Nowness

It’s the first day of September 2026. I’m a writer. I live in a small 120-year-old tenement flat in Glasgow, near to a good 120-year-old public library, with this weirdo.

Projects

I’m preparing for one more 2026 Melt It! screening, this time in the Lakes with special guest Michael “Brass Eye” Cumming.

Aside from that, I find myself at a fork in the roads as we approach the last third of the year. I’d like to start a new novel, which would involve clearing the decks of smaller tasks and projects for the necessary peace of mind. As such, I’m tempted to ditch the New Escapologist December release, which would also give the current one more time to pay for itself. Hmm.

In the other direction, I’ve been involved in some smashing events lately and I’m in the mood for more. This (for me) isn’t compatible with novel-writing. Still, were I to book those events, I’d have the bandwidth to do the New Esc after all and I could probably also faff with the second draft of a regretfully backburnered secret American writing project (ooh, mysterious). It’s just that (a) I’ve already delivered a tonne of stuff this year (Tether, NE19, EE!10, tour) and (b) I’m obviously procrastinating on starting the novel.

You know what? In typing this out, I think I’ve settled on it. One sometimes needs to think with one’s fingertips. Please expect more live events before the year ends, plus NE20. If it’s fun, why not? Maybe I’m not ready to retreat into a novel-writing hole just yet. Thanks for helping me to chew this over.

Travel

I’ve enjoyed seeing more of my native isles while on tour. Hark at the long lad.

The largely renationalised trains have been working well for me, and I’ve hardly been half a day late to anything at all.

We decided today that we will end the year in Montreal, at our volcano lair (in-laws’ spare room). 🌋

Reading

I just polished off The Umbrella Man and Other Stories: What We Talk About When We Talk About the JFK Assassination (2026) by Martin Fitzgerald, which sounds a bit Dad but is totally Rad. The first 40% is excellent. It’s about the lives and backstories of various witnesses to the assassination. It’s a remarkable bit of storytelling and is really exciting. The idea is to provide human context to what we see in the Zapruder footage: it works well. The remaining 60% takes the form of more standard assassination travel writing about the author’s trip to Dallas. I enjoyed this part too, but it’s the first half that properly glistens.

I’m now reading Jon Ronson’s new book, The Castle. There’s a quote on the cover describing it as “intensely of the moment,” and while it looks at the current-ish plague of Manosphere twerps and their victims, his ideas about masculinity are too heteronormative and anchored in Second-Wave Feminism for this century. It’s is full of outdated shite, actually. There’s some analysis of TV advertising to observe “Doofus Man” in his natural environment (a technique and conclusion as old as AdBusters), much fretting about what men can possibly do with their time now that “factories” are closing (famously covered by Ronson’s predecessor Michael Moore as long ago as 1989), and some very obvious stuff about SEO (previously covered by, um, Jon Ronson in 2017’s The Butterfly Effect). Still, it’s jovial enough and his profile of a listless camel murderer who hides in a castle is good. Plus there’s some funny dirt dishing on Glinner.

You can see what I’m reading at any given minute here.

Culture

What shall I see at Sonica then?

Humans

At the recent Edinburgh screening, I reconnected with someone who was very important to me twenty years ago. This feels good. I’m also trying to be a better son to my aging and wrinkled parents by visiting more often and texting with my poorly dad.

Monking

To celebrate having made the decision on which projects to handle next, I will spend this afternoon sweeping the accumulated dust and dead clothes moth bodies from the edges of our rooms. I am just like the mad monk who sayeth: “We remove dust to sweep away our worldly desires. We scrub dirt to free ourselves of attachments.”

Physical form

This is not my best angle, but here’s a snap from culture historian Travis Elborough at Dickon’s show last week:

Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive

It’s the second day of August 2026. I’m a writer and a happy man. I live in Glasgow with this weird gal.

Projects

I’m getting my shit together for a screening Melt It! The Film of the Iceman at the beautiful Cameo Picturehouse in Edinburgh. It’s on Saturday 8th August at 2:30pm if you’d like to come along. This will be cool. Like ice.

I just wrote an account of the Melt It! tour for my blog. Blogging is the best.

New Escapologist Issue 19 is shipping now, as is a tenth-anniversary edition of Escape Everything! Both are also available in stylish bookshops.

Reading

Since returning from the tour, I went insane and read three books in as many days. There were the so-so brand new Red Dwarf: Titan (RIP Rob), Stephen King’s The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon (1999) as part of a mad project to read aaaaall the Kinglers, and Mortimer and Whitehouse Gone Fishing (2025) which is good for summoning old men who want to talk to you if you read it in the pub. Why not see how many you can trap?

I’m currently the brilliant Mrs. Bridge (1959) about which Dorothy Parker said “I only wish I knew how it was done,” and will soon move on to The Journal of a Disappointed Man (1919) by W. N. P. Barbellion. You just try and stop me.

You can see what I’m reading at any given minute here.

Culture

My current telly is Ultra City Smiths.

The Edinburgh Festivals are about to start poppin’. The Alternative Comedy Memorial Society has a good guide to the outré acts if you’re not sure what to see.

Physical form

This is me (on the left) with Steve Sullivan at Chapter Arts in Cardiff last week. He directed Being Frank: The Chris Sivey Story and he came to see Melt It! “Fantastic!”

It’s the first day of June 2026. I’m a writer and a happy man. I live in Glasgow with a small pikachu-like creature.

Projects

We’re taking Melt It! The Film of the Iceman on a ten-date summer tour. You should come. What better way to cool down? This will be ace. Also, check out our brand new trailer (above).

New Escapologist Issue 19 is ready to ship, as is a tenth-anniversary edition of Escape Everything! Both will soon be available in stylish bookshops.

Reading

I just turned the final pages of How Not to Die (Too Soon) by Devi Sridhar on whom I have a devastating crush.

I’m about to start reading The Day the World Stops Shopping by J. B. Mackinnon because I’d love to know what would happen. Chaos, I expect.

Did you know that you can see what I’m reading at any given instant here? If you’re feeling lonely, just have a look at what I’m reading to achieve a palpable sense of connection. It’s what the Internet is good for. Just don’t tap the glass.

Culture

Last night I went to see friend Rowan play Tennent’s Laughter Lounge as I have every right to do.

I’m watching an American shitshow called From. It’s exactly the same as Lost but with uglier actors and I even though I know it won’t pay off in the remaining time it has left on the obscure MGM streaming platform, I simply can’t look away.

I enjoyed The Ex at the Flying Duck last week. They were incredible and the place was full of bouncy skinheads. It was a good final thing to experience at the latest Glasgow venue to shut up shop and thus contribute to the cultural desertification that will come to characterise the Starmer-Farage era of Plague Island history. I came home happy with their new album and a cool tote.

At the GFT this week (support your local arts cinema, folks) I saw poultry-based Buster Keaton homage Hen (2026) and dull boomer around-the-world dalliance The Balloonists (2026). I liked them both!

The eyebrow-raising investigations at The Nerve by Cadwalladr and Company are brilliant. Get informed and then resist.

Physical form

Captured at the Sparkle Horse pub in Partick by Alan Dimmick whose new book is due in July:

It’s March 2026. I’m a writer and ah bloooooody love it. I live in Glasgow with my chosen human.

Projects

I’m working to publish a small book for John Dowie and a tenth-anniversary edition of Escape Everything!, the rights having reverted to me from the original publisher. I’m writing a new afterword for it.

Work is underway on New Escapologist Issue 19 plus a prototype archive edition of our back issues, and I’m submitting Melt It! happenings to fringe festivals.

Reading

I’m reading Gen-X classic Geek Love by Katherine Dunn for the first time, and Some Men in London by Peter Parker (not that one).

Culture

Series 6 of Black Mirror is incredible, especially the one about Jessie Pinkman in space.

I enjoyed the Nightingales at the Voodoo Rooms the other night, trotting home with two new records and a kazoo.

I’m looking forward to seeing The Running Man at the GFT this week, with a Q&A from director Edgar Fish.

I’ve been watching the destruction of important Glasgow art spaces for ages. This article barely begins to account for the scale of the loss but at least someone has noticed what’s going on. “Is Glasgow losing the spaces that made it an arts powerhouse?” the piece asks. It’s already lost them, you’re literally reporting on the closure of the last venues standing.

Physical form

It’s February 2026. I’m a writer goddamit! I also dabble with publishing and film production.

I’m on a train as I write this note to you, blasting home to Glasgow. I’m having one of those “what I am doing with this gift that is life?” conversations with myself, so what better time to update the Now page?

Projects

Yesterday saw the first full, non-WIP screening of our documentary film. It went extremely well and you find me a little bit buzzy.

My second novel, Tether has gushed out. It is disgusting bliss. And is yellow. Get it, players!

I’ve written a few pieces for New Escapologist Issue 19 and commissioned others still. Issue 18 remains good and fresh though, so please pick up a copy online or at one of these excellent places.

I’m yet not sure what my next big project should be. I’m thinking of doing some New Escapologist collections of early issues. These should be better than “best ofs” and I see the archive editions of Worn journal as something to aspire to.

That said, I don’t want to spend a year managing the long tail of legacy projects. I’d like to crack on with the third novel. I also have an idea for a thing dependent on snagging interviews with two quite high-profile guys, so there are practical challenges there.

Other stuff too. As you can probably tell, I’m reconstituting.

Reading

I’ve been reading Autonauts of the Cosmoroute, by the mid-century Argentine novellist Julio Cortázar. Its a 1982 account of Cortázar and his wife Carol Dunlop travelling between Marseille and Paris (usually a journey of a couple of hours) in a VW van, stopping for the night at every other rest station over the course of a month. It’s absolutely brilliant and their experiment was done years before psychogeography or love of motorway modernism really existed.

I’m having fun trying to smash my wishlist. I want to read or acquire the whole lot of it this year. A nourishing time.

I also have an ongoing project to read all of Stephen King. Good clean fun.

Travel

We’re on a train as we speak. Pay attention. We just passed through Wigan North Western station.

Culture Gobbling

I lik this picture (from this Guardian item) of puppeteer Ted Milton playing with his son in 1971:

Scarred For Life is a great podcast with good guests. They each bring three “scars” from their childhoods, usually (but not always) from things glimpsed via popular culture. Yvette Fielding’s episode is a fascinating insight into the production of paranormal telly while Dom Joly’s recent one is a remarkable account of his travel writing career. Nick Helm’s “scar” of Freddy Kreuger popping up everywhere in 1980s London, especially on posters in the Tube, is very relatable to me: it sounds like we both had childhoods spent flinching at strange and inappropriately-placed horror film images.

I’m watching Starfleet Academy because curiosity got the best of me. I generally dislike NuTrek, so that this show is watchable is miraculous. Akiva Goldman, notably, was nowhere near the creative process.

I’m filling my Charlie Kaufman and Spike Jonze gaps. Here’s a rare and pleasant documentary about Maurice Sendak made by Jonze that I carelessly and probably illegally lobbed onto YouTube:

When I mentioned the Sendak film to friend Lando, he sent me this collection of interviews between Sendak and NPR’s Terry Gross. Tis moving.

Sometimes, stand-up comedy is important to me: positive, rugged, pure, independent, ideas-driven, a cleanse. Other times, I’m disgusted and bored by it. It makes me feel glad at the moment, though the mudslide of mediocre acts about to take over my favourite Glasgow music venue for the March comedy festival threatens to push my buttons. One of my first stand-up loves was Harry Hill’s Man Alive video, which was very much a sacred text. Harry is back now, on YouTube for free, with The Harry Hill Show. It’s absolutely adorable. I am instantly a fan of “Name the Seed,” and I love that it’s filmed at Battersea Arts Centre where I have many several happy memories, not least interviewing the Iceman for a day. Go away from the flats.

Physical Form

Here’s how I look now, shot on expired Polaroid film by the Iceman himself:

And a wider shot of what was actually going down:

Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive

It’s mid-October 2025. I live in Glasgow. I’m a writer, but I’ve been dabbling in film production and book publishing.

Projects

The edit continues on our documentary film. It’s almost done. We have a screening scheduled at the Wolverhampton Lockworks on 8th February 2026, but we’re also hoping for a premiere before then.

I’m still tinkering with my second novel, which is almost finished. It will be published soon in a mysterious way with no blurb, synopsis or cover design.

As an upstart publisher, I recently midwifed Diary at the Centre of the Earth Vol. 1 by Dickon Edwards. There’s a launch event in London on 24th October 2025 and we’ll be selling and signing copies at the Small Publishers Fair on 24th and 25th October.

Issue 18 of New Escapologist has just arrived from the printers. It will be for sale at the bookfair mentioned above and subscriber copies will be shipping soon.

Reading

You can see what I’m reading at this very moment here, plus I recently initiated a lunatic project to read every book by Stephen King.

Travel

My most recent trip was to Montreal in September. On this trip I saw a bit of contemporary art, a lot of family, bought and read Big Mall by Canadian Kate Black, ate poutine and the world’s best bagels and challah and hamantaschen, and drank a lot of Third Wave coffee and St. Ambroise oatmeal stout.

I’m now planning a November trip to Utrecht for my third visit to Le Guess Who? festival. On my way, I’ll also see Krakow in Poland for the first time, travelling 13 hours by rail to my final destination.

Culture Goblin

I’ve become very interested in a 1970s comedian called John Paul Joans. Please tell me if you know anything about him.

Ever the connoisseur of melting ice, I enjoyed hearing a glacier melt at the Montreal CCA.

I recently saw Six Organs of Admittance and Richard Youngs at Glasgow’s Old Hairdressers. I bought School of the Flower on vinyl at the merch table and have been listening to it ever since.

I’m watching some recent spooky stuff in October. Best so far has been Little Monsters (2019). Looking forward to Good Boy (2025).

I’ve been drinking Kenyan coffee at Kahawa Mzuri in Glasgow.

I deleted all of my witterings at Bluesky, a social network I broke my vow to muck about with. It’s fine over there but I’d rather use my energy to rewild the Old Web, as you should too.

I’ve been browsing the Now pages indexed by Derek Sivers. I seek out the non-tech people.

I sincerely love my wife’s Monster of the Week blog.

Physical Form

Here’s a picture of me in the bathroom of a new local coffee spot called Amulet.

Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive

It’s January 2025. I live in Glasgow, but I’m writing to you from my Montreal volcano lair. 🌋

I just got back from a performance of The Nutcracker (it was a girls’ night out but one of them got sick) and then played a largely useless part in a minyan. How are you?

2024 was a busy year for me, so I’m taking some time off now. It’s a proper months-long sabbatical in which I’m doing very little.

And yet I dabble.

Projects

The edit continues on our film, but I’m not an active participant in that. What I do at the moment is text back “excellent!” when a new cut comes in.

I’m futzing with the novel I started last year. It will be published mid-year, in a mysterious way with no blurb, synopsis or cover design.

I’m editing, for publication but without deadline, the diaries of an English dandy.

Submissions for New Escapologist Issue 18 trickle in for release in December. Thanks for your patience on that front.

Reading

Two-Headed Doctor: Looking for Ghosts in Dr. John’s Gris-Gris by David Toop (Strange Attractor, 2024)

Love Junkie by Robert Plunket (New Directions, 1992/2024).

Travel

I’m preparing for a leisurely trip to Paris this month to see Jenny and Landis.

I’m dreaming of a trip to Stockholm and Helsinki in April, but I’m not yet sure I have the airfare.

Samara and I are planning a June trip to Italy.

I just bought tickets for my third visit to Le Guess Who? festival in Utrecht in November.

Culture I’ve Been Enjoying

Librarie Drawn & Quarterly in Montreal is a magical land

Kuts by Gamma Knife

Truck Violence

Sky Peals in a concretey motorway service station.

Robert Eggers’ (like a bird’s eggers) Nosferatu

Our pub quiz nemesis, the wool historian Karie Westerman, is the Captain of this year’s Open University team on University Challenge. She’s doing really well but my team keeps kicking her team’s ass in real life. Make of that what you will.

I prefer this Open University anyway.

Physical Form

Here’s what I look like /
at the start of the year /
in my snuggly and delightful /
Montreal gear:

Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive

It’s almost November 2024. I’m a writer-comedian. I live in Glasgow. I’m married to Samara.

I’ve been far too busy this year. It’s not my way. Thankfully, things are starting to slow a little. I’m blowing off creative production altogether from next week until the new year. Next year: no new projects and, as Beethoven used to say, chillaxing to the max.

Projects

I run a small press magazine called New Escapologist. I’ve been working on the all-new Issue 17: All the Way Home. It’s almost ready to print and can be ordered for shipping later this month. So. You know. Do that please.

Related to the above, I was interviewed by Appraisal magazine this month. It prompted me to archive some old interviews as an additional way to explain my behaviour.

Work continues on the film I’m making with Mark Cartwright and Anthony Irvine. We’re turning my book about the Iceman into a documentary and it’s been tremendous fun so far. Our most recent shooting block took place at Clowns International, the Bill Murray Club, and the University of Kent’s stand-up comedy archive. It was the most fun I’ve had with the film so far (which is really saying something) and Mark has been sending me frequent rough edits, all of which look amazing.

The Bill Murray shoot was a live performance, which will be used in the film but also released separately as a live performance video. Mark made a genuinely exciting trailer for it.

Reading

The Book of Trespass by Nick Hayes proved to be incredibly good. Unapologetically magical but he’s also done the hard work of diving deep into law and statute.

I read Watership Down for the first time last week. I blasted through it over three days because I couldn’t put it [Watership] Down. I have a lot to say about it so I might review it for New Escapologist some time.

I’ve just started The Factory by Hiroko Oyamada and Escape to Life by Erika Mann.

Comics: Woman World by Arminder Dhaliwal was a lot of very beautiful fun.

Travel

After travelling very much this year, I’m preparing for mega-trips to Paris, Utrecht, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Zagreb, Belgrade, Athens, and Montreal. Beat that.

The Montreal trip is booked for December, but I might not be allowed into the country since I’m a resident there. Get your head around that one.

Cultural Devourment

I saw Seymour Mace live for the first time last month. He’s an incredibly skilled stand-up comedian and a seemingly lovely man. On the very same day I was blown away by pole-dancing comedian Siân Docksey who I can’t recommend enough. Both of the shows I saw were recorded will be released as videos by GoFasterStripe soon, but just go and see these artists wherever they turn up.

My pal Marcus Brownlow has an art show at New Glasgow Society right now and recommend popping in if you’re local.

I’m looking forward to seeing Michael Cumming’s Oxide Ghosts at The Stand in Glasgow, but Michael’s touring this show so see if he’s local to you.

I’m similarly looking forward to seeing the Necks three times in Europe because they’re an amazing band of deeply-skilled Australian jazz improvisers currently touring.

I saw The Substance recently at the GFT. If you like horror films, don’t miss it.

For a bit of horizontal bone-idle telly gawping, I’m trying to get into The Expanse but it might be a bit too straight for me so I’m cheating on it with favourite ’90s telly comedy and Porridge.

Eczema

I’ve been getting phototherapy three times a week for my eczema. It’s really weird. I have to stand in a sort-of up-right sunbed-like booth with a welding mask over my face and a jockstrap over my precious Dinklage and nothing else. I’m then exposed to UV light and heat for a couple of minutes. It gives me a couple of days of sunburn, during which I moisturise three or four times a day. It’s exhausting. I think is working but I can’t be sure. It’s hard work but hopefully I’ll be handsome and olive-coloured instead of red and gory.

I walk to the hospital for these appointments. It takes about twenty minutes. Google Maps takes you up some partially overgrown steps, which seems wrong, but takes you to a staff car park behind the hospital and then to a back door. Once you know this, it’s fine and perfectly direct, but it’s a bit confusing if you haven’t done it before. Every time, I help someone find their way up those steps to the hospital. It’s like a job. I even helped a refugee couple carry their pushchair up the stairs this morning. I have no idea how people will find the hospital once I’ve finished my course of treatment. I might start going there each morning voluntarily, just to feel useful.

Physical Form

Here’s a cheerful shot of me at the Bill Murray club, taken by Spencer Wakeling:

Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive

It’s August 2024. I’m a writer-comedian. I live in Glasgow. I’m married to Samara (as of ten years ago) and all is exactly as it should be.

Creative Production

I run a small press magazine called New Escapologist and Issue 16 came out last month. It’s a thing of beauty so why not grab a copy? It’s selling quite well, which is pleasing.

I’ve started tentative work on Issue 17. Commissions are out, ideas are doodled, writing is lazily underway. Due for release in early December, this will be the last of the cycle of four issues we financed in early 2023. I’m not sure what will happen after that. It would be nice to do more.

I performed my one-person literary comedy show, The Annotated Audiobook, at PEN Theatre in south London last month. We could hear the rain hammering atmospherically on the roof (which I liked) but the audience was tiny. I quipped that playing to such a small crowd “is either a right of passage or a new low.” If I do more of these, I’d very much like them to be in black box theatres like PEN, though ideally with 30-50 bottoms to warm the seats.

Work continues on the film I’m making with Mark Cartwright and Anthony Irvine. We’re turning my book about the Iceman into a documentary and it’s been tremendous creative fun so far. Last month we were shooting in Devon. This month we’re presenting WIP screenings in Edinburgh and Birmingham to raise money to help finish the thing. September will see a final London shoot at the Bill Murray club.

This month sees the publication of Before I Go, the memoir of “the archaeopteryx of alternative comedy,” John Dowie. I’ve loved working with Dowie on this book (I served as his editor and helped to get it published) and I hope we stay friends once its all over.

In my previous ‘Now’ message, I mentioned that June would be devoted to something new and different. “Ooooh,” I said, and, “yes.” This half-happened. The first two weeks of June were dedicated precisely and successfully to this mystery project. Then things got busy again and I had to stop. Hopefully I’ll pick it up again soon.

I’ve got an article in the July-August edition of the Idler. My name’s on the cover this time and I’ve had some really kind emails about it too. Thanks idlers.

Reading

I finally finished that monster biography of Portuguese poet Ferdinand Pessoa by Richard Zenith. It was very, very good so it’s hard to begrudge the absurd length. I want to tell the world about Pessoa, but there would be no point: Zenith is your man for that.

As much as I enjoyed Zenith/Pessoa, it felt good to draw a line under it. Three months is a long time to spend reading the same book. Since then I’ve enjoyed a short book about Kraftwerk and a deeply entertaining collection of essays about the Talmud. I’m now reading two books (a novel and a nonfic) for review in New Escapologist 17. Bliss.

Travel

I have not travelled at all this summer. Our Canadian relatives are visiting next week though. That’s travel of a sort. They will bring news of a faraway land.

Cultural Devourment

Some films I enjoyed recently were a documentary about rewilding called Wilding (2023), La chimera (2023), mumblecore comedian drama I Used to Be Funny (2023), and wolfcut queer love-in I Saw the TV Glow (2023). That latter film was fascinating: truly, today’s youth have been robbed of their Buffy.

I also saw Oppenheimer (2023) which was one of the most boring films I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s resolutely uncinematic; just loads of dull men talking in rooms. On and on and on and on and on and on and on.

I saw these films at the GFT. Support your local art cinemas, you sods.

Inspired by the Kraftwerk book, I also watched boomer mystery road film Radio On (1979). So cool.

Our legendarily difficult local hipster pub quiz took a few weeks off while some football was happening. I don’t really understand the connection between these two things, but I’m long accustomed to my favourite things being cancelled or destroyed to make way for sport: from tuning in to watch Star Trek: The Next Generation in the 1990s only find that the cricket has overrun, to the public libraries being closed for covid safety in 2020-21 while thousands of dullards are allowed to shout their lungs out at dribbling millionaires at Ibrox on the other side of the river.

For TV, I’ve been watching Batman: The Animated Series from 1995, a favourite of Dowie’s. It’s absolutely superb. Penguin is my homeboy. But I also like the Riddler, so skinny and green. Mark Hamill will always be my Joker, but then so will sexy grandma Caesar Romero. Inspired by I Saw the TV Glow, my wife and I also watched the first season of Charmed. It is rubbish.

Physical Form

Here’s my picture of the “month” so you can continue to monitor my ongoing decay, this time taken in a state of repose at the Devon film shoot:

It’s May 2024. I’m a writer. I live in Glasgow. I’m married to Samara. This is all exactly as it should be.

Work

I run a small press magazine called New Escapologist and I’m currently putting Issue 16 together. It’s a thing of beauty and will be shipping very soon, so why not pre-order a copy?

Work continues on the film I’m making with Mark Cartwright and Anthony Irvine. We’re basically turning my book about the Iceman into a documentary and it’s been tremendous creative fun so far.

I’m editing a new memoir called Before I Go for “the archaeopteryx of alternative comedy,” (Alan Moore’s words, not mine) John Dowie.

You might remember me mentioning Dowie’s other excellent book The Freewheeling John Dowie in my previous Nowness message. I’d enjoyed it greatly and was irritated that it was no longer in print. Well, I pulled some levers and strings and it’s now available again as an e-book at least. Hooray!

The month of June, if I can mop up these few projects in the meantime and since I’m not needed on any film shoots, will be devoted to something completely new. Ooooh, yes.

Reading

I’m 300 pages into a thousand-page biography of Portuguese poet Ferdinand Pessoa by Richard Zenith. It’s very, very good so it’s hard to begrudge the absurd length. I want to tell the world about Pessoa, but there would be no point: Zenith is your man for that.

Travel

I just got back from London where I was filming at the Comedy Store with Mark Cartwright and our little team. We met some incredible people and I’m particularly grateful to the Obi-Wan of improv Neil Mullarkey for all he did for us. Thank you Neil.

Culture Devourment

I’m writing this in a quiet moment at Tectonics, a weekend city festival of experimental music. It’s always one of my cultural highlights of the year. Today I’m all about Koichi Makigami.

For TV, I’ve been watching Werner Herzog’s filmmaking Master Class, chunk by 15-minute chunk. It’s more about spending time with Herzog than actually learning any practical skills for me. But as the Bavarian man himself says, you don’t become a poet by learning to type.

Some films I enjoyed recently were The Delinquents (2023) and Wim Wenders’ Perfect Days (2023). I review both in Issue 16 of New Escapologist since they’re about, in different ways, escapes from work. I saw these films at the GFT. Support your local art cinemas, you sods.

Physical Form

Here’s my picture of the “month” so you can continue to monitor my ongoing decay, this time taken at the Comedy Store in London:

Old Now pages (Then pages?) are squirreled pointlessly into the Now Page Archive

It’s February 2024 and all is well.

Samara and I still live in Glasgow as the baby Jesus intended. I’m a writer. Never mind what she does, nosey.

Work

I run a small press magazine called New Escapologist. Issues 14 and 15 are sold out at the official website but we recently expanded into the real world with these cool shops.

I’m making a film with Mark Cartwright and Anthony Irvine about the Iceman. We’re basically turning my book into a documentary. I was down in Bournemouth this week, filming away.

I’ve finished editing John Robinson’s second book about Momus. It was published this month and it’s a physically very beautiful book.

I’m writing a piece about my relationship with Richard Herring’s blog for the next issue of From the Sublime… magazine. The working title is “My Pet Man: 22 Years of Warming Up.”

I’m preparing for my live show in March. My posters are all over town, though the one at the Sparkle Horse pub keeps getting taken down and I keep putting it back up again.

I heard yesterday that I’m Out is being discontinued (all 1,300 remaining copies to be pulped) by Unbound who aren’t happy with sales despite their stupid cover and title change (that I advised against) and not lifting a finger to market it. I’ve got seven books under my belt now, but the stiff letter I sent to Unbound is one of the most satisfying things I’ve ever written.

Reading

I’m halfway through The Freewheeling John Dowie by, well, John Dowie. Dowie (I’ll stop saying Dowie in a minute) was a great alternative comic in the ’80s who quit the business when it became a business. He’s great. Stewart Lee mentioned him in the interview he gave us for the Iceman film a couple of weeks ago and I suddenly remembered “of course, I must read that book!” Unfortunately, it was published by Unbound (see above) who made an arse of things and is now out of print. You can buy it expensively second hand. Mine was free because it was damaged in the post and I demanded a refund. The book is at least brilliant: a grumpy memoir about cycling in Europe. It’s like Dervla Murphy but properly funny and realistically miserable. I love it so much.

I also recently read Werner Herzog’s excellently-titled memoir, Every Man for Himself and God Against All (which everyone should read but only if they’ve already read his more interesting Guide for the Perplexed) and Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan. The latter turned out to be translated by Heather Lloyd, my old friend Helen’s mum. I didn’t realise until I read her translator’s note and saw that it was signed off “Glasgow, 2013.” I enjoyed the unexpected sense of connection.

Travel

I was on the English south coast this week, filming with Mark Cartwright and Anthony Irvine and our little team. I’ve already said that. Pay attention.

We’re going to Lisbon next week. Like Lanark, all I need is some sunshine.

Time Wasting

Most weeks, we attend a particular Monday night pub quiz. It’s a waste of time, money, and health but we continue to attend for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on. Maybe it’s because we keep WINNING. Oh yeah.

For TV, my partner and I have been watching old episodes of Jeopardy! after we enjoyed the recent UK version despite it being hosted by an awkward old taxidermied bear. On my own, I’ve been watching Inside Number 9, which I gave up around the fourth season but am enjoying catching up with. “Merrily Merrily” is my favourite story so far.

Some films I enjoyed recently were that Scala!! documentary, The Holdovers (which was so surprisingly good that I can’t stretch my imagination in a direction capable of criticising it – it’s a proper film like The Graduate or something, which I’m told is “mid budget”), and Poor Things (which was good but I found myself annoyed by the London bits not being set in Glasgow instead; why resist the call to elevate something instead of doing the same old expected shit?). I saw all of these films at the GFT. Support your local art cinemas, you sods.

Here’s my picture of the “month” so you can continue to monitor my ongoing decay, this time taken in Meadow Road Coffee, Glasgow, where I stopped to recaffeinate and to get a pebble out of my shoe:

December 2023 is almost over and I should be thinking about my end-of-year roundup more than updating the Now page. What can I say? I live in the Now.

My partner and I still live in Glasgow, Scotland. I’m a writer, though much of my work these past few months have been writing-adjacent or administering the necessary business side of writing. I’m fine with that.

Work

From the Sublime… just published a piece I wrote about Pogs and nostalgia in their second issue. It was fun to write about the idiotic cardboard discs and I like the whip-pan “Dudley via Honolulu” structure I came up with.

I’m making a film with Mark Cartwright and Anthony Irvine about the Iceman. We’re basically adapting my book into a documentary. It’s been nothing but fun so far. We’re trying to cover some of our expenses with a Kickstarter so please chip in if you can.

Issue 15 of New Escapologist is out now. It’s been my main workload for at least two months: writing, commissioning, editing, proofing, printing, promotion, shipping. I’m trying to arrange proper distribution for this one too, which I think will happen in January thanks to distributor Ra & Olly.

My first novel, Rub-A-Dub-Dub just scooped a Saltire Award for Best Book Cover. Amazing. September also saw a nice interview about the book with my old friend Reggie Chamberlain-King in Pop Matters.

I’ve almost finished editing John Robinson’s second book about Momus. It’ll be published by P&H in February.

This is a lot of work for me. I’ve loved every minute of it but I’m looking forward to a proper break while the world enjoys Christmas and probably a deceleration in the year of the orangutan.

Reading

I’m currently reading Bore Hole, the memoir of Joe Melen who drilled a hole in his own head. Recommended.

I also recently read Butts by Heather Radke, a cultural history of arses.

Nina Simon’s Gum by Warren Ellis, meanwhile, is the story of how the Dirty fiddler pocketed Dr. Simone’s gobbed-up gum at a concert and what happened next. It’s fab.

Travel

My partner was finally granted citizenship this month. Rejoice! It’s been a long journey. Her passport also arrived today (a separate process, by the way), which means we can leave the UK for periods longer than 180 days if we want to. Ironically, citizenship means the ability to stay without fear of deportation but also the ability to get off this blasted island.

I was in Paris recently, visiting the Asia Now exhibition, dossing in a hostel, and hanging out with Landis who was over from Chicago, signing books and consorting with publishers.

I visited the Netherlands in November ostensibly for a day of Le Guess Who? festival in Utrecht but also flaneuring around (and hostelling again) in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Delft. Oh! And Luxembourg, which isn’t even in the Netherlands! It’s hard to convey how much I enjoyed this trip: the freedom of solo travel, all those lovely European trains, a rich variety of experience.

I was filming in Wolverhampton and Birmingham later in the same month with Anthony and Mark, and also meeting the amazing Fliss, Jim, Michael and Arthur.

Time Wasting

Most weeks, we attend a particular Monday night pub quiz. It’s a waste of time, money, and health but we continue to attend for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on. Maybe it’s because we keep WINNING. Oh yeah.

For TV, my partner and I have been watching Moonlighting (1985-89), which is a lot of fun so far with its fast-talking silliness and two charismatic leads but I worry about all the fourth-wall breaking that’s starting to happen in the second season. On my own, I’ve been watching Season 5 of Fargo, which is awesome. The pared-down minimalist narrative doesn’t get my blood up like Seasons 1-3 but is a welcome reduction after the messy Chris Rock season.

A film I enjoyed recently was Other Music, a documentary about the important record shop in New York City. I also enjoyed Wil Hodgson’s comedy show Barbicidal Tendencies, free to watch on YouTube thanks to GFS.

Here’s my picture of the “month” (this time with Mark and Anthony) so you can continue to monitor my ongoing decay:

You’ve already seen that one? Okay, here’s another:

September 2023 is breathing provocatively down our necks. My partner and I still live in Glasgow, Scotland. And I’m still, thank fuck, a writer.

Autumn is approaching and I’ve been eating veggies and apples from Alan‘s allotment. Nature’s bounty has NOT given me the squits. In banal news we’ve got a new sofa bed coming tomorrow. We sold the old sofa on Gumtree last week and we’ve been sitting on the floor ever since.

Work

Last month’s Kickstarter to bring back New Escapologist went extremely well. In fact, it outstripped all of my expectations. The first new issue of the magazine is now printed and available and continuing to sell well.

Work has already begun on Issue 15. I’ve been writing, editing, and commissioning like a trooper.

The magazine is available in a handful of shops as of this month too. The ever-supportive Aye-Aye Books in Glasgow has a hefty wodge of copies, while Print Culture and Good Press in Glasgow are stocking it too. Exciting news for Londoners: we’re also stocked in the famous magCulture now. Success!

Also this month I’ve been working hard to promote my first novel, Rub-A-Dub-Dub. This has involved interviews and prize submissions and some chats with booksellers. I’m not sure when this will all start to pay off.

Oh! And I had a piece about the Iceman published in From the Sublime…, the cool new zine from Manchester.

Reading

I’m currently reading Salinger’s Nine Stories. This particular copy was given to me by Martin who found it in a Montreal bin.

I also recently read Claire Dederer’s excellent Monsters, Rodge Glass’s biography of Alasdair Gray, John Robinson’s first of three biographies of Momus (which I enjoyed so much that I uncharacteristically left a review for it at Waterstones), a so-so selection of comic essays by Sloane Crosley called I Was Told There’d Be Cake, and a great comic book called Hell Phone by Benji Nate.

Travel

We’re still waiting on my partner’s citizenship application and trying not to think about it.

This month I was in Wolverhampton to be interviewed for YouTube by Ginger Beard Mark, Hay-on-Wye to see some middlebrow tourist bookshops, and at the Edinburgh Fringe for fun and profit.

I’ll return to Edinburgh this week for some exiting hangouts and to see Simon Munnery’s Fringe show, Jerusalem.

Time Wasting

Most weeks, we attend a particular Monday night pub quiz. It’s a waste of time, money, and health but we continue to attend for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on. Maybe it’s because we keep WINNING. Oh yeah.

For TV, I’ve been watching Fleishman is in Trouble, which is okay but I don’t particularly recommend it. Danes dains to be great in it. My partner also got us into Gothic Homemaking with Aurelio Voltaire, which is exactly as it sounds.

The main film I can remember watching this month was The Red Shoes, a beautiful 1948 Powell and Pressburger movie. Oh, and Barbie at the GFT, which is a load of old piss really but the atmosphere in the cinema was fun.

Here’s my picture of the month (this time with GBM) so you can continue to monitor my ongoing decay:

It’s July 2023. My partner and I live in Glasgow, Scotland. I’m a writer.

It’s summer and the sun has been shining. I have a big pile of library books to enjoy. We recently made the switch from crap vegan margarine to real butter from a dairy I used to walk past when employed by Stirling University in 2014: it gives me a pleasant sense of connectedness when I spread it on my toast.

Work

I’m bringing back my small press magazine, New Escapologist and I’ve been working joyfully on the comeback issue. Please back the mag’s return on Kickstarter if you’d like to.

I published my first novel earlier this month. It’s called Rub-A-Dub-Dub.

Go Faster Stripe recently published my book Melt It! (with Anthony Irvine). We had a launch event of sorts at Guggleton Farm Arts in England last week.

Reading

I’ve been reading about early German Romanticism, fungi, Dora Carrington, and Eric Gill. I love public libraries.

Travel

I just got my passport renewed! It took only two weeks.

This month we’re also applying for my partner’s UK citizenship. Wish us luck please.

I spent last week in London, Devon, and Wiltshire. There are photographs in the July section of my Tumblr photoblog.

Time Wasting

Most weeks, we attend a particular Monday night pub quiz. It’s a waste of time, money, and health but we continue to attend for reasons I can’t quite put my finger on.

For TV, I’ve been watching Jeopardy! Masters, Mr. Inbetween, Cobra Kai, The Bear, and Avatar: The Last Airbender.

The only film I can remember seeing this month was The Red Shoes, the devastatingly gorgeous 1948 Powell and Pressburger film.

A friend sometimes gives me free tickets to the GFT. The most recent film I saw was Beau is Afraid. It gave me a nightmare.