I am late to the party. I’m not a purist who is going to tell you that the books are way better than the TV series, that I read the books when they first came out. Well actually, before they came out because I know somebody who knows somebody.

No. I watched the “Slow Horses” show on Apple TV+, enjoyed it, and belatedly thought that I should read the book [affiliate link] to see how similar they are.

I’ve lived in London for thirty years¹. Somehow.

I’m not entirely sure how it happened. It was never the plan. Not that I had a plan. If you’d asked me where I wanted to live, I probably wouldn’t have picked London.

I applied to a handful of jobs at the tail-end of my stint at university². The one job offer I received³ was in London. That’s how it started.

To give you an idea of how arbitrary it all was: my first employer had offices in central London and in Surrey. I looked at the train lines and found that Wimbledon was about half way between the two. That’s where I ended up.

I hear John Elledge a lot on podcasts, so when his new book came out I was immediately interested. I saw it in a bookstore, almost bought it, and then realised that I have more than enough books at home. (Un)fortunately, Amazon were selling it cheap and I caved.

The good news is that “A History of the World in 47 Borders”¹ is an entertaining read. No regrets.

It’s well researched, and full of interesting tidbits, and connecting historical events in logical ways. What stood out for me, though, was the writing. It’s informal, and you get his voice and personality in practically every sentence. Here are a few.

I’ve read a lot of Moren’s words over the years, but mostly in Macworld and Six Colors¹. I picked “The Caledonian Gambit²” entirely arbitrarily.

His fiction is… fine. It’s a bit too military to my taste, but with a bunch of spy and action for good measure. There’s some family backstory that feeds into it, leading to a well rounded story. It didn’t fully engage me but I did keep reading, and wanted to know how it ended. There were a few phrases where I thought “he’s trying too hard” but, otherwise, it’s well written.

I talked about what it would take for me to leave Twitter a couple of years ago, but never followed up when I did leave around a year later. So here we go.

I didn’t quit in one go. I stopped posting. I checked in on my feed less frequently. I switched my account to private. I didn’t go cold turkey, I simply found fewer reasons to return.

I’d like to say that I was high minded and principled, that I quit because of Musk and Nazis and hateful content. But the truth is that the people I followed and blocked meant that my feed was mostly hate-free, an odd mixture of geeky stuff and dad jokes. Though I did leave because of the people and the content.

Comic books are like ballet.

No, wait! I can explain!

I could go to see an opera or a ballet. I might enjoy it. Unless the performers fell over or were dramatically out of tune, I’m not completely sure that I would understand it or be able to assess it¹. What distinguishes a good ballet from a bad one?

So. A Better World [affiliate link]. I’d heard good things about it. The conceit: in a world where the police also serve as judge, jury and executioner, someone figures out that by diverting funds from security to education they can almost entirely eliminate crime. It’s a clever idea and one that fits perfectly into the Dredd universe.

It’s five years since the first UK lockdown.

Despite that distance, I wonder if there is anything original that can be said about 2020?

Unlikely. Knowing that removes some of the pressure. Instead, I really just want to write something to commemorate the strangest of years¹.

For the most part, personally, 2020 wasn’t a terrible year, just unusual. I’m fortunate in so many ways. I kept my job. I normally work from home anyway, so the challenge when the first lockdown hit was having to work while having two kids running around all day. Not easy, but, equally, churlish to complain when so many others were losing their jobs or having relationship issues.

I don’t have an account on TikTok. I’ve never downloaded the app. Yet I see videos that were originally uploaded there, always in portrait format with the logo in the bottom corner. Even if you’ve not used it, you have likely been impacted by it in some way. And if you follow the news, you’ll be aware of some of the controversies.

So even though I never really had much interest, it is interesting.

I’m a big fan of William Boyd. Late last year, I went to the Wimbledon Book Festival to see him interviewed and talk about “Gabriel’s Moon,” his new book. The event wasn’t just about the book, though he did read the prologue. I was predisposed to like him, of course, but I thought he came across well. Smart but not pretentious, aware of his success but hadn’t let it define him. Although I hadn’t planned to, I bought a copy of the book and got it signed.

As Tim Minchin cynically notes in the prologue [affiliate link], universities hand out honorary degrees for good PR. As a well known, articulate, and talented individual, Minchin has received a number of them and this book is the transcript of the speeches he gave when accepting three of them.

If you’ve seen any of his live performances, you’ll be able to hear him speaking as you read through. Each has that easy flow that makes his work so good. Of course, anyone who has written or performed knows that kind of “easy flow” takes a lot of work. Effortless is difficult.