Author: vennsquidink

Thanks Seth Werkheiser for reminding me to back up my writing and attend to my website!

[first published 11.05.2026 Substack] So, time slides by… … and here it is autumn: misty and damp today but the last few days have a been a run of gorgeousness – blue skies, warm sunshine, no wind, beasts and birds all busy with their own concerns. Yesterday my neighbour and I (we are pretty much… Continue reading coincidence vs algorithm 2 (swimming and breathing)

[first published 17.10.2025 Substack] I’d started to lose faith in coincidences. I was afraid that it was all just algorithms from here on: every moment of delightful correspondence tarnished by a dirty tech trick. But today there was a real one and I started to believe again (fuck you algorithm-peddlers!). This morning I was sitting… Continue reading goshawk (coincidence vs algorithm)

[first published 06.10.2025 Substack] Sharing this post by Mark Hurst (who also hosts the fantastic radio show ‘Techtonic’ on WFMU) on Generative AI as the new plastic: “a new future defined not by plastic pollution – which will still be with us, of course – but by generative AI slop that will slosh, flood, cascade into our internet feeds… Continue reading generative AI as pollution (from Mark Hurst)

[first published 25.09.2025 Substack] Yes, it is true: a snail drew this picture of a bird on the window, sometime during the night…

[first published 21.09.2025 Substack] I have an essay in the new print edition of Island mag – called ‘Calibrating’, on archives, histories and disavowal (plus the coastline paradox). Beautiful cover image by Jennifer Tyers. Great people to work with!

[first published 31.08.2025 Substack] It may not be the calendar-allocated beginning of spring today but I’m celebrating a trifecta. Coming in at first place: this morning it was warm enough (just) to not have to light the stove. That felt like a holiday on its own. Second: I saw three blue wrens picking at insects… Continue reading vernal trifecta (wrens, ducklings, an unlit stove)

[first published 08.03.2025 Substack] The highlight, for me, of these autumnal days (Southern hemisphere!) is the late afternoon moment when the small birds come to splash in the… bird bath / pond / mosquito habitat? I’m not sure what to call it as it’s not as ornamental as ‘bird bath’ implies and it aint natural… Continue reading wasps, slime and small birds (harmless highlights)

[first published 18.01.2025 Substack] The Mukbezumps are officially taking control in a couple of days. I share the alarm and dread, a feeling that is exacerbated by almost everything I see and hear in the screenified world. People who know way more than me about these things and can write more thoughtfully about them, include: Brian… Continue reading mukbezumps, flowers, birds, bees (pulling focus)

[first published 11.12.2024 Substack] Cars – like computers, and so much else these days, if you can’t fix them yourself, they cause enormous amounts of angst, even while they promise freedoms. A week or so ago I was driving down the mountain into town and heard an alarming dry rattling in the engine of my… Continue reading off to the wreckers (cars and walnuts – a cautionary tale)