justing.net
Week Notes No. 36
The holiday season is on.
Stacked surf at Bean Hollow Beach, CA
Almanac / outlook
Rain and clouds a few days this week. Wind on Tuesday. Highs in the 60s, lows in the 40s or 50s. Waning moon in the last quarter of the cycle, so dark nights. King tides with some large waves landing on the coast, take extra care on the beaches. Expect a lighter work week with many people away on holiday and two days of for Christmas and the Eve.
Diurnals
DEC23MON
Yesterday I didn’t find a small size (quart) of egg nog at two different stores that we happened to be grocery shopping at. One was out of all sizes. The other only had half gallon. So, I guess it’s either no egg nog for me, or homemade, or nothing. Might go with nothing.
DEC24TUE
The morning rain was ended, and the sun was out. It was a ruse; a deception to get us far enough from the front door without umbrellas so we could be completely soaked by a remnant shower. And drenched we are. It’s been a long time since I’ve been this wet in the rain.
DEC25WED
Happy Christmas all. A and I continue our usual tradition of going to the beach (see above). One beach is not so busy, the other which has a minuscule parking lot is nearly full. The weather was perfect.
DEC26THU
I had a good catch up with C. We mostly discuss food options for after Christmas. Sounds like making sushi at home might be it, I hope it is delicious!
DEC29SUN
Blissfully empty shopping experience. Everyone must be out of town. If only it could always be like this.
Media
Holiday week, so extra media.
Reading
Books
I read Richard II by Shakespeare. It’s been a long. time. since I read any Shakespeare. It took a deep reading, like transcribing and translating, the first scene to get it. But after that it got a lot easier. I was mostly reading it for the rhetoric choices in the writing. But in order to do that I had to know the context, which means the plot and events, and characters. I think it was mostly good, and actually found the couple of speeches to be rather interesting. Quite dramatic, as one would expect for a play, but good. I’ll probably have to read it again, but if I don’t wait too long it should continue to be understandable.
Also: Act I, Scene 2.
Newsletters
This just in: Zvi on o3, which was announced a couple of weeks ago. Sounds exciting. I’m sure it’s more than just hype. There is, of course, the copyright problem with these things. But also, I’m sure I’m not exploring their potential uses enough. Basically, I think just ask them more questions. Questions you would ask any expert you had access to. Like, if you were a wealthy patron, and could call up any expert on anything to ask them to conversationally explain something, or research something and come back, do that. And just like those experts, they can be wrong, and you have to reason about the responses and integrate what they say into your own model of the world, and think if it makes sense. This is what they offer.
Podcasts
None this week.
YouTube
Buncha Maverick’s stuff. ‘Tis the season. long view, in it, in it 2.
Martijn Doolaard 132 and 133.
Music
- Fat Boy Slim Elevator Music.
- Sofi Tukker DJ Sets: Night We Met and Ultra Europe, and the new Bread album.
- Martin Stürtzer Ambient Night 18
Television
Never Have I Ever S2. Quite moving at moment, I really feel for Devi. Excellent writing and story telling. Can’t wait to see S3.
Brooklyn 99 continues.
Movies
Hocus Pocus (1993): First time seeing it. It was funny, silly. Enjoyed it.
Home Alone (1990): Holds up.
Oblivion (2013): A story from an earlier age. I enjoyed the the bit about (spoiler warning) can Tom Cruise defeat… himself? I think my reaction to it was: this is an old fashioned human victory tale, and it’s all rather pointless. What even makes a good movie anymore.
Knives Out (2019) is a rewatch for me, after Glass Onion a few weeks ago.
Other
Appetites
My current food goals are to get more bean based recipes (I want to start with Frijoles Charros for some reason, but making killer daal is another), and to make better roast chicken than you get at an actually good restaurant. Oh, and to make more of the Japanese recipes because they are light and simple in their constituent parts.
Other things that looked good
Facts or ideas
Debuting next week.
Panics
Internet Shaquille, are you me? Should I be worried about people that are panicking about seed oils?? What precipitated this video?
Quotes
“Stop concentrating on what you hate. Embrace what you enjoy.” (source, but I don’t really recommend this tour through someone’s holiday troubles).
Stray thoughts
A stray thought
Well, conversational search, that might be helpful when memory is only weakly helpful. Edit to add: another example of this.
Email me your unusual holiday traditions.
Posted: in Notes.
Other categories: week notes.
Back references: none.
Tags that connect: [[Brooklyn 99]] Week Notes No. 35; [[Hocus Pocus]] Week Notes No. 35; [[Martijn Doolaard]] What I'm up to this week, Latest Now Page Updates, Latest New Now, Update to Now, Updated Now, Most Up To Date Now Page, The Now is Now, Now Now, Late updated Now, Update to Now, Another Regular Now Update, Update to the Now page, Update to the now page, Now double update, Now update, Now update, Now update, Now update; [[running]] Week Notes No. 38, Week Notes No. 37, Notes for the New Year, Week Notes No. 35, Week Notes No. 32, Week Notes No. 30 and 31, Week Notes No. 29, Week Notes No. 28, Week Notes No. 27, Week Notes No. 26, Week Notes No. 25, What I'm up to this week, Week Notes No. 24, Week Notes No. 23, Week Notes 22, Week Notes 21, Week Notes No. 20.
Tags only on this post: Bean Hollow Beach, Davenport Landing Beach, Fat Boy Slim, Home Alone, Internet Shaquille, Knives Out, Marsh, Mavericks, Never Have I Ever, Oblivion, Richard II, Shakespeare, Sofi Tukker, Zvi Moshowitz.