iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

So today in Birmingham we’ve built a high-security detention centre for Conservatives in the middle of town.

Tall security fences around a series of temporary structures. Signs on the fence say CPC26: Conservatives.

Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

What’s the Japanese word for being really pleased with the good job you’ve done of cleaning the windows, until the next morning when the sun strikes from a different angle and you can see every smear.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

It’s #Victober which is the month for reading Victoriana, so I’m giving it a go from the unread on my bookshelves. Please feel free to throw buns at whoever invented the word Victober.

A pile of books: Dombey & Son, Esther Waters, Wives and Daughters, Barry Lyndon, Victorian Verse, and Inventing the Victorians.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Reading Flick: The Story of Female Pleasure by Dr Kate Lister, and I’ve reached Natalie Clifford Barney’s lesbian salon in Paris. I may adopt the phrase ‘you can’t have an elephant in my garden’ as a multi-purpose euphemism.

The legendary courtesan Mata Hari is said to have once danced through the salon completely naked. She had wanted to arrive on an elephant, but Barney refused, saying, ‘there are cookies and tea, but you can’t have an elephant in my garden.’

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Reading homework for Birmingham Lit Fest in October and the gender reversed Moby-Dick is an easier read than actual Moby-Dick but doesn’t really veer off course into new waters and…basically I’ve been tricked into reading Moby-Dick twice in two months, haven’t I.

Cover of Call Me Ishmaelle by Xiaolu Guo.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

I've been to the Handel Hendrix House, as I was passing. They were both out but the Hendrix flat does a reasonable job of making it look like he's just left, down to copious fag ends in ashtrays, though I don't really believe he ate that much fruit.

1960s-style bedroom with a pink psychedelic bedspread and a guitar on the bed. There are turquoise curtains and the walls and ceiling are hung with carpets and shawls.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Birmingham having a normal one today. As I understand it, Mr Egg and the Lord Mayor are raising their standard over the Council Chamber. I had to leave for an appointment, so I'm not sure what happens next, but I imagine Prince Harry raises an army and marches from the north.

A man dressed as an egg dances to a brass band outside Birmingham Council Chamber.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

However early I start to book Christmas travel is still too late to find out there will be no direct trains to Oxford and New Street will be closed. A gazillion sweaty, angry people trying to change at Banbury on Christmas Eve sounds festive though, don't you think?

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 20/09/2026

Increasingly Orwellian Heritage Week. (We are now in year three of Heritage Week. It has always been Heritage Week). Pipe organ in Birmingham Town Hall, much of it hidden by its case. It’s the height of two double-decker buses, has 6,000 pipes and is visible from space.

Huge Victorian pipe organ with highly decorated pipes.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

Slightly resentful of things I recall from childhood being called veteran, but aren’t they lovely? Birmingham buses were repainted royal blue and silver in 1977 for the Jubilee, which I believe marks the beginning of the end of civilisation.

Three old busses, one red, two navy and cream, in a city square.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

[My brain] Go to sleep before midnight, you've got an early start tomorrow. [Also my brain] Begins mental list of all the things Joan Collins has been attacked by in films: radioactive ants, a psychotic Father Christmas, that time James Robertson Justice buried her in a pyramid...

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Proper back-to-school feeling today as the CBSO lunchtime concerts started up again with a Stravinsky String Quartet & Schumann String Quintet. Stravinsky, described by the first violin as: a difficult man to have a cup of tea with, he would always be changing the order of everything.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Lovely evening at *nook* gallery, formerly (1911) the Kings Heath Picture House, later the Cosy Cinema, for a talk on its history. Best character to emerge from this was Lawson Trout, 18-year-old cinema manager and legendary publicist.

Edwardian double-fronted brick house with leaded bay windows and a picket fence. Behind it, the rectangular block of the picture house.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

The bears have had a wash and they’re just chilling on the draining board now. On the left is Willy, who is 58 and deaf in one ear. On the right is Barry, who is in his 70s.

Grey knitted bear in a green knitted suit. Orange fur bear in red trousers and a brown jacket.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Perfectly normal to buy yourself a birthday treat in September when your birthday's in March. Anyway, I'm looking forward to Roger Allam as King Lear, apparently set on a wet day on the bus. Doing a double bill with the Duke of York in Richard II. He was a brilliant Falstaff at the Globe.

Roger Allam in costume as Lear, photographed through a pane of rainy glass.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Lovely free ticket for Schubert Piano Music at the music school tonight. Under-subscription on a school night I suspect. Trying not to look like a freeloading hobbledehoy.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

My neighbour has visitors staying and it's been solid Jamaican cackling laughter coming through the wall all day. This is undoubtedly the joyful noise we're supposed to make unto the Lord, in case you're wondering.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

If the paternoster lifts didn’t get you the wind whipping off the Urals would.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Henrietta Stackpole: I don’t care much for these European potatoes. Lord Warburton: I don’t see how you manage to get on without potatoes; you must find so few things to eat over here. Henry James there, condensing 20+ novels on the culture clash between Americans and Europeans to two sentences.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Vespers at Birmingham’s Greek Orthodox Cathedral of the Dormition of Theotokos and St. Andrew, converted from a Catholic Apostolic Church in the 1950s.

1870s English Gothic church interior with Greek Orthodox icon screen and brass chandelier.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

Up to the top of the library to the archives and the history of New Hall and the Colmore family. Very taken with Anne Sissons, sex worker of Half Moon St, Piccadilly, who inherited most of Birmingham in 1842 and spent the proceeds on living in a hotel in Paris, which is what I would have done.

Birmingham Library with circular bookshelves leading up to a glass elevator and ceiling.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

It’s Heritage Week in Birmingham and the city’s heaving with people in cagoules who’ve brought sandwiches. I’ve been on an architectural tour of Birmingham Rep.

Birmingham Rep, concrete built 1971 building with curved front and repeating arched windows.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

Doing my own House Through Time in my bedroom. I dearly love the swirly carpet and if it was in better condition I’d keep it.

Swirly blue and purple 1960s carpet rolled up to reveal 1930s rose-patterned Lino.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

It. Has. Begun. Though if you would pick just one festival at a time to celebrate months early it would help me distribute my outrage at capitalism more equitably.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

My cello is full of bees. Not a useful phrase for travellers abroad but one of the cello stories in an excellent Gresham talk by cellist Dr Kate Kennedy. The cello belonged to bee expert Martin Bencsik's wife, and of course your first thought would be to recycle it as a bee hive.

A cello with its back replaced with clear perspex, revealing the bee hive inside.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

My bad run of films continued today with Almodóvar’s Bitter Christmas, a film about how it’s okay to steal people’s life story because it’s five years since your last film and something, something, art. Someone says to the Almodóvar character, “You’ve made your best films,” and this is correct.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

There was no bread man at the farmer’s market so I have been absolutely forced to buy samosas, strawberries and Fat Rascals instead. Need to decide which of these I’m going to eat the Taleggio with though, because it’s not disordered eating if I’ve made a plan.

Samosas, cakes, strawberries and cheese on a kitchen counter.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

What do you mean, there's a new sin? I haven't finished committing all the old sins yet. I'm going to have to skip the historic ones, like wanhope and vainglory, just to keep up.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

I was a bit rude the other day about Scottish Colourists' inability to paint flowers. That wasn't fair. They also couldn't paint submarines, unless JD Fergusson was right and in 1918 submarines did have steam funnels and...a pair of garden cloches with their vents open to air the radishes?

Painting of two sailors in white uniform next to a blue submarine. Sail boats with orange and red sails in the middle ground, a steamship on the horizon and an airship in the sky.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Yes, garden centre, I would quite like a flock of concrete sheep, but could some of them be fish in disguise for possibly nefarious purposes? Thanks.

Concrete garden ornaments which are mostly sheep but a few are fish that look a bit like sheep.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Help, I'm in a bank vault! Fortunately, it's a very beautiful 1933 bank vault that belonged to the Birmingham Municipal Bank.

Art Deco strong boxes of various sizes and a bronze gate to the strong room.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Back in The Exchange, and they’ve switched their giant inflatable Sun on for us today, as it’s a bit grey out.

Sun sculpture, lit from within, hangs from the ceiling of an old banking hall.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Live reportage from my narrowly avoided park accident. Never get so excited about the last Mr Whippy of the year that you dart out in front of the Dotty Train.

A land train passes an ice cream van in the park.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Scottish Colourists tonight, and their adventures in not knowing much about flowers. John Duncan Fergusson's Jonquils and Silver, 1905. Those are not jonquils.

Pink and white flowers in a glass vase, on a white tablecloth with silver pots.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Book tropes that should die: chaotic heroine's best friend is a man she's known for ten years, who is constantly available for all her life events but with whom she has a platonic relationship (he's bi, so he can be parked for stretches of the book).

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Thinking of reviving Fie! as a response to suggestions and opinions.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 29/08/2026

The jumper equinox has arrived. Please put your own jumper on first before trying to help others put their jumpers on.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

CBSO in the City 2026 gets underway with the orchestra at New St Station, watched over by Ozzy the Bull. Currently playing something overwrought from The Phantom Menace. Apparently. They’re slightly battling against station announcements.

Orchestra playing on railway station concourse with a crowd listening. Bull statue in the background.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

Autumn has fallen with a thud in tree-lined Augustus Road. Leaves blocking the storm drains have turned it into a series of ponds that could completely drench a small person from head to toe as a car swishes past. Guess how I know this.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Ooh, a proper thunderstorm. This is how 11-year-old me remembers the 1976 heatwave ending. If we stay on track it’ll soon be time for the Sex Pistols to swear at Bill Grundy again.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

Art installation / auction at the MAC. The chairs are suspended from the ceiling and move up and down according to bids.

Gallery full of different chairs suspended at varying heights above a mirrored floor.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Art history tonight was Barbara Hepworth, who I struggle with (oh look, rocks). However, I did quite like the one on the left, called Pelagos, which is Greek for the deep sea. With its lyre-like strings it's 'what if The Odyssey but in wood?' Also interested to discover she invented Joe 90.

Wooden sculpture, like the curve of a shell with the inside painted pale blue and seven strings, like the strings of a musical instrument.

Spherical made of a series of metal hoops joined together to make a sphere, like the segments of an orange, with panels of red, yellow and blue.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

I’ve brought a few sunflowers in to see out their final days in comfort, and I’ve rescued a sleepy bee with a dab of honey. Those are my two superpowers, if anyone from Marvel is watching.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Narrowly avoided a repeat during bin manoeuvres. Slug is fine, and I suppose I am too. This represents emotional growth for both of us.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

One last post on Netherlandish women and art. This vanitas by Maria van Oosterwijck includes a well-thumbed accounts book. Women were often the keepers of the household accounts and, in a mercantile society, it was important not to over-spend but equally important not to under-spend.

Still life by Maria van Oosterwijck, 1668. Flowers, a skull, an astrological globe, bottles, books and an ink pot are among the objects on a table.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

Stayed up until the early hours last night listening to rain. Made soup for lunch. Got a baked potato in the oven. I'm ready for Autumn now, thanks.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

More art history and seamstresses. Highly skilled work like this is uncredited, partly because fragility makes it a rare survival. It's easier to identify women painters and trace their work through workshops, patrons, family relationships and the simple fact that many more oil paintings survive.

Lace tablecloth, anonymous, Southern Netherlands, first half of the seventeenth century. A patchwork of fine lace panels, each in a different design.

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Knitted Clanger @knittedclanger.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

Sadly most directors cut the 8:22 speech where Hamlet repeatedly murmurs ‘a bare bodkin’ against a sea of tape loops.

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