No longer advance!

I asked my daughter why she doesn’t like our local Picturehouse cinema and she replied ‘Because they call their sweet and salty popcorn ‘mix’’

Advance paperback copy of my new book!

The TV adaptation of Super Gran

Crying (not necessarily with laughter) www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/wha...

On Friday afternoon before the Bank Holiday, colleagues in the Humanities department were called to a meeting on Tuesday. They were informed that the University Portfolio Review had decided that English Language, English Literature, Philosophy, History & Creative Writing UG degrees would close

You think you have a new take and then you read a monograph from 1991

Me to my 11 yr old ‘You learned about the mods and rockets, didn’t you?’ Her ‘Yes, and it sucked’

You can include ‘The’ in the title of your journal all day long, but I’m not using it, word waster

Would be really cool if Phillipson acted on the more pressing problem of universities running out of money

Recovering from my daughter telling me my casual clothes are ‘not of this day and age’. Tbf, the top I’m wearing is older than she is

Wow, really thought JD would get him over the line

New book by me, out at the end of next month: The Mummy in the Cupboard Murder www.routledge.com/The-Mummy-in...

Special place in hell for people who spray perfume/cologne/hairspray/anything on public transport

If your self esteem ever dips, take comfort that you aren’t Matt Goodwin

Why is uploading a document to OneDrive such a mission

I like it when the Google AI search claims to be ‘Thinking’ before delivering something useless

Exactly how many roads, Bob?

Ken Loach’s Picture of Dorian Gray

My daughter today: ‘It was fun but also quite boring’ Who says language has to mean anything

@esmoriemiller.bsky.social @lizzieseal.bsky.social and I have out a call for abstracts/titles for the Routledge International Handbook of Historical Criminology - if you're interested take a look here: www.linkedin.com/posts/lynsey...

The crisis in HE means thousands of Labour voters are losing their jobs and the Labour government can’t be bothered to pass comment

Call for abstracts for the Routledge International Handbook of Historical Criminology. Pls repost

Imagine being right wing in the way that you have to pretend Peter Thiel is a ‘thinker’

I don’t know much about Jim Ratcliffe, but can’t a billionaire afford a haircut?

A mistake people make in relation to Matthew Goodwin is to attribute any seriousness to him. He realised he could position himself for a particular kind of public career and did it. That’s it

One the amazing things about this piece is that the author mentions a bust of Bari Weiss in the library as if it’s not deeply weird

Was Jenrick defecting to the Greens?

2026 a joy and no mistake

Ebooks, please let me hover on footnotes/endnotes as standard

It’s ‘kidnapped’, not ‘captured’

The Divine Comedy one is really nice, fao gen x indie fans

Peter Buck of REM swiftly looked away when he realised I had noticed him

Mary Shelley: “Definitely not a real goth. SMDH.” Ralph Ellison: “Oh god, not them again—quick, hide!” Jack Kerouac: “Even I think this guy is a bit much.”

Just had to sit down and take some deep breaths. Bought a book of first class stamps

Impressed by the superhero like confidence of people who book one half of a sofa at the cinema

Appreciate Booking dot com asking if I’m ‘excited’ to stay in a hotel just outside Birmingham (for the purposes of visiting my Mom’s grave)

Have ‘No More I Love Yous’ by Annie Lennox stuck in my head. It’s been stuck there since 1995

One teenage boy to another on the train ‘You shouldn’t talk to your Mum like that’ Then ‘Or you won’t be able to get what you want’

What does my daughter want for tea? Chips, onion rings, Brie and olives

Hard to get my almost 11 yr old to watch actual TV programmes as opposed to YouTube, but the answer turns out to be Miriam Margolyes

‘Talk me through this decision’ is what my tween said to me about my outfit AFTER work (and teaching a class) today 1990s Band or Offhand Comment from My Tween About My Outfit? www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/199...

Just love being bombarded by policy changes, including how attendance should be recorded, in several different emails on the first day of term 👍

13 beetroots in the veg box. A frankly upsetting amount

I used to think the lyric in More Than This was ‘for the leaves in the night’. Prefer it

Anyone live in or near Rhyl? There’s a murder case from 1960 that I would like to know whether you’ve heard of

Call me unpatriotic, but Mr Whippy is what you have when there’s nothing else on offer

American Pie was in my dream last night so now it’s my mental soundtrack for at least the next week

What from the recent past but before you were born was talked about a lot in your childhood? For me, the moon landings