hiding by the bins.

when i started drinking, all the cool bars had websites.

not big websites, not complicated websites, but useful websites – often scraped together from handwritten html, maybe wordpress or one of the other php catastrophies that i have fonder memories of than they probably deserve.

there was usually a blog, and that blog usually contained information about things happening at the bar; quiz nights, theme nights, club nights, &c. sometimes they even told you what beers were on. the really cool bars made their own tills.

this came to mind because today i tried to go to the nice little gay bar near our flat to read a terrible book. there was a thing on in said bar – a movie night, i think – and so i did what a decade and a half of drinking has taught me and checked the bar's website to see what the movie was.

they do still HAVE a website, and it even tells you a bit about what the bar is, and does, and stands for. it's a squarespace (i think), but that's ok. it's not cool to know html anymore, and they even have a little link you can click that says “what's on this week” that takes you to a page with an image of a poster.

now, dear reader, you'd expect the page that says “what's on this week” to contain what's on this week... but for some reason this week is way back in june. it is nearly november.

it's okay, though. if you look at their instagram, the bar has been dutifully posting the little poster images of what's on this week since june for you to peruse in all their little 4:5 aspect ratio handheld-pocket-computer glory – assuming you have an instagram account, it's logged in on that device, and, and, and...

i don't really know what the point of this blog post was; it doesn't have a snappy punchline, i don't have a solution, and, hell, i can't throw stones – this blog is hosted by write.as because i throw them a chunk of cash every five years and point a domain at it and that allows me to not think about php or hosting or remembering to patch bloody debian or whatever. the website it the root of this domain is a carrd for the same reason.

and i know, this is “old woman yells at cloud”. instagram is how these things are done these days. i don't have a facebook account – i got rid of that in 2014 or so – but for my sins i do maintain an instagram account that i log into from my laptop because the mobile app is absolutely perfectly built to be a dopamine-generating waste of time even when you are just trying to look up what's on at your local bar and the mobile website doesn't fucking work...

but i can't help but mourn.

Servings: 12 yorkshires Cook: 20 minutes

Ingredients

• 2 medium eggs (100g liquid egg)
• 100g flour
• 75g milk
• 75g water
• 20g inexpensive brandy or cognac
• lard, goose fat, or other delicious solid fat

Instructions

1. Whisk together eggs, milk, and water
2. Slowly introduce flour, whisking until thoroughly combined
3. Allow batter to sit and hydrate – ideally overnight in the fridge, but at least two hours. Let the batter stand for an hour to come up to room temperature before baking.
4. Load a yorkshire pudding tin with a generous amount of fat – enough to comfortably cover the bottom of the tin when melted (approx 1cm cubes of lard, or a teaspoon of goose fat).
5. Preheat oven and tin to 200 C for 10-15 minutes. Make sure the fat is properly piping hot.
6. Just before baking, add the brandy and give the batter a quick stir to combine.
7. QUICKLY fill the tin; approximately halfway per cup. The batter should fizz, sizzle, and spit, as the bottom cooks in the hot fat.
8. Return the tin to the oven and bake for approximately 20 minutes, or until golden brown and delicious.

Notes

For the best results, bake these in the morning, and let them cool – throw them on a baking tray into a 180 degree oven for 5 minutes to reheat right before serving. They’ll be even crispier!

This recipe works really well with frozen chopped parsley (blend parsley leaves in food processor, into freezer bag, use directly from frozen).

Servings: 4
Prep: 10 minutes
Cook: 20 minutes
Total: 25-30 minutes

Ingredients

• 4 large or 6 medium carrots
• 2 tablespoons salted butter
• 2 tablespoons minced parsley (fresh or frozen)
• flakey finishing salt and freshly ground pepper (to taste)

Instructions

1. Peel your carrots, cut off the ends and slice into 5-10mm slices on a heavy bias
2. Heat the butter in a stainless steel pan over medium-high heat. When hot (the butter should be starting to fizz) add the carrot slices and a big pinch of sea salt.
3. Cook for about 15-20 minutes, stirring as needed until the carrots are tender and starting to brown.
4. Right before serving, add the parsley, mix it all together and serve right away.
5. Season with additional pepper at the table if needed.

It's my blog, I'll post recipes on it if I want to.

I wrote this a few years ago as a quick guide for somebody who'd been thrown into running racks to cover for someone who'd been taken ill at short notice. I revised it earlier this year, and then somebody asked about it this week so I'm sticking it on the blog.

do not panic! here's my five minute cheat sheet:

MAKE SURE YOU'VE HIT PANEL ENABLE SO THE RACKS WORK TO CONTROL THE CAMERA!

1) Iris fully closed (that's the joystick, pull it all the way towards you) 
2) Pedestal (that's the twisty bit at the bottom of the joystick) to so the luma hits the black ref line on the waveform monitor
3) run auto black balance
4) verify auto black on vector, make sure you have no colour cast
5) open iris, get camera op to find a white thing (or use a chip chart/white card/the other side of your backfocus target if you're lucky)
6) iris to hit 70% video luminance on the scope
7) auto white
8) verify white on vector, again make sure no colour cast

now all your cameras look the same, which is 80% of the battle when you're inexperienced.

target about 70% luma for faces etc, expose with the iris and mostly leave the ped alone to start with

other important things: if the camera has dead pixel compensation, run it every time you set the cameras up (with a bunch of cameras, this happens automatically when you auto black)

Portrush, 2025

A few words about this one...

This is one of the biggest pieces of television I've had the privilege of working on, as well as the biggest scopes of work I've been responsible for.

Fifty-one outgoing vision paths, two remote productions, world feed TX, and some unilateral feeds as well.

TV is cool.

Sheffield, 2025

Manchester, 2025