stephenaryan

Real Ale: Heron Porter – Two Roses Brewery

A rich deep scarlet beer with chocolate on the nose and a full round smooth flavour. This 4.2% Porter is one of my favourites from a local Yorkshire brewery, the Two Roses Brewery. So far, it’s definitely in my top 10 porters. At the moment I drink more of this, Ilkley Black (which I coveredContinue reading “Real Ale: Heron Porter – Two Roses Brewery”

Finding Your Voice

Quite a while ago in a previous post I mentioned finding your voice and said it was a topic I would come back to. It’s a difficult thing to talk about, and I’m not in any position to offer advice on the subject, so I’m just going to put down some of my thoughts inContinue reading “Finding Your Voice”

Miserable isn’t Cool

There are lots of good comedy TV shows and films out there, so this doesn’t apply to everything, but in the last seven to ten years or so, there has been a noticeable growth of grim, depressing and gritty output on TV and at the cinema. Now, some of it is distinctly linked to theContinue reading “Miserable isn’t Cool”

Man of Steel

I’ve held off writing a post about this, mostly because I wanted to get some distance from the film, so I could write about it with some perspective. In the end I managed to say everything I wanted to on the latest episode of the Comic Book Outsiders podcast I co-host with Scott Grandison. We’reContinue reading “Man of Steel”

The evolution of MMOs

I’ve been playing computer games at home since they’ve been available. All the way back to the ZX Spectrum 81, which took forever to load, crashed all the time, and was a spaceship of blocks shooting aliens made of other blocks. Not quite Pong, but not far off. Zoom forward a couple of decades andContinue reading “The evolution of MMOs”

Real Ale: Kraftwerk – Revolutions Brewing Company

Mid-brown beer hopped with noble German hops. Medium-bodied, moderate levels of bitterness and a balanced finish. Somewhere between English brown ale and German Alt-Bier. This 4.5% beer comes from the Castleford based, Revolutions Brewery, where they pay homage to music from the analogue age, before digital and downloads. All of the names of their alesContinue reading “Real Ale: Kraftwerk – Revolutions Brewing Company”

Recharged

I’m back from my holiday, feeling refreshed and recharged and ready to face the second half of the year. I saved up some favourite books I’d been holding onto for months, and a couple of new ones, and then spent most of the week lying by a pool, drinking cold beer and reading in theContinue reading “Recharged”

Heroic Scents

Inspired by the recent news that Stan the Man Lee has released his own branded cologne, I thought for a bit of fun it would be nice to come up with branded aftershaves for superhero characters. I’m slightly disappointed Stan Lee’s is not called Excelsior! and it has to have the exclamation mark afterwards becauseContinue reading “Heroic Scents”

Projects Update July 2013

Thought I would just do a quick general post on the projects I’m currently working on. The Novel – The next draft has gone off to my agent for her feedback. I’ve timed it just right so that I can go on holiday in a few days and I won’t spend the entire time pondering,Continue reading “Projects Update July 2013”

Holiday Reads

It’s almost time for my summer holiday so I thought I’d do a quick post on what I’m going to be reading while relaxing by the pool. I’m not a fast reader at all, but when on holiday with few distractions, I can get through about four or five books in a week. So IContinue reading “Holiday Reads”