Tag Archives: Books

GeoSkinner in yellow

Introducing GeoSkinner

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I’ve changed my name! Well, my ‘brand’ and social media handle anyway.

I’ve been ‘FloodSkinner‘ since around 2015 after I change my Twitter handle from ‘CloudSkinner‘. CloudSkinner came about as my PhD was related to clouds and I made the switch as my first post-doc role was related to flooding.

After I left my last academic role and started using FloodSkinner as a catch-all for my personal projects, I considered using a different name. However, logistically it was challenging and my Twitter account had >4,000 followers at that point. I decided against it.

A few years down the line and I am increasingly unhappy with FloodSkinner as a name, or a brand, or whatever it is. It does not accurately capture my range of interests and the things I create and work on.

An example – just 8 out of my 23 YouTube videos on my main channel are about flooding. Just 4 of my 30 Shorts have a flooding theme.

Ultimately, I’ve just had the feeling that the name was inhibiting the growth of my content.

The new brand I am using is GeoSkinner – I am a geographer and a geoscientist, so Geo was the natural choice. I feel it is a much better fit and pretty much all my videos and Shorts feel relevant to the name.

To make the change, I’ve had to: update my logo; change handles on the LinkedIn page, BlueSky, LinkTree, Ko-Fi, and Discord; purchase a new website domain and add it to my website; and update profile pictures all over the place. My Instagram and Threads stay as GeoGamesMaster as GeoSkinner was already taken there.

One things I haven’t done yet is extract my FloodSkinner email account from the places I’ve used it and transfer over to a GeoSkinner one – this is being a bit tricky.

The final thing I’ve done is update my YouTube channels, including rebranding the existing main and Extra Life channels as GeoSkinner.

My 360 videos have never done well on the main channel, they get views but people stop watching very quickly – I guess if you’re pushed a 360 video you are not expecting, you won’t stay long. I’ve started a GeoSkinner 360 channel and moved my existing 360 videos onto it. I also took the chance to collate and upload my previous 360 content onto this one channel.

I feel very happy about the change and hope it makes a positive difference. In the three days before I switched domains this website had 24 views and 81 in the three days after. Now it’s time to make some higher quality content!

Creating a book donation tradition in memory of loved ones.

Creating a Book Donation Tradition in Memory of Loved Ones

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We lost my father-in-law, George, a year ago between Christmas and New Year. He was a good man, into his eighties, who had spent much of his career in the British Civil Service, including the Ministry of Agriculture, Farming and Fisheries.  He had many interesting stories to tell, including how he ended up at Wembley for the 1966 World Cup Final with free tickets as none of his colleagues believed England would reach that far!

George’s passion was for books. He was always reading, was never without a book in his hand, and when asked what he would like for presents we were sent a list of books. He very reluctantly halved the size of his library when he an my mother-in-law, Beverley, downsized and moved to the seaside for their retirement. Beverley still found books hidden in cupboards and drawers.

Left: A table full of books and a photo of George. Right: a smaller pile of books on a table.

This is how we wanted to remember him, so instead of flowers at his funeral we asked people to buy a a children’s book that meant something to them. We arranged with the Primary school he attended to donate them to their library. We were blown away by people’s generosity and we were able to donate over 100 beautiful books!

We continued it again this year but on a smaller scale. With my wife’s family staying with us over Christmas, we visited a local bookshop and each bought a couple of books to donate to a Primary school local to us. I chose some books about neurodiversity because I’d have liked to have read these when I was a kid. We plan on making this an annual tradition. George would have loved sharing his joy of reading with the school kids.

What book would you choose to give to your younger self?

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