I have also found myself in this position, being the first disabled professor many students interact with for the first time. on top of being the first Black professor in my fields for many students

Teaching while being chronically ill is so intense. My plans often meet the limits of my bodymind. And the reality is that I might actually be the first disabled professor who talks openly about their disability for many students. Most are lovely. But some wont react well

Smudge went in because she was sneezing a lot. We were quoted '£3-4k' for tests. Private equity is evil.

Two people at the University of Kent in the UK have just died of bacterial meningitis. There have been 13 cases so far. It’s important to get vaccinated against meningococcal disease, especially when living on campus in a dorm. It won’t stop all cases but it helps reduce the risks.

Smudge doing Smudge things (pic by @nicnorthcott.bsky.social)

Today's massive overreaction by the Metropolitan Police towards the Al Quds Day protest involved bringing in officers from Sussex Police and as far as Cheshire, to maintain the weak narrative that a ban on an annual march was absolutely necessary.

Was working yesterday and we miraculously managed to avoid all the Six Nations news and had the whole day together today. What an incredible championship. For the ages.

Long Covid isn’t just an illness. It is an ostracizing condition that puts you in discordance with society, with your friends, your family, and yourself. People want very much to not think about it, but it’s inescapable if you have it. Only a few illnesses make you a social pariah, this is one.

This is who Starmer gave your health data to.

Palantir CEO promises that his technology will reduce educated women's economic and political power newrepublic.com/post/207693/...

This is who Starmer gave your health data to.

Thing is that's not so dissimilar to advisers to Blair during the Iraq War and Afghanistan. He only wanted to hear good news that could be a press release or a TV segment. Hence six month tours with some 'showstopper' op towards the end like hauling a turbine to a dam etc. It's a wider issue. /1

Disabled people being pushed into poverty. People with disabilities need support, not benefit cuts. Requirement to score 4 points for an activity leads to loss of PIP support. Govts attack human welfare whilst promoting corporate welfare. We are all one event away from needing disability support

In another grim moment in the ongoing attack on freedom of expression and assembly in Britain, the Home Secretary has approved a request from the Metropolitan Police to ban the annual pro-Palestinian Al Quds Day march this Sunday www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

UK media: Starmer stood up to Trump! US military press:

I doubt very much the US will honour the terms of their 'agreement' to use UK bases. Death is death, in any event. And British people can no longer be under any illusions that their country is a US vassal state. 'We will remember', Trump said. How will the commentariat spin this one?

#OtD 7 Mar 1921 the repression of the Kronstadt Rebellion against the Bolsheviks, demanding worker self-governance and freedom for socialist prisoners began. It was brutally crushed by the Red Army led by Trotsky and hundreds were executed stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/1072...

Seismic that for Italy. The end for Borthwick, you'd have to assume, particularly if they get nuked next week by France. Goes to show that a 'winning run' against teams without their best players in some tests because the Prem would only release the England players plus knackered teams was false.

Newly released footage shows an ICE agent killing Rubin Ray Martinez, 23, in his car in Texas. "He was shot at point-blank range through his side window by an ICE agent who was in no danger." www.bbc.com/news/article...

The UK government is going to drag us into a war while simultaneously claiming we can't afford to help children with special needs at school.

We're on tonight from 7.30pm UK time.

Deploying a warship straight out of drydock because you have nothing else available probably should be a message that, even in your own imperialist terms, you shouldn't play silly imperialist games because you literally cannot afford to.

This just isn't true. The 1951 convention requires state parties to facilitate the integration and naturalisation of refugees because the people who drafted it weren't moral vacuums or stupid enough to think that persecution that made people flee for their lives would magically go away in a year.

Saw another thread about AI 'denialists' damning critics as a 'rationalist cult'. It's a false binary. What folks are generally criticising, particularly on here, is the demonstrable negative impacts of these technologies. These are impacting in real time. There is absolute chaos in education. /1

Absolutely this. They have essentially copied what the Conservatives did and look how well that ended for them.

My most recent piece on the @lrb.co.uk blog: www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2026/ma...

Small beer in the grand scheme of things, but Petplan working incredibly hard to get out of paying for Smudge's medical care is the chaser this week didn't need.

ON STRIKE again this week - the university administration wants to take £100,000 out of my pension because they're bad at math and undercosted their construction plans -I stand with my colleagues in @ucunorthumbria.bsky.social, not asking for more just to keep what we've been promised.

Me for @freedompress.bsky.social this morning freedomnews.org.uk/2026/03/02/u...

So it's been confirmed that Akrotiri has been hit. Now Starmer will use this as an 'excuse'. What is happening here is evil, driven by the whims of evil men, visiting destruction and death and chaos upon innocent people. Gazans have been massacred in plain sight. Now this. Decades of forever war.

What's the fucking point of the labour party?

Me for Freedom this morning. Love and solidarity to all facing the horror of war foisted on them by imperial powers.

Well none of us saw this coming, I'm sure.

Past events exist, after all, only in memory, which is a form of imagination. The event is real now, but once it’s then, its continuing reality is entirely up to us, dependent on our energy and honesty.

Me for Freedom this morning. Love and solidarity to all facing the horror of war foisted on them by imperial powers.

Starmer's speech was the speech of a brainless automaton vassal state 'leader', which lacked the (relative) self-awareness of Walter Ulbricht.

This. Today is the first time in a long while I thought about the Austrian ultimatum to Serbia in 1914. The US just 'negotiates' to providen a veneer to its imminent attack.

My experience of the upper echelons of the Labour Party involved being condescended to by the incredibly thick & unpleasant, & thinking that in any other walk of life you would get punched in the mouth for treating people like that. Impossible to overstate how high on their own fumes they are.

They do know when you're ill. She is awesome.

Worrying headline today in Irish Times. Experiencing maelstrom of cuts to humanities & social sciences in UKHE at first hand means that this is a clear warning sign that the crisis could spread to Ireland. Ignore at peril to these subject areas & the right to study them. @royalhistsoc.org @ria.ie

Help these people break their fast for Ramadan. Help them buy food for their children.

Absolutely. There's nothing 'Sir' Keir Starmer hates more than a working class person succeeding. He's showing who he is here, if he hasn't enough times before.

There is some delicious irony how a man who likes to constantly remind everyone he’s the son of a toolmaker in order to appear working class is THIS livid over a working class woman whose working career involves the use of tools

If anything more was needed to demonstrate to his MPs that he has to go, it's this despicable shit. The people did the wrong thing, to travesty Brecht. Whose party ran round with attack ads trumpeting outright lies? As an anarcho electoral politics aren't my thing, but the man is scum.

Turns out telling people you need to vote for you that you hate and despise them isn't a winning strategy. Who knew.

14 years old.

My latest for @freedompress.bsky.social. The extent to which Labour despises disabled people is hard to overstate.

Absolutely this.

My latest for @freedompress.bsky.social. The extent to which Labour despises disabled people is hard to overstate.

I need to get out of this country. I did an article yesterday for @freedompress.bsky.social which came out this morning on Labour's continuing attacks on disabled people and this happens in the meantime. It is just horrific.