🎵 The song for this post is Corazón / Death By Disco , by TOKiMONSTA 🎵 In a group chat, Saurya shared an article on "high IQ groups" like Mensa (and why they frequently fail), which got me thinking about intelligence. I think it's important to have shared context when using language with someone: if I'm talking about horses, it really matters that we both have an idea of what a "horse" is. But…
🎵 The song for this post is Nonsense , by Sabrina Carpenter. 🎵 I saw Thunderbolts yesterday. Here are a bunch of reactions I had. First section contains no spoilers, second is spoilertacular, be warned! (see other art crits if you like me reacting to art) Table of Contents No spoilers Why did I watch this? The Disney franchise "B-Team hypothesis" Bonus: reaction to a poster outside the theatre…
🎵 The song for this post is The Cleaner , by Orgone. 🎵 I saw Fat Ham at SF Playhouse about a week ago. I won't talk too much about it, other than that I really enjoyed it, and if you're in SF, consider seeing it. SF Playhouse describes Fat Ham as Critically acclaimed playwright James Ijames reinvents Shakespeare’s masterpiece with his outrageously funny Pulitzer winner Fat Ham. Juicy is a queer,…
🎵 The song for this post is イイナヅケブルー , by Charisma.com. 🎵 My niece and nephew goign ham on Mario Kart. "On Pablo Day, you can do anything you want!" I was prepared for cooking something, going to the park, a sports event, drawing... they usually just want to play Tio Pablo's video games. Hillel wrote a post I really like for April Cools, on "gamer games for non-gamers": The video game industry…
🎵 The song for this post is Sing Along , by Sturgill Simpson. The song and video absolutely slap 🎵 I don't consider myself much of a "gamer"; it feels like an indulgence to play for any real amount of time. I don't keep up with new releases. Apart from the Switch, I haven't owned a console since the Gamecube. And yet: through dating, and being an uncle to kids, I've watched people hold a…
🎵 The song for last year is vampire , by Olivia Rodrigo. 🎵 --> 🎵 The song for the next year is Bella Ciao de Libertad , by "La Sonora Yarana" (it's for a video game, I don't think the real band is credited, unfortunately) 🎵 Table of Contents Opening words Sapo (~2012 - 2024) Asia (🇸🇬 / 🇮🇩 / 🇹🇭 / 🇻🇳 / 🇯🇵) Writing and blogging, again Languages Rapid-fire Dating Work, kinda Festivals,…
🎵 The song for this post is Sabor a Mi , performed by Eydie Gorme and Los Panchos. 🎵 My buddy Noah started blogging about his favorite books, and the joy is contagious. My art crits this year have been pieces I recently finished consuming, not historical favorites. I got the urge to finally write that love letter to Celeste. I've written a paragraph or two about it before, but 6 years in, this…
🎵 The song for this post is The Concept of Love , by Hideki Naganuma. 🎵 --> 🎵 The song for this post is vampire , by Olivia Rodrigo. 🎵 Asking questions like "what makes art special?" or "how does art teach us to be human?" is a great way to get frustrated and bother your friends—like Haddaway's question ("What is Love?"), it's deeply interesting, maybe important, but impossible to make headway…
🎵 The song for this post is Love Song (The Cure, Salsa Cover) , by the Williamsburg Salsa Orchestra 🎵 A friend and I read The Vegetarian , by Han Kang. Here are some high-level reactions, and a selection of my quotes + notes in the expandable sections. You can see other deep-dive art reactions at the art_crit tag . Table of Contents Cultural Cavendish bananas: prestige, awards, and safe along…
🎵 The song for this post is I Could Fall In Love , by Selena (it still hurts). 🎵 I treated myself to a movie on Sunday, The Substance . All I had going in was the trailer, which I'm embedding here. If you want to experience it fresh, read no further! Maybe see the trailer like I did. But I'm going to write about its later elements, which surprised me, and that surprise was definitely part of my…
🎵 The song for this post is Ecstatic Vibrations, Totally Transcendent , by Sea Power for the game's OST. 🎵 Disco Elysium is probably the game that's impacted most me since Celeste 6 years ago. I was transfixed for days, and about halfway through I realized I was playing something extremely special. I've got a few big "islands" of reactions, with rapid-fire at the bottom. Light, light spoilers…
🎵 The song for this post is Shape da Future , by Hideki Naganuma. Been obsessed with his work recently. 🎵 Twice, I've been late to Year in Review posts. In 2020, I wrote most of it in January, but only posted in July, because I got a new laptop and was too lazy to port my blogging software . In 2021 , I was so bruised by a breakup, I simply needed more time to find the words and start…
🎵 The song for this post is The Seed , by The Roots (feat. Cody ChesnuTT). 🎵 I read ~10 novels on my Asia trip. Here are my notes and reactions on The Sympathizer . I'm currently reading its follow-up, The Committed. As with other write-ups like this, I'll start with some high-level "islands" that came up most strongly, and at the bottom I'll do a spoilertacular assorted rapid-fire notes.…
🎵 The song for this post is Potential for Anything , by Magnus Pålsson for the game VVVVVV 🎵 What do you do after a surprise, huge hit? How do you follow it up? I think sequels are juicy. I recently played BioShock and BioShock 2 , and a decade ago I played BioShock: Infinite . I'll present a little framework I have for sequels and follow-ups, then use that this framework to talk about…
🎵 The song for this post is Beyond the Sea , by Bobby Darin. 🎵 BioShock is 17 years old. System Shock 2 is even older. It feels silly to say this, but spoiler warnings ahead. If you somehow still plan on playing these games and don't know the major story elements I'll discuss here, it is a major draw of the game and I recommend you come back later. Or proceed reading and play it as spoiled as I…
🎵 The song for this post is Bloody Tears , by Kenichi Matsubara, for Castlevania II: Simon's Quest , arranged for the piano by purpleschala. 🎵 One way to describe the Saw franchise is "gore porn": you have a bunch of non-gore scenes that the audience (and actors) are mostly asleep for, which contain very hammy dialogue to give you the illusion of a plot. Really, we're here for the porn, which in…
🎵 The song for this post is Welcome to Paradise , by Green Day. One of the best drum tracks in rock & roll 🤘. 🎵 It's been about 10 years since I wrote my depression post . It's neat as a personal history document, and I think you could do a lot worse (I've gotten a ton of affirming messages from readers over the years), but I think of The Blues a little differently now. Since August I've heard…
🎵 The song for this post is HYPE , by Glitterati. 🎵 Per the last two years, I decided to have an ornate birthday celebration. While my birthday falls during Burning Man, I like to celebrate externally because most of my friends don't go, and there are some experiences that work better away from the desert. I was pleasantly surprised with how much I loved my new camp and how special they made me…
🎵 The song for this post is Disco Inferno , by The Trammps. 🎵 I'm a few weeks back from the mud, how was Burning Man? The best I've ever experienced it This was my third Burn. If you'd asked me in June, I would have told you I'd sworn them off: my first two times (in 2017 and 2018 ) were with Karen and a camp with whom I had significant value differences. I always came back depleted and…
🎵 The song for this post is Hardware Store , by Weird Al. Truly one of his best. 🎵 Four years ago, I wrote that ML/AI is programming's asbestos : amazing for the applications we're finding, but the long-term effects aren't known and I suspect going to bring a lot more complications than peddlers are willing to admit ( this was hot on the heels of reading a horribly credulous and inaccurate book…