It's a while ago I finished watching the sequel television series to the hit film The Full Monty - usually if I don't get around to writing about something relatively quickly, then I don't bother. But this has been living with me, at the back of my brain, thoughts that I have to get down on digital paper. Firstly, there's the obvious question with all these reboots and nostalgia trips …

I continue to find the post-Top Gear careers of the three hosts fascinating, particularly as they diverge more and more into distinct personalities and making their hobbies their jobs. At the moment, James May is winning the battle for best-of-the-three for me, and not just because he makes very good gin. There was an interview in The Times with him recently, on the subject of the future of pubs, but …

This may be a tricky review to write because it's hard to talk too much about the Apple TV series Hijack without giving away any spoilers. I'm not usually worried about spoilers one way or the other, but actually this series is really helped when you don't know what's going to happen next, or who you can trust. The simple premise is a hijacking on a plane travelling back to …

I got to grips with circular knitting needles in the last project, and thought perhaps it was about time I dipped my toe in the waters of double pointed knitting needles - which means I could try my very first socks! I used this pattern for Relax at Home socks which seemed relatively easy and the kind of footwear I would enjoy wearing. It took a little while to get …

Finally, I have managed to cross 'Watch Back to the Future: The Musical' off my to do list. There have been a couple of failed attempts and I've been worried that the universe didn't want me to see it, but I've thwarted the universe and seen the brilliance of this show. I went in with trepidation, of course I did. When they announced there was going to be a BTTF …

Have you watched The Muppets Mayhem on Disney+? You may be thinking 'no, of course not, why would I' but I'm here to tell you that you absolutely should. I wasn't aware of Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem, even though by all accounts they've been around for nearly fifty years, but their comedy musical series that was released in May was surprisingly brilliant viewing. At first, I gave it …

Almost a year ago, I wrote about a tweak to this very website that split off the films into their own sub-site, to try and speed things up as a publisher. It turns out, the more you write, the more a static site generator struggles to keep up. Well, fast forward to the present and I'm very happy to say the films are back home where they belong - all …

Julia Bradbury has walked all over the UK and made various TV episodes about her adventures, but one that has always stuck with me is the Worcester & Birmingham canal walk. Julia split the nearly 50km walk into a two day mission, stopping off at Tardebigge to break up the two halves. I finally got organised and kicked off this walk, but only did about 10km in the one session, …

I'm still learning a lot about yarn, the different types and weights, materials and measures, the fact that they appear to be sold in grams rather than length, and that kind of thing. But I do like perusing the huge variety of colours and yarns available, and was happy to find the above in store. Yarn made from recycled bottles is genius, isn't it? What a great use of bottles …

It feels like the output of both TV and films has slowed somewhat, presumably relating to the strikes that are ongoing. Although any situation that forces a strike is not great, it is a bit of a relief to have a minute to think about what we're watching and actually catch up a bit. I've been looking through the next few months of movie releases and there are quite a …

We need to talk about Silo... and there will be spoilers. To set thing up, I was looking forward to this obviously, as it's about a post-apocalyptic world where a hardy group of survivors live in a sealed bunker, make do and mend, because the outside world is so dangerous. I hadn't read the books, although I have now somehow managed to snap up all three of the books for …

It's Wimbledon time! Lush green grass courts, strawberries and cream, and one eye always watching the weather to see how much play is going to get completed each day. I can't wait! Here are five things I'm looking forward to ahead of the 2023 tournament: Being on it. Have watched qualifying and kept an eye on that draw, as well as being ready with the draw and the order of …

I've been meaning to write this post all week and I admit it feels a bit late to be talking about Glastonbury Festival a full week on from when it ended. But then again, I still watch old sets from past Glasto festivals, so potentially it's a timeless thing and it doesn't matter how long it takes me to get these thoughts down. This is just some thoughts from the …

If you're looking for a TV show that follows a brilliantly flawed independent woman investigating mysterious circumstances against all the odds in the deserts on the west coast of the US, then you're in luck, there are two! Poker Face and High Desert both follow that premise and whilst they do have plenty of differences, the similarities are hard to ignore! Both were brilliant though, and I highly recommend them. …

When it's hot and stuffy on land, one option is to get out on the water and feel the breeze as you sail along. With this in mind, I joined family on board the SS Shieldhall for the first of their summer sailings. Steamship Shieldhall is the largest working steamship in the UK, staffed fully by volunteers who keep it running as a charity. The journey was from Southampton Docks …

From hats and scarves, I wanted to move on and try knitting an actual item of clothing, so I started on a jumper from my beginner's knitting book. However, I realised that summer was quickly approaching and it might be more fun and useful to try something like a tank top or vest. So, I opted for this super easy, but with a few elements I would need to learn, …

Another successful two weeks of Roland Garros is complete, with our attention turning swiftly to the grass court season. However, there was plenty to enjoy on the clay courts of Paris, here are just a few notes I made as the fortnight unfolded: As always, loving Radio Roland Garros. They seemed to get a lot of heat about the balance between ball-by-ball commentary and general chatter, but I think they've …

It's the Monday of WWDC week which means Apple Keynote day, and it is always a lot of fun to see where they think technology is going next. This time, it's all about the mixed reality headset, something which has been discussed for a while and leaked more seriously by tech journalists recently. So it wasn't a surprise when Tim Cook announced the Vision Pro headset, but it was a …

I've just wrapped up watching A Small Light, the series that chronicles the life of Miep Gies, the secretary and incredibly brave woman that helped hide Anne Frank and family during the Second World War. The series is incredible, beautifully made and well told, but also difficult to watch - eight episodes that chronicle the build up to the war, the hideous slide into occupation and oppression, and the terrible …

I feel like it's been a slow start to the year, vegetable gardening wise. I somehow managed to start things off too soon, before all danger of frost had gone, but then also the things that I did time right have been so slow to start coming through. However, we are starting to see some greenery and things are looking more promising as the sun comes out. Radishes, meanwhile, are …

I recently finished watching the mini series Daisy Jones & The Six on Amazon Prime and what a journey that was! The show documents the rise and fall of a new band in the 1970s who gain popularity very quickly but find that drugs, rock and roll, and the intricacies of managing relationships on the road can be a downfall just as fast. It's basically watching a fictional version of …

Last year, I, along with a lot of other people, watched in joy and awe as Ukraine won the Eurovision Song Contest, closely followed by the UK with our best performance in a good long time. I'd actually sworn off Eurovision for a bit, despite being a fan since before I can remember. I've had, and still have, an issue with the scoring but I won't get into all that …

My obsession with the UK's National Trails has taken a bit of a backburner recently, but I decided to go in search of another starting point. This time, I looked for the trail that practically divides two countries - Offa's Dyke Path. The path is a wobbly straight line hovering around the border between England and Wales, following the 8th century Dyke construction by King Offa. Lots of history. I …

Season three of The Mandalorian wrapped up last month to very mixed reviews, and it's taken me a while to decide how I feel about it. Overall, I liked it. I don't think it quite lived up to the hype and quality of previous seasons but there was plenty in there to amuse. One of the biggest complaints I've seen is about the pacing of the show, which was, admittedly, …

I wanted to just practice the feeling of knitting and test out my endurance and patience levels, so decided to go with a superbly basic garter stitch scarf next. I didn't think this wool was particularly good, it was labelled as craft wool rather than something you might make items of clothing out of, but as it was just practice, I wasn't bothered. Turns out, the end result is really …

I was so happy with the result of the little blue hat in all aspects except the size of it, I immediately had another go making it a bit bigger. This turned out just as well and has the added bonus of fitting on my head, so a big step forward. I made my first tassle to go on top, with a cardboard circle method. It was a bit fiddly …

After some of the early bits and pieces, I wanted to knit something actually useful so opted for a hat. I wasn't ready for circular or double pointed needles (still not, if I'm honest), so this fantastic pattern which knits a bobble hat on straight needles was a gem of a find. I dived straight in without thinking about measurements or gauge or anything, so the end result was way …

I've been knitting a couple of months now and am currently working on a bigger vest project, but realised I haven't shared evidence of the small early projects I started with. Pics or it didn't happen, right? The first one was a small bag that came from this book. Whilst I appreciate beginning with a small and super easy project - garter stitch and two separate parts just to join …

I expected to like one of the latest shows on Apple TV+, Hello Tomorrow! because I've grown to love Billy Crudup and he was front and centre of this series. Oh and he's selling real estate on the moon and we all know how much I love that celestial object. The show is styled as 'retro-futuristic' which is a word that makes my head fizz a bit, but I guess …

So sad that Mark Sheehan has died. The Script were one of the last shows we went to before the pandemic and had hoped to see them a lot more times in the future.

I love this blog post from Duolingo recommending ways to increase your language learning by utilising your television and its various audio/subtitle options. The post runs through the different scenarios you can try to help boost your listening and reading skills, for example, audio in your own language and subtitles in the language you're trying to learn, or vice versa. Or the pro option, audio and subtitles in the language …

Apple launched a separate music app for Classical music this week, dedicated to the classical music genre, whilst continuing to work with your existing Apple Music subscription. I think this is an interesting idea, and if I hadn't been taking a pause from monthly challenges then 30 days of classical music could very much have been on the cards. A separate app for classical music makes sense to me but …

I love this project Diaries of Note which is reproducing one diary entry from the past for each day of 2023, featuring well known writers such as Beatrix Potter and F. Scott Fitzgerald, people you may not know as writers such as Louis Theroux and Andy Warhol, and then, of course, lots of people you've not heard of at all. Reading diaries is such a good way of discovering about …

A week or so ago, the final episode of the first season of Shrinking was released and it wrapped up what has been an incredible series of television. This show, inevitably linked to Ted Lasso thanks to creators Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein, focused on the life of a therapist who was in the grieving process as his wife had just died... and of course the friends and family that …

I mentioned in my wrap-up of the March challenge that I'm taking a pause on these monthly endeavours, because there are only so many hours in the day. That's part of it: I don't know why I assumed time would just keep expanding to allow me to add hobby after hobby. But there is more to it than that... in having to pause the project, it really proves what a …

My challenge for March was to read the front page of the Financial Times website every day, and see what interested me, read through some of the articles and generally get a bit smarter. I've talked already about how surprised I was at the variety of content for what is originally a newspaper about financials and economies, and that continued as a pleasant surprise as the month went on. I …

I have always, always been a cheerleader for blogging in any form. I think the spirit of sharing things, writing things down, just having an outlet and tiny corner of the web for yourself is a brilliant and important thing. In the past, I've come up with challenges to help encourage people to read and comment on blogs, and taken part in other experiments to share thoughts and feelings about …

Even though the time and inspiration to watch films (particularly new ones) is still eluding me somewhat, I'm starting to feel just a shimmer of excitement about what's upcoming. These quarterly sneak peeks at the fresh releases are helping no end, and this quarter feels quite blockbuster heavy. Let's see what we've got in store. April On a Wing and a Prayer. This doesn't look all that great but is …

If you've been following along my musical album odyssey over the past few months, you'll have noticed that a lot of inspiration for the choices recently has come from the time shifted repeats of Top of the Pops that are available via the BBC. Currently they're airing episodes from 1994, and I'm loving (almost) every minute of it. It's one of the biggest problems with streaming music, the vast amount …

I saw this on Kottke a while back and really wanted to share - Wonders of Street View - a super simple site designed by Neal that just shows you random pictures from Google Maps. It's one of those things that can suck you in and take up far more of your time than you want, so do be careful before clicking the link... but once you do, it's a …

I love this post from The Guardian last week that looks at a handful of artists behind the biggest theme tunes of the last couple of decades - how their songs were chosen, the impact it had on their careers and the legacy they have been left with. The most obvious one is the first, with The Rembrandts talking about how being the most recognisable song behind sitcom Friends actually …

Procrastination can be a bit of a problem when you're trying to get something done, and focusing on one task at a time can be a challenge in this world full of endless distractions. There are lots of apps out there that can help with focusing, lots of timers and distraction-less environments and that kind of thing. My chosen one is the Bear Focus Timer, because Tom the bear is …

Like many others, I've been intrigued by the high concept building The Line in Saudi Arabia, and have been keeping an eye on its progress. I really thought it would just be a concept piece and never come to anything, but lo and behold, the building teams have actually broken ground and started work on the 170km long building. This video from Two Bit da Vinci sums up the project …

I’ve been talking quite a lot recently about programming on Disney+ and that’s because of all the streaming services around at the moment, they have some of the most high profile shows alongside some hidden gems. That’s because they are such a behemoth, the vast array of franchises Disney has under its banner is something to behold. As it is at the forefront of my mind right now, for whatever …

I've been reading the Financial Times for about ten days now. I mean, I say reading it which sounds very grandiose but it's more like scanning the homepage for interesting topics. There have been a couple each day, although naturally the weekend is quieter than during the week. I've been surprised at the variety, though, with lots of culture stuff that's interesting, TV reviews, and even recipes! Plus all the …

As part of the efforts to reduce waste and combined with a need to try and reduce grocery costs due to the wider economy challenges, I've been quite focused on the kitchen recently. It means considering how best to cook things in which devices, whether to bulk up and batch cook, and how much time is too much time to spend meal planning. I've been doing my best to use …

I’m not sure where I first saw this to be able to assign proper credit, but I’m mildly obsessed with the BBC Motion Graphics Archive compiled by Ravensbourne university. The archive is a collection of graphics that aired on the BBC, including some of the iconic channel idents that you know and love, as well as opening credits from some of the biggest programmes across the years (Doctor Who, Top …

As I am now mildly obsessed with knitting, I bought a handful of balls of wool and various knitting needles and quite quickly realised I wasn’t sure what I had and what I needed for future projects. As you can imagine, there’s an app for that! My choice at the moment is YarnBuddy which seems like a simple enough app that has just enough detail to keep things ticking along …

In 2021, Disney+ released a television special with Chris Hemsworth, where the Australian actor met and travelled with some experts to understand sharks in more detail - their nature, the threat they actually are compared to the image of them and, more importantly, the growing threat we pose to them. At first I couldn't quite make sense of this show and the casting decision, but then I remembered that these …

My first day reading the Financial Times and the homepage pointed me towards an interview with author Linwood Barclay, who writes detective books, about his hobby collecting model trains. I love model train layouts so this was a very good first day. In the interview, he talks about how he developed the hobby and what he loves about it, and then points towards a video created by his son Spencer. …