Just a thought I'm putting out into the universe. THE RIVALS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES has been a thing since forever, or 1971 at least. There was a British TV series by that name and a more recent anthology of short stories. Thing is... how about THE RIVALS OF IRENE ADLER, an anthology of adventuresses?

Had an intriguing editorial discussion recently: how did people in the past talk about 'minutes' when they didn't have watches or standardised times? How does that affect your thinking? Come down an Elizabethan/Jacobean rabbit hole with me. 1/

From: The Tell-Tale Heart (1953), dir. Ted Parmelee, UPA

Quick Old Timey Color Poll: Which shade of blue is Electric Blue to you? It was mentioned in a Sherlock Holmes story I was rereading and I thought it would be fun to see which one you think is The One.

Today’s Find: “Body-Snatching” published anonymously in London in 1824. Written by Southwood Smith & William Mackenzie tinyurl.com/48fuc4f6 #histmed #medicalhistory

“I am a chorus in search of a tragedy, a raker of middens in the industrial North. “I am a genius in an obscure line of business. Try me a little. “I may have something you can use.” The artist & writer Alasdair Gray (1934–2019) was born #OTD, 28 Dec 💙📚 1/5 www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/a...

🚨 The goat has fallen!!! #Gävlebocken

And to Tiny Tim, who did NOT die. He was unable to. He still walks among us, cursed to remember in a world where everyone has forgotten. He’s out there now, just beyond the light your lantern throws,

The confusion and conflation of ‘generative ai that is built on stolen artwork’ and ‘machine learning, character behaviour modelling and proc gen’ is intentional on the part of the grifters peddling the former. They benefit from murkiness of classification, because the latter predates their bollocks

Very Happy Blue Carbuncle Day, to all those who celebrate! “It was lost, if I remember aright, at the Hotel Cosmopolitan,” I remarked. “Precisely so," Holmes replied, "on December 22nd, just five days ago." 💎

Welcome to academia in 2025. The bar is in hell

Very disappointed in the new Nebula Award eligibility information from SFWA that allows partially-generated works to be on the ballot. See 9.11.2. www.sfwa.org/complete-neb... This shouldn't be difficult. #noAI

I'm obsessed with the way this is just Metropolis - Coppelia - Pygmalion all the way down. Every new technology is turned to the service of "what if woman, but without the pesky autonomy".

Listen up. My book on Victorian New Humour is out in the new year. The perfect gift for loved ones/University Libraries who are into humourists like Jerome K. Jerome. Also guaranteed to ward against dyspepsia, St Vitus's Dance, & housemaids knee. #Victorian #C19th link.springer.com/book/9783032...

of course I’m being a bit facetious but honestly the only people who ask that are the ones who really want to say “how do I explain to my kids that I’m a bigot while still pretending to myself that I’m a good person”. because that’s what they’re struggling with.

“And what is the charge? Eating a seal? A succulent Chinese seal? GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY PENIS!”

I've written about "disordered counterpublics" groups that reinforce shared delusions Here, the LLM becomes a 1 person counterpublic. It mirrors assumptions, absorbs contradictions, & provides the sense of a responsive, confirming audience. It is the architecture of disordered discourse, automated.

This sounds like the country’s worst minor league team

The Flayed Man’s Tale~ another concept design for @realgdt.bsky.social incredible FRANKENSTEIN! Always a wonderful collaboration with Guillermo and the amazing Mike Hill, working over in-progress body sculpt pics & trying different head/ jaw designs (originally a screaming skull in early concept)!

Half-Life 2 is 21 today! The Citadel in City 17, art by the late Viktor Antonov (1972-2025):

Trans Awareness Week: New game takes aim at transphobia in the British media

Roses are red Lilies are chaste

Concept art by Chen-Yi Chang for Mulan (1998), dir. Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft, Walt Disney Feature Animation

It’s officially pub day for Opium Slavery: Civil War Veterans and America‘s First Opioid Crisis! Available at a bookshop near you. Thanks to everyone who made it possible to bring this research to life! 🗃️ @uncpress.bsky.social uncpress.org/978146968953...

If you care about the performing arts, give your money and attention to those who are engaged in the practice, not to those who want to press a button and monetize fame & past practice into fake stuff at the expense of the struggling, and sometimes starving, performers of the present and the future.

Love being reminded to do this every year. It's a win/win all round

Glasgow fought tuberculosis long after rates fell elsewhere in Britain. In 1957, the city launched a month-long mass X-ray drive—backed by a full media blitz. This ad appeared on the side of a tram. This image is from the Wellcome Collection, London. #Glasgow #Scotland #PublicHealth #TB #MedHist

Happy Circulatory System Walking Through The Kitchen Day to those who celebrate.

Renders from my alternate history project wherein I designed 80s military spacecraft based on the ships from Star Wars; a world where the Strategic Defense Initiative conformed more strictly to its nickname.

'Monkey and Moon' - Ohara Koson, ca. 1910. #FullMoon #shinhanga #JapaneseArt

Sarah Cooper explains the mystery of the Techbros' strategy, and their growing love of the idea of Techserfs.™️ 😎 www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cJ1...

"I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain." This James Baldwin quote is hitting harder than ever.

also Gilda is the story of a guy breaking up with his Nazi sugar daddy via the medium of Rita Heyworth

It's cool how every claim trans people make about our own lives must be backed up by peer reviewed randomized control trials but the claim an entire kind of person is a "contagion" (using the unweighted data of a community survey) is gospel the moment it's made

How to Hibernate. Scanned by us from the 1952 book Animal Fair, by the Provensens. It’s time.

not to brag but i can generate slop with natural intelligence

I've got an article in November's @historytoday.com on the remarkably durable hypothesis that Earth is hollow, from Halley to Symmes to underground feminist utopias to UFOs. You know the drill — to the centre of the Earth (I've probably used that one before).

Designer: all right Mr. Del Toro here’s those Frankenstein’s monster designs, real sexy just like you asked for. Del Toro: (nodding) this is exactly as sexy as I asked for.

Every late 90s video game ad is like "What's up, coward. You still drowning in your own piss, or are you ready to actually live a little bit? Well, if you manage to find your balls, come play this game. If not, you're never getting laid. A Bug's Life, now on the Game Boy Color."

'Fog: Ladies crossing Piccadilly' (from 'The Colour of London', 1907) by Yoshio Markino

Autumn be autumning 🍁

For Tolkien fans, a timely passage for No Kings Eve, from WH Auden’s review of Lord of the Rings.

My first book, Say Her Name: Centering Black Feminism and Black Women in Sport, came out this March with Rutgers University Press. Since then I've given talks in Boston, Urbana-Champaign, Charlotte and most recently Memphis. /1

“Copyright growing pains” is one hell of a euphemism for the biggest IP theft in history

I did not know that Glasgow played a pivotal role in Rocky Horror!

Disney wasn’t too far off with its likeness of King John! John’s effigy on this 13th-century coin looks strikingly similar to the John in Disney’s 1973 “Robin Hood”. 🙃

This is a paradigm shift in how we understand metabolism. People will cite regain after stopping a GLP1. But that’s the point. If the weight gain is due to a hormonal imbalance, that will not magically repair after stopping. For many, this will be a lifelong drug to correct a lifelong health issue.