stocktaking

COVID-19 year 4

changestocktaking

COVID-19 year 4

Three years ago, feeling much like a hedgehog staring into headlights, I wrote about exponential growth, at the point where UK hospital cases from COVID were doubling every 4 days due to a colossal failure of government to do anything…

stories as crows

stocktaking

stories as crows

Stories are like crows circling in and out of sight in the mist overhead: there's no simple distinction between one of them and another, and the precise flight path of any one particular crow is known only to itself…

writing and writing

stocktakingreview

writing and writing

It's been a strange summer. It can't be the first year I haven't had a holiday, but it's the first year that a global pandemic has forced me to cancel my holiday and stay at home for month after month.…

the end is nigh

imagequotationstocktaking

the end is nigh

The final hand-in deadline for my MA course is at the start of September, and effectively that will end my two years as a mature student. I enjoyed the classes, the cameraderie with classmates, and the access to university facilities,…

interstitial

stocktakingNews

interstitial

Interstitial spaces are defined by what they are between. They are non-places, between other, proper places. Here is one. In web design, an interstitial meant a “please wait” screen displayed to deter the user from closing the browser whilst the…

being a writer

stocktaking

being a writer

I've noticed one or two of my Creative Writing classmates referring to themselves on social media as a writer. Perhaps it jumped out at me. Obviously I write (the evidence is right here), but I don't really think of myself as a writer.…

Newcastle revisited

memorieschangestocktaking

Newcastle revisited

Returning to Newcastle 25 years after living here has been a disorientating experience. Walking down familiar streets, there are unfamiliar absences and presences, and, which is even odder, buildings that I can see are new, but I can't for the life of me remember what was there before.…

open source? Microsoft?!

Newsstocktaking

open source? Microsoft?!

Microsoft announced recently that it has developed *its own* distribution of Linux. Having followed the IT industry since around the time MS-DOS came out, this is hard to digest and gives rise to some complicated feelings.…