Happy new year with a trip to the pubs of St Albans
Happy new year! As has become a tradition, I will be at the helm of the Guardian’s live blog for NYE later today. Before that we published a First Edition newsletter that I am rather fond of, as myself and…
A one-line spoiler-free review of everything I watched in the cinema in November and December 2025
A double helping as I’m back at work full-time which has slowed down my afternoon cinema trips, but nevertheless I got to see Bugonia, Palestine 36, Animalia, The Shining, The Alien Dead, Train Dreams, plus big screen music experiences from…
Help yourself to the First Edition quiz of the year 2025
No Thursday news quiz this week as it is Christmas day, but why not treat yourself to the first ever First Edition quiz of the year? Seeing as I’m temporarily one of the writers on the Guardian’s daily news newsletter,…
Merry Christmas, a happy new year, and a happy birthday to my blog
I usually post something on Christmas Eve because it is my blog-o-versary, although I realise it risks coming across like one of those family circular letters. Thank you for continuing to read my personal blog posts, more than two decades…
Friday briefing on missing TV episodes
I mentioned earlier this week that I had spent a day in Derby at the beginning of the month at the Quatermass event, and off the back of that I am particularly pleased with today’s First Edition newsletter. In it…
Dachshunds everywhere!
I had some fun on Sunday going to the annual dachshund Xmas walk in Hyde Park, which I also used as an excuse to report on it and continue my drive to become the Guardian’s official dachshund correspondent on a…
Quatermass at last: a day with Nigel Kneale’s sci-fi in Derby
To my shame, despite being a massive science fiction nerd, I had never seen a single second of any of the various Quatermass television serials or films. That changed earlier this month, when I spent a day at the Quatermass…
Some thoughts on The War Between The Land And The Sea for the Guardian
I’ve written today some thoughts for the Guardian on The War Between The Land And The Sea, the Unit-focused Doctor Who spin-off that is an ecological morality tale featuring 1970s monsters The Sea Devils. “Whether The War Between the Land…
A one-line review of every gig I’ve been to in November 2025
This month featuring, among others, Wet Leg, Cabaret Voltaire, Gary Numan, Adam Ant, ABC, Fields of the Nephilim, Desperate Journalist, Swans, Sananda Maitreya, Toyah, and me literally annoying Robert Fripp … Heathen Apostles, O2 Forum, Kentish Town, 1 Nov – Sort of…
Making my Guardian First Edition debut
Those of you who regularly do my increasingly silly Thursday news quiz will have noticed that today, rather than appearing at 11am as is traditional, the 222nd edition emerged blinking in the dark horror of 6.30am. Why, you ask? Well,…