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Grimmer Fairytales: Clever Gretel

In which a cook proves that perfection and wine rarely mix.A reworking of the classic tale by the Brothers Grimm. Gretel was a good cook. All good cooks, she reasoned, drank a little wine while they worked.How much had she drunk already — three? Four? She couldn’t remember. But what did it matter? Efficiency was the key. Why waste time filling glasses when you could just drink straight from the…

Grimmer Fairytales: Clever Gretel

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Redesigning My Writing Setup: Sofa, So Good

Redesigning My Writing Setup: Sofa, So Good

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Grimmer Fairytales: The Mouse, the Bird, and the Sausage

A tale of teamwork, tea, and terrible ideas.A reworking of the classic tale by the Brothers Grimm. Once upon a time, a mouse, a bird, and a sausage lived together in a little cottage.Each had their daily duty: The bird fetched the scones,The mouse brewed the tea,And the sausage rolled about in the jam and cream until everything was extra buttery. So their household was content. But one day,…

Grimmer Fairytales: The Mouse, the Bird, and the Sausage

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You don't know what you don't know—so how can you know? When I started writing, I didn't know what a good environment would look like. So I didn't overthink it. I just started, iterated, and each version taught me what I actually wanted. This is how you find a good solution when you don't know what that even looks like.

The Hill Climb Method of Writing

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Flat-sharing is never easy. Especially when your housemate is a cat. And you’re a mouse. Shared meals. Monopoly. Trust. Betrayal. Some partnerships just aren’t built to last.

Grimmer Fairytales: The Cat and the Mouse in Partnership

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How much preparation is too much? I used to pack for every possible race-day disaster. Spare wheels. Tools. A backup plan for my backup plan. Then one day, I realised: none of it helped. It wasn’t preparation. It was just… faff. This is a story about overthinking, under-trusting — and what happens when you learn to leave that weight behind.

The Faff Paradox: When Preparation Becomes Friction

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You think you know the story of Rumpelstiltskin? The spinning, the straw, the baby, the name? That’s not this version. This one’s about bad demands, good deals, and a girl who out-negotiates a goblin. (Also: there are weird songs. Very weird songs.)

Grimmer Fairytales: Rumpelstiltskin

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We all know what art is, right? A painting in a gallery. A sculpture in a square. Something profound made by someone in a turtleneck. At least, that’s what I thought. Then I solved my fridge magnet problem… and started wondering: is this art? And if it is — does that make me an artist? If so, then I think anyone could do it. I reverse-engineered the algorithm I followed. This is how I did it — and how you could do the same thing too.

How I Might Have Accidentally Become an Artist (And How You Can Too)

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Have you ever read the Grimm’s fairy tales? They’re like a fever dream. They skip bits. They end abruptly. Sometimes a sausage dies for no reason. The stories barely make sense — but some images stuck. A poisoned apple. A glass slipper. A house made of cake. This is why I’m rewriting them — and what I’m trying to hold on to.

Once Upon a Stranger Time: The Grimmer Fairytales

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This started as a project about fridge magnets. But really, it’s about what happens when an idea grabs hold—when you don’t know the final shape, only that you have to keep going. It’s a story of obsession, creative persistence, and how sometimes you only see the full picture when the final tile slides into place—and you finally step back.

I Tried to 3D Print Fridge Magnets. It Spiralled Into Non-Repeating Chaos

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When I first rode the Oxford chaingang, I got dropped in the rain and finished last. I loved it anyway—and I never got dropped again. Over time I found a way to win, week after week, on the same stretch of road. Everyone knew what was coming, but no one figured out how to stop it. This is a story about winning, strategy, and changing the game.

Breaking the Chaingang

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How do you get really good at something? I don’t think it’s perfection. Or talent. I tried, failed, learned, and tried again. When it worked, I moved on — and did the next thing a bit better. This is my manifesto for “That’ll-Do-ism”: the quietly powerful art of momentum, imperfection, and making progress anyway.

That’ll-Do-ism: A Manifesto for Good-Enough Creativity

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500km. Eight days. One tyre explosion. This is how I tackled the Festive 500 — and what it means to push through when things feel impossible.

The Festive 500: Cold Legs, Cracked Tyres, and Christmas Magic

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I’ve been writing a series of short “Scrum Fables” — lighthearted stories that use talking animals, ridiculous situations, and a bit of satire to explore workplace dynamics. This one is about monopolies, bad product decisions, and what happens when a company decides it knows better than its customers… right up until reality disagrees. No spoilers — but Dunwell doesn’t take corporate nonsense lying down. Here’s Scrum Fables: The Biscuits Are Yours.

Scrum Fables: The Biscuits Are Yours

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The Hug That Already Knew

Some evenings need words. Some need soup. And some just need a hug that already knows. It was winter, and the evenings came early.Snow still clung to the edges of the windowsill when Fluffytail came home from work, brushing cold off their red fur, leaving tiny flakes melting on the floorboards. Barney was in the kitchen, making dinner. The room smelled of freshly baked bread. The soup burped…

The Hug That Already Knew

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Scrum Fables: It’s a Wonderful Lemonade Fountain

When life gives you lemons… vaporise them. It was the day of the Summer Fête.The teams from Yolotown and Dunwell had been tasked with creating a lemonade refreshment solution. Dunwell went first. The snail pressed a brass button, and a clockwork mechanism whirred into life. A thin jet of lemonade squirted out the top, forming an elegant little fountain. The lemonade trickled into a carved…

Scrum Fables: It’s a Wonderful Lemonade Fountain

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Scrum Fables: The Parsnip Lecture

Sometimes wisdom comes in the shape of a root vegetable. The turtle was teaching his monthly cooking evening class. “Welcome, everyone. Today we are making soup.” Everyone stood at a cooking station, ready to start chopping. “Soup’s like a story,” he began. “Start with your base — onions, garlic — let them speak before the others arrive. Simmer gently; if it’s boiling, it’s angry. And treat…

Scrum Fables: The Parsnip Lecture