iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

When I was younger I used to see everything right wing as fascist or the thin end of a fascist wedge. Now I am much older and the political trends and policies I hated back then have come to fruition - I realise I was quite right.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Consulting Dr Google is never a good idea, but for me it just got even worse. Increasingly when I put in my symptoms it’s says the most likely cause is ‘ageing’.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

“The man who thinks creativity might yet become a technology is the man who stands no chance of ever understanding what creativity is. But we can be sure the technicians will eventual find us a bad mechanised substitute and persuade themselves it is the real thing.” Theordor Roszak, 1969.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

‘OK I understood the thing about bringing mice and birds into the house. But you never said anything about squirrels. I think you’re making up these rules as you go along.’

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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

So why did Mr T take that name? Because white people would often call black men ‘Boy’, and so this way they’d have to accord him the respect of being a man. Extraordinary interview by @shattenstone.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...

Aged 18, he changed his name to Mr T. "Let me explain that," he says. "See, everything I do there is a reason behind it. My father was a minister and I watched him being called Boy. And I watched my uncle being called Boy. I watched one of my brothers who was a marine come home from Vietnam in his beret and uniform, and some white guys were calling him Boy. So at 18 I had to register for the draft. I said, if I'm old enough to fight and die for my country, I'm old enough to be respected as a man, so I self-ordained myself Mr T at first. Then I legally changed my name to Mr T later on, so the first word out of everyone's mouth would be Mr."

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

‘By the way, I brought a mouse into the house and let it go. It’s hiding under the fridge. Night night. zzzz’

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By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 26/08/2026

They disinvented the VCR. You might think that the reason we don't have VCRs anymore is because VCRs were supplanted by DVDs, PVRs and streaming, but that's not the case. They had it in for the VCR from the very start, and they never stopped trying to kill it. Eventually, they succeeded. 1/

A 1960s family living room in which a mom, dad and two kids are mesmerized by a cabinet-style TV. The image has been altered. The TV has an early 1990s VCR atop it. The TV screen is displaying a cross-sectioned human head with brains and spine on display. A huge fist has materialized in the room, with bloody spiked knuckle-dusters, smashing into the VCR. The oil painting over the sofa has been replaced with a pulp image of a male head, its cranium removed and replaced by a dome. Inside the dome is a red eight-segment VCR clock, displaying 12:00. The background in the painting is a tangle of cassette tape. The whole image's colors have been boosted, giving it an overexposed look.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

I love ‘proper’ nougat. However…

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Have you finished? Can I get on with draining the peas now?

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

OGTHROD AI'F GEB'L-EE'H YOG-SOTHOTH 'NGAH'NG AI'Y ZHRO

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

Heading into cinema for second viewing of Odyssey.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

I commented earlier in someone’s else’s timeline about The Odyssey (film). At my own prompting therefore, I have spent the last hour reflecting on it. I am coming to the conclusion it might be a much greater film than my first viewing led me to believe. Need to watch it again.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

I don’t watch much football, so when two players have a tussle I often find it hard to recognise who has commited the foul. I would like to thank Argentina for providing me with some clarity in this aspect of the sport.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

Nolan: “This character is super smart. But he’s suffering from trauma. He can’t remember who he really is. He’s a lethal killing machine. Lots of people have suffered. He fears that all the pain is his own fault. Eventually he sails off into the sunset with the woman he loves. Who should we cast?”

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

I have left my wife and son at home, and have gone to local cinema on my own. I hope I make it back.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

Ah, I am rembering now why I don’t really watch football.

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Annette Gordon-Reed @agordonreed.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

Don’t know who to credit for this. But it is how I feel.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

I would to hear Freudian, Lacanian and Guatarrian analyses of this news story.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 30/06/2026

My brain was momentarily thrown here and it took me a moment to work out why. An excellent example of how the eye unconsciously bounces around the page finding connections of its own.

Text from FT, quoting someone called Beckelman immediately next to an ad featuring David Beckham.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

Just finished this. Stunning. One review (can’t remember where, sorry) described it as a novel of ‘epistemological collapse’. An excellent encapsulation. The last novel I read that achieved that effect with such an intensity was Dhalgren.

Cover of M John Harrison’s The End of Everything.

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Simon Wren-Lewis @sjwrenlewis.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

New post: The Consequences of Tolerating the Far Right mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2026/06/the-... The rise in the far right is not a result of changes in people’s attitudes, but is due to the political elite eroding the social norms we used to have against racism and dehumanising minorities.

mainlymacro.blogspot.com

The Consequences of Tolerating the Far Right

As I have argued in previous posts , the rise in the far right is not a result of changes in people’s attitudes. In many ways over the las...

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Scribbler Pen @scribblerpen.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

Half of UK welfare is pensions, 1 in 3 people on Universal Credit are in work, disabled people are disabled, more of them since Covid hit, but the welfare bill as % of GDP is stable (lower than most developed countries) and is forecast to stay stable and below OECD average for the next 5 years.

Chart from the Resolution Foundation of Social security spending as a proportion of GDP by category, Great Britain. The chart from 2007-2008 shows social security spending falling since 2013 from a peak in 2008-2009, pensions rising to account for the biggest share, and disability and incapacity spending rising in the post-Covid years from 2023.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

Defence spending shortfall? Why not squeeze the multibillion profits of UK defence firms or even nationalise them? If the answer is: “the UK cannot defend itself against Russian tyranny, but it’s more important not to upset defence firms” then don’t we need to question the terms of this debate?

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

Scaffold built in Washington - world tunes in to watch removal of Donald J Trump. Recyclable headline?

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Steve Peers @stevepeers.bsky.social · 10/06/2026

Will Farage, Musk etc be condemning white people in general for the actions of this violent white person, and advocating rage or violence in response? Will the BBC be laundering their 'legitimate concerns' about those white folks?

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 07/06/2026

The key to a good Sunday roast is timing. And I can confirm that declaring beer o’clock at 11am, can result in an inferior meal.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 26/05/2026

We’ve had one of these since the 1990s (when they were briefly fashionable). Our model only goes up to 27C.

Galileo thermometer - glass tube filled with liquid and floating glass baubles. Baubles rise and fall according to temperature.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Once again, I have spent the hottest day of the year standing over hot coals, burning meat.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Nothing to complain about at all? Nil issue.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

Rocket has been looking at the spring menu.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

If you ever leave food or drink in a room and walk away, the cat will have licked it by the time you get back. They have done this with a mouth that recently ate raw mouse. Don’t stress about this. Just accept it and move on.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 09/05/2026

Please tell me this is not serious. OK… I’ll give it a go: I wandered lonely in the cloud Whose data centres climate kills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host of witless online shills.

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Henry Morris @mrhenrymorris.substack.com · 07/05/2026

EXCLUSIVE - The Papua New Guinea Courier's view on today's Welsh, Scottish and local elections. More in my Substack: open.substack.com/pub/mrhenrym...

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 05/05/2026

Asking ‘what about?’ is a basic question of scientific and moral inquiry. It the question that helps us identify flawed logic and hypocrisy.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

One of my local kebab shops offers a sophisticatedly teasing option.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

Film you've watched more than six times with a gif. Hard mode: no Star Trek, Star Wars, LOTR, DC, Marvel, Disney, Pixar, Spielberg, Cameron, Wachowskis, or Ghibli.

media.tenor.com

a group of men are standing in a room and one of them has a patch on his sleeve that says ' nyc '

Alt: Crew of spaceship Dark Star, listening to music.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

We keep telling the cat that if he doesn’t stop being so grumpy, we are going to get some kittens. But he would kill them. And we would probably forgive him.

Black cat. Curled up on sofa, but looking cross and contemptuous.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

Ah. A good old-fashioned afternoon of family viewing.

Warning on streaming video: flashing lights, nudity, violence, alcohol use, smoking, foul language, sexual content.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

I dont want to alarm anyone unnecessarily, but about an hour ago I saw Nigel Farage crossing Tower Bridge on a tank.

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 28/02/2026

Some say that if there’s an anti-democratic criminal regime that sponsors terrorism in other countries and which is opposed by much of its own population, one should bomb that country hoping the people take over. This is utterly wrong and I will always be opposed to missile strikes on Washington.

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Peter Stefanovic @peterstefanovic.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

Labour MP Clive Lewis doesn’t hold back on the Gorton and Denton result in this interview with ITV

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James Ball @jamesrball.com · 27/02/2026

The current argument of the British right is that Muslims turned out in "blocs" with "family voting" to cast their ballots for a party led by a gay Jewish man, and this shows that multiculturalism has failed, voting is "sectarian" and we are in a crisis. Hmmmmmm.

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Martin Nicholls @martinnicholls.bsky.social · 26/02/2026

In honour of the Sunday Telegraph's editor and offical maddest columnist, we have created the Allister Heath headline generator... stirring-fox-7e1fab.netlify.app

stirring-fox-7e1fab.netlify.app

Allister Heath Headline Generator

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Simon Watkins @simonywaking.bsky.social · 24/02/2026

My phone has looked through my photos and decided this is one of my ‘Pet Friends’.

A dead mayfly floating in a swimming pool.

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