CJ Smith
@colinsmith1.bsky.social
Sing to me, Oh Muse, of this man of many turnings: child of the Postgate generation, hauntologist, pastoralist, folklorist, writer, jackdaw, makar, artificer, self-made author, seller of dreams, and average Wordle solver @ avebury.press
#I_like_this A smoking jacket is as suitable for outdoor wear as a string vest but for a languid Edwardian sadist with a passion for topiarising his victims it's perfect. Sadly, without a chauffer-driven car to take me to evening soirees where I could show off it's fabulous but pointless.
#Social_commentary tonight the clocks go back in the UK and once again an 'event' that has occurred twice a year every year of my life and then some is a source of news and debate. www.bbc.co.uk/weather/arti...
When do the clocks go back in 2026?
British Summer Time will soon comes to an end as the clocks go back an hour to Greenwich Mean Time.
bbc.co.uk
#Place I only visited for a few days to attend an interview but Edinburgh left a deep impression on me. Edinburgh Uni accepted me but for complicated (and bad) reasons I chose Gloucester College in Cheltenham. In retrospect, it was a turning point and I think I made the wrong turn.
My first published book, though oddly not my first completed book. It's a cheerful tale, sort of. avebury.press
#I_made_this my lovely, slightly expensive and rarely visited website at avebury.press where you will find all my books alongside author bios (yes, plural) and a light sprinkling of erudite and sometimes amusing articles exploring the strange worlds of #This_Iron_Race
Avebury Press
for the discerning reader
avebury.press
#Influence The MV Mi Amigo, home of Radio Caroline, the last of the pirate radio stations. Unlike the chartbound playlists of Radio 1, its DJs could play what they wanted and so the teenage me learned to love music from many years and across different genres. Plus: who doesn't want to be a pirate?
#World_of_Wonder I have a weakness for recherché and retro accessories be they pocket watches, wingback armchairs, or what-have-you, so I was relieved that when I saw this advert my immediate reaction was Wtf is the point of a pocket sundial? www.pocket-sundial.com/products/kal...
Pocket Sundial by Kala - The most charming timepiece of its time
Crafted with traditional materials, based on ancient knowledge, this sundial will be a reliable companion. Made of solid brass and steel.
pocket-sundial.com
#Social_commentary "Ten years ago, a pumpkin patch was a field and a wheelbarrow. Now it's a wonderful experience for the whole family," she said. Setting aside the entertainment value of a pumpkin patch, this story says something fascinating about our culture. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Why Halloween is now bigger than Christmas for some attractions
From scare parks to pumpkin patches, Halloween is driving huge crowds and spending.
bbc.co.uk
#Influence writing fiction draws on every aspect of a writer's life and taste and especially the latter when creating an unfamiliar world, be it fantastical or historical or both. The Pre-Raphaelites and Gustave Dore are key influences for the faux 1860s of #This_Iron_Race avebury.press
#I_like_this except I really didn't. Not even slightly. The best words to describe it are it's like cream of mushroom soup but without the mushroom and definitely no trace of cheese or beer. Irretrievably and unpleasantly bland and with the texture of mucus.
#World_of_Wonder Beer and Cheese are two essential but perfectly ordinary ingredients in a Ploughman's Lunch. Combine beer and cheese in a soup, however, and we are in the realm of the weird. But such is Aldi's celebration of Oktoberfest and my lunch.
#Social_commentary Can you be cruel to AI? Some say 'no' because AI cannot feel (a claim which is debateable), but I think they're missing the point. Is cruelty permissible under any circumstances is a better question, not least because of what it does to perpetrators. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Anthropic bans users from being 'cruel' to its AI systems
The firm said users can no longer engage in "sustained and needless" abusive behaviour towards the tech.
bbc.co.uk
#Place Phoenix House, King William St, London: my workplace 1979-1982. It was my first job and I was too young and too stupid to realise that I hated it - hate that manifested in incompetence. After 18 months of procrastination, Phoenix Assurance fired me and in 1984 was taken over by Sun Alliance.
#Book as it's Thursday I mention my books, but why stop at only one when I have a trilogy?! avebury.press/this-iron-race-book-one/ amazon.co.uk/dp/B0D7KX7WJR
#I_made_this when summoned by Odysseus to advise him on his voyage home to Ithaca, the ghost of the blind seer Tiresias (Eliot's "old man with wrinkled dugs") instructed him to make one last journey to appease Poseidon and find peace. Homer never related that journey so I wrote a poem about it.
#Influence #The_Owl_Service #Alan_Garner 's characters have dated but the intertwining of their lives with the legend of Blodeuwedd is timeless and vivid. It was the first novel I read that wove the mythical and magical into the everyday and The Owl Service is still a huge influence on my writing.
#I_like_this The title of Camus' L'Étranger has been variously translated as The Stranger and The Outsider, which suggests something of its intractable nature. What I can say is that Meursault, its central character, may be the closest I have found in all fiction to someone resembling myself.
#World_of_Wonder Unsurprisingly there's no observational evidence for a fourth spatial dimension. Just as a point is unaware of the line and a line unaware of the sphere, the fourth dimension is beyond our awareness. But we can imagine... youtube.com/shorts/KTKfiT9tRko youtube.com/shorts/SL9KWQiTAqE
What would a 4D object look like to us?
YouTube video by Tibees
youtube.com
#Social_commentary I'm peeved that one of my favourite people was booted off #The_Celebrity_Traitors before I got around to watching the damn thing! Rotten luck #Richard_E_Grant
#Place Capel y Gorlan, Cwmorthin, N Wales. When I saw it 46 yrs ago the walls and roof were intact. Less happily, a miscreant had scratched a pentangle on the wall and hung a plastic sheep's skull where the altar had stood. Later, another miscreant stole the slates off the roof and ruin followed.
#Books My oddest book by far is only partly written by me. It records my conversations with ChatGPT and Claude as I try to understand what they are, what they can do, and how they compare with different forms of human intelligence. It left me questioning how much we really know about ourselves.
#I_made_this My other BlueSky account is dedicated solely to the strange worlds of my twin novel series #This_Iron_Race and #The_Reluctant_Ascent_of_Nevil_Warbrook bsky.app/profile/thisironrace.bsky.social Read more at avebury.press
bsky.app
#Influence Julian Karswell (Niall MacGinnis) about to get his comeuppance in #Night_of_the_Demon. It should be hokum, but it eschews the camp horror of ‘Hammer’ for something far creepier as the ever-rational Dr Holden (Dana Andrews) too, too slowly realises his “Time Allowed” is running out.
#I_like_this Sibelius's Seventh Symphony is, for me, the greatest piece of music in any genre. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi9Q...
Sibelius: 7. Sinfonie ∙ hr-Sinfonieorchester ∙ Paavo Järvi
YouTube video by hr-Sinfonieorchester – Frankfurt Radio Symphony
youtube.com
#World_of_Wonder. At 65 I know something in the darkness will kill me, but I always thought death was an instant not a process. There’s something tragic in the way even a single-cell organism rages against the dying of the light, yet ironically, light is the killer. youtube.com/watch?v=n4wlS5y896E
Single-Celled Organism Dies
YouTube video by The Microscopic Odyssey
youtube.com
#Social_Commentary www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... This is one of those stories where I find the urge to revert to grumpy old sod almost irresistible.
Could an iced coffee freeze you out of the job market?
Employees and recruiters weigh into the online debate around interview etiquette.
bbc.co.uk
