Peter Hewitt
@petehewitt.bsky.social
Opinionated medicinal chemist. Prize-winning photographer. Extremely moderate.
"Not doing experiment instead of doing experiment can lead experiments astray, study finds"
December 16, 2025 at 11:42 PM
"Not doing experiment instead of doing experiment can lead experiments astray, study finds"
Credit card is in absolute ruins, but I think we're probably 80% there with the Christmas shopping.
December 15, 2025 at 8:34 PM
Credit card is in absolute ruins, but I think we're probably 80% there with the Christmas shopping.
Tonight's drink: Aviation (gin:lemon: Maraschino liqueur: crème de violette, 2:1:0.5:0.25). Interesting twist on The Last Word; warming sweet richness of Maraschino opposed by floral perfume of violet liqueur instead of herby Chartreuse. 7/10, but I think I can dial in the proportions to improve it.
December 15, 2025 at 6:07 PM
Tonight's drink: Aviation (gin:lemon: Maraschino liqueur: crème de violette, 2:1:0.5:0.25). Interesting twist on The Last Word; warming sweet richness of Maraschino opposed by floral perfume of violet liqueur instead of herby Chartreuse. 7/10, but I think I can dial in the proportions to improve it.
*scornfully* watch out lads, here comes
December 15, 2025 at 1:54 PM
*scornfully* watch out lads, here comes
Cogwork Dancers in Silksong: one of the all time great boss battles, up there with Mantis Lords from the first game (and the likes of Ornstein and Smough)
December 14, 2025 at 11:30 PM
Cogwork Dancers in Silksong: one of the all time great boss battles, up there with Mantis Lords from the first game (and the likes of Ornstein and Smough)
The title track is great and so is SOYCD, even if in the cold light of day it's five minutes too long. Have A Cigar and Welcome To The Machine are good but not quite top tier.
Great album for sure, but "which Floyd album is best" is one of those questions where the obvious answer is also correct.
Great album for sure, but "which Floyd album is best" is one of those questions where the obvious answer is also correct.
"Melancholia bathes Wish You Were Here like cold moonlight. It is so very sad, and so very lovely."
I revisited the album I consider Pink Floyd's true masterpiece for its 50th anniversary edition, in Metro.
I revisited the album I consider Pink Floyd's true masterpiece for its 50th anniversary edition, in Metro.
December 13, 2025 at 12:18 PM
The title track is great and so is SOYCD, even if in the cold light of day it's five minutes too long. Have A Cigar and Welcome To The Machine are good but not quite top tier.
Great album for sure, but "which Floyd album is best" is one of those questions where the obvious answer is also correct.
Great album for sure, but "which Floyd album is best" is one of those questions where the obvious answer is also correct.
Could pass for a still from an undiscovered Coen brothers film, if it were just framed slightly neater.
'Skull of St. Thomas Aquinas being transported to Fossanova Abbey.'
Photograph by Daniel Ibanez
Photograph by Daniel Ibanez
December 10, 2025 at 7:09 PM
Could pass for a still from an undiscovered Coen brothers film, if it were just framed slightly neater.
Reposted by Peter Hewitt
"there's a new serif in town"
Marco Rubio ordered diplomats to return to using Times New Roman font in official communications, calling his predecessor's decision to adopt Calibri a “wasteful” diversity move
Rubio Stages Font Coup: Times New Roman Ousts Calibri
The secretary of state called it a "wasteful" diversity move, according to an internal department cable seen by Reuters.
www.huffpost.com
December 10, 2025 at 1:06 AM
"there's a new serif in town"
Forego streaming services & build a music collection around a few thousand ripped CDs for the following benefits: no ongoing subscription costs; discovery driven by curiosity rather than algorithm; no creepy digital footprint of your listening habits; no annoying annual summary for social media.
December 3, 2025 at 2:11 PM
Forego streaming services & build a music collection around a few thousand ripped CDs for the following benefits: no ongoing subscription costs; discovery driven by curiosity rather than algorithm; no creepy digital footprint of your listening habits; no annoying annual summary for social media.
You can sense the rank desperation in this headline really start to come through at the "critics ask broader questions" bit.
A former junior champion said Reeves did not hold the official British girls’ under-14 title, and critics ask broader questions about her CV and career claims ⬇️
Rachel Reeves accused of overstating junior chess title
A former junior champion said Reeves did not hold the official British girls’ under-14 title, and critics ask broader questions about her CV and career claims
www.thetimes.com
December 2, 2025 at 10:20 PM
You can sense the rank desperation in this headline really start to come through at the "critics ask broader questions" bit.
Subscribe now to The Economist, so as not to miss the most penetrating insights and the best writing.
There are three possibilities for the Middle East in 2026. That things go well, or badly. The most likely scenario, however, is somewhere between the two
The Middle East will not be all progress or all disaster in 2026
In Gaza, Israel and beyond things could go well, or badly, but are most likely to be somewhere in the middle. Here are three scenarios for the coming year
econ.st
December 1, 2025 at 10:01 PM
Subscribe now to The Economist, so as not to miss the most penetrating insights and the best writing.
Corny phone snap from everybody's favourite bit of the Lagan Meadows towpath, early afternoon today (yes, this is about as high as the sun gets this time of year, welcome to Belfast).
November 30, 2025 at 9:32 PM
Corny phone snap from everybody's favourite bit of the Lagan Meadows towpath, early afternoon today (yes, this is about as high as the sun gets this time of year, welcome to Belfast).
Fun exercise for the reader: calculating the proportion of higher education spending that goes into funding the lifestyle of this one guy.
Interesting investigation into a dodgy Elsevier journal -- with the additional nugget that the CEO of Elsevier's parent company made more than €15 million in total compensation last year.
english.elpais.com/science-tech...
english.elpais.com/science-tech...
The fall of a prolific science journal exposes the billion-dollar profits of scientific publishing
One of the 15 publications that put out the most studies globally has been expelled from the indexing system for irregularities. Its publisher, Elsevier, has a 38% profit margin that reached $1.5 bill...
english.elpais.com
November 30, 2025 at 7:54 PM
Fun exercise for the reader: calculating the proportion of higher education spending that goes into funding the lifestyle of this one guy.
100% agree. In my experience, streaming music services in particular are just unbearably banal in what they try to serve you. Consult *individual* flesh and blood critics - not the "critical consensus", whatever that even means WRT art - and just try stuff yourself.
The death of browsing is part of the reason art is the way it is now. Our opinions are largely fed to us by algorithms. Spending a spare 15 minutes wandering around a bookstore or comic shop or video rental place was how you found stuff you wouldn't ordinarily pick up and thereby expanded your taste
Bookselling is like the most "people go to the store and buy what looks cool to them without a particular agenda" type business left, and your purchases have a huge influence on what is ordered, what is displayed, and what is recommended.
November 30, 2025 at 9:01 AM
100% agree. In my experience, streaming music services in particular are just unbearably banal in what they try to serve you. Consult *individual* flesh and blood critics - not the "critical consensus", whatever that even means WRT art - and just try stuff yourself.
The right-wing commentariat literally has no idea what the housing situation in the UK is like for normal people under 35.
Even so, "six-bedroom North Kensington home" must surely - surely! - have been written as deliberate ragebait.
Even so, "six-bedroom North Kensington home" must surely - surely! - have been written as deliberate ragebait.
November 29, 2025 at 4:05 PM
The right-wing commentariat literally has no idea what the housing situation in the UK is like for normal people under 35.
Even so, "six-bedroom North Kensington home" must surely - surely! - have been written as deliberate ragebait.
Even so, "six-bedroom North Kensington home" must surely - surely! - have been written as deliberate ragebait.
(complimentary)
So, happy 50th anniversary to Melody Maker’s review of Bohemian Rhapsody: “Queen, with a suitably baroque vocal orchestration, contrive to approximate the demented fury of the Balham Amateur Operatic Society performing The Pirates of Penzance”
November 29, 2025 at 11:59 AM
(complimentary)
Magnificent. An actual photo, albeit with extremely contrived custom lighting for theatrical effect. Looks like a creation from Hollow Knight - which is about as high praise as I can offer. www.digitalcameraworld.com/photography/...
Shot with a Canon EOS R5 and custom lighting, this magical, otherworldly photo captures a moth's glowing eyes
Ivo Niermann reveals how he built custom lighting to photograph the tapetum lucidum effect in nocturnal insects
www.digitalcameraworld.com
November 26, 2025 at 8:24 PM
Magnificent. An actual photo, albeit with extremely contrived custom lighting for theatrical effect. Looks like a creation from Hollow Knight - which is about as high praise as I can offer. www.digitalcameraworld.com/photography/...
I strongly believe O-rings constitute an affront to logic, to language, and to life itself.
November 21, 2025 at 7:50 PM
I strongly believe O-rings constitute an affront to logic, to language, and to life itself.
Well, I've fixed one peak and made the other slightly worse, and tbh that's not bad for an evening's worth of amateur plumbing.
November 20, 2025 at 10:36 PM
Well, I've fixed one peak and made the other slightly worse, and tbh that's not bad for an evening's worth of amateur plumbing.
This weekend's drink: St Clement's French 75 (3:1:1:0.5:5 gin:simple syrup:orange juice:lemon juice:sparkling wine). Excellent: zingy, fragrant, beautifully balanced, properly grown-up. I think this will be my festive season go-to this year. 8/10
November 16, 2025 at 10:18 AM
This weekend's drink: St Clement's French 75 (3:1:1:0.5:5 gin:simple syrup:orange juice:lemon juice:sparkling wine). Excellent: zingy, fragrant, beautifully balanced, properly grown-up. I think this will be my festive season go-to this year. 8/10
FILM REVIEW: Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, Netflix, 2025). Extraordinarily beautiful realisation, with great casting, marred by the occasional Garth Marenghi moments in the script - "YOU are the monster, Victor, YOU" - and the absurd am-dram saccharine staginess of the final quarter.
November 15, 2025 at 11:24 PM
FILM REVIEW: Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, Netflix, 2025). Extraordinarily beautiful realisation, with great casting, marred by the occasional Garth Marenghi moments in the script - "YOU are the monster, Victor, YOU" - and the absurd am-dram saccharine staginess of the final quarter.
Reposted by Peter Hewitt
(walks into a room, sees a blonde man called Brexit frantically stabbing for four years a twitching near-corpse called British Productivity)
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
The Resolution Foundation should take this as a sign of support from the editor of the Times that they haven't chosen to send out one of their credible, economically rated writers, but someone who's actually run a similarly-redistribution minded think tank, and former Tory candidate to boot
At last, a fearless @thetimes.com enquiry into the Institute of Economic Affairs’ economically disastrous effects and Policy Exchange’s pernicious legacy of division? No, just an attack one of the few think tanks that did not shape Labour’s toxic inheritance.
www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...
www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...
November 15, 2025 at 1:24 PM
(walks into a room, sees a blonde man called Brexit frantically stabbing for four years a twitching near-corpse called British Productivity)
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
Lads the mint is a bit overgrown I think it might be mojitos tonight
November 14, 2025 at 7:26 PM
Lads the mint is a bit overgrown I think it might be mojitos tonight