Hello again, dear reader.
In case you're new here, I'm Alastair Johnston and you're receiving this newsletter because you subscribed over at my blog or via a link from Substack. I'm grateful for you giving me some of your time and attention and hope I always inform or entertain you here. If not, please feel free to unsubscribe, I won't be offended.
That picture up top, is not what it seems. It’s not Garlic Bread. It is in fact, hand harvested, Wild Garlic Bread. Made a while back after an afternoon foraging the pungent herb that grows everywhere there is some water in my neck of the woods. It’s delicious, natural and I’ve been told that it does not leave you with Garlic Breath, which is an interesting fact I’ve yet to prove.
Why the sudden influx of bread related header photo’s you may be thinking?
English Essays
I’ve launched a new section on my Substack. It’s called English Essays and it’s a place where I will be sharing personal stories from my 50 odd plus years as a British Chap. The kind of thing I occasionally write about on my blog. I decided to start this series, because a few times in the past, I’ve had comments on here that some of you, from distant shores (i.e. not people living in England), enjoy when I write about how life is in Blighty.
Whilst I didn’t want to mix it all in with this newsletter, it seemed better to have a separate section so those of you not interested in my friendly ramblings, can avoid. I also thought long and hard and decided that as I would like to earn from my writing, and this stuff is personal, and takes time, these posts will be for patrons primarily. This is to give those of you who choose to support me with paid memberships, something to say thank you for your kindness. So for you kind souls, English Essays will be like the back stage pass, the invitation to a mug of tea and a choccy biscuit to sit and chat in my lounge, with snoring whippets by our feet, or an offer of a swift pint at my local to natter and set the world to rights.
The first essay, Bread, is up. And if you’re not yet a paid subscriber, I’m offering a 20% discount on new subscriptions until 4th October via this link so you can hop over and read it.
Here’s a few other things that have been occupying my attention lately…
How to De-Google your life
Proton Mail has this great guide showing how you can wrestle your data and identity back from Google. As you know via my un-machined writing, I’m in the process of doing exactly this. So if you’re interested in doing the same, it’s a good read.
UnConformed Lives
I’ve been really enjoying reading the many posts over on A Library of Unconformed Lives by Ruth Gaskovski. I was included in the submissions, but it has been great to find a similar crowd of folks pushing back against the ever tightening grip of technology.
10 AOM Posts
I’ve been reading Brett McKay’s Art of Manliness blog since I was in my 30’s. It’s steadily provided a huge amount of honest and actionable information to help me live a better life. I recently found this old post in the archives where Brett lists the 10 posts he’s found most useful to him and they are really worth reading.
Whippets
Finally, I was messing about with slow motion video on my phone and decided to shoot this sequence of my wife’s whippet leaping over the sofa in hot pursuit of her ball. I share it here just because she is mad (the dog not my wife obvs), whippets look odd from underneath, and it made me laugh. I hope you enjoy it too. We should all be more whippet!
That’s it for now.
Be kind and live well!
Comments? Insights? Join the discussion or email me.
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