@DJDarren Over-reliance on the 'Great man theory' of history as it relates to governance of a nation. With a constitution, strangely enough, authored by a few men who considered themselves to be great.
@BonehouseWasps Oh aye, it’s not vastly better over here, but we do at least have career politicians who work hard to cultivate the appearance of gentlemanly conduct.
That said, Johnson took a lot of pointers from Trump.
Been watching this play through of Hellblade 2 this evening.
The first game was incredible, both in the story it told and the graphics used, so I was looking forward to the second one. But I’m told it’s essentially a playable movie, so rather than fanny about trying to get it to look beautiful with our streaming setup, I’m watching someone else play it in 4K.
And yeah, it looks incredible. There are times when I forgot I was watching someone play a video game.
Finished reading Paul Auster's '4 3 2 1' today. Now in a place where I'm kinda sad that I'm not in Ferguson's world any more, and don't really know what to read next.
Are there any #networking types out there that can offer me an answer to an issue I'm having?
My Mac wouldn't upload to websites using either Safari or Firefox. Tried searching for an answer, but nothing came up, so I posted on /r/macOS.
A reply I got there suggested manually changing the MTU rate in network settings to 1280, and that if that worked then something is up with our network.
Just spent an hour working out how to get Excel to tell me exactly - to two decimal points - how little I’ve done towards a Big Task that’s looming over me.
The Big Task is now 25% complete, all because I procrastinated doing it by taking the time to visualise how much needs to be done.
This morning I kinda felt like I wasted that hour, but the fact is, I've done more on that job today than I have in the 8 months since I first took it on.
@DJDarren can you do just that bit of the job which makes sure people don't die and fuck the rest?
This is the problem, managers use that shit against you, and as far as I can work out the only remedy is stop caring or find a different job. I suppose one could go all in on the office politics and try to get them replaced if that was feasible but in my experience it's usually a cultural problem. Anyway preaching to the choir here no doubt :-)
I love podcasts. I love podcasts about people, stories of the ordinary.
Which is why I love Rumble Strip.
A couple of years back, Erica won a Peabody award for her episode "Finn & The Bell", a look at the story of Finn Rooney, a 17yo who took his own life, and the many ways in which he touched the small Vermont community he lived in.
If that subject matter isn't too much for you, then I wholeheartedly recommend listening to it -
The reason I bring up a podcast episode from two years ago is that the latest episode is a return to it, with a ten minute catch up with Finn's mother. It's a beautiful, heartfelt conversation with a woman who's slowly coming to terms with something so awful.
Erica is a master at capturing conversations, of drawing people into trusting her, and seemingly forgetting that there's a microphone between them.
Apple Music has just informed me that Bess Atwell’s new album arrived a few days ago, and, well, that’s a lovely, mellow listen for me for this afternoon.
Accompanied my good wife to a physio appointment in a council run sports centre, where children on half term appear to be doing gymnastics to Iron Maiden.
Just saw a post about how The Flintstones movie came out 30 years ago, and honestly, I think that movie was a slab of genius.
Sure, the story is kinda dumb, but the loving care with which they created the whole world around it was worth the price of the ticket alone. ‘50s surburban Americana with Stone Age technology that looked for all the world like it was filmed in a theme park.
I was 13 on holiday in the US with my Dad, and it was perfect.
Thinking more on this, I think a large part of why The Flintstones movie lives on in my affection is because it has a physicality that I don’t think you’d get so much now.
Sure, there was CGI in 1994, but you won’t really find it here. All the sets were physical, all the effects practical. If made today, the dinosaurs would all be CGI. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it feels like an easier thing, somehow.