With Christmas and New Year just around the corner, this is my final post of 2024. It’s been an interesting—but certainly not the best—year.

I’ve always thought of myself as coming from Irish roots. I never questioned it. My family are Doyles. Doyles were Irish. So, my roots were in Ireland. Except they’re not.

I don’t know whether it’s been a reaction to post-Musk Twitter from the people I read and talk with on Mastodon, but there seems to be a renewed interest in personal websites and hosting one’s own content.

The spectacle of yet another Tory leadership campaign—this time to replace Boris Johnson—is in full swing. So, I thought it would be fun to rank the hopefuls’ campaign catchphrases. The results may shock you.

I’ve been a paying member of YesCymru for the past year, because I believe that Wales would have a better future as an independent nation. At the very least, people who live in Wales deserve a vote on independence. I have thoughts about the YesCymru message and how they can make a better case for independence.

“I’ve got an idea,” I said as Sue and I sat on beach outside Perth in Western Australia. “Why don’t we move to Australia for a couple of years? We love it here and it would be an adventure.”

Let me start this list of my top five country music albums of 2015 with a confession. Although country’s been by far my most listened to genre again this year, I haven’t listened to it as much as I have the past few years. In the latter part of the year, I’ve taken several musical diversions. The last one’s been Electric Light Orchestra, a band that I’ve loved since my teens. But, with the possible exception of their Wild West Hero, they couldn’t be further from county.

I know that my taste in country music’s mainstream. Mainstream enough that some country aficionados might criticise my ‘this Englishman’s’ lists for not straying far enough from the top of the country charts. The truth is, I like catchy country pop, and while next year I will try harder to discover music that’s further from the stereotypical southern dirt road, this year I’m happy to listen to songs about beer, cut-off jeans and cowboy boots, fishing in lakes and trucks and tractors.

I’ve been over the moon with messages of support and offers of help for Geek Mental Help Week. I’m going to write personally to everyone who offered to design and build the website

Like, I guess, everyone else, I now know more about ALS than I did before the Ice Bucket Challenge. The campaign has been hugely successful, has raised awareness and ten times more money than was raised last year to help combat the disease. Of course charity didn’t start and doesn’t end with the Ice Bucket Challenge and so my friend Paul Boag challenged me, Rachel Andrew and Carl Smith to:

When Sue and I were a young couple with a four year old boy, we didn’t get the chance to go out very much. An evening meal while a babysitter watched our son Alex was a rare treat.

Last November I switched from a 13" MacBook Air to the equivalent MacBook Pro with a retina display. How does that feel?

It’s once again that time of year when almost every web designer, developer, podcaster and bottle washer that you follow on Twitter is asking you to vote for them in the annual Net Awards. Well, if you can’t beat’em, join’em.

I won’t blame you if you didn’t read it, but a couple of Septembers ago I wrote something personal about my name, how it made me feel, why I changed it and then regretted it ever since. You can read it now if you like, but the general gist is that being called Andrew when I was young reminded me of something I was missing and that made me terribly sad. So I asked everyone to call me Andy instead, and they did that for the next thirty-five years.

Related to my This Englishman’s top five country music albums of 2013, Alex sent me a link to this, on YouTube, Grady Smith’s ‘Why Country Music Was Awful in 2013.’

This time last year I didn’t feel much like sharing, so went without a run down of top country music albums of 2012. Looking back now, that was probably a wise choice as the musical year seemed epitomised by Lionel Ritchie, yes ‘that’ Lionel Ritchie’s truly, truly terrible Tuskegee. No link because, ‘Sail On!’

And here’s what happened:

A 64Gb first generation iPad sits by my desk. I bought it on the first day they were available in the US and, like many people I suppose, using it has changed what and how I design.

Here’s something personal I wrote for the Pastry Box Project today:

Remember “MICKY,” the world’s cleverest CHIMPANZEE? Of course you do. Well now, thanks to renowned Liverpool historian Ken Pye, I’ve finally seen a photograph of Micky:

Before she died at the fantastic age of 98, my Nana gave me her boxes of family photographs. She knew I value family histories and would keep her things safe. I’m in the process of organising them and in one box I found a tourism brochure from Liverpool from around 1938/39. In it, an advertisement, for Liverpool Zoological Park caught my interest. In particular, “MICKY,” the world’s cleverest CHIMPANZEE.

More about Micky the world’s cleverest chimpanzee. I’ve ed several parts:

I’ve turned into a country music nut. What a started as downloading Dolly albums for a road trip has turned into real enthusiasm. Although I look terrible in a cowboy hat and don’t know the difference between a’coon dog and a corn dog, lately I’ve listened to little else. We could disagree about what classes as real country — Cough. Taylor Swift — but all I really care about is music I like.

In the comments of many web design group interviews, many readers ask for more beards on the panels in particular because, There is no way of discerning how the experience of a bearded designer might differ, simply because there is a complete lack of representation. So, we decided to prepare an article featuring specifically professional bearded designers giving their expert advice.

I’m almost at the end of preparing materials for “Hardboiled Web Design” and soon I’ be writing. To demonstrate various CSS3 properties, I’ve put together an archives page in the demonstration site, “It’s Hardboiled”. That’s where you come in (again).

If you follow me on Twitter, you might know that I've spent the last couple of weeks in San Francisco, recording several DVD titles for New Riders. Most will be available in around three months, but I'm pleased to announce that one, I Can Make You A CSS Zen Master, is available today. Watch the trailer below to find out more.

The end of this week sees web design masterminds, mobsters and even petty criminals heading to Austin for SXSW. It’s like Parkhurst for design geeks.

The end of this next month should see me taking the longest flight of my life; from London to Sydney for Web Directions, then on to Spain for Fundamentos Web. Two conferences, a world apart.

Early one mornin’ while makin’ the rounds I took a shot of cocaine and I shot my woman down I went right home and I went to bed I stuck that lovin’.44 beneath my head Got up next mornin’ and I grabbed that gun Took a shot of cocaine and away I run Made a good…

Even after only the briefest of spells travelling in the USA this year, I became accustomed to those creature comforts that make a travelling designer’s life so much easier.

Driving around Engerlaaand, it’s hard to miss the flags of Saint George flying from buildings and cars. Every second person is sporting a replica shirt and petrol stations are doing a roaring trade in everything from Ferdinand fragrance air-fresheners to…

In today’s Arno Zimmerman episode, Paul Scrivens hones in on the money in’The Nine Rules’. Of all Arno’s contacts, Paul was the only person to name a figure. Arno would have been pleased to pay it too, if only life were so simple.

Being the proud owner of a new PowerMac Book ProMac Book BookPro Mac MacBook Pro with its dinky Apple Remote, I wondered what fun or naughtiness could be had with this (where the hell does the battery go) IR doofer.

With awareness of standards and accessibility being raised by groups such as WaSP, companies and organisations across many sectors have adopted standards. Sometimes their decision to do so might have been commercial, other times out of a need to comply.

In the news this week, three times winner of the Tour De France and occassional web designer Jeffrey Veen announced that MeasureMap has been acquired by Yahoo, AltaVista, Starbucks, Google.

In the news this week, three times winner of the Tour De France and occassional web designer Jeffrey Veen announced that MeasureMap has been aquired by Yahoo, AltaVista, Starbucks, Google.

It was announced yesterday that one of the most influential artists of the British 1960’s art movement, Patrick Caulfied, died on Thursday.

I love my Nano, I want to keep it close, keep it safe. My Nano is so precious, I can’t bear to think of it getting scratched.

Travelling around the London Underground, it is difficult not to notice a series of posters for the British Legion’s Victory Thanks campaign. Among all the advertising for theatres and stores, these Victory Thanks posters stand out as striking and evocative.

Every now and again I pull out the tin and sift through its contents, photographs and other small treasures which my Grandad thought important.

School music teacher: (To class) Who would like to learn a musical instrument? Teacher: What instrument would you like to learn?

Since I delivered my (slightly modified) Anatomy of a Mouse presentation at @media2005, I’ve had time to formalise my thinking about my answer to one of the questions from the audience.

When I reached the studio this morning, (Ed says: Malarkey is always grumpy before 11am. ) there was a mysterious box sitting on my desk. Open the box! shouted the voices in my head, so guess what? I opened the box!

A while ago (when I couldn’t sleep), I sat up late watching re-runs of home decorating shows on UK TVStyle, a channel wall-to-wall with house make-overs.

Some of you may recall that way back in June last year, Stuff and Nonsense grew up, moved away from home and got a place of its own. I wasn’t so sure about the move at the time, but (happily) I was proved wrong and it’s been a good move.

Just like Scrivs announced this week that the CSS Vault has been sold, this site too has a new owner and I’d like to introduce him to you. His name is Malarkey. (Ed: What are you rambling on about now?) OK, I’ll get to the point.

Oh my kiddy aunt, it’s started already. Driving through Warrington yesterday, I caught my first glimpse of the UK Labour Party’s first campaign posters for the up-and-coming (to a church hall near you) General Election.

When I was working (on my own) in the studio between Christmas and New Year, I played the Live Aid DVD which the guys bought me for my birthday.

I’d just finished reading Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman’s Long Way Round book (kindly given by Sue’s Mum for my birthday at the end of November) when the DVD pops into my Christmas stocking (this time, nicely gift wrapped for my brother by Amazon (lazy…

Most recently, Paul Chadwick has recieved much critical acclaim for his work on comic-book movie tie-ins such as Star Wars and the Matrix.

Two of my favourite comic books artists excel in black and white illustration, the first, Frank Miller is better known for his work on Batman: The Dark Knight Returns and more recently, Sin City.

NB: This article refers to a prior version of the WWF UK online store that I designed in 2004. I was pleased to learn yesterday that our work has won the ECMOD 2004 (European Catalogue and Mail Order Days) Best Charity/Good Cause Related Catalogue Award for…

Forget Superman or the Hulk, the Fantastic Four or (God forbid) Captain America! When I was a kid there was only one comic book hero, the mighty Judge Dredd.

We’re back from the south of France, two weeks without the phone, email or MSN. At home, my usual morning routine runs something like this, In France it’s a little bit different; two weeks of,

Time travel. It’s a subject that often keeps me awake at night, pondering… So I thought I’d interview a bunch of bloggers to help me out. Thanks to Brit Packers Andy Budd, Simon Collison, Jon Hicks, Gordon Mackay, Tim Parkin and Richard Rutter.

Over the weekend, I installed iTunes on all the computers in the design studio and centralised our entire CD collection on the server.

Why are certain types of criminals glamorous? Not murderers or muggers, but forgers, safe crackers and con-artists. From the fictional Italian Jobster Charlie Crocker (original, not remake) to the late Great Train Robber, Ronnie Biggs, I see a certain romance…

Working life at Stuff and Nonsense has been very hectic of late, infact there has rarely been a day off in the last twelve months.