This is Mr. Horsy. Mr. Horsy is not just a badly-drawn horse. He's that feeling artists get when we have to draw a horse, and we're trying to remember how their parts fit together.

Just saw one of those Big Ben tweets that's just like "BONG BONG BONG BONG," and my brain automatically added "SPLOOSH." (Because of that "Tales from the Crypt" story, "For How the Bell Tolls. Spoiler: the clapper is a person. Bong, bong, bong, sploosh.)

If you see this, post your bird tongues!!!!! #birds

One time in high school, I saw a teacher wheeling a light aircraft across the car park, pushing it with his shoulder. I spent the REST OF THAT DAY searching the school. I found entire rooms I'd had no clue existed, but I never did find where he'd stashed that plane.

I can't read anymore of this without sobbing in public, but if you are considering delaying the MMR vaccine for your kid, please read it. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

Most of the art you see of tardigrades shows them how they look under a scanning electron microscope. Which means most of the art you see of tardigrades is really depicting gold-plated dead ones. They're meant to be sort of translucent, not, y'know, opaque like brown paper bags.

That's me, SJ Myles! This anthology comes out in June of this year. Looking forward to seeing what everyone else wrote.

I don't think there'll ever be a day when the Dragon Quest opening fanfare doesn't make me grin like a chimpanzee.

Dental healthcare should be considered medical care and covered by medical insurance. Implants and dentures are not cosmetic, it is life-changing and life-saving medical intervention. 800,000 people visit the ER annually for teeth issues. A 12-year-old died of complications from an infected tooth.

A thing you think about in videogames: when you "steal" from an animal and get an animal pelt, are you skinning that animal alive as it continues to fight you? What about when you steal and get TWO pelts? Was that animal wearing the pelt of its beloved, which you already killed?

I don't think it's performative when people say "I never liked [name] anyway," when some celebrity shits the bed. I think it's relief. Relief at not having propped up someone awful. (That relief never lasts, though. Neil Gaiman was never my jam, but Cormac McCarthy sure was.)

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a short story about a "cancelled" writer and his loathsome crisis manager, quoted here: “You will be cancelled a year or two, yes, but nothing we’ve seen so far says ‘legal action.’ Sure, you’re a pervert, you’re a bad feminist, you rob the cradle—dirty old man. (1)

My first glimpse of a person I knew long ago, in the window of a shop near the Grafton Centre (Cambridge, England). I was looking at the sparkly shit in the window, and suddenly noticed a person was there.

The song in my head today was "Va, pensiero," but then I lost my pencil. I said to my friend, "man, I lost my pencil," and he said "but, HAVE YOU CHECKED YOUR BUUUUUUUUUUUUUTT-HOLE?!!??!!??", and now that's the song in my head.

I wonder if birds ever...don't feel like diving into cold water to get their dinners. If they ever sit looking at the icy cold sea, going "nah, not today, that's a big nope for me." Do they ever ask another bird to grab a fish for them? Does the other bird ever oblige?

Slept 20 minutes; woken by that dream where none of the doors that ought to lock WILL lock, and people keep barging in. Trying again...

Who else up desperately begging their senators not to invent some set of “rules” that will definitely turn the lawless ICE paramilitary forces into “good apples” and thus make it fine and cool to give them a pile of money? 😭 ABOLISH ICE! NO PARAMILITARIES! @murray.senate.gov @cantwell.senate.gov

With respect to Murakami...what? The routine he describes is virtually identical to mine, when I'm writing a novel (which is always; I'm a ghostwriter). I get up at 5 and go to bed at 10, and I walk rather than running or swimming. Otherwise, same. ...it's just habit, man. It's not that deep.

With all the talk of Moby-Dick lately, I thought it was time to resurrect the legend of the terrible lightning whale.

I’m in a local bird photography group of Vietnamese Americans to level up everyone’s birding ability This is the conversation I just had with one of our group members Please protect birders of color who live near you. If you can, volunteer to accompany some you know I personally don’t feel safe 🪶

How many people think my profile picture is a self-portrait? (It's not. It's a picture of a man in my old neighbourhood, whom I secretly thought of as Uncle Tortoise, because he had a long neck, like a tortoise. I changed his hairstyle so he wouldn't know himself if he ever saw it.)

This is a photo from, I think, 2016. These two crows are a parent and fledgling. The parent had been hit by a car, and was very, very sore, but the fledgling was hungry, and would not stop begging. (This story has a happy ending: after one miserable week, the parent recovered.) #birds

I shared this post earlier without knowing the context, simply because this is a beautiful object. But knowing the context, I'm sharing it as what it is: a powerful statement.

The song in my head today is the first ten bars of the Trout Quintet, on repeat. Stop it, brain, stop it. Play the damn rest of it!

1. An Artist of the Floating World 2. The Master and Margarita 3. The Really Dead Wives of New Jersey

The definition of frustrating: I ordered a BUNCH of embroidery shit, so I can get back into visual art. It IS in the building, but my wheelchair gets stuck on the hallway carpet, so I have to wait for my housekeeper to come next week and get the package from the mailroom.

Today's vibe: standing on tiptoe in your Primary 1 classroom, sharpening your pencil down to a nub with one of those turn-the-crank pencil sharpeners, while your whole class recites their five times table. Your pencil is thumbnail-sized. You smell of wood shavings.

When you see a two-headed animal, do you say: a) oh, look a rat with two heads or b) oh, look, two rats with one body?

The reason I thought of this was, with all the game remakes lately, they want us thinking the old is new again. But I was playing the Dragon Quest remake, wandering through this 25-year-old game, and I rocked up to that old priest in Cantlin, and my immediate reaction was "that guy's still alive?"

A bug you WON'T want to scoop up on a newspaper and throw out of your house.

People exist--people you know, even--who prefer the taste of diet soda. They stand in their kitchens and crack open cans of it, and they sip it and make with that "oh, so good" shudder. ...for water and aspartame. ...people you know. ...you'd probably be one of them, if you'd tried diet first.

I've developed a new, annoying habit lately: whenever someone says an accidental rhyme, I say "Burma Shave." "I ate your bread. I thought I'd said?" "Burma Shave." "Oh, fuck off."

First time I saw "Rocky Horror Picture Show," I was fourteen, sheltered, and DEEPLY confused, sitting there staring like "what's going on?" Then Meatloaf cruised out on his frozen motorbike, all HOT PATOOTIE, BLESS MY SOUL, I REALLY LOVE THAT ROCK 'N ROLL, and I was like YES, STRANGER, I AGREE!

What is this song? "Here comes Johnny in again! He's gonna do another striptease. Hey, man, where'd you get that lotion? I've been working with the telephone! Some call it love, yeah some call it love, And that's like hypnotising chickens!" ...it's in my head tonight. I may have the words wrong.

Most of you follow for my art, but I live in Minneapolis right now & I have to tell you how bad things are here now. I'm not sure if what you're seeing on the news really does it justice. It's basically a battle ground on the streets.

Terrible videogame idea: the first time you load the game, an internal clock starts. Real time starts passing in the game world. Starting a new save does not reset this clock. Every year, the game gets a bit harder, as NPCs and characters die, and the in-world situation degenerates.

The song in my head today is "Summertime," and oh man, I wish it were. How is it still only January?

Rules that apply only to developers who don't bring in much profit are worthless and meaningless. Either "nudify" apps are allowed, or they aren't. So, Apple, which is it?

If I get my skates on, I could finish 250 novels this year. (As in, lifetime total. Not as in, I'm going to write 250 novels this year.) All but five have been ghostwritten, and published under other people's names. Three were finished, sold, then never published; two were personal projects.

When the party you've voted for harms somebody, you're responsible, in your small part, for the harm they've caused. It's therefore on you to do your part to help: phone a member of Parliament. Write letters. Donate. Go into your community and find out who's helping, and lend them a hand.

The song in my head today is "We'll meet again...don't know where, don't know when...but I know we'll meet again, some sunny day." Apropos of nothing.

I've ordered a bunch of embroidery stuff. This might or might not be the way I get back into visual art. I think being able to feel where the marks are might compensate for my poor vision. ...I forgot to get a thimble.

Turned my oven on for the first time ever, and a fan came on and blew a bunch of dryer lint in my face. Well, that was unpleasant.

There should be a punctuation mark that reads as a raspberry. Substitute a raspberry for a full stop; end your statement not in silence, but with a rousing "pthbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbt." (It might also be assumed you are flipping the bird.)

The song in my head today is... Bah-bah-bah, bird-bird, bird. Bird is the word. Bird. Bird. Bird is the word. YOU'RE WELCOME. #birds

I...sat wrong (?) and sprained my arse cheek. Then, there was the time I took a big gulp of ginger beer, dropped my pen on the floor, bent down to get it, and ginger beer went up my nosepipes and out through my lachrymal ducts.

"The Busconductor Hines" by James Kelman. ...story of my life, man. Story of my life. No other book feels as real to me, no character as familiar and loathsome as Hines. Alternatively, "The F*ck-It List" by John Niven. INSPIRATIONAL LITERATURE!

I was disturbed to learn I posted almost 44,000 words to Bluesky this year. That's almost a novel's worth. I ghostwrote five ACTUAL novels this year--about 380,000 words--and non-ghostwrote one novel, for 50,000 more. I CANNOT shut up.

What do birds think of birdwatchers?

Arrive alive! <3