Yes, it’s warm and moist, hereabouts at least, and time to remind patrons that this rickety barge is kept afloat by the kindness of strangers. If you’d like to help it remain buoyant a while longer, and remain ad-free, there’s an orange button below with which to monetise any love. Debit and credit cards are accepted. For those wishing to express their love regularly, there’s a monthly subscription option top left. And if one-click haste is called for, my PalPay.Me page can be found here. Additionally, any Amazon shopping done via this link or the search widget top right, or for Amazon US via this link, results in a small fee for your host at no extra cost to you.

For newcomers wishing to know more about what’s been going on here for the last decade or so, in over 2,500 posts and close to 85,000 comments, the reheated series is a pretty good place to start – in particular, the end-of-year summaries. If you can, do take a moment to poke through the discussion threads too. The posts are intended as starting points, not full stops, and the comments are where much of the good stuff is waiting to be found. And do please join in.

Again, thanks for the support, the comments, and the company. 

Proud father. (h/t, Dicentra) || 50 notable special-effects movies. || Things the Soviets made. || Continue the research. || An encouraging sign. (h/t, Julia) || Remember, citizens – always respect the media. || We must listen to the children. || Campus tolerance, part 4,022. || Painting with light. || Luminous women. || Thirsty lions. || Bored Tourists, an anthropological study. || Call it ambition. || Instagram boyfriends. || The crab bucket life of the woke resistance. || Bitesize. || Want one. || It’s all in the ankles, you know. || Hong Kong in ‘49. || It was 1988, when phones were the size of shoeboxes and Milli Vanilli roamed the Earth. || And finally, perhaps symbolically, something small but strangely maddening.