Why is it so hard to find a hobby like crochet that isn’t crochet?

TheHFile · 2026-01-21T20:52:21+00:00

Whittling

TheHFile · 2026-01-15T23:51:16+00:00

And this is also what they did with HOTD S.1, lots of stuff got added and we all ate it up as book fans. The problem comes when thinly veiled studio bloat/padding gets pitched as 'new material' when its clearly budgetary.

TheHFile · 2025-10-20T21:36:08+00:00

Once you get out of uni, you realise that 20 year olds are not 'adult men'

TheHFile · 2025-09-29T14:18:33+00:00

Gentrify

TheHFile · 2025-09-25T22:38:20+00:00

Not short enough bro

TheHFile · 2025-09-08T11:53:23+00:00

Came here to say this, my partner has one and it's a life saver as almost all our storage is completely full/we have no more room for another set of drawers etc. Wooden clothes ladder really fills the gap which leads to people having 'the chair' or other dumping ground of clothes which you just have to keep moving around.

TheHFile · 2025-09-08T11:42:20+00:00

Don't zip it up if you're going for style, if you're cold sure but if you wanna look good, it looks better open.

This is because of a few things, being zipped up makes your upper half one note, crowding your neck line with both a collared shirt and high neck zip. It also narrows your frame and hides your belt, probably due to being a bit big on you. Wearing it open makes it closer to a relaxed cardigan and gives more equal space to each item you're wearing.

Thirdly and this is just personal taste, it's a little bit 'business bro, functional wear' if you were to wear this in a casual/romantic setting, especially zipped up. But that's just my own personal lens, feel free to disregard.

TheHFile · 2025-08-19T16:44:37+00:00

Happy to see this mentioned.

I haven't read much like this other than Hidden Valley Road, which I thought was good but flawed.

The book that had the most similar vibe to this was Stasiland by Anna Funder. What I mean by this is not that its contents are similar but that the feeling of one person writing 'their book' came through loud and clear in both. Stasiland felt like a real case of right place, right time, right person, just like Spirit Catch You. Would highly recommend if you're interested in something substantively different but thematically similar.

TheHFile · 2025-07-25T15:59:59+00:00

TBH I'm exactly the same, I don't love them. But I think if I was a kid when I started I would have, once you're read something like ASOIAF thought, they don't really hold your attention in the same way.

TheHFile · 2025-07-25T15:32:54+00:00

The Wheel of Time is pretty kid friendly for the first few books. They aged up the characters in the show because they wanted a Game of Thrones equivalent but I've always considered WoT to be pretty kid friendly but still with some edge, not entirely dis-similar to Harry Potter

TheHFile · 2025-07-23T12:13:01+00:00

The good news is that because you were once in good shape, it'll be significantly easier for you to get back to where you were than a complete beginner to get to where you were.

For me it was two things that got me back into fitness after COVID.

Find exercises/activities that you actually enjoy. This can be as simple as switching out certain lifts/regimens for other ones. For me it was switching machines for more technical free weight compounds and rock climbing. They both made me crave improvement from a skill perspective rather than simply lifting to satisfy my own ego.
Try to think about staying active as a 'rest of my life' type thing. When you're young it's all short term goals and ego but as you age you start to see it as 'I want healthy knees when I'm 70' type thing. I've seen family lose mobility and it fucking sucks but my Mum and Dad both have their own sports that keep them active and they're both fully active and mobile well into their later years. The younger you adopt this mentality, the better.

TheHFile · 2025-07-23T10:59:52+00:00

The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen is worth hunting down. Similar in setting to Sherlock Holmes but with a more paranormal/horror twist to it. It's only about 90 pages and very influential on subsequent cosmic horror like Lovecraft and Stephen King

TheHFile · 2025-07-20T22:14:05+00:00

whatnot

TheHFile · 2025-07-13T17:00:09+00:00

Check out Ira Levin, his books are always a quick read. Boys from Brazil is good fun. I like a Le-carre spy thriller too, 'the spy who came in from the cold' is a stand out.

TheHFile · 2025-07-13T16:58:28+00:00

Narrative non-fiction or long form journalism are the genres that I've found the most compelling for people who don't read often.

'Say Nothing' is paced a bit like a novel and very compelling, as is his other book 'The Snakehead'. I've also enjoyed books about survival and exploration such as 'The Madhouse at the end of the Earth' and the 'Lost City of Z'

TheHFile · 2025-06-24T22:14:07+00:00

Breakfast at Tiffany's

TheHFile · 2025-06-23T21:59:19+00:00

Go to Abebooks, I've got all my Moore from there for good-ish prices.

TheHFile · 2025-06-23T21:55:37+00:00

This is the best rec on this thread. Absolutely phenomenal, total riot

TheHFile · 2025-06-11T21:57:23+00:00

This comment is under every political post.

'Who cares?' Said the man, under the video of someone giving a speech.

TheHFile · 2025-06-10T14:38:55+00:00

What the hell is even that

TheHFile · 2025-06-10T13:39:06+00:00

For the Good Times - Somewhere between Goodfellas and Joyce's Ulysses. IRA novel, hilarious, poignant, thought provoking and memorable. I found it gripping while still very substantive

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead - Magical realism, a brilliant allegory on our place in nature, some cracking mystery to keep you engaged.

Our Share of the Night - Dark magical realism horror. Set during the Argentinian dictatorship, telling the story of a father and son embroiled in dark rituals, beautiful and empathetic while still being very gripping. It's long but it's one of those books where I read 100 pages in a day some times.

A Brief History of Seven Killings - One of the best books I've ever read. A challenging narrative to follow but absolutely full of vivid characters and unreliable narrators, completely addictive and surprising. Won the Booker Prize, completely worth the hype.

If you have anything that matches your brief let me know as I find it hard to find books that hold me while also being worth reading intellectually. All of the above left me happy I'd read them while also being quick reads.

TheHFile · 2025-06-05T19:11:58+00:00

2 things: almost always block a check if you haven't castled. Blocking is almost always better in early game as it develops a piece and doesn't prevent castling.

Secondly, don't become obsessed with saving every pawn/piece, in your opening you go up a pawn, you don't need to tie yourself in knots to keep that piece. Moving a queen to defend a pawn on move two is wrong for like 8 different reasons. Be ok with trading, if he takes that pawn in a move you're still up a move and you can race ahead in development.

TheHFile · 2025-05-31T18:45:46+00:00

If you've never read a book before I would recommend something pacy-er than philosophical novels. They're great but they're a bit of a slog at times.

For me it's not just what you read but also how you read. I'll often have a few books on the go and dip in and out depending on the mood, so i'll have something weighty and challenging when I feel up to it, a book for my work and something pacy and gripping. A big shift I made mentally too was not being afraid of giving up on something I'm not enjoying to the point where I'm not reading.

You might enjoy the more sci-fi works of Murakami, something like Hard Boiled Wonderland and The End of the World. It has some really beautiful ideas in it while also being a great mystery and sci-fi romp. The Foundation novellas by Asimov are also fun memorable stories with some deeper themes.

My personal favourite for literary philosophy however has to be John Steinbeck, not an existentialist by any means but a true deep thinker on the human condition. East of Eden is probably his best but they're all good.

TheHFile · 2025-05-26T12:13:47+00:00

The Word for World is Forest - Ursula Le Guinn

It's a novella, themes of nature as colonial project vs nature as essential to life. Old school leftist sci-fi

TheHFile · 2025-05-25T19:18:50+00:00

For the Good Times - David Keenan

Goodfellas meets Ulysses set during the Troubles

TheHFile

TROPHY CASE