Commonplace

Commonplace #1

A miscelleny of the interesting and the improving

Adam Tinworth

15 Feb 2026 — 2 min read

Clerkenwell in London, on a overcast morning.

Why commonplace?

A commonplace book “contains a collection of significant or well-known passages that have been copied and organized in some way, often under topical or thematic headings, in order to serve as a memory aid or reference for the compiler” (Harvard University Libraries).

[Source]

About blogging

Robert Birming

There’s so much more to blogging than just writing posts.
It’s a way to learn more about yourself and others. It puts things into perspective. It’s hard to beat as a creative outlet, in so many different ways.

How badgers created a 35-mile detour

It’s terrifying to think what they could do if they united with the mushrooms and the snakes.

Tom Cox’s writing routine

Inspirational stuff:

If you are like me you will discover that there’s a particular fizzing inspiration that needs to be bottled at this time of the day, lest it leak away. My own method is to squeeze it straight out of my pores into the jars from my fridge I save after I have scraped them clean of the chutneys and pestos they were made for. I then label these with my beloved Dymo Labelwriter 360. I am rather specific about the labelling because I place a high value on accuracy, and I always give the inspiration a star rating out of five. More recently I have started to permit half and quarter stars, which gives room for the greater nuance and self-criticism that I increasingly pride myself on. I have also taken the precaution of making the lettering bigger since the night in 1997 that Barbara Kingsolver stayed here, got up even earlier than me and, having mistaken the contents of one of the jars for homemade lemon curd, spread it liberally on three pieces of sourdough then immediately went home and wrote The Poisonwood Bible.

The perfect antidote to the tech bro hustle nonsense.

Empathy (selective)

Manton Reece:

I think I’ve figured something out that has been nagging at me for a year. Some people are only selectively empathetic. This sounds fine if you are “on their side”, so it’s easy to miss unless you look closer.

Obviously, not a plea for universal acceptance, just a realisation that some people are drawing their circles of empathy too tightly.