Taylorism

The words of Blair’s outgoing chief strategy adviser translated for “net-heads”. (As a hostile, self-righteous blogger, I may have got the wrong end of the stick. Never mind, I’m sure nobody else has.)

Read More · 23 November 2006 · · Net Culture

Collection Day

Sitting in a link dumpster near you...

Read More · 23 November 2006 · · Weblog

Please Turn Left Now

We rented a car on Friday to drive down to Nottingham for the weekend to visit friends, and it turned out to have sat nav. I’d never driven a car with sat nav before, with its LCD screen in the middle of the dashboard and mellifluous but stilted Englishwoman telling us what to do. Jane turned it on as we left the carpark and before long it was telling me to turn left every time I turned right, because at first it was trying to guide us back to the rental place.

Driving out of town it wanted to take us down the east coast, presumably because the route was a few miles shorter, but I wanted to go down the west, which has a much higher proportion of motorway. So I struck onto the Biggar road, only to keep getting told to detour or turn around. “PLEASE turn LEFT—NOW.” “PLEASE turn LEFT—NOW.” “If possible, PLEASE do a U-TURN.” “PLEASE turn LEFT—NOW.” It was like being told off by a robot Supernanny.

Read More · 22 November 2006 · Travel

How To Be Mysterious

A controlled experiment in telling friends and family.

Read More · 17 November 2006 · · Journal

Recipe for Success

We had guests for dinner on Sunday night, for the first time in months, and even getting to that point took a fair bit of negotiation to find the one weekend when three work colleagues and partners could all come at once. The six-week delay between thought and deed cranked up the pressure, too, to pull off something special; yet by Saturday I still hadn’t figured out what I would cook. As official inviter, I was the one doing all the cooking, which is half the fun.

Read More · 15 November 2006 · · Journal

Swells

life
is a sea
of momentous
possibility
lifting us
in its
swells
and
dashing us
on its
reefs
where
clownfish nibble
at the coral of
our plans
and friendly anemones
tickle our
regrets

Read More · 12 November 2006 · · Journal

Alnwick

Read More · 4 November 2006 · Travel

The Great Link Giveaway

Links! Links for everyone!

Read More · 4 November 2006 · · Weblog

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