Martin Boombastic

Been in a big fuckin’ tunnel the last couple of years. Marital infidelity ain’t a great experience. Wee light at the end tonight, implying to me that I’m not entirely worthless. I’ll be grand. Hopefully going to meet somebody awesome.

No pleasure, no rapture, no exquisite sin greater than Irish wheaten scone slathered in butter and munched at midnight when you’ve gone home for a holiday and don’t have to get up in the morning. Christ, the contentment. Going back in and we’ll get more tomorrow. I’ll slim back in Glasgow.

Now on Blindsight by Peter Watts. I’m going to enjoy this, too. I’m deep into the aftermath of infidelity, separation and, in future, divorce. The section with Siri and his father disengaging from his mother, who was no longer theirs, made me take a break and have a good stare through the walls.

Finished Angel Down. Utterly astonishing work. Best book I’ve read in many years, a gut-punch and warm hug in equal measure. And so inventive and propulsive, horrific and full of longing, withering and nourishing. I felt everything with, through Bagger. I’ll read it annually.

I really only use this account to recommend things now. Because of Angel Down (seriously, buy that book), I’ve been watching Great War films. Watched Journey’s End earlier this week and it was fantastic. Claflin, Butterfield and Bettany amazing. Great direction, photography, script, sound. Loved it.

Holy shit, Mina the Hollower is a cracking game. Lot of thought went into it. Worth paying full price for.

Took delivery of this today. I’m tempted to read all night. But I’m up in a few hours, because I read on longer than I should have. It’s genuinely astonishingly good, compulsive, visceral, many times already I’ve caught my breath. Buy this book.

Catching up on Double or Nothing. What a wild thing it is to see Katsuyori Shibata wrestling, may he live long and prosper.

Weird effect klaxon: if you eat a good conference pear and some strawberries, and then experience indigestion, you’ll belch the flavour of cucumber. Taste and flavour are fickle mistresses, but often throw up weird results. Heston, you don’t need to credit me.

Properly playing Hollow Knight: Silksong this time. It’s phenomenal. I love a Metroidvania, and Team Cherry got it absolutely spot on again. They deserve every bit of their success.

Watching the Alec Guinness Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Very good. Absolutely cracking turn from the woman playing Connie in episode 3.

Was over at my house yesterday to let my ex go out with her new partner. Stings a bit. Looked up couch co-op games me and the kiddo could play on PS+ for some bonding time. “Ooh,” I thought, “It Takes Two looks fun.” Then I googled it and… aw hell no. It’d leave him more scarred than me moving out.

Darby being the new AEW champ is so awesome. I really want to see him seriously defend that title, like Orange Cassidy with the TNT.

Picked up GRIME II. Even better than the original, and I really liked GRIME. Don’t know if it’s helping with my chronically clenched teeth, but it’s good fun nonetheless.

Dave Bautista’s fucking ace, isn’t he? Watching Dune 2 again and can’t imagine anyone else capturing Rabban’s savage nature so well.

Watching The Taking of Pelham 123, first time. Really excellent film, chock to the gunnels of fantastic New York assholes. Needed a wee bit of cheering up, my entire life has been wrecked and things are going to be a long succession of absolute bullshit for the next couple of years.

I think I’d pay £100 for a copy of He’s a Nightmare by The Electroluvs. I’d love to have that back in my life and my minidiscs have been lost to the sands of time. I might just do a cover of it, just so I can hear an approximation of it again.

Suppose, as the world turns into a big pile of undifferentiated fuck, it’d be nice to share nice things on here, the twee app. So here’s a wee reminder to listen to Innervisions by Stevie Wonder. I got it for £5 at Fopp in about 1999 and it still stands me in good stead. What a fucking album.

Just heard a cuckoo in Barrhead. What a rare treat.

What a lovely treat A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is. Considering it’s brutal in places, it’s far more gentle than you’d expect for a Game of Thrones joint. Like a Game of Thrones Detectorists. Only two eps in to be fair, but it’s like getting into to a warm bath.

Private Eye, take a bow. Defo have somebody who knew what was about to go down. Well played.

Know what takes me out of a film like nothing else? Bad marching. When I was a wean, I got to be in an opera. We had some marching training by the army. Every one of us got to be great at marching in very short order. Seeing sloppy marching in a film takes me out if it. These are career soldiers?

High on Life 2 seems more fun/less forced than the first one (half an hour in). Still maybe too much going on to enjoy everything while actually playing the game, it was always too ambitious a concept for everyone to catch everything, but I laughed out loud at the skateboard tutorial video.

Bad Bunny, I didn’t appreciate your game. That was entertaining as hell and the best Superbowl half-time show I’ve ever seen. Some man. Love will win.

I remember when Feel It by The Tamperercame out and people were pretending they knew all the slang. “Chimney means a black eye, you just aren’t cool enough to know.” Meanwhile it was sampling a song called Drop a House (on That Bitch), which was about dropping a house on a bitch.

Logged on to Amazon (I know) to see this new Prince Charlie thing promoted. To me. Who has never shown one iota of interest in those benefit cheats. King Chucklefuck telling us peasants we need to be stewards of the environment is fucking rich. Tell it to the corporations, you fat fingered cunt.

I hope they bury Mandelson under the jail. Odious, treacherous, selfish cunt. But the real sickness is that everyone knew what a cunt he was and still kowtowed to him and gave him infinite political lives. Because he schmoozed the worst people in the world. I hope he gets Crohn’s Disease.

Even more so than just being handed £55K, which I definitely would remember asa key life event, I’d remember the time I was holding a clipboard in a pair of y-ftonts (and certainly wouldn’t be doing it around people I don’t know). Is Mandelson suffering Convenient Dementia? Creepy bastard.

Been watching the doc about the mushroom murderer. I can’t believe how strongly I want to go for a pint with that doctor. Absolutely represents the best thing about Australians. Not a care in the world apart from his patients, utterly no-nonsense, and mad as a March hare in every other way.

As the world goes to shit and I feel like shit, I’m finally getting around to Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla. Don’t usually get into AC games, but very much enjoying my time with this. So much to see and do, good characters and decent writing. Brilliant bang-for-buck, could easily put 80 hours in.

His name was Alex Pretti. He will be remembered. Bella ciao.