, lol. Next up is one of Knut Hamsun's Hunger, Juan Rulfo's Pedro Paramo, or Thomas Bernhard's The Loser.

Is this writer the only one who absolutely trashes stuff working for the Guardian today? Don't even particularly connect with his stuff, though it can be funny, just seems there should be more people who will sometimes ridicule things.

This was just on Night Tracks. Sensational stuff, not listened to it for years for some reason.

Anyone read the Goncourt journals?

Combo of headline and image make it seem like he phoned Number 10 to ask, the way my dad phones to ask about tech problems.

When I started reading this I thought it was leading to "and burn it all" and was ready to agree without having really considered it.

iPlayer's World Cup section is pretty cool, loads of nicely packaged old highlights etc.

Heard the first mention of Breel Embolo of my summer just now. Always welcome.

"Growing up, I remember how important our home was to our family." Keir Starmer.

Geography teacher was mainly a PE teacher and was obsessed with being one of the lads. Would set an exercise then sit on a desk with legs akimbo and attempt a one-to-one sotto voce discussion about rugby training with classmates who despised and routinely humiliated him.

Unbelievable journalese/reportage vagueness here.

Elden Ring

Have cause to use Seven Sisters today. Doing the six European cups hand gesture in my mind.

Always feel euphoric after getting off a flight. Mixture of due to still being alive, not being on a plane or in an airport, and arriving home/going away.

I go home tomorrow anyway but here is a final beautiful moon. Yet again should have booked two weeks.

That shootout really got the heart racing and I was only marginally up for PSG.

This is a sorry night for those who believe in managers obeying the rule to stay in technical areas.

Just watching the last stage of the Champions League and I'm tipping a late goal for the PSG

Weird seeing people mock a perception that "Liverpool don't sack the manager" is some holy creed for the club? Not sure I've ever heard fans say this and we've gone through managers at a rate in the past. This was only briefly a thing for United post-Fergie, right? Soon they got up to speed.

Bit harsh for Arne Slot but probably the right decision. A decent man and by winning the league he's done more than many.

Music had three chords or four, later Slade kept the wolf from the door.

Love this track.

I recently learned passports aren't super common in America.

Not so specifically related to the Granta thing but this is a brilliant article.

CMAT's music isn't really my thing, and to each their own, but it does amuse me how when she's interviewed, her hometown of Dunboyne is at times a commuter town, at times an urban wasteland, at times a cosy Irish village etc, depending on the interviewer's need in a given sentence.

My nephews just told me they played a game in the local pub at Xmas where my nephew who has just been given permission to drink, who got a pint which he hated, had to drink every time I took a sip of my pint 😀

Think British food discourse is starting to come from British people. A mutation which even the most pessimistic epidemiologist did not anticipate, believed to be caused by the unique conditions of Bluesky.

Beautiful night with the family, little balcony drink now 🤎

Let's do it.

Feel I'm going to have to watch Dear England just because it seems so desperately of the times. The fact it's definitely going to be terrible is irrelevant - it's just important to know what is at the heart of nervous broadsheet dreams for England and Englishness.

"Have started writing a memoir of this famous day, cooling down in a loincloth I've made from frozen peas. John, Bury."

Think am making paella for 14 people today. If anyone mentions Valencia or rabbits I will disown them.

Weird vibes tbh. Feels hard to disconnect from the 115 charges. Wonder did Noel Gallagher leave five minutes before the end of this one.

That time of year again.

This was interesting.

Jess Phillips, the Sean Dyche of UK pol.

Dublin footballers losing to Westmeath while the hurlers beat Kilkenny. We're in some mad timeline here.

Visiting family by the sea now. Big bear hug greeting from my youngest nephew who demands I go for a swim in the sea, so I do. Kids are great, lol.

The politics in this story are delicious.

"Leftie loosey, righty tighty"

Good job interview technique.

This is how I felt about the local natural wine bars when I lived in Clapton.

I know we're all going through it lately but didn't expect deliberately doing a half-hour walk through the most touristic port area of Málaga while listening to Barry White would prove so philosophically rewarding tonight.

🤎

A warm evening and this setup is the perfect state of affairs.

Well, this is horrible and sad. I'll keep watching though.

This looks ominous in Bilbao.