Challenge accepted.

Also, in May, my next poetry book, Let The Quiet Ones Rise, comes out and so does paperback of Normally Weird and Weirdly Normal, aiming to visit a few bookshops and libraries so please do get in contact if you’d like me to visit

See you in 2026! 🥳 Here's an overview of our 2025:

The son has come to mine for the week, so setting up his Christmas present - a portable digital piano

Trapped by a dog that is a tad heavy to be on my lap...

I am currently comprised largely of potatoes roasted in goose fat. This is definitely a good thing.

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and please complete your mandatory e-learning by 31 December.

I think this is a really important point. When folks say "no AI" they often don’t mean "I can conceive of no possible use for AI"—they mean "the use cases I’ve been shown do not begin to justify the harms"—that’s not something you respond to by offering another narrow use case

Popped to the allotment to get some parsnips and a leek. One parsnip has done a tad better than the others, it's enormous!

Just had an "out of office" reply from an academic based in Lapland that I very much approve of! "I am currently working on a playful project supporting Santa Claus in Finnish Lapland – in other words, I am on Christmas break."

Drove across to see the daughter and got the closest to running out of electricity yet in the car! About 4% left when I found a charger, eek! Currently having a cuppa while it charges.

The shorteste daye The longest nighte Welcome, sun Welcome, lighte

Just heard that the venue is confirmed for an @nlisn.bsky.social conference next summer! So hold the date, 16th / 17th July, 2 day conference in Leeds. Probably first day neurodivergent library / info people only, but include some wider allies on the 2nd day? More info in the New Year...

Can't think of a stronger endorsement for Erasmus.

Playful Learning Association Collaborative Jamming - an online meetup Thu 12 Feb 2026 13:30-16:30 GMT www.tickettailor.com/events/playf...

If you have a quick 10 minutes before the end of the year we would really appreciate you using it to fill in our playful survey! Wearing Christmassy attire and singing throughout is advised 😀🎄

Latest Playful Learning Newsletter is out, news about lots of playful conferences, contributing towards things like RE:PLAY, & a cheeky little extension for a journal special issue too. Take a look if you're interested in adult play, playfulness, learning. playfullearningassoc.co.uk/december-new...

Missed this from the last Playful Learning Newsletter, whoops! Our next meet-up is now open for bookings, but this time it's online and about co-creating resources that bring more people into our joyful world of play. www.tickettailor.com/events/playf...

I’m pissed that we’re all going to have a shitty 10-15 years economically because a dozen techboys believed that it was possible to write code to the point that the program could write better code and eventually either kill us all or make us immortal, and so they spent $1.5tn for $41bn in revenue

If you love play, this should be of interest: The Playful Learning Conference (1st-3rd July, 2026) is open for submissions. Get those ideas submitted by the 2nd Feb! Theme this year is "into the woods." playfullearningassoc.co.uk/submit-a-ses...

CounterPlay - another play conference: www.counterplay.org

Latest Playful Learning Newsletter is out, news about lots of playful conferences, contributing towards things like RE:PLAY, & a cheeky little extension for a journal special issue too. Take a look if you're interested in adult play, playfulness, learning. playfullearningassoc.co.uk/december-new...

😍We are rejoining Erasmus. Official announcement tomorrow😍 www.theguardian.com/world/2025/d...

Closing this Friday:

The Disability Champions Forum of the Association of Librarians & Information Professionals in Social Sciences have shared notes from the last meeting: alissnet.com/disability/ slides: ♥️ alissnet.com/wp-content/u... 💚 library.worc.ac.uk/sensory-guid... 💜 view.officeapps.live.com/op/view.aspx...

Please feel free to share! We want to understand how to better support autistic and or ADHD undergraduate students at UK universities. The entire study team is neurodivergent (as you can imagine we had some excellent meetings!)

Just looking at the text I wrote for a Playful Workplace course (weekly PDFs over 6 weeks) and it adds up to 13,000 words... should I just bite the bullet and start extending it into a (short) book? Wouldn't be too much work to restructure it slightly and extend it to 25k words, 100 pages, surely?

“…it's not making much money from its AI products. That's because no one is buying them, and that is because very few people actually find them useful… AI agents failed to complete tasks up to 70% of the time, making them almost entirely redundant as a workforce replacement tool.”

This person has been doing Trust and Safety work since web 1.5ish. She knows what she is talking about in a very deep sense. People who have just been paying attention for a while say the same thing. #NZPOL

Another little custom print! Anyone else want a custom letterpress print, last chance to order before Christmas will be Monday 15th (as they have to dry before posting!) www.etsy.com/shop/Librari...

You have often heard me repeat the founding phrase of Hookland: re-enchantment is resistance. This is the county’s core truth. However, I will point out that that sometimes re-enchantment is also an act of intentional sabotage.

Are you researching digital education in HE? Want to share your work at a conference? Then maybe submit a paper to the RIDL: HE conference 2nd/3rd Sept 2026 hosting2.northumbria.ac.uk/ridlhe/ CfP at hosting2.northumbria.ac.uk/ridlhe/?page... deadline 16 Feb 2025

Just come across the 14th/15th Century idea of a folding almanac and now want to make one! Leather cover should be reasonably easy, but can't think what should go on the actual almanac inside... historyofinformation.com/detail.php?i...

Call for speakers! 📚 On 18.03.26 @nlisn.bsky.social is running a full-day online event on neurodivergency and entry into the LIS profession. We welcome proposals from current students, recent graduates, early-career, long-term staff, recruiters, anyone! More info & form - forms.gle/MjT2djGSXp1o...

Today, the Real Simple Licensing (RSL) Collective releases the RSL 1.0 standard. CC worked with the RSL Collective ahead of this release to integrate components of the CC signals framework into the new standard. 🧵 creativecommons.org/2025/12/10/i...

Thinking about going to #LILAC2026 next year? The @infolitgroup.bsky.social is trying out a new programme for LILAC attendees, LILAC Learning Sets, to help people keep in touch and build on their enthusiasm after the conference. Sign up here if interested! infolit.org.uk/keep-that-li...

Went to a craft "taster session" this morning, did a tiny bit of linoprint stuff for a couple of hours :)

Great talk from @jofitz.bsky.social & @playbrarian.uk for tonight's @laicdgroup.bsky.social event on neurodiversity in libraries. Definitely check out @nlisn.bsky.social if you're neurodivergent and working in libraries/information sector in the UK or Ireland! #CDGND

Andy @playbrarian.uk also does in-depth and interactive in-person workshops focusing on neurodivergent staff or users. Check out his website for more info: playbrarian.uk #CDGND

Pondering taking my work pension from my 55th birthday (next Feb!), just asked for a proper quote... can't decide *when* to take it or how much to take as a lump sum. It's probably worth taking earlier rather than later for me!

📢 Last few tickets available for our free event tonight on Neurodiversity in Libraries! www.eventbrite.ie/e/neurodiver...

It's that day again. Try and have a good one. 🦉

The other one I've only run on request before for individual library services, and is "supporting neurodivergent library users", that's on 27th Feb. I'll open bookings for them next week, so just a "hold the date" today for anyone interested! www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1975823292...

Do you know someone who is an outstanding practitioner of Information Literacy? Nominations for the 2026 #infolit award open in the new year, so it's a great time to start thinking about who you want to be recognised. Don't forget - individuals & teams can self-nominate or nominate others.

Calling on all my library friends to share and/or apply as appropriate! We have 4 posts in our new academic skills team open to recruitment here at BCU: jobs.bcu.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx... jobs.bcu.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx... jobs.bcu.ac.uk/vacancy.aspx...

Professors:

Thank you TikTok for my daughter wanting hard to source tat (spice village houses) from the 1990s for Christmas... Managed to find it for her though!

Join us 10 Dec.1-2pm for a free online webinar to discover the Neurodiversity Community of Practice & its Resource Bank - its ethos, guiding principles & neurodiversity-affirming frame with Jennie Dettmer and Ra... aldinhe.ac.uk/the-neurodiversity-community-of-practice-and-its-resource-bank #LoveLD

Happy "Cloudflare is fucked again" day to all who celebrate. Seems to come round earlier every month these days.

Facial recognition technology = mass human rights violations. Again and again, this technology has been proven to be discriminatory against racialised communities. Make no mistake: this is a decision to further entrench racism within policing.