10,000 Followers

Critical Dispatches gained its 10,000th follower over the weekend, which is rather a remarkable consideration. That I can publish a post in London that can be viewed as far away as Australia, the US, or Argentina still blows my mind. It is an absolute pleasure to be part of a community as diverse, engaging and…

Smile

Today’s customer information update at Camden Overground Station. I know these kinds of things can come across as a little trite and sentimental but sometimes there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. “What passes for hip cynical transcendence of sentiment is really some kind of fear of being really human, since to be really human […]…

Cooking George Orwell’s Long Lost Kidney Stew Recipe

On the day following King George V’s Silver Jubilee celebrations, 6th May 1935, George Orwell took a break from writing A Clergyman’s Daughter to type a letter to his friend and one-time romantic interest, Brenda Salkeld. Among Orwell’s usual topics of discussion (politics, literature, and low-culture) the author outlined what he described as a “wonderful” ox-kidney…

Cure the Sunday blues

I haven’t had much time to write recently as we have just moved into our new house in Chiswick; this task involving a significant deal of packing, lifting, unpacking, rearranging, realising it doesn’t look quite right and then throwing away altogether. I saw this sandwich board while we were walking through Hamstead last week. After…