iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Foggy! Or misty. Not sure what the boundary is between the two 😶‍🌫️

View from a high window. Near the foreground a slightly hazy cedar tree is showing touches of brown among its dark green needles. Further away, an old, tall sycamore is ghost-like in the fog. The sky above is uniformly grey.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Renton makes much the same point in Trainspotting:

Mark "Rent-boy" Renton: [narrates] When you're on junk you have only one worry: scoring. When you're off it you are suddenly obliged to worry about all sorts of other shite. Got no money: can't get pissed. Got money: drinking too much. Can't get a bird: no chance of a ride. Got a bird: too much hassle. You have to worry about bills, about food, about some football team that never fucking wins, about human relationships and all the things that really don't matter when you've got a sincere and truthful junk habit.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I went to the surgery for my flu jab at lunchtime and on the way back, I was accosted by this ruffian in the park 🐿️

A sturdy squirrel stands in rough grass, a few fallen leaves around it. It’s squatting on its haunches with its front paws, slightly apart, resting on the ground, and it's staring directly up into the camera with a rather confrontational expression. Its tail is curled up its back, the end curling backwards away from its head in a fine furry display.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Don’t make me tap the sign, etc. 🙂

…when you are underfed, harassed, bored and miserable, you don't want to eat dull wholesome food. You want something a little bit ‘tasty'.

George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Did somebody mention lanyards? (This is far from my entire collection, just some that happened to be to hand.)

Eight or so lanyards tangled up on a desk. They feature various brands including Samsung Internet, O’Reilly Publishing, Django User Group London, and the @media conference of blessed memory. One is for Yocal, a Yahoo! service I worked on that was cancelled before it launched.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

I fondly remember this Private Eye cover from that summer: www.private-eye.co.uk/covers?showm...

Cover of Private Eye issue 383, 20 August 1976. The headline reads “Water shortage: Queen’s message.” Beneath it is a photograph of Queen Elizabeth II saying something with a big smile; behind her, Prince Charles (in Naval uniform) is laughing, and to the side a Naval rating standing at attention is clearly trying to stifle his laughter. The speech bubble coming from the Queen’s mouth reads, “Let them drink Coke!”

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

I mostly use BlueSky via the web app, and one regular annoyance is that I’ll accidentally tap a link in the left column while scrolling, because they’re too close to the timeline. So I added a user stylesheet to my browser and stopped them coming all the way across. Much better! 🙂 1/7

Screenshot of Bluesky’s main navigation column (on the left in left-to-right languages) with the links outlined with dotted lines to show that by default, they extend to within about one character width of the timeline column.

Screenshot of Bluesky’s main navigation column (on the left in left-to-right languages) with the links outlined with dotted lines to show that with my custom CSS, they shrink down to the width of the text within them, leaving plenty of clear space between them and the timeline column.

The CSS I used:

html > head: has(link[href*=“go.bsky.app"]) ~ body main ~ nav > a {
width: fit-content;
}

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

In “The Adventure of the Empty House” Watson describes Holmes taking a circuitous route to the house opposite their digs on Baker Street: “…and so to Blandford Street. Here he turned swiftly down a narrow passage…” That's further down towards Oxford Street than “221B” is: maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/...

Am Ordnance Survey 25-inch-to-the-mile scale map from circa 1914, showing that Blandford Street meets Baker Street some distance from the location that would be 221B under the modern numbering. The “narrow passage” mentioned in the story must be Blandford Mews, which runs along the backs of the buildings on Baker Street.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 20/06/2026

I’m not sure if it’s in the main Google Maps UI but I followed the “Open in My Maps” link on a saved map and found it over there.

Screenshot of Google’s “My Maps” feature. The menu next to the map title has been opened, and includes the option “Export to KML/KMZ”.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 16/05/2026

These were the results from people who arrange their bookshelves by colour:

The Guardian’s “100 best novels” survey entries 6 down to 1, but the titles are “Lilac, Burnt Umber, Orange, Light Green, Puce, Magenta”.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

I can never drive past the signs on a certain stretch of the M6 without the words “Erasmus Darwin lived in Lichfield” popping into my head, because that’s the sentence used in the “example type sizes” appendix of a letterpress textbook I bought in the 1970s.

A page from “Introduction to Printing: The Craft of Letterpress” by Herbert Simon. The heading is “Appendix B” followed by “The type on this page enables the various body sizes from 72 point to 8 point to be readily identified. The column on the right sets out minimum weights that should be acquired in the various sizes.” Beneath this is a list with the first item in 72pt and the last in 8pt, spanning eleven font sizes. The first item can only fit “Erasmus” on the page, but from 18pt downwards the full sentence “Erasmus Darwin lived in Lichfield” fits into the available width.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

I saved this useful medical advice off Twitter in 2012. Perhaps more inspirational than funny 🍺

A black-and-white drawing of a doctor of a previous era, perhaps the 1940s or 1950s. He’s wearing a suit and tie and has a receding hairline and glasses. He has a reassuring and informed expression as he addresses the reader:

DOCTOR: “Beer is an appetite builder, often prescribed for convalescents. It's mild and wholesome... a beverage of moderate people. You're not likely to get yourself in trouble if you stick to beer.”

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 18/03/2026

That one’s part of the Shuttleworth Collection at Old Warden aerodrome, England: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuttle... And here’s a photo of my father next to it in August 2023, a few months before his death.

An old, white-haired gentleman looks towards the camera, sitting in a wheelchair and holding a walking stick, in an aircraft hangar. Next to him, behind a low railing, is a Westland Lysander Mk. IIIa, formerly of 161 Squadron RAF, painted in the black livery used for clandestine missions into Europe in World War II on behalf of the Special Operations Executive (SOE).

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 20/02/2026

It never ceases to amaze me that the flags on Leicester’s Arch of Remembrance aren’t flags - they’re carved Portland stone. They were repainted before Armistice Day last year, so they’re looking particularly fine at the moment.

Looking from west to east through the Arch of Remembrance in Victoria Park, Leicester. The arch is of Portland stone and has four very thick legs on a square base. Inside each leg is what looks like a large flag on a dark staff with a gold finial, fixed to the wall at its base and sloping outwards a few degrees so the flag hangs from it in folds: the Union Flag, the White Ensign, the Red Ensign, and the Ensign of the Royal Air Force. In reality, these are carved and painted stone. Although the ground and the outer walls of the arch are damp with recent rain and the sky beyond the arch is grey, the colours of the flags are vivid and lustrous.

A zoomed-in view showing the flags in more detail. The northwest leg of the arch bears the Union Flag; the southwest, the White Ensign; the southeast, the Red Ensign; and the northeast, the Ensign of the Royal Air Force. The way the fabric hangs in folds is extremely realistic, making it hard to believe that this is carved and painted stone.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 11/02/2026

I greatly enjoyed the Philosophy of Mind course I took as part of my degree. The understanding and knowledge I gained allow me to identify this as belonging firmly in the category of ”arrant nonsense”. (Reposted with alt text, which is apparently too hard for the @newyorker.com to add itself.)

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

I bought this hardback copy of Swallows & Amazons at the Windermere Steamboat Museum over 20 years ago, on my first trip to the Lakes since 20 years before that! I still have many of the classic Puffins, but the family paperback of S&A had fallen to bits through much reading many years ago.

Cover of “Swallows and Amazons” by Arthur Ransome. The dust jacket features the classic design featuring various of Ransome’s illustrations from the book arranged haphazardly over a light green background.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 02/01/2026

First book finished in 2026: “There Is No Antimemetics Division” v2 by @qntm.org. I’d read v1 of the book a while ago but this rewrite is well worth it, particularly in the latter parts where the rework is most extensive and helped to clarify several concepts for me. Highly recommended. #BookSky

Cover of the UK edition. A young deer with four eyes, part of whose brain seems to be visible through its brow, stands on a rippling surface that has dark shades of blue, green, and grey; is it the sea? Behind, a huge, sullen red orb floats on the horizon against a strangely green and murky sky. The title of the book, all capitals in a heavy sans serif typeface, is in bright highlighter green, while the author’s name, lowercase in a stylised angular typeface, is in the same reddish orange as the glow spreading from the orb.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 16/12/2025

This is all well and good, but where’s the option for afternoon delivery? “Don’t you dare get here until after lunch. Even once I’ve woken up, I need a few hours before I can deal with things arriving.”

From an online order form, an option for “Morning delivery: delivery between 7am and 11:30am on your chosen date."

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 12/12/2025

Me trying to schedule an important task that will only take five minutes once I get started:

Screenshot of four films on the same row in my Apple TV movie library: “Before Midnight”, “Before Sunrise”, “Before Sunset”, and “Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead”.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 05/12/2025

Well, that answers my question, I suppose!

Screenshot of a web browser. The URL in the location bar is “downdetector.co.uk”. The title bar reads “500 Internal Server Error” and the only content on the page again says “500 Internal Server Error” followed by a horizontal line, beneath which is the single word “cloudflare” in lowercase. The page is rendered in the default font, Times New Roman.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 21/11/2025

From the old place, a tweet of mine about the halcyon days of Friday night telly 🙂 The link at the bottom is to an @anonopin.bsky.social tweet about somebody else’s idea of the glory days of Saturday teatime telly, which was crossposted here: bsky.app/profile/anon...

Screenshot of a tweet. The content is:

Nick Fitzsimons @NickFitz Aug 19, 2024

A Friday night on Channel 4 in 1999:

9:00pm Friends
9:30pm Smack the Pony
10:00pm Frasier
10:30pm So Graham Norton
11:10pm King of the Hill

We didn’t know how lucky we were to live in such times 🙂

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 02/11/2025

OK, found it in the Internet Archive and it’s even more 80s than I remembered: a utility downloadable from Ceefax which generated a Welsh BBC BASIC ROM image from your existing ROM, that you then had to burn to a chip and install yourself! archive.org/details/micr...

Part of a scanned page of issue 68 of “The Micro User,” a 1980s magazine for Acorn computer users:

Cymraeg
Dataun
Crewr
Datadau
Geiriad
Pedwar
Saesneg
Meistr
Hyffor

Use BBC Basic, but program in Welsh. This amazing utility will allow you to translate your existing Basic 1, 2 or 4 into Welsh by producing a sideways rom image of the Welsh version. From then on, use the Welsh Basic keywords as listed in the dictionaries Geiriad and Saesneg.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 22/10/2025

Went for a walk in the country, where I was confronted by this looming cattle trough.

View up a steep grassy slope leading into a pasture. At the top of the slope and some distance away, a stone cattle trough is silhouetted against the sky. The field stretches out on either side of it, ridged and uneven from ploughing in mediæval times. To the left are a couple of distant trees, almost bare of leaves Above, the sky is almost completely covered by low stratocumulus clouds that seem to sweep in a curve towards the viewer, with just a few patches of blue sky visible. In the top right, the ends of a couple of branches of a nearby ash tree bear clusters of seed pods.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

The man who said "Tap's fine, thanks."

Cartoon by H.M. Bateman. A man is asking a waitress for something in an ornate room. She is recoiling from him in shock; all the other people seated in the room are turning to stare at him, or staring at each other, with expressions of incredulity, anger, and contempt. The original caption is "The man who asked for a double Scotch in the grand pump room at Bath."

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 06/10/2025

My school had a PDP8/e like this. Ours had a high speed punch tape reader that sat on top. There were two Teletypes and a VDU connected to it, and it was usually running a BASIC interpreter based on DEC BASIC, but rewritten to add multiuser capability via timeslicing by one of the teachers.

A Digital Equipment Corporation PDP8/e minicomputer. The front panel is in shades of light and dark orange on a black background. There are several rows of twelve lights with a rotary switch with six labelled positions. Along the centre bottom of the fascia is a row of twelve large toggle switches, alternating colours in sets of three. To the left, a key in a lock has three labelled positions. To the right, more switches: a group of two, a group of five, and one on its own.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

It's Friday night! Remember to follow medical advice 🍻

A clipping from an old print publication. At top, a black & white drawing of a doctor, identifiable by his stethoscope, balding head, spectacles, and suit & tie. The style suggests it's from the 1940s. Beneath, the caption:

DOCTOR: "Beer is an appetite builder, often prescribed for convalescents. It's mild and wholesome... a beverage of moderate people. You're not likely to get yourself in trouble if you stick to beer."

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 23/09/2025

WTF?! I have been home ALL DAY! 😡

Card with the heading "Heavenly Host Logistical Solutions". The body of the card reads: "We came to rapture you but you were out. To arrange salvation, please call 0909 8790666 (Premium rates apply) or enter your deliverance code (overleaf) at loser.heavenly-host.god".

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 19/09/2025

Do you know the "no blue plaque required" house in Cheltenham commemorating Edward Wilson of Scott's Antarctic expedition? maps.app.goo.gl/AVHbZNTfmH3z...

Street View screenshot of a house faced with stone blocks in Montpellier Terrace, Cheltenham. Engraved in large letters in the stone, between the ground floor windows, are the words "Edward Adrian Wilson, Antarctic explorer. Born here 1872. Died with Scott 1912."

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 10/09/2025

And though they're neither herbs nor spices, I'm always happy to give a shoutout to my vegetable Oxo cubes that were BBE Jan 2006.

Back of a box of twelve Oxo vegetable stock cubes showing a Best Before date of Jan 06.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 10/09/2025

I had a clear out a week or so ago, but luckily I haven't yet got around to cleaning and recycling the jars of old herbs and spices. Due to the printing of the date being slightly broken up, I'm not sure if this jar of Provençal herbs were BBE Nov 2010 or 2018.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 05/09/2025

In today's post and hot off the press, this thing of beauty by @rickardsisters.com 🙂

Cover of Scarlett & Sophie Rickard's new graphic novel based on “This Slavery” by Ethel Carnie Holdsworth.

The cover illustration depicts two women in the centre, standing back to back in the middle of a cobbled street, with terraced houses on each side. They are both turning their heads to face the reader.

The woman on the left has long blonde hair, and wears an orange-brown shawl wrapped around her shoulders over a long, light blue dress. She has a violin and bow, clasped in front of her.

The woman on the right has long brown curly hair and is wearing a thick, dark overcoat with the collar turned up, over a blue dress with a pattern reminiscent of tartan. Around her neck, a large mortice lock key hangs on a length of cord. A small white and brown terrier peeps out from behind her with a curious but amiable expression.

Behind the women, the street of terraced houses stretches away, built of stone blocks in a style typical of certain industrial areas of northern England. From one of the houses on the left, a working man looks down towards the women; he has a red neckerchief, a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up his brawny arms, a brown waistcoat, and a flat cap.

In the background, the tall chimneys of numerous factories rise into the sky against a backdrop of distant hills. Smoke pours from them and is blown across the sky to the right.

The sky immediately above the hills is red and orange; higher, there are dark clouds massing, though their tops are catching some rays of light from the unseen sun.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 02/09/2025

Using one photo already on your phone, what is the announcement tomorrow at 2?

Screenshot from S1E1 of "The Thick of It". Closeup of Ollie in the back of the car taking the Secretary of State to make an important announcement to the media during a visit to a school, which 10 Downing Street has now told him not to do. The subtitles say "What if the announcement is… there's no big announcement."

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 19/08/2025

I've got that recording of "The Planets"! Cost me £1.25 at Boots, probably around 1980.

Cover of LP of "The Planets" by Gustav Holst, recorded by the Hallé Orchestra conducted by James Loughran, and released on the Classics for Pleasure label. The cover image shows a starfield with a large transparent circle in the centre whose circumference transitions through the colours of the spectrum of visible light.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 11/08/2025

Been a while since I baked sausage rolls #SausageRolls

Six freshly baked sausage rolls resting on baking parchment on a baking tray. The egg-washed puff pastry is glistening and golden, while juices from the sausage meat have oozed out of the ends and browned. The top of each one has three diagonal slashes that allowed steam to escape during baking. Each one is between four and five inches (10 - 13 cm) in length. They look absolutely delicious.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 04/07/2025

Amazing stuff from Google Maps Q&A.

Question: "Are towels and hairdryer available in each apartment? Thanks." Answer: "There is a lift."

Below, a link to "See 6 answers" with the additional text "5 years ago."

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 21/06/2025

Happy Summer Solstice! Last time I was at Stonehenge for the occasion was 20 years ago; and 20 years before that, I was some miles away at Westbury, being chivvied by Wiltshire Constabulary in the antagonistic period after the Battle of the Beanfield. This photo is from my less-chivvied 2005 visit 🙂

The light of the rising Summer Solstice sun bursts through a trilithon at Stonehenge. In the lower foreground, barely visible in the glare of sunlight, are the heads of a dense crowd of people.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 18/06/2025

Just arrived from @biggreenbooks.bsky.social is my copy of @mirandakeeling.com's new book "The Place I'm In"! I received number 2 of the first 200 signed copies, which means I also received a nice little notebook to record my own observations. I wonder who got book number 1? 🥰

A notebook with the same cover illustrations as the book, but in place of Miranda's name it says "Inspired by Miranda Keeling's "The Place I'm In" and the title and subtitle read "The place you're in: what do you see when you stop to notice?"

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 15/06/2025

This in www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... seems disingenuous to me. Somebody skim-reading will register the large figures cited for the event referred to in the preceding paragraph and assume they are for yesterday's event. The "well below that" without figures in the next paragraph is easily missed.

The last US military parade was held by President George HW Bush in June 1991, celebrating the US-led victory in the Gulf War.
A crowd of 200,000 people attended the parade to cheer on veterans, peaking at 800,000 who watched the fireworks display, the LA Times reported at the time.
The numbers at Saturday's event was well below that, partly due to wet conditions and the forecast of heavy rain.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 24/05/2025

I got these beautiful notebooks featuring the Pennine Tower at Forton Services on the M6 from @gailmyerscough.co.uk's shop. Go and do likewise 🙂

Four ring-bound notebooks, two A4 and two A5. The front covers bear a design showing the Pennine Tower at Forton Services, viewed from across the M6. The style uses flat colours in shades of grey and grey-blue, with a large yellow-brown sun at top right.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 09/04/2025

Mine still shows evidence of my father not bothering to take it down before painting the door one of those weird mustard shades that were popular in the mid-1970s.

Ceramic nameplate for mounting on a bedroom door. It bears a drawing of a red vintage Austin car, and the words "Nicholas' Room" in a fancy typeface. The edges of it have mustard brushstrokes intruding here and there.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 27/03/2025

Just arrived and hot off the press, @hallierubenhold.bsky.social’s latest book, about the infamous Dr. Crippen 💀

Cover of “Story of a Murder: The Wives, The Mistress and Doctor Crippen” by Hallie Rubenhold.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 19/03/2025

Five year ago today, Sainsbury's had no eggs, and no flour on the shelves on the other side either. But you could get a case of Corona for only £10! 🦠 🍻 #coronavirus

The middle of a Sainsbury's superstore. In the background are empty shelves with a sign above saying "Eggs" while in the foreground, a special display is piled high with cases of a dozen bottles of Mexican beer Corona, which a red promotional label announces are only £10 each. It appears that many cases have already been sold.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 13/03/2025

I see the market’s opened across the pond.

Screenshot of the iPhone stocks app open at the one day chart for TSLA. A red line descends steeply at the left, most of the chart being empty as trading has only just begun. It’s down 10.31.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 04/03/2025

Seventh: "The Forever War" by Joe Haldeman. Inspired by his experiences serving in Vietnam, the eponymous war seems to feature few battles but relativistic effects of near-light-speed travel mean it stretches out over millennia. N.B. bsky.app/profile/nick... #BookSky

Cover: in the foreground a man in a space suit on his knees reaches towards us, while a large yellow sun glows low in the sky behind him.

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Nick Fitzsimons @nickfitz.bsky.social · 04/03/2025

Sixth was "Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter" by @kateconger.com and @rmac.bsky.social. A detailed account of the Fuckwit-in-Chief's dry run for his latest project of destroying the federal government of the USA, and probably its economy and infrastructure too #BookSky

Cover of the book with the title in huge Helvetica Bold hyphenated across three lines, above a partial photograph of the ugly South African scumbag looking even more fatuous than usual.

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