OPERATIONS: still zero energy, so today is for scriptment – that version of scripting where you just slap down dialogue and vague directions and then go back when you feel human to convert it up into full script. STATUS: two steps from the boneyard READING:A FIELD GUIDE TO REALITY, Joanna Kavenna (UK) (US+)
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The hour of the predator is essentially just a return to normality. The anomaly was the brief period during which we believed that we could curb the bloody quest for power with a system of rules.
Pair that shit with Mark Carney talking about the end of rules-based international order the other week.
I read this short, witty and fairly scary book over Xmas. It’s a series of pen-portraits of autocrats and global political entities – the opening section on how the United Nations doesn’t actually work at all is both funny and horrible, and feels particularly pointed this month.
da Empoli is a longtime political operator and writer who’s been around power a lot. He’s very good at pointing out how political theatre is reflected across history and across the world right now in ways we don’t always see.
A less common occurrence is for a head of state to appear dressed in an outfit of his own invention, made for him by Miss Universe’s stylist. Yet this is what happened when Nayib Bukele, the young president of El Salvador, appeared in an indigo tunic with golden floral motifs embroidered on the cuffs and collar, giving him a look midway between Simón Bolívar and a Star Wars character.
I started to feel a little better yesterday, managed to overextend myself by cleaning out the chicken coop and turning the compost bins, and then got mild food poisoning. I’m ready to lay down on the edge of the property and get eaten by pigs like in DEADWOOD.
I have remembered, for the first time in a week, to do my short stack: 2000mg liposomal nicotinamide riboside with TMG and Pterostilbene, Vit D3 and K2, 1 Floradix for insurance, taken with a bowl of blueberries, blackberries, almonds and honey.
SpaceX shifts focus from Mars to Moon, which seems from here to be about Musk working hard to realign himself with the White House. Also, since the US is all about the Moon in terms of space policy right now, the money is right there, and SpaceX has its eye on ramping to 10,000 launches per annum, largely in pursuit of lofting space-based AI compute. It’s also worth nothing that Japan have now started beaming space-based solar power back to earth via microwave.
PROJECT HAIL MARY trailer. People are saying it contains spoilers. It does not. A trailer for a buddy movie that introduces both buddies does not constitute a spoiler.
Bought myself a leather notebook cover that can contain up to six Field Notes notebooks, from InkitLeather here in the UK.
I also had my eye on the covers from Veyrona, but it looks like they might be winding down.
Additionally, I saw something unusual on MUJI, of all places: a Vietnamese variant on the French chore jacket, long-cut/fingertip-length, in a blend of denim and kapok, which I picked up in a medium grey with matching wide-leg trouser.
I’m wearing a new ribbed grey 100% cotton henley that I picked up for a song from a site that didn’t appear to know they were selling it, under a black Carharrt work shirt I’ve had for a dozen years and which seems to be indestructible, paired with a black Carharrt utility pant. I love workwear and I cannot lie. I fell back in love with clothes a few years back and am enjoying it a lot.
STATUS: siiick READING: A FIELD GUIDE TO REALITY, Joanna Kavenna (UK) (US+) , M SON OF THE CENTURY, Antonio Scurati (UK) (US+) LISTENING: Just discovered Duo Ruut via Night Tracks on Radio 4:
About to switch on the Retro Nano and stream some podcasts from the phone: I deleted hundreds of episodes of stuff from the app that I know I will simply never get to.
Today I feel like I might have hit the midpoint of The Mange, as I feel a little stronger and clearer. Currently deleting some distraction apps and putting the AI devices in a drawer – the Bee can no longer access current information, it tells me, and the Rabbit can’t perform scheduled tasks without a reminder to perform them, which kind of defeats the purpose of scheduling tasks. Currently shopping for new notebook covers – I have a passport-sized Wanderings notebook cover and a newestor leather cover sized for Field Notes notebooks, of which I still have a ton from years of being on the Field Notes subscription service, and I have a feeling I need at least one more of the latter. Although this might also be the year I crack and get myself a Roterfaden. Scriptorium-monk mode!
STATUS: it is time to blitz out my inbox, my RSS feed and my podcast queue. Having to clean-slate everything barely six weeks into the year is not where I thought I’d be. READING: finished THE ART OF WAR, Sun Tzu (UK) (US+) last night. As previously noted, I tend to use winter to read the books I should have read/re-read years ago. LISTENING: Oh my god, this. I discovered Barn Hoppit last night and this is extraordinary:
LAST WATCHED: FIRST BLOOD. There are, as far as I’m concerned, only two Rambo films: FIRST BLOOD and RAMBO.
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.
Day 7 of this appalling plague. Took this yesterday, down at Old Leigh, because I was told it would be good for me to get outside. Reader, it was not. Two hours in the outdoors absolutely burned me out. I sound like a broken bellows today.
I keep having late-night brainwaves that I do not have the energy or time to follow up on, which is driving me mad. Today I’m looking at Beehiiv’s digital products system, as it might be the outflow for all my excess ideas that I’ve been looking for.
OPERATIONS: the simple targets for today are: prepare and send an invoice, and do a little rewriting. I have to punt the other dozen things to tomorrow. The likelihood of achieving those two things is low. STATUS: I can barely see or breathe and I’m in a stupid amount of pain, so nobody should expect me to be interesting or useful today READING: THE ART OF WAR, Sun Tzu (UK) (US+) LISTENING:
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.
There’s a new Shackleton record. I thought he’d retired.
OPERATIONS: managed to get a script out yesterday, need to get 8pp out today, but I suspect the day will get in the way. Had to process some foreign right and film-related stuff last night and follow up on some production schedules. STATUS: apparently I am going out for lunch, presumably so I can infect the outside world with The Death. I’ve ordered a case of beer as therapy. READING: SPIES: THE EPIC INTELLIGENCE WAR BETWEEN EAST AND WEST, Calder Walton (UK) (US+) (this book is going on forever) LISTENING:Monument Waves 008 : Atomic Moog (live) podcast
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.
Still gripped by plague. The weather outside is dismal and has been for days – the garden has become an intractable bog and I have new plants sitting in buckets of water, waiting for the possibility of me having two days without rain and the ability to move without coughing or otherwise dripping.
OPERATIONS: work is for people not drowning in their own fluids STATUS: ded. Less than 7hrs sleep. Inbox 150. Connecting the Retro Nano to the phone and doing podcasts all day. READING:SPIES: THE EPIC INTELLIGENCE WAR BETWEEN EAST AND WEST, Calder Walton (UK) (US+)
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.
Fashion writer/editor Tish Weinstock‘s newsletter is a riot.
There’s nothing like landing in LA to make you realise you’re definitely not as hot as you thought you were. In London, I rarely leave the house unless I’m going to dinner. i.e.under the cloak of darkness and wearing copious amounts of slap. And if, by some freak chance, I am out during the day, I won’t be travelling by foot, which means I’ll never be caught en plein air. But even if I was, because it’s so grey and depressing outside, I find that my wrinkles, bags and jowls tend to be miraculously, mercifully obscured. Well, not in LA, they’re not. Bathed in the golden light of the Chateau Marmont, I was reminded how old I really was: 185.
THE MEDIEVAL DRONE SOCIETY by Laura Cannell arrived and has been on repeat.
OPERATIONS: I did manage to get a foreword written for someone. But, honestly, I’m looking at that grindcore piece and thinking that’s not the worst idea. STATUS: all is plague READING:SPIES: THE EPIC INTELLIGENCE WAR BETWEEN EAST AND WEST, Calder Walton (UK) (US+) LISTENING: Ambient Daily 47 podcast LAST WATCHED: BLOODSPORT. We rarely turn off a JCVD film in this house.
MISSION CONTROL: I can be contacted via the Cheng Caplan Company or Inkwell Management. Link in masthead to join my free newsletter.
“Alfvén waves—plasma waves traveling along Earth’s magnetic field lines—act like an invisible power source, fueling the stunning auroral displays we see in the sky.” Never heard of them before! I love that.
This is a tripwire crossbow. I discovered Will Lord some years ago, when he was on an episode of FIRST MAN OUT, and have been following his work ever since.
FIRST MAN OUT was a show where survival expert Ed Stafford would race against someone with similar skills through some inclement part of the world. The episodes would all follow a similar pattern – Stafford would almost kill himself to win, and his competitor would rock up to the finish line a short time later having had a nice time and usually arriving in some style. I have a memory of Will Lord’s episode featuring him basically whittling a hotel room and dining like a medieval king while Stafford nearly died a couple of times and crawled around in the dark eating ants.
STATUS: went out for a glass of wine and a quick stop at the shops yesterday so of course I have a slight cough and what feels like the beginning of a chest infection today READING: SPIES: THE EPIC INTELLIGENCE WAR BETWEEN EAST AND WEST, Calder Walton (UK) (US+) LISTENING:
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