In which I go to church and unexpectedly cry
Man Feelings 18 Apr 2025
Last week I went to church. My family brought me and my sisters up as Christians, attending church each Sunday morning and all of us coming to play parts in the various functions of the local parish: kids helping run Sunday School and singing in... keep reading
The old men and the sea
Man Feelings 11 Apr 2025
Killing time with a toddler is mind-bendingly dull. Sure, there are moments of intense beauty and wonder as you revel in your child’s awestruck delight at something as trivial as a cardboard box or the reflection from some coloured glass. You can put on a... keep reading
I'm in love with my friends
Man Feelings 04 Apr 2025
I’m reading a new book at the moment called John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs. It’s about the two famous songwriters and how the music of the Beatles defined their relationship. The popular conception is that John Lennon was the troubled genius whose... keep reading
I love user reviews of online products (and here are some of my faves)
Man Feelings 28 Mar 2025
I’m addicted to user reviews of things. It started many years ago when I was first starting to buy things off Amazon and needed reassurance that the electronic gadget I was planning to purchase would definitely improve my life. I clung to the opinions of... keep reading
On "Adolescence", and feeling angry about how we're failing our kids
Man Feelings 21 Mar 2025
Over the last week or so, I’ve been glued to Netflix and watching Adolescence. If you’ve missed the hype, here’s a quick summary: it’s a four part British drama about Jamie, a 13 year old boy who’s accused of murdering a schoolmate called Katie. As... keep reading
Explaining Pi to a child
Man Feelings 14 Mar 2025
Today is “Pi Day” – 14th March, or 3/14 if you follow the obviously-flawed American standard for expressing dates. As I hinted last week, my son’s school is celebrating today by asking kids to dress up again as “something maths-related”. Thank you, school! At 6.30am... keep reading
Notes on starting a new job
Man Feelings 07 Mar 2025
A new start is a daunting thing. Imagine you’ve just moved house: suddenly you realise you don’t know where the stopcock is and panic that your kids are going to flood the bathroom while you run around fruitlessly yelling “WHERE IS IT”. The first time... keep reading
Stacking pigs and boxes
Man Feelings 28 Feb 2025
My name is Matt and I’m addicted to stacking pigs on top of steel barrels. Let me explain. If you haven’t seen “Styscraper” before, prepare to be… confused. I’ve never been a big video game fan. When I was a kid growing up in rural... keep reading
The trials of half-term with a bored kid
Man Feelings 21 Feb 2025
“Ted, come and look at the monkeys!”, I yell for the third time, unconvincingly. My five year old son remains unmoved, his attention transfixed by a Lego model of a snow leopard. “This one’s from Asia”, I half-heartedly add as he boggles at the plastic... keep reading
Writing about watching paint dry
Man Feelings 14 Feb 2025
It all starts out so promising and precise. Clean, straight lines of green frog tape demarcate the areas to shield from the paint. A bucket of sugar soap solution sits primed and ready to wash the walls clean. Neatly arranged dust sheets are in place... keep reading
Don't crash the hire car
Man Feelings 07 Feb 2025
I’m sitting in an unfamiliar car with my foot glued to the brake pedal, dashboard beeping angrily at me as cars whiz past. I try—for the third time—to put the vehicle into reverse, moving the gearstick to the clearly-indicated “R” position. I gingerly take my... keep reading
LAN feelings
Man Feelings 31 Jan 2025
The room smells like microwaved hotdogs and sweat. Six computer tower units wobble precariously on someone’s mum’s dinner table, fans blasting hot air into the already-thick atmosphere. Cans of knockoff Red Bull litter the table and someone is crouched on their knees trying to find... keep reading
Stuck in limbo
Man Feelings 24 Jan 2025
I’ve spent a lot of time in limbo these past few weeks. I remember learning at university about the concept of “liminality”, which (Wikipedia helpfully tells us) is about: the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of a rite of... keep reading
The inevitable self-destruction of your heroes
Man Feelings 17 Jan 2025
There was a period a decade or so ago where I’d listen to Ryan Adams’ Gold double album on a weekly basis. It’s the perfect blend of Americana, singer-songwriter and rock’n’roll and when I discovered his music I greedily digested it all, constantly returning to... keep reading
Grandmothers are super-heroes
Man Feelings 10 Jan 2025
It’s June 2017 and I’m on a work trip to Belfast – it’s my first time in Northern Ireland and I’m feeling a little lost. The city was beautiful but bruised, and the impromptu history tour we got from a sharp-eyed colleague gave me an... keep reading
I am one hundred per cent Faithful
Man Feelings 03 Jan 2025
The Traitors is on TV again. If you’re a fan of the show and/or already understand the premise, then feel free to skip the next paragraph while I sum it up for everyone else: A few dozen random people go and live in a remote... keep reading
So this is Christmas
Man Feelings 27 Dec 2024
I’m typing this week’s email from a pub table, on my phone, with a roaring log fire while my partner relaxes opposite with a book. Our kids are miles away being entertained by their grandparents, and the only thing I have to worry about today... keep reading
On being made redundant
Man Feelings 20 Dec 2024
A few weeks ago at work, I got called into a short-notice meeting with my boss’s boss. When someone from HR joined the call, I knew something was afoot. Within minutes I was being told that I was “at risk of redundancy”. It’s a funny... keep reading
Eternal London haunts us still
Man Feelings 14 Dec 2024
I’ve been pottering around cyberspace this week as I moved some old websites from one server to another. Midway through my list was a blog I started in 2010 after moving to the capital, which I called “Lessons Learned in London”. It was mainly concerned... keep reading
AI isn't going to take your job – just your joy
Man Feelings 07 Dec 2024
I apologise for the lateness of this week’s issue, normally scheduled for Friday mornings. I wracked my brain to think of a good excuse but wasn’t able to come up with anything convincing, so I asked an AI bot to write some instead: “Sorry it’s... keep reading
The masks we wear
Man Feelings 29 Nov 2024
My new album is out this week – a collection of songs I spent the past year or so writing and recording, then editing and tweaking until I hated each song and never wanted to hear them again. But ignore me, and go listen to... keep reading
In the ancient times before mobile phones
Man Feelings 22 Nov 2024
It’s 2005 and a week before my nineteenth birthday. Mobile phones at the time were still primitive, but if you were creative and had enough time on your hands, you could edit your own ringtone on some Nokia devices, which I successfully used to program... keep reading
Vanity metrics
Man Feelings 15 Nov 2024
Everyone’s a little vain, really. If you’re on social media—and who isn’t—then you’re lying if you claim that you’ve never gleefully checked the Like count on a particularly good post you were proud of. We’ve all been trained, like the proverbial rat in a cage,... keep reading
I will not write about the US presidential election.
Man Feelings 08 Nov 2024
I sat down to write this week’s newsletter with the intention to discuss Trump’s victory. It’s the biggest news story all year and will materially affect the lives of most people reading this for years to come. But you don’t want to hear about this... keep reading
Taking the family on holiday and melting down
Man Feelings 02 Nov 2024
Sorry for the delayed arrival of this week’s Man Feelings. I’ve just got back from a week in Portugal with the family (it’s half term) and I was in no fit state to write an email when we got home on Friday afternoon. The theme... keep reading
Turning the tables on the teacher
Man Feelings 25 Oct 2024
Parenting a school-age kid is a weird experience of confusion, bureaucracy and misinformation. You’re left at the mercy of multiple, non-interoperable IT “platforms” to do things as basic as pay for your kid’s milk, and unable to persuade the child in question to give you... keep reading
Bricks and mortar
Man Feelings 18 Oct 2024
I’ve lived in ten different houses since leaving my family home back in 2005. This averages out at a move almost once a year for the first decade, as I rotated through student houseshares in Leeds and then the London rental shitshow with my partner.... keep reading
Being an influencer is risky business.
Man Feelings 11 Oct 2024
Yesterday evening, just before we started to round the kids up for bed, my five year old son Ted uncharacteristically curled up on the sofa in silence. He sat there hugging his knees while we tidied away the remains of dinner, and it soon became... keep reading
The art of getting lost
Man Feelings 04 Oct 2024
Do you remember the time before Google Maps? The geospatial dark ages, we might call them. If you wanted to travel somewhere in the late 1990s, you could put your faith in primitive online navigation sites like Multimap.com, printing out reams of step-by-step directions which... keep reading
Someone reversed into my car and yet I ended up feeling guilty?
Man Feelings 27 Sep 2024
Maybe I experienced a premonition, or maybe I’m just naturally nosy. Either way, I had a feeling that the van was going to hit my car. Seconds after disaster I think I was expecting a delivery when I noticed the large white van manoeuvring outside... keep reading
40 experiences that define and unite modern men
Man Feelings 21 Sep 2024
The Guardian published an article this week called “The rise of Britishcore: 100 experiences that define and unite modern Britons”. I groaned when I saw the title: as my friend Jon observed: “100 things is a terrible number of things to try to write about... keep reading
Did you ever try making your own magazine as a kid? Some of us never grow out of it, it turns out.
Man Feelings 13 Sep 2024
When I was about ten years old, someone got me and my sister a subscription to a comic each. I got the Beano, she got the Dandy. Each week, we’d trot along to the village newsagent to collect our publication and the ubiquitous “free gift”:... keep reading
A year of Man Feelings
Man Feelings 06 Sep 2024
Welcome to issue #52 of Man Feelings – that’s right, it’s been one whole year since I started writing this newsletter, and incredibly, I’ve not missed a single week. I’ve written and sent this thing while on a family holiday to the Canaries, from a... keep reading
What catching crabs taught me about British society
Man Feelings 30 Aug 2024
“It’s called a devil crab”, the old man told us, plunging his hand into the cloudy bucket. He neatly plucked the crab from its plastic lair and raised it to head height. “Red eyes”, he pointed out helpfully, as the tiny crustacean struggled in his... keep reading
How I tried to be a teenage edgelord
Man Feelings 23 Aug 2024
My five-year-old son has recently started doing things to grab people’s attention. I don’t mean showing off with daredevil feats of physical bravery, or wearing dress-up costumes to public places – he’s been doing that since he was a toddler. No, this is a more... keep reading
Help, I've accidentally taken two kids to a music festival
Man Feelings 16 Aug 2024
As you read this email, I’ll be experiencing the first day of Green Man festival in Bannau Brycheiniog (the region formerly known as the Brecon Beacons) with my partner and two kids. We’ve been three times before, but only once with a child – doing... keep reading
Riots and an argument with a white van man
Man Feelings 09 Aug 2024
I acquired a cargo bike recently for transporting my children. I don’t specifically think of them as baggage, to be clear, but it helps with managing expectations. I was riding on this—large, heavy—bike to collect the five-year-old from summer holiday club earlier this week. The... keep reading
Why I deleted 20,000 of my best (and worst) tweets
Man Feelings 02 Aug 2024
I was an early Twitter user, joining the site in March 2008 and using it as a platform to spout my half-baked opinions, weak attempts at humour and efforts at self-promotion. These days I do that stuff via newsletters. Twitter back then still had something... keep reading
A song for a little bird
Man Feelings 26 Jul 2024
Content warning: this post talks about child loss. Last weekend we celebrated the start of the summer holidays by taking the kids to Center Parcs. If you’re somehow unfamiliar, this is basically middle-class Butlins: overpriced forest cabins with swimming pools, chain restaurants and woodland activities... keep reading
School's out for summer
Man Feelings 19 Jul 2024
Yesterday was the last day of school for my five year old son. I dropped him off that morning along with a couple of his favourite toys, which he was excited to get to take with him for his final day in Reception. My excitement... keep reading
The universal bonding power of ... football?!
Man Feelings 12 Jul 2024
I have a complicated relationship with football. It’s the early 90s and I’m in junior school. We’ve just moved halfway across the country from Merseyside to rural Nottinghamshire and I’m something of a novelty with my Scouse-tinged accent and—crucially—lack of interest in football. The most... keep reading
The righteous vengeance of election defeat
Man Feelings 05 Jul 2024
As you read this email, you’ll know the official results of the UK general election 2024. I’m typing this on the day of voting, but let’s be clear: we already know who the winner is going to be. Or, perhaps: we know who the loser... keep reading
Playing the same video game for 16 years straight
Man Feelings 28 Jun 2024
I’m not much of a gamer. When I started university in 2005, I took with me my recently-acquired Nintendo Gamecube, which was four years old at that point. It replaced my, er, Sega Mega Drive, which was released in the late 1980s. I like games,... keep reading
Being scouted in the pub for movie stardom
Man Feelings 21 Jun 2024
There was a pub we used to drink at when I was on the cusp of 18 (and technically not allowed to be there) called the Old Angel, in the centre of Nottingham. Back then it was a rock/metal pub, though it looks to have... keep reading
What being shat on by a bird taught me about life, or something
Man Feelings 14 Jun 2024
The bird shit landed on my outstretched hand, describing a perfect semicircle of recently-airborne faeces around my fingers. At this late stage of the day I actually found myself laughing at, rather than cursing my unseen avian assailant. Shit happens. It was 6pm this Tuesday... keep reading
Being the youngest person at a gig
Man Feelings 07 Jun 2024
I pulled the ticket out of my pocket and showed it to the worried-looking official standing outside the auditorium doors. “The support act is on right now”, she told me. “You’ll have to wait by the side till the song finishes”. I’d forgotten that this... keep reading
Trying to make gender less of a drag
Man Feelings 31 May 2024
“Only girls like unicorns”, my five-year-old son Ted told me confidently as we walked to the park. He elaborated, explaining the gendered “rules” he had already become aware of in his nine months of full-time school. He’d presumably forgotten about the unicorn bell decorating his... keep reading
Losing the only election I've ever contested
Man Feelings 27 May 2024
I’ve only ever stood in one election in my life, and I didn’t win. It’s 2007 and I’ve just joined the student newspaper at university. A guy I vaguely know from lectures already works on the paper, and he’s standing for the position of Editor... keep reading
Aurora bore: trying to photograph the impossible
Man Feelings 17 May 2024
Every eleven years, the sun’s magnetic field reverses itself, in a process called the solar cycle. The north pole becomes the south pole as the star at the centre of our galaxy completes the biggest flip-reverse it since Blazin’ Squad. Don’t be confused: this isn’t... keep reading
Please stop ringing my doorbell
Man Feelings 11 May 2024
As I’m sure all my subscribers are keenly aware, this year’s Met Gala happened on Monday. All the world’s press and photographers turned out to breathlessly cover the great and good from the worlds of fashion, stage and screen. As I’ve written before, I’m not... keep reading
Testing times: eyes, maternity leave, and hearing your own failings
Man Feelings 05 May 2024
I’m writing this later than usual – apologies to those of you expecting their weekly hit of Man Feelings on Friday. It’s been a busy week! Changes: turn and face the strange Lots has changed in our household: my partner Maddy went back to work... keep reading
Trampolines, making dad friends and the allure of power tools
Man Feelings 26 Apr 2024
It was my son’s fifth birthday this week, which immediately gave me reason to suspect we live in some kind of time paradox: I’ve aged at least ten years in the same period. Kids’ birthday parties at this age are a social minefield: do you... keep reading
The fear of women
Man Feelings 19 Apr 2024
A few days ago I was playing with my ten month old daughter on the sofa. She’s in a very tactile phase and loves grabbing things—typically my glasses—and swinging them around. She reached over and grabbed the TV remote control and happily waved it around... keep reading
The rituals of manhood
Man Feelings 12 Apr 2024
As a man of a certain age, I’ve participated in a few of the rituals of manhood: the stag do, the boys’ weekend, the silent drinking of beer before a funeral (maybe this is a Merseyside thing?). Here’s my take on them. The stag do... keep reading
Naming things is hard – so I surrendered mine
Man Feelings 05 Apr 2024
There are two “hard things” in computer science: cache invalidation, and naming things. After years of experience in software engineering I can vouch for the former, but it’s the latter which is truly hard. In the software world, “naming things” can refer to the challenge... keep reading
What my teenage poetry taught me about being a modern-day man
Man Feelings 29 Mar 2024
Sometimes I find myself digging through my past to figure out who I am in the present. It feels faintly pointless: what can the 37-year-old me learn from my teenage past? I’m a father to two children, with a job, mortgage and partner. My concerns... keep reading
Getting out of my comfort zone in rooms full of beards (and mums)
Man Feelings 22 Mar 2024
On Tuesday this week, a friend I haven’t seen in half a decade was visiting town and got in touch to suggest we grab dinner. He also asked if I was aware of any “folk or trad music night worth checking out – I could... keep reading
Take your kid fishing, they said
Man Feelings 15 Mar 2024
When I was 11 years old, my dad decided to take me fishing. I remember it being a process accompanied by substantial paperwork: we had to go to the local Post Office to purchase my “fishing licence” which would prevent angry bailiffs from insisting we... keep reading
The unbearable lightness of beards
Man Feelings 08 Mar 2024
You can tell a lot about me by the state of my beard. I’ve worn facial hair since my mid-teens, ever since my maths teacher commented on my “bum fluff moustache” when I was 14 and struggling to establish myself as a cool, stylish young... keep reading
Pub banter, sexist movies and the joys of being a dad
Man Feelings 01 Mar 2024
I had half an hour to kill yesterday before a post-work event started, so I popped to a favourite quiet bar for a cheeky pint before it started. It’s a real ale specialist pub so it’s usually full of middle-aged men asking to sample half... keep reading
I think I'm addicted to videos of men living on narrowboats.
Man Feelings 23 Feb 2024
My name is Matt and I’m addicted to watching YouTube video series about men making new lives for themselves on canal boats. I don’t know exactly how or when this addiction started. I remember late one night, perhaps during a covid lockdown, browsing the Amazon... keep reading
In which your narrator gets a stomach bug
Man Feelings 17 Feb 2024
Hello. This man has been feeling, well, sorry for himself. This email is a day late, which isn’t so bad in the grand scheme of newsletters. But most of my week has been a write-off due to a particularly unpleasant stomach bug. It began ominously... keep reading
Welcome to the Hotel California
Man Feelings 09 Feb 2024
Twelve years ago today, I climbed out of a taxi in Menlo Park, California and was greeted by a large billboard featuring the ubiquitous blue thumb of the Facebook logo, whose head office we were there to visit. This was my first experience of visiting... keep reading
Why man caves are actually hugely important
Man Feelings 02 Feb 2024
A “man cave” is a bit embarrassing, isn’t it? There are various other euphemisms for these spaces where men go to escape their wives, hide from the kids, indulge in their nerdy hobbies, or just drink from a secret booze stash and watch questionable YouTube... keep reading
In pursuit of the perfect Tetris grid (and what it taught me about life)
Man Feelings 26 Jan 2024
I remember reading somewhere that playing Tetris could be used to avoid post-traumatic stress disorder. According to research, people who played a game of the famous block-wrangling classic were able to avoid forming painful memories of car accidents if they played within six hours of... keep reading
On sixteen years as a partner: how did I manage to swing this?
Man Feelings 19 Jan 2024
I celebrated sixteen years with my partner Madeleine this week, a number so mind-bogglingly large that we had to count on our fingers to ensure we’d definitely worked it out correctly (look, we’re tired parents). We got together at university when we were 21, and... keep reading
Do you need to know how to drive to be a man?
Man Feelings 12 Jan 2024
When I turned 18 years old, I received a razor in the post. It was a marketing campaign by Gillette to congratulate me on “becoming a man”, even though I’d been shaving for years by the time I opened it. I also seem to remember... keep reading
Why riding a bike with stabilisers is fine, and a Victorian ghost for Christmas
Man Feelings 05 Jan 2024
In the “festive perineum” between Christmas and New Year, there’s a lot of time to kill. Alas, I was in charge of a four year old, whose appetite for sitting down quietly with a book is famously limited. I was desperate, therefore, to encourage him... keep reading
Why that box of old cables you're keeping can go in the bin
Man Feelings 29 Dec 2023
Every man has a drawer or box full of old cables and electronics, right? I hate to stereotype, but I’m also reasonably confident that every man reading this (and let’s be fair, quite a few women too) will have a tangled mess of old USB... keep reading
Why the Bear reminded me that working in kitchens is chaotic yet fun
Man Feelings 22 Dec 2023
We tried watching The Bear at the start of this year after hearing good things, but my partner Maddy got fed up with the intensity of the kitchen scenes and didn’t enjoy it. Fast forward to this week, and the Guardian have named it TV... keep reading
The Invincible Man
Man Feelings 15 Dec 2023
I was getting my hair cut this week and the barber was making small talk as he negotiated my sideburns. We were talking about children and their chaotic injuries, and I mentioned my son’s space hopper/slide injury (see a previous Man Feelings for the full... keep reading
How well dressed are you?
Man Feelings 08 Dec 2023
Before my son started school, he went to nursery on the campus of the University of Birmingham where my partner works. When collecting him I’d sometimes take the scenic walk through campus which was always filled with irritatingly young-looking students having fun with their carefree... keep reading
Jobs for the boys
Man Feelings 01 Dec 2023
A decade or so ago, I got myself into what I believe the youth call “Twitter beef” when I called out a tech conference happening in London with an all-male speaker lineup. I posted a ranty tweet and a blogpost, then went to bed. I... keep reading
Coming out of my cage and I've been doing NOT FINE
Man Feelings 24 Nov 2023
I’ve been flat this week. Struggling to kick a winter cold, which can always be an energy-sapper, and also going a little stir-crazy. I normally work from home for 3 or 4 days per week, and go to the office for the remainder. My company... keep reading
International Men's Day
Man Feelings 19 Nov 2023
It’s my tenth issue of Man Feelings, and I’m very proud of sustaining this thing for ten weeks in a row. Today is also International Men’s Day—yep, you thought it was just a meme, didn’t you?—which is definitely why this newsletter is a couple of... keep reading
Now and then
Man Feelings 10 Nov 2023
I’m a huge Beatles fan. I blame my dad: our family are from Merseyside where the Beatles are even more ubiquitous than everywhere else, and every car journey was accompanied by a blast through the #1s CD (it was quite a lot later in life... keep reading
The woes of being a travelling man
Man Feelings 06 Nov 2023
This is technically last week’s newsletter because I was on holiday in the sunny climes of Tenerife for all of last week. I toyed with trying to write that week’s edition on my phone and send it out on Friday, but found myself chasing a... keep reading
Boys don't cry... but perhaps men should?
Man Feelings 27 Oct 2023
Welcome to the seventh edition of this newsletter – thanks for taking the time to read it. I should take a moment to call out a great comment on a previous edition—Being a “fixer” of problems—by my close friend Tsering. He’s challenged some of my... keep reading
A tale of two teachers
Man Feelings 20 Oct 2023
When I was a teenager, PE lessons at school were the bane of my existence. Never the most sporty kid, I had to line up with the rest of my nerd friends and submit to the ritual humiliation of being sorted into teams to play... keep reading
There's something in the water this week
Man Feelings 13 Oct 2023
Just after I sent out last week’s newsletter, the “Dads ‘n’ Lads” WhatsApp group I’m in sparked into life. Unrelated to my newsletter, one of my close friends shared a Reddit AskMen post with the group to ask for our thoughts on the male loneliness... keep reading
Being a “hands-on” dad
Man Feelings 06 Oct 2023
Walking to the train station in Manchester city centre this morning, I saw a little boy of about four years old riding a tiny bike towards me, followed by a dad also on a bike. I smiled to see them, and felt a pang of... keep reading
The prerogative to have a little fun
Man Feelings 29 Sep 2023
So last night I went to see Shania Twain. It was my mum’s birthday and she booked the tickets months ago for her partner, my sisters and I to go to a concert together. She reads this newsletter so I’m obliged to say: hello mum!... keep reading
Being a "fixer" of problems
Man Feelings 22 Sep 2023
The difficult second newsletter – thanks to all the new subscribers who are interested in hearing about, well, man feelings. Turns out there are at least a few folks who think this is a good idea, which is equal parts encouraging and daunting. On with... keep reading
This is Man Feelings
Man Feelings 16 Sep 2023
I should begin by crediting my friend Annie for inspiring the creation of this newsletter. A few months ago, I was mouthing off on Twitter—quelle surprise—about the new Caitlin Moran book, What About Men?. I hadn’t actually read the book, but I was enjoying the... keep reading