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Things I’ve Seen

  • On the unimprovable

    05/05/2026|AUDIO FILM & DIGITAL, FICTION, SHARING SOME DOTS, THEATRE, THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    A word which has never, I expect, been said to us, or used to describe anything we did, anything we made, anything we laboured over.

  • On marshmallows, binge-watching and delayed……………………………………………..gratification

    24/03/2026|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    My educational attainment is pretty good. My BMI, less so. I doubt my parents would describe me as "competent" at anything. 

  • On the utter waffling bollocks either side of ad breaks on Sky Arts’ Portrait Artist of the Year

    10/03/2026|THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS, AUDIO FILM & DIGITAL, SHARING SOME DOTS|

    I honestly think the note of letting self-doubt fuel you is entirely unplayable, entirely unusable, in any creative context.

  • On big issues and small details

    24/02/2026|FICTION, SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS|

    If you let them come for your milk and say nothing, next they will come for your apples, and before you know it, they come for your freedom, your life, and no amount of bleating will stop them.

  • On (un)healthy relationships with the metal pet

    10/02/2026|THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS, INPUT, OUTPUT, SHARING SOME DOTS|

    "And then I realised, geez, how dependent I have been on my cellphone. But I should confess, you know, after the first day, I felt liberated."

  • On waving goodbye to 2025 and saying hello to 2026

    31/12/2025|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    Here's to a 2026 filled with daily bread — the kind we bake for ourselves, with craft and sweat and discipline and love.

  • On the 88 Club

    09/12/2025|OUTPUT, SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    The thing I will always love about Tom Stoppard is his spectral hand in the script for Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

  • On the brain being mostly right, then a little wrong

    18/11/2025|THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS, AUDIO FILM & DIGITAL, SHARING SOME DOTS|

    Interestingly, I have never yet met a woman who had a good word to say about Arrival.

  • On (the joys of) negative utopias

    28/10/2025|AUDIO FILM & DIGITAL, FICTION, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS|

    You never know when you’ll read something that proves itself to be grimly, magnificently prophetic within your own lifetime.

  • On being a Stranger to the Muses

    30/09/2025|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    Uh-oh... Should I have got my coat and bag from the locker and just left quietly...?

  • On pride and productivity

    16/09/2025|THINGS I'VE SEEN, INPUT, OUTPUT, SHARING SOME DOTS|

    So many employers profess to value wellbeing — until it comes into conflict with the productivity which they value even more.

  • On saying what you mean and meaning what you say

    26/08/2025|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS|

    "If you're making a statement, artistically, then when you're making that statement, as far as you're concerned, it's an absolute."

  • On contraction and expansion

    29/07/2025|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS|

    Have you ever felt like a broken accordion sometimes?

  • On having your vichyssoise and eating it

    22/07/2025|AUDIO FILM & DIGITAL, INPUT, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    Is Bruce Wayne, like so many of us, just plain lazy when it comes to matters of taste?

  • On liking

    15/07/2025|THEATRE, THINGS I'VE SEEN, SHARING SOME DOTS|

    Maybe we all need to stop using the word “like” for good; maybe we need to retire it forcibly from the English language.

  • On using just one element and really going to town with it

    08/07/2025|OUTPUT, SHARING SOME DOTS, THEATRE, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    Quite possibly a total nightmare for stage managers — I do sympathise with them when faced with designs and designers like these.

  • On when the mind is empty and when the mind is full

    24/06/2025|OUTPUT, SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS, INPUT|

    Joy is currently failing me and I’m very aware that this is a dangerous, not to mention costly, headspace for a freelancer to find themselves in.

  • On whether accents matter, or just get in the way

    17/06/2025|THEATRE, THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    Does it really matter what accent an actor uses to play a character, or does it not?

  • On boats, tigers, zebras, and why story-telling gets done dirty by religion

    03/06/2025|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    The whole thing was not, in fact, about a young man on a boat in the middle of the ocean with a tiger and a zebra and a few other animals at all.

  • On remembering that hands consist of more than just fingertips

    25/03/2025|OUTPUT, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS|

    I’m doing my little bit to reclaim the concept of manual labour for myself and for creative people in a very literal (and literary) fashion.

  • On behaving like a pineapple, or, realising when it’s not all about you

    25/02/2025|INPUT, SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    What better way of challenging these unhelpful feelings than by taking my clothes off in front a room full of strangers?

  • On someone just saying yes

    13/08/2024|SHARING SOME DOTS, THEATRE, THINGS I'VE HEARD, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    In order to say yes to one thing, you have to say no to another. That’s how time is protected. That’s how the art gets made. But it starts with you, saying yes to yourself, for yourself.

  • On a historical novel of the past and another one of the future

    16/07/2024|FICTION, SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE SEEN|

    One of the big surprises from the Enzo Mari exhibition was discovering the number of different ways Mari had ventured into the world of literature.

  • On the reasons for new projects

    02/07/2024|SHARING SOME DOTS, THINGS I'VE READ, THINGS I'VE SEEN, WRITING PROCESS|

    On a recent trip to London, we finally made it to the Design Museum so we could catch the exhibition of work by the Italian design legend Enzo Mari.

  • On Miss Marple, class and human nature

    13/02/2024|THINGS I'VE SEEN, FICTION, NOVELS, SHORT STORIES, THINGS I'VE READ|

    I don’t fall asleep easily, so for a good many years, I’ve listened to audiobooks and radio plays in bed — and now I’ve got an elasticated headphone band to make it a more comfortable experience.

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