One of the many silly monsters that has taken over Belfast landmarks this Halloween. Go the other way in a world where everyone takes themselves too seriously.I've had the most extraordinary weekend. Yesterday I went with Nuwani to see Westlife in concert, a group that was a big part of our childhoods. The short...

Running indoors has made me much faster, but it's no fun.The PureGym app tells me that I have now visited them 6 times. That is about right—2 visits per week, over 3 weeks. We said we'd go 3 times a week but Belfast buses on Sundays are so infrequent that it's been impossible to do that so far. It is an excuse, I...

Back in Belfast again after an uneventful flight that took off late and landed ahead of time (make that make sense). Caught up on the chores I had missed, glanced at the work email inbox that had, curiously, not exploded, and made dinner. Life continues as normal tomorrow.

Storm Boelo grounded meHaving made my way back to the hotel after an excellent evening in Manchester immersed in the music of The Witcher last night, I opened my email client to find a notice from the airline informing me that my return flight to Belfast has been cancelled. Not a worry, they had booked me on a later...

Get to know me: the food editionAfter a lively discussion among some members of the Web Writers' Collective, a challenge was born. It involves a few food-related questions which participants are encouraged to answer on their websites. James' original post on this is linked above. Here are my answers. What was your...

Thank you. It's been great to get to know you a little bit over the past few months on chat. Thank you for stopping by the website. I have long admired yours, too!

Save the last independent bookshop in Belfast city centre.Belfast's North Street is not a fancy neighbourhood. Years of neglect and rising costs have caused independant businesses to move out, leaving derelict buildings in their wake. The controversial Tribeca development has played a part. Keats & Chapman, a...

Tarmac vs. treadmillIt's getting colder here. That makes running outside slightly less appealing. Nuwani and I had been talking about joining a gym for the winter so we could keep up our weekly running habit, and today, we did. We didn't want to sink a lot of money into this. Really, all we needed was access to a...

The cost of car insurance is making me regret wanting to drive. One local company quoted me £5,400 for the year! (It hasn't all been that bad, but we will have to make some serious adjustments to the monthly budget to make this work).

A Creative's Guide to Personal Websites: ideas to make the web fun againThe other day I received James' zine titled A Creative's Guide to Personal Websites in the post. It combines a lot of topics he has been writing about for a while: the importance of the personal web, why have a website, being creative on the web...

Of all the changes I made to my website this year, the gigs page is my favouriteThe gold standard of the IndieWeb /concerts slashpage, in my mind, is Lynn Fisher's. It has everything you would expect. The cool ticket stub design even includes the seat numbers. It's not a boring list of concerts but rather a lovingly...

Of all the changes I made to my website this year, the gigs page is my favouriteThe gold standard of the IndieWeb /concerts slashpage, in my mind, is Lynn Fisher's. It has everything you would expect. The cool ticket stub design even includes the seat numbers. It's not a boring list of concerts but rather a lovingly...