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Tom Sutcliffe

@tds153.bsky.social
8.9K followers 296 following 2K posts

Presenter, Radio Four’s Front Row and Start the Week.

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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 22h
In the light of recent events Crouch End Airsoft Society have decided to cancel our scheduled night paintballing exercise in Norfolk (r.v. RAF Lakenheath Viewing Area). Pass it on will you?
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The Onion @theonion.com · 27/09/2026
Xi Jinping Impressed With How Much Trump’s English Has Improved Since Last Visit
theonion.com
Xi Jinping Impressed With How Much Trump’s English Has Improved Since Last Visit
WASHINGTON—Marveling at how his American counterpart’s grasp of the difficult language had progressed, Chinese leader Xi Jinping told reporters Thursday that he was deeply impressed with how much Pres...
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
To the people who’ve been complaining about their colds all week: I took delivery this morning and you’re right, it’s a stinker.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Lovely breezy day on the Rochdale Canal, between Hebden Bridge and Todmorden.
Tree lined canal, hills rising in the background.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Oh FFS…
~ Trending
1. Debate over iced coffee at interviews
A Washington Post piece asks if bringing iced coffee to interviews is unprofessional.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
“I will not engage with the listicle, I will not engage with the listicle, I will not engage with the listicle….what the hell do you mean Peep Show is below Downton Abbey!!”
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Reading this, which is grimly wonderful. Loved this passage in which an inveterate liar and bloviator, Tamkin, finds himself saying something true (or true for Bellow’s main character Wilhelm)
Penguin Classic edition of Saul Bellow’s Seize the Day. Cover image a Vivian Maier picture of a solitary man on a city street, walking past a fence made of old mismatched doors. 
Now, Wilhelm, I'm trying to do you some good. I want to tell you, don't marry suffering. Some people do. They get married to it, and sleep and eat together, just as husband and wife. If they go with joy they think it's adultery.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
At last. NONE of the suits I currently own allow me to do this…
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Anne Billson @annebillson.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Happy birthday Stephen King! Here (for the umpteenth time, sorry) are some photographs I took of him encountering a fish-paste sandwich in London, 1983.
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Adam Rutherford @adamrutherford.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
I’m back on Start the Week on BBC Radio 4 at 9: Carlo Rovelli on philosophy and physics, Lavinia Greenlaw on difficulty in poetry, and James Graham’s new play about John Maynard Keynes. Stick that heady mix in yer podcast pipe. How lucky we are to have the BBC.
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Steven (with a PH) @sjksalisbury.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Christening a baby is nothing like christening a ship. I know that now. Once again I can only apologise.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
Yikes. Though obviously without the hounding the wait would be even longer. The BM appear to have got their flow calculations badly wrong.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Today I experienced Swiss railway disruption due to work on the tracks. Honestly, “If Carlsberg did bus replacement services”. They even send you a little map so you know exactly where to find the bus.
Map of Bex station with a line of little blue arrows guiding travellers from platform to bus stop.
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Petrus Crinitus @petruscrinitus.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofa_Mo...
en.wikipedia.org
Sofa Mountain - Wikipedia
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Back from three days walking in the Alps and the only summit I have in my sights is Mount Sofa. I know it can be climbed. I’ve done it before.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Today we headed up to the pointy bits*. *Technical language used by advanced Alpinists.
Rock massifs on the route between Derborance and Ovrannaz. I am far too tired to look up its name.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
When the Swiss tell you a route has a “passage difficile” believe them.
A walker descending a precipitous path, clinging to safety chains. The view plunges to the valley beyond.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Petit-déjeuner. (Romantic purists please ignore the Komatsu digger).
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
In the Valais every picnic table has a cow attendant.
Swiss cow on the other side of a mountain picnic table. She looks like she’s waiting for me to get out the sandwiches.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Nice day for a walk.
Looking across the Rhine valley above Sion towards the Bernese alps. Sion Airport down in the valley.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Genii: You have released me from the bottle and in return I will answer *any* question you ask me. All human knowledge is yours! Aladdin: Will your answers be correct? Genii: Well now you’re just being picky.
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Helen Barrett @helenbarrett.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Pasted a John Berger quote into Google, just to see. Gemini assured me it was from Downtown Abbey.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Life can be hard. But at least you're not a garfish.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Never knowingly unembarrassing... www.theguardian.com/us-news/live...
theguardian.com
Trump says he would ‘love’ to see unified Ireland and ‘it may as well happen now’ as he visits Dublin – live
US president is meeting politicians and business leaders – and playing golf – during two-day trip to Ireland
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
Morning has broken and there are crumbs in the bed.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Just watched Penda’s Fen. That kid was tripping balls.
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Inside Ukraine 🇺🇦 @insideukraine.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
A Ukrainian song. Bravo! 📹: Darina Orlova / Facebook
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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Is it just me or is still too soon for the Wellcome gift shop to be selling a Covid-19 microbe cuddly toy?
Covid 19 microbe cuddly toyToy tag
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Well this is VERY on brand.
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Anne Billson @annebillson.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
PRESSURE: not enough saluting IMO. In the entire 100-minute running-time, I counted two fairly limp salutes. Rest of the time, everyone shakes hands. When Andrew Scott's meteorologist first meets Brendan Fraser's General Eisenhower, supreme D-Day commander, they... shake hands? Is this normal?
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Don’t panic, don’t panic!! A usefully level-headed thread.
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Saskia Daniel @saskiadanielceramics.com · 09/09/2026
My friend's great-great-grandfather conceived the idea of the marathon race for the first modern Olympic Games in 1894. I had no idea.
instagram.com
Henrietta Parsons on Instagram: "Next Tuesday sees the launch, in Paris, of Global Marathon Day, celebrating the day in 1894 when my great great grandfather Michel Bréal thought up the idea of a 42km ...
3 likes, 1 comments - henriettaparsons_paintings on September 9, 2026: "Next Tuesday sees the launch, in Paris, of Global Marathon Day, celebrating the day in 1894 when my great great grandfather Mich...
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Love the Freudian slip here in the middle of the weaselling evasion: “I have every doubt that what he’s conveying there is what he experienced.”
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Charles Fourier @charlesfourier.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Bill Bryson’s words seem appropriate to post right now
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
This is really going to put a crimp in Jeremy Corbyn’s windsurfing holiday…
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Currently boning up on a Front Row item on the effect of drought on England's historic gardens. To the sound of steady, unceasing rain.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
Sweetly trusting of The Guardian if they really believe that when I press the “Maybe Later” button I mean maybe later.
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Michael Warburton @michaelwarburton.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Audition polaroids taken by Hollywood Casting Director Mali Finn, in the 1980's
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
This is terrific. (A great double with Mark O’Connell’s equally good non-fiction book A Thread of Violence, which is about the real case that fed into Banville’s novel.)
Cover of John Banville’s The Book of Evidence, image of a Dutch old master painting with a heavy gilt frame of a young woman against a black background.
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Reece Dinsdale @reecedinsdale.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Can any of you good burghers of Calderdale help us with this? 🙏🏻 And a retweet would help from all of you. 🙂 Let’s keep the magnificent #SquareChapelArts for exactly what it says on the tin… the Arts! Thank you. 🙌 www.facebook.com/groups/79219...
facebook.com
Facebook
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Oh shit. They’re plotting something.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
What larks Pip. The workmen rebuilding our front steps have just pickaxed our gas supply. And as I was out front calling the Emergency Leak line the dog ran out across wet cement and then back into the house across the just washed floor. Basically my life has turned into a Jacques Tati movie.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
Me to the dog: “I know you don’t like having a bath but think how fluffy and clean you’ll be afterwards.” Dog to me: “Waterboarding is ILLEGAL!!! You’re a WAR CRIMINAL!”
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Henry Mance @henrymance.ft.com · 01/09/2026
A liberal is a conservative who just got mugged by the police
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
These two quote posts appeared in succession on my timeline.
Coinbase CEO and billionaire Brian Armstrong says “charity is a negative for the world”. “Ti West’s film Ebenezer will ponder whether Scrooge had a point actually.”
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
“I cannot tell a lie. It was Joe Biden who did it.” www.alternet.org/trump-dc-gol...
alternet.org
Trump cuts down oldest cherry blossoms in DC for his golf course
A few years ago the cherry blossoms given to the U.S. from Japan in 1912 had to be removed to rebuild the flood wall on the Tidal Basin in Washington D.C. The oldest trees left remained within East Po...
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Stephen Collins @stephencollins.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...
theguardian.com
Trust nobody – not even the sweet shop lady: the Stephen Collins cartoon
The dark secrets people hide …
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David Benedict @eggsbened.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Lessons in subtext.
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Tom Sutcliffe @tds153.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Death must have been reading his Customer Satisfaction Surveys. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...
theguardian.com
Ratko Mladić, the ‘Butcher of Bosnia’, dies aged 84
Bosnian Serb commander responsible for Srebrenica massacre dies in prison while serving life sentence for genocide
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Nahel Belgherze @wxnb.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
An incredibly well-timed Landsat 9 pass captured the effects of yesterday’s catastrophic glacier collapse near the Nepal–Tibet border. The event was so massive that it was detected by seismometers around the world.
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