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September Links

Some interesting stories, thoughts, and ideas i’ve discovered throughout September 2020, rounded-up.

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Scientists Rediscover Rare ‘Singing’ Dogs - I’m not saying I have one in the house already that makes noise when the postman arrives, but i’m not not saying that either.

What Does Everyone See in Jesse Plemons? - From being absolutely the bigest asshole in Breaking Bad to main cast in the recent I’m Thinking of Ending Things and all the supporting roles in between, Jesse Plemons is getting a lot of work. This is an excellent profile on his rise to stardom his confusion thereof. We recently watched him shine in Season 2 of Fargo- he’s definitely an actor worth following.

The Controversial Origins of the Story Behind Mulan - Disney’s recent live action Mulan has been embroiled in delay after delay, pricing concerns, and even social boycott. In this story TIME examine just how faithful (or otherwise) it is to the legend, and if it matters or not (I don’t care for the animated ‘original’ all that much…)

Glitzy SUV Adverts Subverted on 100 Billboards by Guerilla Eco Warriors - ‘Brandalism’ is now both my favourite word and concept of 2020.

What is ‘friluftsliv’? How an idea of outdoor living could help us this winter - While a fireplace, books, and hot chocolate are usually the go-to idea of winter, here’s an alternative suggestion: go outside. Exploring and exercising in nature is a great way to escape mental hell and internet doom, and comes with lots of benefits. Tme to layer up.

What hundreds of American public libraries owe to Carnegie’s disdain for inherited wealth - An excellent article about sharing knowledge via wealth and the sacred comforting aura of the library. Andrew Carnegie built just over 2500 libraries in his lifetime and gave away the majority of his wealth. What a legacy! Take note Bezos and Zuckerberg…

This game of Dungeons & Dragons has been going on for 38 years - We’re only a few months in so only really scratching the surface tbh, but here’s a great story of history inspiring roleplay, the inifinite possibility of the game, and most of all, the comforts of a friend group kept together despite a worldwide pandemic.

The impossibly perfect landing of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1 + 2 - I’ve never skateboarded, but the recent remaster of these games this month have been a long-time coming. These were the games I spent an entire puberty playing and now in 2020 it’s a remake that’s audiovisually perfect. Twenty years later it’s great picking up exactly where I left off, minus (most of) the tantrums.

Stolen books worth £2.5m found under floor of Romanian house - We’re not quite at ‘hiding books under the floorboards’ capacity level here in the house, but an interesting news story about a recent BOOK HEIST with plenty of advice, illegal or otherwise for moving and storing books.

Daily Pics of Chameleon Holding Lego - exactly as it sounds. Now, if only we could get him to actually sort and tidy Lego as well, that would be fantastic.

Video

Caravaggio: Master of Light - Another excellent video from The Nerdwriter, this time examining Caravaggio’s dynamic use of lighting in his works and the cleverness within. His paintings are always bold, brave, and really quite profound; a visionary ahead of his time

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The SS Reoccurring Nightmare - These are the audio logs of Chief Engineer Marrow Pilkinbear of the spacecraft S.S Re-Occurring Nightmare. Some excellent sci-fi narrative v cleverly presented. Give it a listen!

Other

Autumn Feels Film Playlist - With Autumn now here/fast approaching I picked 10 of my favourite films relating to or about the season. Everything starting a bit warm and golden, quickly changing to cold dark nights and reasons to stay inside; Letterboxd rounded-up the most-mentioned from all the site users.

August Links

Some interesting stories, thoughts, and ideas i’ve discovered throughout August, rounded-up.

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Microplastics have moved into virtually every crevice on Earth - this sounds like a horrible nasty plot from a Doctor Who episode, but it’s actually happening right now (and for a while obv given findings), under our noses. Absolutely terrifying stuff.

The Unravelling of America - this is an immensely fascinating read by anthropologist Wade Davis on the formation of the United States, the history there-of, and it’s place now in a post-pandemic post-truth world stage. America now is where it’s been heading for a long time, and it’s a fall that’s happening real-time. Of note, “Trump is less the cause of America’s decline than a product of its descent”. Really recommend giving this a read.

‘We Are the Guinea Pigs’: Hollywood Restarts Its Blockbuster Machine - Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom is probably one of the worst sequels in a while, but it’s interesting reading about the development and filming of it’s upcoming follow-up, and how they’re committed to continue filming safely, despite that whole 2020 Global Pandemic thing.

Fall Guys is Pure Saturday Evening Television After a hundred different first-person shooters, third-person shooters, and even Tetris, the Battle Royale genre finally gets the game it was invented for- I played it for a whole saturday night this month, LOTS of fun.

Bella Mackie: Is It Really A Bad Idea To Give Into Rose-Tinted Nostalgia Right Now? - I can relate to this so much, particularly about “the good old days”, taking things for granted, and honestly, just having happier times in general. 2020 has been incredibly awful- this year more than any other has just made me thankful for everything I do have.

The Matrix as a Trans Allegory - I haven’t seen The Matrix in a decade plus, but here’s a great Twitter thread by Netflix breaking down the connection between the cyber sci-fi action film and some of the transgender themes that it contains, compiling lots of links to supporting pieces in the process. Rewatch due soon.

What Dungeons and Dragons Taught Me About Politics - D&D is a game all about rolling for success, correct dialogue choices, and working well as a party, so this is an apt comparison. Travelling to Barnard Castle and rolling for an Intelligence Saving Throw isn’t something I remember in my adventure, however…

Get Happier by Rereading Your Favourite Books from Childhood - 2020 has been hellish. I’ve still got a massive backlog of both children and now adult books to catch up-on, but dipping in to familiar favourites in any media can be comforting. I rewatched a lot of my favourite films in lockdown.

Is It Possible To Have A Healthy Relationship With Social Media? - Why is disabling social media or leaving your phone at home so hard to do? I’ve been very guilty of doomscrolling these last few months, and some of these tips really helped me. It’s good to switch off.

Video

“This Is...” A Personal Ode to Going to the Cinema by Matthew Mulcahy/Little White Lies is a lovely short full of cinematic nostalgia and the memories created from cinema trips. I haven’t seen many of the films in the video so my own one would be quite different, but the sentiment here resonated with me a lot.

How a Last of Us Part II Level is Made - The Last of Us Part 2 is probably my game of the year, and narratively, one of my favourite stories ever. This is a great video by the always excellent Game Maker’s Toolkit/Mark Brown examing some of the environmental design and development. [SPOILERS]

The Batman - DC FanDome Teaser - You know, maybe it is time DC branched out a bit with their films and roster of Superheroes, but when there’s still so many possible interesting stories/casting/and set-pieces yet to happen, maybe more Batman isn’t necessarily a bad thing. This trailer really nails the character.

Audio

Kermode on Film: Christopher Nolan Special - my favourite film critic discussing films by my (probably?) favourite film director. This is a big two and a half hour ranking of every film directed by Christopher Nolan with lots of interesting consideration and discussion about each one. My favourite, still, is The Prestige.

2020 Best Of - Just a very loose WIP playlist on Spotify of my favourite music this year so far: i’m going to add stuff as I discover it!

Other

Would You Search Through The Lonely Earth For Me - a one page, one player, journalling rpg, that focusses less on the quest and the adventurer and more on the treasure or artefact itself. I’m hoping to play a lot of solo-RPGs over September to get something creative going, this one is probably going to be the foundation.

Ailpol on Instagram - i’d be remiss if I didn’t link this, but my partner has been working hard and posting a lot of really great art on her instagram recently, go have a look!

Always Love (write.as/richardam/)

On it’s website, write.as describes itself as “A place for focussed writing…with no distractions to interupt your creative flow”. It’s a personal space for writing and publishing away from all the noise of social-media that immediately reminded me a lot of early days Tumblr, with it’s minimalism and customisation. Simpler times. Through recommendation, as creative writing practice, and as a result of recent ongoing meh-ntal health problems, I decided to sign up and give it a shot.

It feels odd doing so and even starting it as another blog effort because while I plan to natter away and be very much here, there’s an opportunity to do something different there as well. My thinking is it’s going to be (mostly) daily updates and a log full of positive ideas, happy feelings, and good memories. Just optimism. Always love, like the title suggests. You know, the stuff the internet doesn’t *really* favour. Obviously with 2020 in full effect it’s been doom after doom, so I’ve enjoyed trying to pick out some pleasant experiences and thoughts each day, and reminisce accordingly. What is happiness? Well, it’s hopefully a collection of some of these concepts. As a project I’m not sure how long i’m planning to run it, but if anyone wants to check it out or follow for some vibes (ugh?) give it a look. It’s all a bit experimental and looser than what i’m hoping to do here, but I like that sketchbook feeling of it, and crucially, I’m finding it helping with both the mental health and creative sides of things at the moment.