not sport | Wait until next year

July 25, 2014

The pint with your fish and chips on a Friday

Menu sign in a chip shop

Fish Friday. Chippy Tea. Whatever you call it. Fish and chips on a Friday night is one of the great institutions, the sort of tradition that genuinely keeps giving and giving, still seems relevant, vital even. Fish and chips are basically great anytime, but there is something special about having them on a Friday. It is a treat to end the week, a night off the cooking after five days of work. A way to see in the weekend. Read the rest of this entry »

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July 24, 2014

The Baffler and The Nostalgia Gap

Nostalgia is a form of propaganda, an exercise in laughter and forgetting, in which the right visual iconography and perceived authenticity can create a longing for an existence which is no longer possible and was in fact never possible.

The Baffler have opened up their archives, so you can now access articles from their 25 issues from 1988 to the present day. The piece quoted above, The Nostalgia Gap, was published in 1993, yet still reads as something valid and true today. It is well worth your time, as are the complete archives that I’m slowly working my way through now. Oddly, reading the old issues creates a similar misplaced longing as outlined in the quote above, which makes my head hurt a little.

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July 18, 2014

Gotta get a move on tryin´to find a man I know – A near-review of Vulgar Things by Lee Rourke

Graffiti on Canvey Island -

Vulgar Things by Lee Rourke is a book about a man who goes to Canvey Island, then Southend, to sort out the affairs of his uncle who has recently died. That’s as much plot as you need. I don’t want to give away the plot. Plus, while it is a good plot, and the story matters, Vulgar Things is about a whole lot more. At least how I read it, anyway. Read the rest of this entry »

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Video | June 7, 2014

Saturday Night Movie: The Haircut

A lovely little film, starring John Cassavetes, Nicholas Colasanto (Coach from Cheers) and a pre-Bangles Susanna Hoffs, among others. I like my regular barbers, but I wish I could go to somewhere like this when I need a trim…

June 3, 2014

Tending my own garden

Old glass lantern slide of gardener

We’ve been living in our current place for a little over a year now. And over the past few months we’ve edged closer to getting the house sorted. It has been rewired, re-floored, re-carpeted, re-decorated, re-most things. We’ve found homes for stuff that never had a home. The place feels very much like home now, somewhere I’m reluctant to leave each morning and eager to return to every evening. Read the rest of this entry »

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Category: not sport

Video | June 7, 2014