the digital home of

Calum Andrew Morrell

Recent Posts


Duck you Covid

Just over a week ago I fell ill. I was expecting to. My mother had fallen ill three days earlier and then my brother fell ill the following day. With that, and along with my rather pitiful immune system, it was inevitable I was going down with whatever bug it happened to be. In case you somehow got here without spotting the post title, it has (almost certainly) been Covid. And it hit really hard to the extent that over the first two days I was concerned I would be hospitalised.


3rd of August, 2024 covid, health, mentalhealth
Bird food war zone

Yesterday morning I put some food out for the wild birds that visit my garden. This is a regular occurrence and not worthy of note on it's own. Unusually, just a minute later, I heard fighting and looked out to see a wood pigeon and feral pigeon viciously attacking one another. To be clear, there was no shortage of food for both and it was even spread out. This is my normal approach and they tend to eat near one another without too much issue.


7th of July, 2024 fighting, garden, pigeons
A monster parody?

Monster Magnet. 90s American hard rock. Catchy, engaging tracks with well produced videos to go with them. Stereotypically over the top videos. I really really desperately hope they're doing an intentional parody... but I fear they may be serious.


12th of June, 2024 music, ott, recommendation, rock
Politicians as normal people?

Apparently it happens, occasionally, that the politicians we see everyday parroting the party line, refusing to answer questions directly or tell us what they'll do to improve a certain situation are, in fact, capable of coming across as normal everyday people.


11th of June, 2024 farage, politics, starmer, sunak, uk
YouTube's mid-roll adverts

Adverts are annoying. I'm more than a little certain I'm not the only one who holds that opinion. They are, however, a necessary annoyance in order to receive free content: tv channels; on demand services; YouTube; newspaper articles without a paywall; and on and on it goes. This does not mean they can't be presented ethically - something YouTube (owned by Google) are miserably failing at.


5th of June, 2024 advertising, annoying, google, ux, youtube