@chrisphin@mastodon.social
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chrisphin

@chrisphin@mastodon.social

Uses language suitable for miners rather than minors. Proud xennial. Podcasting, tech, publishing, ebikes, art and design, queer shit. (I did warn you about the language.) 🩷💜💙

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craiggrannell, (edited ) to random
@craiggrannell@mastodon.social avatar

If nothing else, still writing for magazines forces discipline. I’m writing my next back page for Stuff, which has a strict 530-character limit per text block. The current edit is 720. Time to kill some darlings, so to speak.

EDIT 1: 583. So close! And now things get really difficult…

EDIT 2: 539. Eeeeeeeee.

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell Character counts ftw 😏

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell I can’t remember what the number was now, but I did some analysis before switching to character counts for my commissions… was that just for Tap!, or did I do it before that at MacFormat? Can’t remember. But anyway: character counts were significantly more accurate, unsurprisingly, and while they do require a tiny adjustment to, kinda, the pace of writing, they’re better for this reason!

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell Hahah, ‘prediction editor’; sounds like I was anticipating AI.

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

I have an Elgato Key Light Air to my right to act as a fill light to balance the natural light to my left. I moved its position from one side of my main display to the other at lunchtime. Which do you prefer?

(No alt text because I don’t want to influence you. Will reply with alt text and commentary later! Both images are a selfie of me, a middle-aged, mostly-bald man with a mostly-white beard, in my home office, with subtle differences in lighting.)

image/jpeg

craiggrannell, (edited ) to retrogaming
@craiggrannell@mastodon.social avatar

EDIT: Thanks for the suggestions! All written and filed for tomorrow.

===

Any Amstrad CPC fans on here? What would be the five games you would HAVE to put on a list of the very best for the system? (I have my own ideas, but would love input from other people.)

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell God, I've no idea what I played back then, haha. Wouldn't even recognise the names!

jamesthomson, to random
@jamesthomson@mastodon.social avatar

When the local TARDIS regenerates from being a woman back into being a man again.

A police box labelled “Coffee Joe’s”

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@jamesthomson This seems like a downgrade in every reading.

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

Parents: we’re experimenting with a prepaid debit card for our kid (8).

✓ My wife and I can manage her account as co-parents
✓ Relatives can be given access to top up her account
✓ We can create a gift link for, eg, birthdays
✓ …set limits, and get notifications when she spends
✓ …set up recurring pocket money or give money for tasks

× It supports Apple Pay but we can’t add it to her phone till she’s 13

Referral link (first month free, plus £10 free pocket money): https://www.gohenry.com/uk/referrals/?ght=RAF&utm_campaign=refer_a_friend_A&utm_source=activityMA#ref_act_goAT20449_Yu

craiggrannell, to random
@craiggrannell@mastodon.social avatar

In another life, I was games editor on a fab little iPhone mag called Tap!, launched by the most excellent editor @chrisphin. I found my digital copies and in one of them is a review of the original Monsters Ate My Condo (before it somehow became ‘Super’, I guess).

(I do miss that mag. It was such fun to work on.)

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell @flargh All the love to you two legends. I miss working with you both too!

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

My daughter asked me jokingly the other day “Why are all your friends trans?” and as I went to correct her a little mental subroutine kicked in unbidden and teletyped out an inventory. It’s definitely not absolutely true, but without me realising it, over the last few years a good chunk of the folks I actively maintain friendships with are somewhere under the trans or gnc umbrella. Says more about society than me, but I’m happy they’re here, and delighted they’re my friends! 🏳️‍⚧️🏳️‍🌈

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell That’s what it felt like!

girlonthenet, to random
@girlonthenet@mastodon.social avatar

I've had such a lovely day off - pretending to be a lawyer with (actual lawyer) @neil, then having a lovely long walk through the city and ending up in a nice park. I should take the day off every day.

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@girlonthenet The future liberals want.

girlonthenet, to random
@girlonthenet@mastodon.social avatar

My boyfriend says I may show you his sexy hands. Enjoy 😍

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@girlonthenet Men in nail varnish can GET IT. (Esp when their hands look like this 😍)

(I’ve long suggested to straight men that they paint their nails because I get far more attention from women than men when I do, but recently one of my partners, who’s a trans woman, pointed out that I should stop doing this because bad actors could use it as a way of flagging themselves more progressive than they actually are.)

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

Always love clocking the juxtaposition of the oil rigs (here for service and decommissioning) and the uprights for the wind turbines (being assembled here to be take out to the North Sea for installation). The past and future of energy production in one scene.

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar
chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

Early night as early start. Going to bed with Terry Pratchett as I have most nights for decades.

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

TikTokkers handholding lav mics make my teeth itch. Hate it. Hate, hate, hate. Clip it to your damned clothes.

(PS this is me trying to flush out of the woodwork people who will defend this practice with things I haven't thought about that will make complete sense.)

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@DJDarren @pdcawley Get out.

jamesthomson, to random
@jamesthomson@mastodon.social avatar

Remember when we all made tiny Mac laptops out of a Dell mini 9?

The back of a Dell mini 9 with an six colour Apple logo added over the Dell logo.
A Dell mini 9 next to a slightly trashed white plastic MacBook.

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@jamesthomson Yes. I remember Apple’s European PR head being rather put out when I took mine to a briefing.

girlonthenet, to random
@girlonthenet@mastodon.social avatar

This is subscriber-only and I might subscribe to see Papi’s answer because I think it is screamingly obvious. Points if you can guess exactly what I’d tell this dude. They will be dispensed when I return from the shops.

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@girlonthenet Forcing myself to answer before looking at the replies, but I’d tell him to be interested in her. Like, ask stuff, sure, but don’t just have some dick-assed list of questions. In other words, don’t just feign interest, BE interested. Humans are AMAZING, find out about them! You have an amazing chance!

Ironically, the advice is the same I’d give to a journalist even though that’s completely the wrong vibe: don’t just work through a list of questions: LISTEN TO THE ANSWERS and riff.

chrisphin, to random
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

Did you guys know that there's literally nothing stopping you buying a retail pack of Mega Double Lollies? Except maybe shame? But I have no shame? Or self-control?

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell I hate to tell you this, but the Mega ones are easy to take off. 😬

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell Ada literally cried with joy when she saw them and I let her have one, and honestly, I get it.

craiggrannell, to random
@craiggrannell@mastodon.social avatar

Wall one, finally done!

Top row: Lew Stringer sketch / Ltd Usagi Yojimbo print / 2000 AD Mark Harrison print (The Out) / Lew Stringer original Robo-Capers art

Bottom row: framed Susan Kate icons bandana (bit wonky due to the material itself) / PJ Holden Dredd sketch / Larson penguin on banana card / Bob Wakelin NewZealand Story print.

:)

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell haha, nice. I have some gorgeous Panic artworks framed to hang sometime. I wonder when…

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@craiggrannell Yes!

jamesthomson, to random
@jamesthomson@mastodon.social avatar

I’ve got a great product idea for Apple. It’s a market that can bring in recurring revenue through consumables. One that has a variety of existing poor products with bad user interfaces, buggy software, and privacy issues.

Printers.

chrisphin,
@chrisphin@mastodon.social avatar

@jamesthomson @twostraws Or indeed, for the first time! Same with routers. I’m dreading my AirPorts dying. I know they’re marginal businesses, but especially with routers, I don’t understand why they don’t want to own that ‘glue’.

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