This week’s written snapshots.
Feathery felines followed fluffy flamingos for finding forbidden fluffy fortunes for fleecing fishy ferrets.
As she was heading to bedtime, the girl handed me Daddy Bear.
In the morning I found him on the floor next to my bed.
I tucked him back in bed for extra rest before starting my morning.
10 Jun 2023
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OPM.44 Asking earnestly
Before the shutdowns started three years ago, my wife watched COVID march towards our shores while our nation reacted in slow motion. Coincidentally, my in-law’s tenants gave up their lease, so I moved into the vacant house.
I spent a few months as a bachelor, waiting for America to shut down and then finishing an intensive period of budgeting site visits before reuniting with my family.
Having a spare house to exile oneself was the height of privilege, but that didn’t make it any easier.
Even though my boss took a relaxed approach to the insanity (he started Doordashing to break up the monotony), he went out of his way to ask how I was doing. He checked in to ask how I was doing with the self imposed separation from my family.
That meant the world to me, he understood our concerns and treated it with respect. I vividly remember walking in my hallway looking at the setting sunlight through the blinds while telling him that it wasn’t easy.
It’s amazing how a short sincere conversation left such a lasting impression.
As OPM’s we have a similar opportunity with our project teams. Of course, this is not a cheap tactic for building rapport. People are much too sharp for that. A long term relationship takes investment. Sometimes a relationship is just a transaction. That’s ok, as long as they execute on their deliverables.
But if as someone who cares deeply about your work, you’ll connect with certain individuals along the way. When you do, take that risk. Ask that question. Develop that relationship. Don’t waste a precious opportunity to be meet another person in our one wild and precious life.
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Some Links
This documentary of the making of Wootz Damascus Steel is worth all fifty minutes. It’s a great study in metallurgy, starting with iron ore and ending with a piece of polished steel.
Klangphonics is a live techno trio with a fun retro vibe. I really enjoyed their shorts with unique instruments, such as a vacuum and spray bottle.
Erik Young wrote a powerful essay “I Have Long Walked By Your Side” from his experience as a chaplain about living with the knowledge of death. It will be our reality and we live better if we hold it close as a companion.
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While searching for a photo, I came across this photo of this beauty on a biplane. Wikipedia fills in the blanks: “Hélène Dutrieu (10 July 1877 – 26 June 1961), was a Belgian cycling world champion, stunt cyclist, stunt motorcyclist, automobile racer, stunt driver, pioneer pilot, wartime ambulance driver, and director of a military hospital.“
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Thanks for reading!
Justus Pang, RA
09 Jun 2023
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Without words clogging the box of glass and steel, he saw details buried in the blatant mundanity of his daily commute.
Tractor trailer,
A box of silver reflections,
grey, blue, brown,
The road, the sky, the me.
Sun setting below a sign,
Orange tints green and yellow,
Buffalo Drive
EXIT ONLY
䷳䷕
mountain toes,
betwixt glass and rock,
grace and stillness,
no body,
08 Jun 2023
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Sharpening Blades
The knives in our house were ridiculously dull, so I finally took took to the internet. YouTube did not fail*.
As with any varied collection of DIY videos, I was confronted with a conflicting advice that could have frozen me to inaction**. I could have been intimidated by my lack of good equipment. Fortunately, the knives were so dull I was forced to do something.
I grabbed our cheap stone*** and sharpened.
I started with 5 pounds of pressure**** on each side. Try putting that much pressure on a kitchen scale. No joke. Once a blade was back to mediocre, I ran descending passes (ten to one) on both sides of knife on both sides of the whetstone — 220 in total for this second phase.
Repeat that process for a house full of knives. My forearms were sore***** the next day.
But I had a meat cleaver that could cut paper******.
So over the top, but so satisfying******.
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*A basic search led to a beginner’s tutorial by Joshua Weissman, then warnings against beginner mistakes by Ethan Chlebowski, and finally in Burrfection’s extensive library.
**On the other hand, the algorithm fed me videos sharpening the silliest things, like a cardboard box. At least my knives were made of metal.
***Two years later and I’m still using our cheap whetstone. I should spend a $40 Japanese whetstone to see what I’m missing. But that would force me to buy at least one knife that cost as much as the stone…and that’s how the damn hedonic treadmill gets started.
****Burrfection recommends against putting so much weight on a knife while grinding. Pick your poison.
*****I now use my legs in an extremely shallow “bow and arrow stance” to shift my whole body back and forth, minimizing the effort in my arms. That’s about the extent of my martial arts now.
******After writing the initial draft, I chopped up a batch of bad apples for composting. Wow, the new knives were scary sharp. I didn’t notice the seeds as I sliced through the cores.
*******I sharpen the kitchen knives about every other month whenever my wife makes a big meat purchase from Costco. I don’t know how we lived years with such dull blades.
07 Jun 2023
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The desert rats were unprepared for the simulacrum of moisture in the atom-sphere.
A man jogs
Blonde mane,
Just shorts,
Stars and stripes.
Five lights repeating thrice
The sign blinks
>>>
(merge right, merge right, merge right)
A sun rises
through clouds
past skyscrapers
down Russell.
䷁䷇
yellow skirt
perfect fortune
no flag
06 Jun 2023
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Paranoia Agent, Satoshi Kon, 2004
Two years ago, I wrote these sentences to start my notes:
Awesome psychological thriller anime by the legendary director. Highly recommended, available for free (with ads) on Funimation.
All that I remember now:
That was a fucking crazy show.
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Paranoia Agent hit my key checkboxes at the time.
- Genera fiction: Detective, Fantasy, Slice of Life, Horror. A collage with everything.
- Auteur: Narrative told in a quirky way with an open ended resolution.
- Weird: A crazy story that toys with artistic effects and taps my favorite gimmick — busting the fourth wall.
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If you haven’t seen anything by Satoshi Kon before, here is a 1 minute short to whet your appetite.
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Since this was the last piece of Satoshi Kon’s catalog, I should rank his major. It happens to follow the path of heartwarming at the top to darkness at the bottom. But Perfect Blue is still better than almost any other anime film you could watch, it’s a classic like Jin-Roh and competes with the best in Ghibli’s catalog. All are highly recommended.
- Tokyo Godfathers
- Millennium Actress
- Paranoia Agent
- Paprika
- Perfect Blue
Here is an hour long retrospective of his catalog.
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Paranoia Agent is a wacky piece, but after watching a couple reviews of the series on YouTube, I agree that it falls in in line with the rest of Satoshi Kon’s catalog.
It’s a mind bending animation that explores the intersection of delusion and media. Kon explores the idea that our brains and our realities exist on different planes which are mediated by mass media. As one review said, it’s an “animated fever dream”.
However, I heard two critiques that are worth countering.
Someone wondered on a podcast if Satoshi Kon lost control along the way. I agree that Kon plays a high wire act where everything spins all over the place. Midway through the series you’re praying that it all comes back together. But he never lost command of the story. The trajectory could have ended badly but he pulled it off.
Also another reviewer thought that a couple of the tangents felt like filler. At a macro level, any narrative could be boiled down to a simple sentence, but the reviewer didn’t mention which episodes could be cut. Since nothing felt like filler to me, I’d say that the show hit its 13 episode length perfectly. This was an expansive, twisted universe that didn’t overstay its welcome.
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Here is the my ranking of the anime series I had watched:
- Mindbending favorites: Space Dandy, Paranoia Agent
- Fun Classics: Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo, Hilda
- Almost Classic: Arcane, Cyberpunk Edgerunners
- Decent with weaknesses: Kids on the Slope, Kipo and the Wonderbeasts, Terror in Resonance
- WTF, but still worth watching: Neo Genesis Evangelion
- Flawed with a few great moments: Carole and Tuesday
- Honorable Mention (no storyline): Love Death + Robots
Will I watch rewatch Paranoia Agent anytime soon? I doubt it. I moved on after spending a couple of days scrolling through YouTube commentaries. It takes a lot for me to commit to longform media — my protestant work ethic doesn’t allow me to do regularly indulge in such unproductive activities, even if I already know I’ll love it.
If I were to rewatch anything on that list, it would be Space Dandy. That show hits all the wild stuff with a comedic edge, which my wimpy self prefers over the light horror of Paranoia Agent.
Ultimately, both Paranoia Agent and Space Dandy are great works that routinely surprised me. More often than not, I’d end an episode with my jaw agape, OMG what did I just see?! That wuz fucking Brilliant!?!!
What more can you ask for at 22 minutes a pop?
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If all this didn’t do it for you, then at least check out the opening and ending credits that was played for each of the shows, with music by the incomparable Susumu Hirasawa (who also composed the excellent Paprika soundtrack)
05 Jun 2023
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Thanks for reading!
Justus