Rob Cook
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robgcook.bsky.social
Rob Cook
@robgcook.bsky.social
Slightly older than Sgt Pepper, slightly younger than Milton Keynes. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🇮🇪. Dad. Registered Nurse. Minimally published unit. Variegated dilettante.
I just watched Nolan’s TENET again and it’s still definitely either ✅✅✅✅✅ or ✅⬛️⬛️⬛️⬛️.

But I haven’t made up my mind yet, and it could go either way.
February 4, 2026 at 12:21 PM
Reposted by Rob Cook
Banned Wikipedia entry from 2027: The former democracy known as the United States of America lasted for 250 years, fewer than four lifetimes. Long after the end, residents would still describe themselves as living in a democracy, and as part of, even leaders of, ‘the free world’.
Trump, in an Escalation, Calls for Republicans to ‘Nationalize’ Elections
www.nytimes.com
February 3, 2026 at 8:06 AM
Bahahahahahahahahahahahaha
February 3, 2026 at 5:34 AM
I just found out James Sallis died a few days ago, and so now seems like the time I was saving these for 🖤
February 1, 2026 at 6:26 AM
Read in January. I’m not a speedy reader, so no, it’s not many. Definite running theme of freedom vs various kinds of tyranny. And each one has led, inevitably, to a purchase: Marlowe’s plays, Arendt’s less obvious works, more Simenon (in *those* covers, not the ugly new ones), and Sanderson’s next.
January 31, 2026 at 11:48 AM
Five jobs I’ve had:

Cardboard box folder (pharmacy)
Stockroom helper (WHSmith)
Assistant Manager (Thornton’s)
Hospital porter
Registered Nurse
Five jobs I’ve had:

Bookshop guy
Videographer
Door-to-door salesman
Tutor/lecturer/research fellow
Writer
Five jobs I've had:
Video store guy
Subway sandwich artist
Pizza hut dish pig
Public servant
Academic
January 29, 2026 at 1:26 PM
@ilhanmn.bsky.social for President. Seriously. In that video alone she shows infinitely more moral courage, integrity, intelligence, and humanity than all Trump’s administration and all his ICE goons, hell the whole damn MAGA cult, put together.

#omar28
REP. OMAR after being attacked with liquid: “We will continue! These fucking assholes are not gonna get away with this! Here is the reality people like this ugly man don’t understand — we are Minnesota Strong. We’ll stay resilient in the face of whatever they might throw at us.”
January 29, 2026 at 12:24 AM
It’s strangely pleasing how profoundly Freudian this is.
January 28, 2026 at 11:59 PM
So first they want us to believe that the overwhelming evidence is neither overwhelming nor evidence & that the murdered citizen was in fact “lie lie lie”. But now they want us to believe we never heard/read them say “lie lie lie” & that they never even heard/read themselves say “lie lie lie”. Wtaf.
January 27, 2026 at 7:39 AM
I finished this remarkable book by @lyndseystonebri.bsky.social a couple of days ago & its acute prescience is terrifying. It’s a clear-sighted future history of now, written as a character-focused history of then. The sections on how fascism warps reality describe today’s headlines chillingly well.
January 25, 2026 at 4:20 AM
He's actually correct. At a full speed of 21.5 knots it would've taken about 3 minutes. So, he's right, but also stupid.
January 24, 2026 at 3:30 AM
I just watched DÉJÀ VU again, I dunno maybe for about the 6th time? and that movie has me on the edge of my seat *every damn time I watch it* — just as tense and thrilling as it was the first time I saw it. Which, well. You know.
January 23, 2026 at 10:12 AM
@mark-carney.bsky.social is my new favourite world leader. Not that I really had any favourite world leaders before — I mean, it’s a low bar right now, let’s be honest. But Mark Carney’s just set his own bar, at a decently ambitious height, and welded it into place. Just got to hope others follow.
January 21, 2026 at 11:08 AM
I get that the Joint Chiefs didn’t say no to the illegal Venezuelan snatch-&-grab, but surely invading a NATO ally is a wholly different prospect? And by different I mean unthinkable. They have to just say no, don’t they? Or am I being outrageously naive?
January 20, 2026 at 8:52 AM
This book causes serious whiplash to one’s historical consciousness — you’re in the Now, reading a history of Then, but it feels like you’re in the Yet-To-Be reading a history of Now. It also reads like an essential survival manual for the ongoing calamity.
January 19, 2026 at 3:08 AM
When your country gets to a point where its government defines a conspiracy as any individual or body of opinion that doesn’t happen to agree with that government’s actions or policies, then your country is basically f**ked.
January 17, 2026 at 2:25 AM
Reading @lyndseystonebri.bsky.social’s brilliant WE ARE FREE TO CHANGE THE WORLD. Replace ‘Jewishness’ here with ‘Palestinianness’, ‘Somaliness’, ‘Venezualanness’, or ‘pick-your-preferred-racial-stereotype-ness’; after ‘bystander’ add ‘not least because one might get shot in the face’; & hello USA.
January 15, 2026 at 7:42 AM
Portrait of a constipated old bully trying to shit standing up.
January 11, 2026 at 10:47 PM
If an ICE agent coldly executing an innocent woman & the administration flat out lying about it in the face of documentary evidence viewable by every US citizen with a smartphone… if that isn’t the last straw then what the hell is?
January 8, 2026 at 2:12 AM
Reposted by Rob Cook
I don't care if she didn't follow directions; I don't care if she was disrespectful; I don't care if she was noncompliant; I don't care if she spit in his face, called him ugly, and smacked his mom - "immediate execution by the state" was not warranted; jfc, this isn't complicated.
losing my mind at the "she should have followed directions" people

really? really? you're cool with "if you don't follow directions, they get to kill you"? that seems like a good state of affairs to you? that seems like how law enforcement ought to work: instant obeisance or death?
January 7, 2026 at 7:09 PM
Reposted by Rob Cook
losing my mind at the "she should have followed directions" people

really? really? you're cool with "if you don't follow directions, they get to kill you"? that seems like a good state of affairs to you? that seems like how law enforcement ought to work: instant obeisance or death?
January 7, 2026 at 6:25 PM
Covers of this year’s books (as per previous post) [1/2]
December 30, 2025 at 12:34 AM
My RTY pile (Read This Year) for 2025. Fell back in love with fiction thanks to Gwendoline Riley, Claire-Louise Bennett & Olga Ravn. Rediscovered the joy of crime via Seichō Matsumoto. And Maggie Nelson remains essential. (Three books not in the pile because ebooks or out on loan — see next post.)
December 30, 2025 at 12:25 AM
December 23, 2025 at 8:55 AM
Reposted by Rob Cook
My sense is that the “male loneliness crisis” is not really about addressing men’s emotional needs but rather the relatively newfound absence of having someone to perform domestic labor for you quietly in the background now that there is a longer gap between your mother and your wife doing it
December 17, 2025 at 3:48 PM