Notes From The Engine Room 17 / 2022
Meta Letta When I previously wrote that I was going to aim for a monthly schedule for the newsletter, truth be told I didn't really mean it. I expected to...
Notes From The Engine Room 16 / 2022
Meta Letta Well, I think we can safely say the schedule has slithered out of my grasp just a little bit; this is only the second newsletter since the end of...
Notes From The Engine Room 15 / 2022
Meta Letta Welcome back! What do you think would work better? Pretending I didn't miss my deadlines by weeks, or pretend that this would always be the...
No Notes From The Engine Room - Summer Break
Never Meta Letter I Didn't Like I really should have sent this out last week, even the week before. It just goes to show that hope lives eternal, even in the...
Notes From The Engine Room 14 / 2022
Meta Letta As I write this introduction I'm on day three of testing positive for COVID. Again. It's a milder affair than last time by far, but that just...
Notes From The Engine Room 13 / 2022
Meta Letta "Nomenclature" - That's what I wrote in the draft version of this section, an aide memoir that I would then fill in when the time came. Well, the...
Notes From The Engine Room 12 / 2022
Meta Letta I think one thing that keeps me writing these newsletters is that it's pretty much the only remaining thing that I still write these days. Gone...
Notes From The Engine Room 11 / 2022
Meta Letta Ceasing work on my dayjob, hobby and side-hustle, to go and write a newsletter that few people really care about is absurd, adding to my mental...
Notes From The Engine Room 10 / 2022
Meta Letta It's gotten to the point where I might as well start sending these out entitled Apologies from the Engine Room. An apparently significant downside...
Notes From The Engine Room 9 / 2022
Meta Letta Things have been erratic of late: my adherence to schedule, my focus, the quality of my writing and photography. The only truly consistent...
Notes From The Engine Room 8 / 2022
Meta Letta I seem to have lost the ability to measure the passing of time. Not only did my ability to perceive, measure and control get away from me this...
Sounds from the Engine Room - 9 / 2022
Having a week off really messes around with your perception of time. Throw in a few bank holidays and a packed work schedule, and it appears that newsletters...
Notes From The Engine Room 7 / 2022
Meta Letta My plan was to write this yesterday, Friday. My thought was that writing it fast, and in a delirium born of stress and poor sleep, would allow me...
Sounds from the Engine Room - 7 / 2022
What's this? What happened to the weekly schedule?! Sadly this is not a return to weekly newsletters — the fortnightly schedule works better for me, so I...
Notes From The Engine Room 6 / 2022
Meta Letta Does your life go in seasons? I don't mean feeling dreary and SAD in winter, only to come alive when the sun comes out; blooming like cherry...
Notes From The Engine Room 5 / 2022
Meta Letta You know, I might just declare Friday to be The Day from now on; I have more time to myself on a Friday and I've not been hitting a Thursday...
Notes From The Engine Room 4 / 2022
Meta Letta You know, these newsletters would be a lot easier to write without the spectre of disease hanging over me? Last time it was the last embers of a...
Notes From The Engine Room 3 / 2022
Meta Letta Here we are again, welcome to the contents and product of my mind! To my surprise, one of the unexpected complications of switching to a...
Notes From The Engine Room 2 / 2022
Meta Letta If there's one thing I've learnt about myself, it's that just because I give myself more time to do something doesn't mean that I won't try and...
Notes From The Engine Room 1 / 2022
Meta Letta Happy New Year! Can you believe it's 2022? The year in which the classic disaster movie Geostorm was set; the year of Dead Rising 4. Welcome to...
Notes From The Engine Room XXXVI
Meta Letta I should never have bragged about being ahead of schedule in the last two weeks. When will I learn that neither easy nor smooth are the leitmotif...
Notes From The Engine Room XXXV
Meta Letta Well, this is a turn-up for the books! As I begin to write this issue 35, issue 34 is scheduled to go out tomorrow! For the first time since...
Notes From The Engine Room XXXIV
Meta Letta This run-up to Christmas is going to be busy. I mean, sure, there are all the usual reasons related to reaching work deadlines ahead of the year,...
Notes From The Engine Room XXXIII
Meta Letta I'm going to try something crazy here and actually start this newsletter... in advance of the deadline! Perhaps at least starting to write a few...
Notes From The Engine Room XXXII
Meta Letta One thing established photographers do from time to time is writing articles about the equipment they use; partly to illuminate their methods, and...
Notes From The Engine Room XXXI
Meta Letta I've reached the point where I'm beginning to have second thoughts about using Roman numerals for each edition of the newsletter. It might have...
Notes From The Engine Room XXX
Meta Letta For what is apparently the XXX edition of this fine newsletter, it is actually going to be quite tame. If I'd planned ahead in any way at all, I'd...
Notes From The Engine Room XXIX
Meta Letta Well, well, well, if it isn't the consequences of my own actions! Being very impressed by your humble correspondent in his day job, his employers...
Notes From The Engine Room XXVIII
Meta Letta After passing the six month anniversary, working on issue 28 feels almost workmanlike; not quite pedestrian, but certainly part of the weekly...
Notes From The Engine Room XXVII
Meta Letta Last issue, when I said my plans for this six month anniversary edition were grand I was thinking grand as in grandiose, not grand as in large....
Notes From The Engine Room XXVI
Meta Letta I think this is the latest I've ever sent this out. Time, it turns out, is not a flat circle; it's an entropic fractal. But, I had such grand...
Notes From The Engine Room XXV
Meta Letta At time of writing these words, I'm sweating in a new pub that's hoping to thrive on borrowed nostalgia. It has the same name as something nobody...
Notes From The Engine Room XXIV
Meta Letta It feels like every other newsletter introduction is some form of cry for help; a handwringing as to whether I'll be able to pull anything out of...
Notes From The Engine Room XXIII
Meta Letta It may surprise you to know that I don’t enjoy self-promotion. Wait, that’s not right: I don’t enjoy creating advertorial style updates, whether...
Notes From The Engine Room XXII
Meta Letta A decent novel tends to be around 80k words long. NaNoWriMo asks a mere 50k words of you, and anything over 40k words is considered novel-length,...
Notes from the Engine Room XXI
Meta Letta The gods of writing are really capricious little goblins; they'll punish hubris as much as humility, only to then reward them on a whim, bestowing...
Notes from the Engine Room XX
Meta Letta This is one of those weeks again, where I sit at the keyboard and wonder whether I’m going to find anything to write about. Where I just have to...
Notes from the Engine Room XIX
Meta Letta You know what the worst sound is that a computer can make when you try to turn it on? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Thundering silence. That's what...
Notes from the Engine Room XVIII
Meta Letta My favourite bit of feedback I ever received with regards to this newsletter was: "The meta bit, it's a bit self-referential isn't it?" I love...
The Engine Room Future Direction Survey!
Hello! As threatened last week, I need your help! If you have a couple of minutes, I’d really appreciate it if you could fill in this brief questionnaire....
Notes from the Engine Room XVII
Meta Letta There is problem with being freed from tasks, duties and responsibilities, and gifted freedom and space: Who are you when there are no...
Notes from the Engine Room XVI
Meta Letta I never considered these newsletters arduous to read, and have often been told they’re a good length. If I don’t include too many links (or you...
Notes from the Engine Room XV
Meta Letta I think if these newsletters were to have a leitmotif, it would be my tired, gleeful journey towards burnout. It's a thrilling tale, with a...
Notes from the Engine Room XIV
Meta Letta Thursdays come around fast, don't they? There I am, minding my own business, keeping things together as much as I can, and BAM! My todo list...
Notes from the Engine Room XIII
Meta Letta Ooh, lucky number 13! Remember: To have a fear of the number thirteen is called triskaidekaphobia, but to have a fear of failure is called normal....
Notes from the Engine Room XII
Meta Letta There are times that you write and you are riding the muse hard (or the other way around, if you see yourself more as the vehicle in this tortured...
Notes from the Engine Room XI Supplemental - In The World
Betta Meta Letta It had to happen some time, and this is that time: Planning a whole extra section for Newsletter XI, but then forgetting to add it in. There...
Notes from the Engine Room XI
Meta Letta Here we are again, the sun is shining, let’s delve in together! I was asked yesterday what this week’s newsletter was going to be about, aside...
Notes from the Engine Room X
Meta Letta Ten newsletters. “Ten newsletters” Those are the words I wrote last Thursday, mere seconds after sending the ninth out. I had planned to follow...
Notes From The Engine Room IX
Meta Letta I hate being late. And last week I was a good 24 hours late in delivering a poorly-written, thin on content, abbreviated issue, and it fills me...