It’s not even ten and I’m dozing off. To bed then with a bit of Roddy and Aztec Camera. www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

I’ve been reading Richard Siken’s Crush over the past few weeks, and I keep coming back, like Scheherazade herself, to the opening poem in the collection.

The best #ValentinesDay

Twenty-five years ago, I scoffed at Tracey Emin and her art. ‘Insufferable and talentless’, reads my journal. What a dick! She’s amazing and a quite brilliant artist. Can’t wait for the Tate show! www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

Do yourself a favour. Take ten minutes to read this.

Watching Jaws with my 12-year old last night at the cinema. He loved it! But awkward questions: "Dad, what does Quint mean by "Here's to swimmin' with bow-legged women!" I'm a sailor, and I don't even know the answer to that! :-)

Good dad or bad dad? About to traumatise / thrill the boy with the greatest film ever made on the big screen. Jaws! Side-eye inbound for the Ben Gardener head scene! 🎬

Call me Old Fashioned! Chin Chin, shipmates! And happy weekend!

Fantastic feel-good television, every bit as good as The Detectorists. Favourite character: the annoyingly uncurious and ridiculous 'Get your fucking hedge cut' next door neighbour Clive. "My neighbour has got monkeys in his shed!" www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

At the Old Vic for Arcadia. Third Tom Stoppard in a year. I’m practically a groupie.

Excellent and informative piece in the @lrb.co.uk on Barnett Newman. It’s convinced me that I can do better than dismissively saying ‘Rothko with a zipper’.

“Let us eat, drink and be merry. There are sausages in the scrutoire; there is beer in the green jug. I shall regale myself on toasted cheese.” Stephen Maturin is coming very close to being my favourite character in literature.

Troublemaker

1. Noam Chomsky's response to the first tranche of Epstein docs - arrogant, high-handed, obfuscatory and, we now know, dishonest - reminded me of something: his response to my questions about genocide denial, 15 years ago. 🧵 www.monbiot.com/2012/05/21/2...

Life is like Tottenham Hotspur; you never know what you’re going to get! 🤣 #COYG

Tate Britain this afternoon. I’ve really learned to love John Constable over the past ten years … he dazzles and charms and makes you want to stomp out into the meadows for a brisk walk. But he’s no Turner!

If you get chance have a peek outside. It’s a full moon, except for the tiniest edge. Brilliant and mottled, with Venus bright and clear, up and to the right. Tomorrow it counts as the proper full moon, the Snow Moon. A treat.

A pint, a bit of shore-time with Aubrey and Maturin, and 4-0 to the Arsenal.

Ah nuts! It’s boring reading Frank O’Hara in London as if I were a 1950s hipster waiting for my Vodka Martini … Not true of course. Reading Frank O’Hara is never being boring.

Somewhere between Minneapolis and the Angel of Islington. Craig Finn and the Band of Forgiveness at the Union Chapel.

33 years of gig going in London and only now is it my first time at the Union Chapel. Craig Finn without The Hold Steady. The latter will be next month. Also, ‘church with a bar klaxon’!

At the Hampstead Theatre for Indian Ink. Felicity Kendall in a Tom Stoppard play. Just don’t tell Miriam.

Currently ranting out loud in the office that this man is not from Wigan. Next steps will be sending around a google maps link of Astley to show just how far away from Wigan it is. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

This morning in Tottenham

I miss Frank Sidebottom, Terry Hall and you! :-)

Lovely and drunk on the bus home listening to Phoebe Bridgers. ‘You said when you met me you were bored.’

Columbo's wife, all day long! Wait, there's a spin-off series featuring Columbo's wife! WTF? www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Perfect Henry James quote on Fra Angelico (and religious art). ‘You may be as little of a formal Christian as Fra Angelico was much of one, you yet feel admonished by spiritual decency to let so yearning a view of the Christian story work its utmost will on you.’ www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Falstaff me regarde! 😳

Watching The Traitors for the first time so I can gather round the water cooler on Monday and jibber-jabber. All I’ve got to say so far is that ‘I love a turret’!

Trailers can put you in a bad mood. As can drafting in the wrong raptor. Thoughts on Chloé Zhao’s adaption of 'Hamnet'. somemelodiousplot.blogspot.com/2026/01/inva...

Loved my spontaneous trip to Wigmore Hall last night to see The Jerusalem Quartet. The highlight was Ravel's String Quartet and the frantic pizzicato in the second movement. The January blues temporarily dispelled. @wigmore-hall.org.uk

Do I read this or the piece on Britney Spears first? I think you know the answer. Hit me, baby, one more time! @lrb.co.uk

Some calm amidst the storm. At Wigmore Hall for the Jerusalem Quartet. Mozart, Ravel and Shulamit Ran.

Faint silver linings. Hope the Moth Club manages to stay afloat too. www.theguardian.com/music/2026/j...

A second viewing of David Lynch's Inland Empire last night, and - though I know better than to try and make full sense of it - it's still a glorious fever dream. Rewatching this scene in isolation today offers a key. Laura Dern's face is ours in the movie theatre. www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRh2...

Horrid and dramatic start to the week. Stepping out for my morning run and within a minute a piece of metal going through the sole of my barefoot trainer and piercing my heel. To the Royal London for a tetanus jab! Still, the week can only go uphill (with a limp) from here! Look at the bastard!

Here for Inland Empire, but if I’d been a bit quicker off the mark I could have made it an amazing double bill, Withnail himself doing the Q&A.

Hamnet is a very dirty film. Not in that way, Matron! :-) Rather fingernails and hands, the sides of Tudor houses, filthy streets.

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Taxidermied Tories is rather beautiful (in a bad taxidermy way). Very harsh on Bucks Fizz though. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Get your weekend off to a fine start by watching this, and gasping in wonder as Jeff and the gang nail the noodly bit in Turn To Stone. #ELO www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXpj...

I watched The Greatest Night in Pop last night. All about the recording of We Are The World. I don't really like the song, but loved this documentary. All that was missing was a permanent Bob Dylan cam. He was utterly lost until Stevie Wonder sorted him out.

The glory that was Phoenix Nights, and memories of my own nights out in Clubland (Goose Green Labour Club ... not that Goose Green, sunshine!) A quibble on this Guardian piece though ... it doesn't half read like it's been generated by AI. www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Columbo in his first episode looks like a dog that's just come back from the groomer

Marginalia from 2004. I wasn’t wrong! #Proust

"AI will have mowed the lawn and washed the dishes, assuming that some remnant of ordinary life persists. This seems optimistic." Marilynne Robinson on AI and affordability. @nybooks.com www.nybooks.com/articles/202...

Afternoon parts one and two.

Either thick or pretending to be thick. Neither is good…(unlike the amusing examples of correlation in the replies)

Post a pic of the venue where you saw your first concert and the band or artist.