This is an excellent analogy, because my recollection from grade school is that the pen on the right looks fun and exciting, and then you play with it for a few minutes and realize it's not actually useful for anything and in fact makes some tasks more cumbersome, and never think about it again.

Before my time with The Pensions Regulator is done, I'd love to figure out how I could get paid to organise all the cross-gov things. Not fussed what combination of people or organisations fund me (public, private, voluntary sector, etc) within reason. #PublicSector #community #events

📢Key protections that UK nature desperately needs are hanging in the balance. We still have a chance to convince the government otherwise, but we have to act now. Take action here 👉 act.clientearth.org/page/184558/...

Pick up the nearest book. Turn to page 42, post the second sentence. "No two pieces of recycled glass worktop are the same."

Oops – I can’t say anything about some potentially good news related to my limited company yet. 😊

For my next short (2-month) contract, I'm required to work inside IR35 and through an umbrella company. I've operated as limited since 2008, apart from 1 payroll contract in 2018. The chain for this one is Client > Digital agency > An onboarding agency? > Umbrella company (1 of 5)

My tiny digital eco action this January has been the usual deluge of unsubscribing, plus new this year deleting loads of old emails. Not just large attachments. I’ve got my Gmail inbox down from around 11,000 to around 3,500 yay. Because it’s all stored somewhere! #WorldWideWaste

Mystery of the Beachy Head Chip Ship could be a Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys story!

Wow, sure would be pretty crazy if a ton of experts in the artificial intelligence field relentlessly warned everyone about this state of affairs being inevitable over and over for years.

A thought for these times

I WOULD HAVE A CUP OF TEA, OBVIOUSLY

i see ICE have joined bluesky

New release of #UCDFreelancersDirectory now live! 🥁 Find 65 user-centred professionals for digital project design, leadership, advice and training. This month we welcome a Head of UCD, a Strategic designer, a UX/UI designer and a Design consultant. Updated every 3 months. Next release: April.

New release of #UCDFreelancersDirectory now live! 🥁 Find 65 user-centred professionals for digital project design, leadership, advice and training. This month we welcome a Head of UCD, a Strategic designer, a UX/UI designer and a Design consultant. Updated every 3 months. Next release: April.

Why does the last sentence read like a politics-themed Prince b-side

Learn about recognising bias, plus inclusive design, teams and research in my user-centred design e-learning course. #UCD #HumanCentredDesign

AI results and summaries should not be trusted for health info. Go to NHS.uk instead, or trusted equivalent where you live.

Today I learnt about ‘quarter-zips’. Apparently they’ve been in fashion for a couple of years or more. I heard about them on Radio 4, Googled, and then thought “oh the Rishi Sunak look”. I really hadn’t heard of them, as what I originally Googled was ‘cortizip’, which is quite different.

Excited that I'll be working with GOV UK Forms in my next project role! #UCD #content

Had a phone call about a new contract role. An actual ruddy phone call! I liked it.

There's a newish term apparently, it's 'reusable service patterns'. I would have thought a 'service pattern' was always reusable? That's what the 'pattern' part means. Otherwise, it's just a service flow, blueprint or user journey is it not? Genuinely curious. #UCD #ServiceDesign #ContentDesign

2 email confirmations for an online event booking, neither saying the date and time. Hmmm. #content #comms

Waiting for my niece to get back from college before tucking into the Christmas log swiss roll that magically wasn't eaten by extensive rota of cat sitters over the break. Hard to hold back. Having 9th cup of tea (this one decaf) meanwhile. 🍫 🍰 👀

Extremely grim picture of the life of ordinary Russians. Soldiers welcome amputations to exit the battlefield. Killers and rapists pardoned to fight are returned to society as veterans committing horrific murders. Patriotic bloggers arrested. Teen folksingers must flee. Gift link: wapo.st/3N1JnFu

New year, new soap! Bought from same shop in Montmartre as holder in 2024. I travelled to Paris and on to Frankfurt in December by coach. Coach travel’s a top enviro-friendly option, and costs a lot less than Eurostar. But trains esp electric are much lower-carbon than plane or car travel as well.

Happy New Year 2026! 😊 Took a long digi break this year, apart from photo taking. I’m currently reading The Midnight Library by Matt Haig – it’s a reflective fiction novel based on the concept of parallel universes. How about you, what are you reading and why do you like it? #reading #Booksky

Been feeding the birds around us the past few days and they're demolishing everything they can get. Having more calories on board helps them survive the cold. Keep the birds around you in mind. Bonus points if your +1 got binoculars for Christmas and you can now spy closely on guzzling birdies!

The serendipity of putting jigsaws together

Completed a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle over the w/e and a few eves this fortnight. It made me think a lot about design patterns, consistency not meaning conformity, assumptions, joy of things connecting up, and those issues that keep coming up but you can’t deal w as you don’t have enough context yet.

“My eyes come and go out again at the bread (and) beer eaten” I’m too busy to eat (?) A man named Pushu-ken tells his wife Lamassi that he keeps looking at the food and drink being consumed, but is too busy to eat them. He prefaces the phrase with “as they say” so it may even be like a proverb.

During my time at MHCLG I did a series of opinionated* sessions on agile/digital ways of working I think of as the [IMHO] series. This is the 1st of 4 posts based on those presentations. [IMHO] The Art of Effective Agile digitalbydefault.com/2025/12/15/i... *i.e. there is much to disagree with!

GOV UK has announced an AI “helper” and people are already saying oh we won’t need such clear navigation and #ContentDesign handholding. This is not it. Humans will still be using more traditional pathways. Not everyone will switch to a robochat.

Ah some kids just walked past singing in unison "Santa Claus is coming <pause> to town". Sweet.

Thought I'd seen it all and then... Currently doing some desktop research around topic info from other orgs in the digital landscape. Today's gem is news items without dates. News items, without dates. Why would anyone do that? #content #comms

New kettle allows heating to specific temperatures. This ADT cartoon comes to mind

Have now tried this 3 ways: as is (unwrapped though), in takoyaki, and as cheese on toast. Tasting notes: • It has a definite wasabi flavour but very mild. • Adds a bit of bite as plain or grilled cheese. • Pretty much indiscernible in takoyaki, as competing w stronger flavours like pickled ginger.

Sometimes clients veer in the wrong direction. Agencies and consultants are here to probe, challenge and realign. We need to be given opportunity to do that.

Hazel putting in the good snores this Monday morning. 🐱💤 #ProofOfCat

So love wobbegongs. Everything is good about the wobbegong. Its name. Its flattened Oscar the Grouch face. Its frondy bits. Its lazy life as a hungry rug. And it’s a shark. Outstanding animal 10/10

Heartbreaking. Not unlike Northern Native Americans, these people watch their world get systematically destroyed in the names of profit and greed.

This week’s baking is gingerbread! And cake – an orange and chocolate chip sponge.

“A change in the circumstances of a user which creates a need to use a public administrative service or services, and that may require co-ordination and integration between different service providers” —life event definition for public #serviceDesign, shared by @oecdgovernance.bsky.social this week

Great chat yesterday with @hilarymarsh.bsky.social about documenting #ContentStrategy history, and not reinventing the wheel!

If we can only have art from people who "aren't in it for the money" that means we can only have art from privileged middle-class dilettantes. Making art being a viable career is responsible for nearly all worthwhile art, and if it's not a viable career any more we will get drastically less of it.

The corvids are really bogarting this thing currently. #ThursJay 🪶

Massively chuffed to discover my online #ContentDesign training course recommended as a resource by the State of California's Office of Data and Innovation! It sits alongside absolutely fantastic advice and guidance: take a look, you might find sthing new to you. 📄 🙌 #GoodPractice #Training #UCD

WCAG in clear language. Someone’s finally done what we’ve all wanted to do. #ContentDesign #ServiceDesign #UCD

I have #content project availability again from Jan/Feb 2026, after completing current 2-monther. Looking for content #ProjectManagement (have managed redesigns + migrations as well as BAU), #ContentStrategy, lead/senior #ContentDesign and training/workshops provider roles. Here's my portfolio!