I don't really know how to start this newsletter. February is the shortest month, and I always need to write it at the last moment. It is hard to write about what I did up to the 27th when the month has only one more day. So I am always short on time, and I never learn my lesson. I didn't learn it even this time.

February 2026 has been... nice? Re-reading my journal entries, I see a lot of stuff-much more than I expected for the shortest month: I wrote a short story for my writing group, ran two fun D&D sessions, watched a couple of good volleyball matches, had some good meals, and made some movement on my projects.

But I also saw a lot of tiredness. I never use my mornings, as I was always physically or mentally exhausted. Sure, Pepito messed up my sleep schedule, but I know this is tiredness percolating from the general "life tiredness" I've carried with me for the last few years.

Oh well. A month full of events also means that I have fewer things to talk about here. Luckily, I read five books, so this will not be completely empty.

Housekeeping

I wrote a short article on my issues with all those articles trying to "measure" the productivity of coding agents.

I would like to refresh my blog homepage. I want something more fun and more "modern" than just a list of images and text (unbalanced, nevertheless), but I am not sure how. :(

Moreover, I am learning for real Elixir. It is a great language. Once they release some form of gradual typing, it will probably become one of my favorites. To learn it, I am writing a personal dashboard/RPG game to keep track of my writing. It is kind of dumb, but it is fun. If it becomes something real, I'll be happy to show it here.

Reading

• Star Trek: Mirror Universe book 1 and 2: Glass Empires and Obsidian Alliances by various writers. It is funny that the Mirror Universe is one of the parts of Star Trek I hate the most. I found it gimmicky and boring. So why did I start a small series of short stories set entirely in the Mirror Universe? I don't know. They were on sale, and I like some of the writers, so I gave it a shot. To be honest, it is a mixed bag. Some stories are really great, some are kinda uninspired. Overall, these two books are better than I expected. However, I don't know if I'll continue with the series.

• Intentional by Chris Bailey. Chris is able to put in the same book the most well-researched and inspired psychological insights and also the most cringeworthy sides of "self-help books." Overall, this is an interesting book, but not spectacular. There is a good section on values and intentions, but not much else.

• The Way of Excellence by Brad Stulberg. I have this early-in-the-year ritual of reading some "productivity" books, not because they are actually useful, but because they put me in the right mental state. This one is a better version of Intentional. It is probably more inspiring and has fewer cringe parts.

• Writing without Teachers by Peter Elbow. This book is always cited when talking about freewriting. Unfortunately, it is dated (1973). The first chapter about freewriting is actually great, but the rest feels out of place in the modern world. I didn't find the part about reading and writing groups very interesting or useful.

Watchlist

Strange month from a movie/series point of view. None of my series is over yet, and all the movies I watched were not up for a featured spot. The 007 marathon is not helping in this regard. So, we only have one movie worth sharing.

100 METERS (2025)

The 100-meters dash is the most odd of choices for a sports manga (and subsequent anime), but at this point the Japanese population was able to make manga about literally everything. Therefore, I am not surprised it exists; I am more surprised it is as good.

100 METERS is a sports drama anime directed by Kenji Iwaizawa and based on the homonymous manga. On the surface, it tells the story of Togashi, a talented runner and the best sprinter in grade school. One day, he meets another boy called Komiya. Komiya is determined but not a very good runner, so Togashi starts to train him. As you can imagine, Komiya will become his greatest rival for the next decade or so.

But the movie is more than that. The question that echoes through the entire movie-why do we run?-is the narrative core and extends well beyond "running." That, ultimately, we run/do-what-we-do for the joy that we get from doing it. And even if all we get is 10 seconds of doing it, we can make those the finest 10 seconds of our lives.

Moreover, it is also a pretty anime to look at. There is a lot of creativity in the visual solutions they adopted to express the entire emotional palette of a 100-meters dash. There is also a three-minute rotoscoped one-shot scene under the rain that took one year to animate.

So, overall, this is a great anime. It reminded me of Look Back (2024). It is not as good (Look Back uprooted my heart from my chest and stomped on it), but definitely worth your time.

All the Rest

• Octopussy (1983) My 007 marathon continues with the most cringe entry so far.

• A View to a Kill (1985) This movie spends the first third of its runtime on a horse-doping charade that I still have to understand.

• The Living Daylights (1987) We are now in the first of the two 007 movies with Timothy Dalton. Honestly, a step up.

• About Time (2013) It is not bad, but the time-travel mechanic is unnecessary and weak.

• Sleepless in Seattle (1993) A fun romcom. Like they don't make anymore.

• Licence to Kill (1989) Let's spend a bit more words on this, as it is probably my favorite so far; at least in the first half. Timothy Dalton makes a gritty, dark version of Bond. It's kind of a Dark Knight of Bond movies, and there are some very Mission: Impossible-style action scenes. I liked that finally Bond has some personal motivation for once. I liked that finally there is a non-useless female character. Then the second half starts to become wishy-washy, as usual. But I have to say that I liked it.

On the TV series front, I am at season 5 of Slow Horses. I like this series a lot, but I didn't particularly love Season 4. Other than that, great show. I started Star Trek: Academy with little interest, as I thought it was not for me (I am totally okay when a franchise does a show for a different demographic). Instead, I think there are some of the best Star Trek episodes of the last 20 years. I am getting very Deep Space Nine vibes. We are also near the end of season 3 of Shrinking. After those end, I still have many series to catch up on.

Music and Gaming

I seize the occasion of a February without any album that stole my heart and ears (I also objectively listened to less new music) to mix the Music and Gaming session with a Music RPG.

VOID 1680 AM is a solo RPG, nominated as the best solo RPG of 2024 at the CRIT Awards (the Academy Awards of the tabletop role-playing games world), where we play as the host of an indie AM radio.

The game is very simple: you take a normal deck of cards and use it to prompt four blocks of three songs. While the songs play, you may receive "calls" (still cards) from listeners with song requests or some problem or opinion. In between the blocks, you take your phone audio recorder and record whatever the music (and the callers) inspired you to say. That's it. You may role-play it more (for instance, by being a specific radio station with a specific genre and location) or less. Your call.

It sounds stupid, but, I kid you not, it was a cathartic experience. First, it is a novel way to explore our music library. We are so used to putting music in the background that we forget to "just listen" to a song. When was the last time you listened to three songs in a row doing nothing other than listening to the music? Second, recording yourself, speaking out loud about what the music makes you feel, about the songs, about whatever comes to mind to fill the gaps between the next music block, was... an experience.

The entire session lasts around one hour (depending on how much you talk, if at all, and the length of each song). It was a really great way to spend an hour with my music.

To conclude, this is the playlist that came out during my last playing session:

• Cirice — Ghost

• Glasgow Song (feat. Dana Jean Phoenix) — Michael Oakley

• Fifteen Minutes — Palace

• BIRDS OF A FEATHER — Billie Eilish

• Brooklyn. Friday. Love. — The Midnight

• Dance on the Moon — AURORA

• You Are the One — Sentenced

• Welcome to the Endgame — Typhoon

• She Belongs to Me — Bob Dylan

• Autogrill — Francesco Guccini

• The Secret of Life (Chapter II) — Vision Divine

• Pink Pony Club — Chappell Roan

Quite a journey, isn't it? But that's one of the cool aspects of this game.

You can buy the game here.

Conclusions

In the end, like February itself, this issue wasn't so short, after all. As usual, I hope you got something interesting to watch/listen/play.

I actually have many more solo RPGs to play in March. That's as far as I can predict.

See you next month.