Simon J. Reynolds

📖 "Looking at Each Other", my cycling-meets-mythology epic, is available from: Amazon £9.60/US$12.69; Audible £3.65/US$6.36, narr Kate Walsh @katevoice.bsky.social Or read it in chunks (which may or may not be in the right order, but 🤷 ) at #LAEO. #books #booksky #poetry #cycling #mythology

My calendar tells me it is British Black Cat Day, so happy BCD to all who calibrate. Lunaki doesn’t know what the fuss is all about — isn’t every day Black Cat Day?

Hegseth: Boss, I broke the world with my staff of office. Trump: You're fired! That's my job.

I love these little unintended juxtapositions! @jbf1755.bsky.social @fleuranderson.bsky.social

@jbf1755.bsky.social @hcrichardson.bsky.social Oh you two! Anyone tell you you’re beautiful when you’re angry? www.youtube.com/live/vOzvJUl...

"I have wanted to work for him for a very long time." Ambition is good, Katie, but never mind—those 14 minutes must have felt like a *very* long time. Sure seemed a painful eternity to the rest of us... www.youtube.com/shorts/_iIfP...

Joanne Freeman (codename @jbf1755.bsky.social ) on the sceptred aisle…👏 www.youtube.com/live/3Ztujjd...

Thought I'd share this with my disciples er, I mean followers, some in the US where the MICE are out again (a plague on 'em) and SoD Hegseth is pitching his new reality TV idea (©️ ISIS!). HCR (@hcrichardson.bsky.social) took her Birthday (👏) off yesterday, but I'm sure Jake is a welcome stand-in. 🙏

I am bemused by this: a US president giving an enemy permission to attack America unhindered ("Let 'em take out a city")? Implicitly, using a nuclear weapon? Small price to pay (for what)? @jenpsaki.bsky.social @hcrichardson.bsky.social @jbf1755.bsky.social @ms.now www.youtube.com/watch?v=oA6_...

"Driver-volunteers go to homes to drop off diapers, baby formula, toilet paper, groceries... "Drivers switch routes and cars, write addresses on paper, and carry a water bottle so they can drop the paper in water and obscure the addresses if stopped... kansasreflector.com/2026/10/02/t...

Intriguing! Sounds like at the very least it deserves to be given a chance. We must try to give it a go.

Just caught Kate Walsh’s unmistakable continuity voice on #BBC1 , introducing The Candyman. 🫪🫪 Pure honeyed menace… 😱 @katevoice.bsky.social 😱

Saddam Insane really is furious that the sobriquet “Donald Chump” is being used of him. And when Insane is mad, watch out… 🤭

Axes to the White House, on the other hand…

[Prompt 1882] Who turned on that light? And me looking such a fright, My makeup half done! #poetry #micropoetry #haiku #haikuhorrorprompt #flicker

I wondered when / whether this might happen.👏

Dear @jbf1755.bsky.social , As a secular Christian, I want to thank you for last night’s Thoughts, which I do appreciate. I was all adream so missed the live stream, but Rosie appears well-focused and content. And Ialso see having fun as an act of defiance! www.youtube.com/live/Zp-Roni...

Bitcoin mining! I'd bet any money you like - even crypto - that Dr HCR (or, as some people call her, @hcrichardson.bsky.social ) is right about the true purpose of "data centres". It makes perfect sense -- the complaints of noise, the power/water use. (±minute 29.) www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fTE...

Okay, so instead of idly speculating (see repost), I roused myself to DuckDuckGo it. The results showed that, post-stabbing, Salman Rushdie's sales did indeed surge, if not soar. And I was part of that! Talk about unintended consequences... #books #booksky #rushdie londondaily.com/uk-sales-of-...

It would be interesting to know how much the attack stimulated sales of “The Satanic Verses”, thereby putting the assailant himself ironically in breach of the fatwa he thought to obey. Very funny book, by the way. #books #booksky #rushdie youtu.be/0TmWA2qDmMU?...

Hillary Monahan (aka @hillarymonahan.bsky.social ), Good for you! Wars will always kill kids! So, don’t start wars. Cc @oldenoughtosay.com Talking of dead children, here (2nd time today) is that egregious SoD Hegseth gloating, four days after taking out 123. www.youtube.com/shorts/lqxYd...

I've been called an antisemite and an islamophobe this week for making space for multiple traumas and declaring dead children is wrong no matter who does what travesty to whom. I don't decide what you think of me. I do decide that "dead children is wrong" is a hill I will defend.

Lest we forget... a moment's silence, please, to reflect once more on the Feb 28 slaughter of 123 Teheran children by "death and destruction from the sky". And on the sneering, gloating US SoD Peter Hegseth, unrepentant four days later. @hcrichardson.bsky.social www.youtube.com/shorts/lqxYd...

Spot the slip of tongue? USP DJT confirms what we knew already ... that the reporting he bans is what *he* doesn't want to hear. "Negative" stories are NOT the same as "fake" stories. @maddow.bsky.social @hcrichardson.bsky.social @ogc56.bsky.social @lisaguerrero.bsky.social youtu.be/aNPiNGZuV2U

A man with “morals so loose they flapped when he walked”—no, not the usual suspect but a character in #KatherineRundell ‘s new Glimouria book. Dazzling wordplay from a goddess of English prose (if prose can dance). That 300 yet? (keen to get back to ch3) #books #booksky #kidlituk #childrensbooks

#LAEO 78 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Hanna concurs: ‘And never – Not even hurt or sickly – Shall anybody catch me!’ But what of our heroine? To a stats table, wherein (As if dying weren’t enough!) We find this slight epitaph: Eurydice – DNF. [That's it. Tomorrow I'll post some Notes.]

Safely under lock and Lunakey! @oldenoughtosay.com , many thanks. 🙏

#LAEO 77 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Oculation is Bad Luck Officially – trumping pluck And hard work. From this day on, I promise, in peloton Or break, you’ll not discover *Me* looking at each other.’ ‘Never?’ ‘Well… hardly ever.’

Regardless of the antisemitic connection, maybe give it a miss…

#LAEO 76 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Henceforth this sport, I predict, Will suffer for its looks. Tricked Out of our polite “You first”, “No no, after you”, we’re cursed To regard invitation As tiltyard vacillation.

NOT YET, BALOO!

#LAEO 75 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology ‘I thought you took a hands-off Position on rules?’ ‘Lay off The commissaires, I say!’ laughs Her friend, who does nix by halfs. Then sombrely: ‘These events Have stained our sweet innocence.

Reassuring.

“The Field of Blood”, by the Quentin Tarantino of US political history Joanne B Freeman, is an entertaining, poignant, intriguing tale of duels and fisticuffs in antebellum Congress. Pertinent in this age of the sentimental bruiser Markwayne Mullin. #history #books #booksky @jbf1755.bsky.social

#LAEO 74 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Now Marian states: ‘A rule Is a rule, and though you’ll Think that harsh, as a rule it Should apply. Bite the bullet, Bear the bitter bleak blemish Brightly, as befits beamish Bike-buddies blatantly blessed By backbone.’ Hanna, in jest:

#LAEO 73 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology To turn, with polite outrage, Disvantage to advantage.

#LAEO 72 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Saving with her band of she-Riffs Robin Hood’s men in tight spots – Not once but time and again. Always up for a campaign, She upsets the old order, Will dispute any border, Brave even the slur ‘outlaw’, To share prizes with the poor,

#LAEO 71 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Could they but catch her off-bike: Fair Maid Marian, saintlike Champion of the greenwood Where she honed her skills real good, Making fools of the Sheriff’s Team, tying them all up in Notts,

You can say that again...

#LAEO 70 #books #poetry #cycling #mythology Of course, he stands not a chance With this pair—looking askance At his stare—as Hades knew Very well. For these are two Proud ladies: Hanna the Meek (She who shall inherit eke The earth and all its rainbows), And one on whom *would* rain beaux,

"That's MY job!"