Peter Hewitt
@petehewitt.bsky.social
Opinionated medicinal chemist. Prize-winning photographer. Extremely moderate.
I strongly believe O-rings constitute an affront to logic, to language, and to life itself.
November 21, 2025 at 7:50 PM
I strongly believe O-rings constitute an affront to logic, to language, and to life itself.
Well, I've fixed one peak and made the other slightly worse, and tbh that's not bad for an evening's worth of amateur plumbing.
November 20, 2025 at 10:36 PM
Well, I've fixed one peak and made the other slightly worse, and tbh that's not bad for an evening's worth of amateur plumbing.
This weekend's drink: St Clement's French 75 (3:1:1:0.5:5 gin:simple syrup:orange juice:lemon juice:sparkling wine). Excellent: zingy, fragrant, beautifully balanced, properly grown-up. I think this will be my festive season go-to this year. 8/10
November 16, 2025 at 10:18 AM
This weekend's drink: St Clement's French 75 (3:1:1:0.5:5 gin:simple syrup:orange juice:lemon juice:sparkling wine). Excellent: zingy, fragrant, beautifully balanced, properly grown-up. I think this will be my festive season go-to this year. 8/10
FILM REVIEW: Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, Netflix, 2025). Extraordinarily beautiful realisation, with great casting, marred by the occasional Garth Marenghi moments in the script - "YOU are the monster, Victor, YOU" - and the absurd am-dram saccharine staginess of the final quarter.
November 15, 2025 at 11:24 PM
FILM REVIEW: Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, Netflix, 2025). Extraordinarily beautiful realisation, with great casting, marred by the occasional Garth Marenghi moments in the script - "YOU are the monster, Victor, YOU" - and the absurd am-dram saccharine staginess of the final quarter.
Reposted by Peter Hewitt
(walks into a room, sees a blonde man called Brexit frantically stabbing for four years a twitching near-corpse called British Productivity)
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
The Resolution Foundation should take this as a sign of support from the editor of the Times that they haven't chosen to send out one of their credible, economically rated writers, but someone who's actually run a similarly-redistribution minded think tank, and former Tory candidate to boot
At last, a fearless @thetimes.com enquiry into the Institute of Economic Affairs’ economically disastrous effects and Policy Exchange’s pernicious legacy of division? No, just an attack one of the few think tanks that did not shape Labour’s toxic inheritance.
www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...
www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...
November 15, 2025 at 1:24 PM
(walks into a room, sees a blonde man called Brexit frantically stabbing for four years a twitching near-corpse called British Productivity)
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
"Well, the Resolution Foundation has a *lot* of explaining to do"
Lads the mint is a bit overgrown I think it might be mojitos tonight
November 14, 2025 at 7:26 PM
Lads the mint is a bit overgrown I think it might be mojitos tonight
The continued presence of the forces that gave us Brexit in the first place - the electoral interests of the Conservative Party in a media/social media environment dominated by the hard right, along with the dynamics of FPTP - have also given us the ever-more-extreme purity drive ever since.
Forgive me if I'm wrong, I can't think of a single politician who campaigned hard for Brexit who has since come out and said that they think it was a mistake. Surely, in their heart of hearts, literally one or two of them must know that. So is it that they can't admit it to themselves or just to us?
Read 'em and weep. (www.nber.org/system/files...)
November 14, 2025 at 7:01 PM
The continued presence of the forces that gave us Brexit in the first place - the electoral interests of the Conservative Party in a media/social media environment dominated by the hard right, along with the dynamics of FPTP - have also given us the ever-more-extreme purity drive ever since.
"As of 2020, 75% of American teachers are using three-cueing". This whole topic is... pretty mindblowing, to be honest. Do read the long APM article just down the thread.
ever since I learned about three-cueing I've developed infinitely more patience for replies on social media. mfers literally do not know how to read. people are walking around conjuring random meanings into words they don't know, and they don't know a lot of words. it's crazy
November 11, 2025 at 10:18 PM
"As of 2020, 75% of American teachers are using three-cueing". This whole topic is... pretty mindblowing, to be honest. Do read the long APM article just down the thread.
Counterpoint: no it didn't, you credulous muppets.
November 9, 2025 at 8:39 PM
Counterpoint: no it didn't, you credulous muppets.
I'm not even sorry.
November 8, 2025 at 10:16 PM
I'm not even sorry.
With all due respect to Sam Freedman, it is a serious problem if the governing party is getting its information from Substack (it is of course even worse if they're not even doing that).
Huge numbers of Labour policy spads read @samfr.bsky.social’s Substack, where the exact scale of the repair job was written in black and white. What actually happened is those people were cowed into silence by a set-up that valued polling over policy.
November 8, 2025 at 8:34 PM
With all due respect to Sam Freedman, it is a serious problem if the governing party is getting its information from Substack (it is of course even worse if they're not even doing that).
The greatest accomplishment of American marketing is surely turning a really mediocre oversweet gypsy cream into the world's best-selling biscuit.
November 3, 2025 at 8:46 PM
The greatest accomplishment of American marketing is surely turning a really mediocre oversweet gypsy cream into the world's best-selling biscuit.
Tonight's drinks: French Pearl (2:0.75:0.5:0.25 gin:lime juice:sugar syrup:pastis, shaken with mint leaves). Delicious, fragrant, zingy, lethal; a truly great drink, lacking only the last degree of alchemy that distinguishes the very best. 9/10
October 31, 2025 at 10:40 PM
Tonight's drinks: French Pearl (2:0.75:0.5:0.25 gin:lime juice:sugar syrup:pastis, shaken with mint leaves). Delicious, fragrant, zingy, lethal; a truly great drink, lacking only the last degree of alchemy that distinguishes the very best. 9/10
When forced to choose, the BBC in particular prioritises impartiality over accuracy. This was the crucial insight of Vote Leave, and explains quite a lot of the last decade of British politics.
Also the broadcasters (wrongly) interpret impartiality regulations through the lens of partisan balance. If the governing party just shrugs at insane shit opposition parties say they don't feel they have to include any pushback, it just becomes content fodder.
October 28, 2025 at 8:20 PM
When forced to choose, the BBC in particular prioritises impartiality over accuracy. This was the crucial insight of Vote Leave, and explains quite a lot of the last decade of British politics.
Ah, the "perpetual darkness" half of the year again, marvellous.
October 26, 2025 at 6:31 PM
Ah, the "perpetual darkness" half of the year again, marvellous.
To the Northern Irish eye it is unfortunate that they decided to call their game "ballix pit". www.theverge.com/games/805022...
Ball x Pit is a deep, delightful rabbit hole
Balls everywhere.
www.theverge.com
October 25, 2025 at 4:23 PM
To the Northern Irish eye it is unfortunate that they decided to call their game "ballix pit". www.theverge.com/games/805022...
I can't vouch for the provenance or context or whatever but I can promise you that this is one of the funniest things I've seen for ages.
Oh my god some fucking tech dingdong posted this on Twitter with the caption "AI games are going to be amazing" totally seriously, you have to watch it. You have to. In full screen.
October 24, 2025 at 10:33 PM
I can't vouch for the provenance or context or whatever but I can promise you that this is one of the funniest things I've seen for ages.
Tonight's drinks: Negroni (1:1:1 gin:Campari:vermouth). 10/10, no further discussion needed; and Breakfast Martini (3:1:1:0.5 gin:triple sec:lemon juice:orange marmalade). 7/10, pleasantly sharp and zingy, gin-forward enough to pass as a Martini of sorts, first time trying, will make again.
October 24, 2025 at 8:42 PM
Tonight's drinks: Negroni (1:1:1 gin:Campari:vermouth). 10/10, no further discussion needed; and Breakfast Martini (3:1:1:0.5 gin:triple sec:lemon juice:orange marmalade). 7/10, pleasantly sharp and zingy, gin-forward enough to pass as a Martini of sorts, first time trying, will make again.
Every so often you come across a recording of a piece of music that is *so* good as to render all others of the same work irrelevant. A month ago I discovered the 2006 Leopold Trio / Marc-Andre Hamelin recording of Brahms' G minor piano quartet, which absolutely flattens all alternatives I've heard.
October 17, 2025 at 8:04 PM
Every so often you come across a recording of a piece of music that is *so* good as to render all others of the same work irrelevant. A month ago I discovered the 2006 Leopold Trio / Marc-Andre Hamelin recording of Brahms' G minor piano quartet, which absolutely flattens all alternatives I've heard.
Strong agree. And it's also easy to write off the radicalisation of the terminally online as a fringe concern - the 'every society in history has had a certain proportion hyperfixated on existential threats and thus fascism-sympathetic' view - but I think this underestimates its significance.
So much talk of economics and far right radicalisation but my increasingly view is we are all - myself included - underestimating the impact of both internet culture and (more importantly) the economics of the internet/social media on politics and radicalisation
Last night I heard of another friend of a friend who has been lost to a rabbit hole of online propaganda. We need to start treating this as a serious public health concern.
October 12, 2025 at 9:08 PM
Strong agree. And it's also easy to write off the radicalisation of the terminally online as a fringe concern - the 'every society in history has had a certain proportion hyperfixated on existential threats and thus fascism-sympathetic' view - but I think this underestimates its significance.
Tonight's drinks:
Hugo Spritz: 1.5:1.5:1 prosecco:soda water: elderflower liqueur, generous handful of mint leaves. Floral, fresh, effervescent. 8/10
The Last Laugh: 1:0.6:0.6:0.6:0.6 prosecco: gin: maraschino liqueur: green Chartreuse: lime juice. Delicious & fun Last Word variation. 9/10
Hugo Spritz: 1.5:1.5:1 prosecco:soda water: elderflower liqueur, generous handful of mint leaves. Floral, fresh, effervescent. 8/10
The Last Laugh: 1:0.6:0.6:0.6:0.6 prosecco: gin: maraschino liqueur: green Chartreuse: lime juice. Delicious & fun Last Word variation. 9/10
October 12, 2025 at 8:29 PM
Tonight's drinks:
Hugo Spritz: 1.5:1.5:1 prosecco:soda water: elderflower liqueur, generous handful of mint leaves. Floral, fresh, effervescent. 8/10
The Last Laugh: 1:0.6:0.6:0.6:0.6 prosecco: gin: maraschino liqueur: green Chartreuse: lime juice. Delicious & fun Last Word variation. 9/10
Hugo Spritz: 1.5:1.5:1 prosecco:soda water: elderflower liqueur, generous handful of mint leaves. Floral, fresh, effervescent. 8/10
The Last Laugh: 1:0.6:0.6:0.6:0.6 prosecco: gin: maraschino liqueur: green Chartreuse: lime juice. Delicious & fun Last Word variation. 9/10
I have discovered today that the card game Jack Change It is indigenous to Northern Ireland, and my heart is swelling with patriotic pride like never before.
October 12, 2025 at 12:41 PM
I have discovered today that the card game Jack Change It is indigenous to Northern Ireland, and my heart is swelling with patriotic pride like never before.
When you work in drug discovery there are *so* many ways of hearing you're in for a very bad day.
Efficacy Results Came Back
[competitor] Patent Just Published
Batch Two Looks Inactive
Every Example Has hERG
Literature Compound Isn't Working
The Cells Died... Again
Hits Everything In Selectivity
Efficacy Results Came Back
[competitor] Patent Just Published
Batch Two Looks Inactive
Every Example Has hERG
Literature Compound Isn't Working
The Cells Died... Again
Hits Everything In Selectivity
In honour of spooky month, share a 4 word horror story that only someone in your profession would understand.
rm -rf ~/
rm -rf ~/
"The chancellor approved it"
October 12, 2025 at 12:04 PM
When you work in drug discovery there are *so* many ways of hearing you're in for a very bad day.
Efficacy Results Came Back
[competitor] Patent Just Published
Batch Two Looks Inactive
Every Example Has hERG
Literature Compound Isn't Working
The Cells Died... Again
Hits Everything In Selectivity
Efficacy Results Came Back
[competitor] Patent Just Published
Batch Two Looks Inactive
Every Example Has hERG
Literature Compound Isn't Working
The Cells Died... Again
Hits Everything In Selectivity
Accidentally left my Garmin charger at work so I think I shall be having an off-grid run today. The prospect of not being measured or judged is actually quite liberating to be honest.
October 12, 2025 at 11:30 AM
Accidentally left my Garmin charger at work so I think I shall be having an off-grid run today. The prospect of not being measured or judged is actually quite liberating to be honest.