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As a computer geek, I never had much trouble navigating the world of microcontrollers and logic gates. Analog circuitry proved to be a different story; for a good while, I resigned myself to copying other people’s designs and going on wild-goose chases to procure long-obsolete parts that cropped up on the schematics. After years of trial and error, I know that analog signal processing is a complex area of study — but I can finally navigate it with relative ease.

Year’s ago I worked on a film project that affected me deeply. It was the incredible story of Daniel Northcott, a young man who grew up in the same suburbs near Vancouver that I did, who loved travel and documenting his experiences. He spent years making a film that aimed to capture the essence of his perspective on life, an attempt that all artists have a yearning to achieve. The major “twist” in Daniel’s story is that he never got to finish his film.

What is it about being a prestigious chef that activates my imagination? Chef culture — the tattoos, the screaming, the drugs, the extremely regular workplace abuse — has always been an engaging ecosystem, begging to be plumbed for drama. This is why when I saw a trailer for the first season of The Bear two years ago, I was more excited about the idea than any show since maybe… Mindhunter? It even took me a minute to lock into Succession.

Larry Williams was moving way too fast.  He should have slowed down. Born in New Orleans in 1935, he grew up around music, learning to play the piano. In his teens, Williams moved with his family to Oakland, California. There he joined a local R & B group, The Lemon Drops.  He also became familiar with what some called “the sporting life.”  On a visit back to New Orleans in 1954, he met singer Lloyd Price, then recording for Specialty Records.

As I sat on a veranda in Kasoa, a town playing hard-to-get just outside the clutches of Accra, I closed my eyes and listened to the intermittent rattling of brave cars navigating the treacherously pot-holed road outside. The road is called Knife Street and my mind sets to work imagining how a knife could have sliced these deep trenches in the road, waiting to swallow up the tasty tyres of a Toyota Corolla or whatever the meal of the day happens to be.

Hi friends, In honour of the re-launch of Doctor Who for a new era and new audiences (and in tacit admission that I desperately need a distraction and escapist sense of play this week), I thought I’d create a permanent spot here at the newsletter for my geek flag to fly at full mast with you. That’s right, folks: it’s time for that long-promised Beginner’s Guide to Doctor Who!

The Beginning or the End, the first film made about the development of the atom bomb, MGM’s ‘The Beginning or the End’ announces it’s not to be trusted with its first scene. Opening, a la Citizen Kane, with a newsreel, it depicts a gathering of “scientists and dignitaries” as they bury a time capsule at the foot of a redwood tree. The capsule contains a record of the atomic program, not to be opened until 2446, five hundred years in the future.

Audacious Women, Creative Lives is a newsletter sharing inspiring stories of women writers and artists. It is also a community supporting and inspiring women to live bold creative lives. Each post is free for all to read, although I certainly welcome paid subscribers who support my mission and would like to see this community grow into a space for workshops, meetings, perhaps a reading group—there are so many possibilities! Hello from Sicily!

My favourite thing about university is the philosophy conferences: five times a week or thereabouts, philosophers come to Oxford to present their latest work, and—if they’re lucky—have it flame-grilled by Timothy Williamson, who roams from talk to talk, dropping the decisive objection to each one. Oddly, almost no undergraduates go to these talks. I go … ncG1vNJzZmivn6G5prrBpaagZqOqr7TAwJyiZ5ufonyxe9OhnGaalajBbq3RoKymnZ6peqe70WakqKqRoXqiutOi