My mother has long argued that a large category of popular music, second only to those on the subjects of sex and drugs, are about food. This so-called corpus of food songs is,
I’m pretty confident, mostly based on mishearing lyrics, but I think she’d have a friend in the fabulous Bec Hill who’s this
month made a follow-up to her video When You Listen to the Radio When You’re Hungry. And it’s even better (and to my
delight, paella still manages to make a cameo appearance).
Unfortunately Warner Music Group don’t seem to have a sense of humour and you might find that you can’t watch her new video on YouTube. But thankfully that’s not how the Internet works
(somebody should tell them!) and if proxying isn’t the best solution for you then you can just watch her new video
on the BBC’s Facebook page instead.
“Why make the web more boring? Because boring is fast, resilient, fault tolerant, and accessible. Boring is the essence of unobtrusive designs that facilitate interactions rather than
hinder them.” says Jeremy.
He’s right. I’ve become increasingly concerned in recent years in the trend towards overuse of heavyweight frameworks. These frameworks impose limitations on device/network
capabilities, browser features, caching, accessibility, stability, and more. It’s possible to work around many of those limitations, but doing so often takes additional work, and so
most developers, especially junior developers raised on a heavyweight framework who haven’t yet been exposed to the benefits of working around them. Plus, such mitigations tend to make
already-bloated web applications – full of unnecessary cruft – larger still; the network demands of the application grow ever larger.
What are these frameworks for? They often provide valuable components and polyfills, certainly, but they also have a tendency to reimplement what the browser already gives you:
e.g. routing and caching come free with HTTP, buttons and links from HTML, design from CSS, (progressive) interactivity from JS. Every developer should feel free to use a framework if it suits
them and the project they’re working on… but adoption of a framework should only come after consideration and understanding of what it provides, and at what cost.
And on a way, way lighter note to my last repost, Parry Gripp’s latest song and video is the catchiest song about tacos or robots
that you’ll ever hear.
I discovered Philosophy Tube earlier this year but because I’ve mostly been working my way through the back catalogue it took until very recently before I got around to watching the
video Men. Abuse. Trauma. And about 95% of everything he says in it so-closely parallels my own experience of an abusive relationship that I was periodically alarmed by his
specificity. I’ve written before about the long tail an abusive relationship can have and that this video triggered in me such a strong
reaction of recognition (and minor distress) is a testament to that.
I escaped from my abusive relationship seventeen years ago this month. It took me around seven years to acknowledge that the relationship had been abusive and to see the full picture of
the damage it had done me. It took at least another four or five before I reached a point that I suspect I’m “recovered”: by which I mean “as recovered as I think is feasible.” And the
fact that this video – on the first two viewings, anyway – was still able to give me a moment of panic (albeit one well-short of flashbacks) is a reminder that no, I’m not yet
100% okay.
Regardless – I’ve wanted to plug the channel for a while now, and this was the vehicle I had to hand. Go watch.
Last week I happened to be at an unveiling/premiere event for the new Renault Clio. That’s a coincidence: I was actually there to see the new Zoe, because we’re hoping to be among the
first people to get the right-hand-drive version of the new model when it starts rolling off the production line in 2020.
But I’ll tell you what, if they’d have shown me this video instead of showing me the advertising stuff they did, last week, I’d have been all: sure thing, Clio it is,
SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY! I’ve watched this ad four times now and seen more things in it every single time. (I even managed to not-cry at it on the fourth watch-through, too; hurrah!).
Yesterday, I shared with you the introduction video I made for my new employer. A few friends commented that
it seemed very well-presented and complimented me on my presentation, so I thought I’d dispel the illusion by providing this: the “outtakes”. My process was to write a loose script and
then perform it multiple times (while being sure to wear the same hoodie) over the course of several days as I walked or cycled around, and then take only the “good” content.
That I’m able to effortlessly make a longer video out of a selection of the outtakes should be evidence enough that I’m just as capable of mucking-up a simple task as
anybody else, probably moreso.
You may observe in this video that I made a number of “Hey, I found a…” snippets; I wasn’t sure what would scan best (I eventually went with “Hey, I found a… nothing?”). Folks who’ve
seen this video have already criticised my choice; apparently the cow I found was more photogenic than me.
New employees at Automattic – like me! – are encouraged to make a “howdymattic” video, introducing
themselves to their co-workers. Some are short and simple, others more-ornate, but all are a great way to provide the kind of interpersonal connection that’s more-challenging in an
entirely-distributed company with no fixed locations and staff spread throughout the globe.
In anticipation of starting, tomorrow, I made such a video. And I thought I’d share it with you, too.
Truly in the style and spirit of Challenge Robin / Challenge Robin II, this sweary idiot decides
to try to cross Wales in as close as possible to a completely straight line, cutting through dense woods, farms, rivers, hedgerows and back gardens. Cut up by barbed wire, stung by
nettles, swimming through freezing rivers, and chased by farmers, it makes for gruelling, hilarious watching. Link is to the four-hour playlist; put it on in the background.
Eight years, six months, and one week after I started at the Bodleian, we’ve gone our separate ways. It’s genuinely been the nicest place I’ve
ever worked; the Communications team are a tightly-knit, supportive, caring bunch of diverse misfits and I love them all dearly, but the time had come for me to seek my next challenge.
My imminent departure began to feel real when I turned over my badge and gun card and keys.
Being awesome as they are, my team threw a going-away party for me, complete with food from Najar’s Place, about which I’d previously
raved as having Oxford’s best falafels. I wasn’t even aware that Najar’s place did corporate catering… actually, it’s possible that they don’t and this was just a (very)
special one-off.
Start from the left, work towards the right.
Following in the footsteps of recent team parties, they’d even gotten a suitably-printed cake with a picture of my face on it. Which meant that I could leave my former team with one
final magic trick, the never-before-seen feat of eating my own head (albeit in icing form).
Of course, the first thing I was asked to do was to put a knife through my own neck.
As the alcohol started to work, I announced an activity I’d planned: over the weeks prior I’d worked to complete but not cash-in reward cards at many of my favourite Oxford eateries and
cafes, and so I was now carrying a number of tokens for free burritos, coffees, ice creams, smoothies, pasta and more. Given that I now expect to spend much less of my time in the city
centre I’d decided to give these away to people who were able to answer challenge questions presented – where else? – on our digital signage
simulator.
Among the games was Play Your Shards Right, a game of “higher/lower” played across London’s skyscrapers.
I also received some wonderful going-away gifts, along with cards in which a few colleagues had replicated my long tradition of drawing cartoon animals in other people’s cards, by
providing me with a few in return.
“Wait… all of these Javascript frameworks look like they’re named after Pokémon!”
Later, across the road at the Kings’ Arms and with even more drinks inside of me, I broke out the lyrics I’d half-written to a rap song about my time at the
Bodleian. Because, as I said at the time, there’s nothing more-Oxford than a privileged white boy rapping about how much he’d loved his job at a library (video also available on QTube [with lyrics] and on Videopress).
It’s been an incredible 8½ years that I’ll always look back on with fondness. Don’t be strangers, guys!
My department’s made far too much use out of that “Sorry you’re leaving” banner, this year. Here’s hoping they get a stabler, simpler time next year.
I’m not sure which is the most-hypnotic in this video: the graceful click-clack motion of the finished product or the careful and methodical production steps that precede it. Either
way, this perpetual calendar is brilliant, but if I owned it I’d absolutely spend the entire time playing with it rather than using it for its intended purpose.
Performed routine maintenance at the cache site; everything seems well.
A couple of ‘cachers have reported that the GZ is inaccessible owing to the path being overgrown. The “obvious” path to the cache really is pretty heavily overgrown and I’ll be
increasing the terrain rating from 3 to 3.5 accordingly, but the “obvious” path isn’t the only path! If you need a hint as to the direction from which the alternative path (which is
quite a bit longer, but much more-usable) comes, see my GZ video below:
Possibly CGP Grey‘s best video yet: starting with the usual lighthearted and slightly silly look into an interesting piece of history, it quickly
diverges from a straightforward path through the Forest of All Knowledge (remember No Flag Northern Ireland?) and
becomes an epic adventure into fact-checking, healthy scepticism, and demonstrable information literacy. Speaking admittedly as somebody who genuinely loved the Summer of Grey Tesla Road Trip series of vlogs, this more-human-than-average Grey
adventure is well-worth watching to the end.
