Hello and welcome back. This is Issue 25 of “a bit of bird words” and I’m realizing it’s been, what, two years since I started writing and sending these? Wild how time flies.

What did I play/read this month?

I ended up reading something like 3000 pages over the course of our ten days in Spain. Most of those were re-reads, mind (I really wanted to read The Priory of the Orange Tree and A Day of Fallen Night again) but I did finish one new book: Perdido Street Station. What a book, let me tell you. Miéville ratchets up the intrigue slowly, painfully, all while richly describing the world the characters inhabit. The world itself, really, is a character, in all its horror and splendor.

Because of all the reading, I didn’t really play too many games; I dabbled a bit in Mina the Hollower and picked up Picross S7, but otherwise the most notable game I played was Big Walk. I think a lot of words have been spent by others talking about the social and communicative aspects of this game, so I’ll just say: the game has incredible hang-out vibes and I marveled at the moon a few times while trying not to get lost in the dark. It made me appreciate that I can get this same experience of falling on my butt off a small mountain and getting lost in the woods if I go outside my door. (I won’t do that, I promise.)

What else?

Honestly, August was pretty quiet, which is good because September’s looking to be quite packed. I’ve been watching the Hobonichi reveals for 2027 with interest while experimenting with my current journals to decide what to do next year. I think I have my solution, and I’m just going to hope the tanakadaisuke Weeks I’m looking to get doesn’t sell out too quickly.

Oh, I did add some more haiku to my little website on compost.party; check that out if you’re curious.

I’ve been feeling especially nostalgic for when I was in university. It was a luxury, that time when my only concerns were going to class and hanging out with friends. It must be the trees slowly changing from green to yellow, the smell of damp earth, the slow shifting of sunlight… the feeling that, even as the year is slowly ending, the year in a sense is also just beginning. Maybe those of us who grew up in societies with school years that began in the fall will carry that duality with us for a long time yet.

See you next month.