Bundate 10-20-25 Where ya been, bun?
Boy howdy, it's been a minute, huh? Can't really call it biweekly at this point (I could, but I don't like to lie). Because we're understaffed at the ole Retail gig, I've ended up working 6 days a week between that and teaching for the last month and a half or so? Not loving it!! I know many people work more and I don't think they should have to either. But when one job has homework and the other is draining, it's hard to find time to do the things.
Binkies (Gags, goofs, other positive notes from the week/fortnight)
- chat, I think we broke Al with Lost Soul Aside, this game is fucking ass, bro. This was some time ago, but it was legitimately too much fun forcing this man to play a game that randomly becomes a slideshow.
- I started making zines. Check them out here
- a few weeks ago, I cat-sat for my friends while they were at a work thing in Hawaii. There were several stores in walking distance! and my commute was only half an hour! wild!! Wish that could just be my life
- I started making a database on obsidian for my Magic cards and decks and it's deeply satisfying.
- Various people in the discord have been streaming Silent Hill f and uh, game good, y'all. I'll probably never play these games, but I'm beginning to get the appeal. Also, I've seen the opening like 6 times lol
- A friend recently (likeamonthagoholyshit) hosted an "oyster and tin fish party" and it was so much fun. Like, I needed it so bad that day and it really lifted my spirits and made me feel validated in ways I don't get in real life often. I love my friends so fucking much y'all (see "I fucking love my friends")
What I've been Playing
- Finished Lost Crown. God, that game was fun. Gonna try to clear the DLC, though it feels a bit fiendish. Also, god, literally like everyone in that game can get it, wtf
- Started up Silksong. We'll see how far I get given that I'm going from a game that starts you out with some incredible tools to a game that starts you out with basically none.
- like, literally one metroidvania to another and you start with a parry in Lost Crown that just feels fucking good as hell to hit. Silksong starts you with a weapon attack and a jump. The jumping attack is cool, visually, but it's diagonal, so you've gotta be more careful with it. Idk how I feel yet--aside from lost lol
- I've more or less dropped this. I don't know if I got that bug in me anymore.
- Keeping up the Metroidvanias, I started Metroid Fusion. I love Samus' suit in this one. Pretty fun! Gotta get at it more.
- Played through Dishonored in the time since my last update (good lord) and I really enjoyed it. I went high chaos more because I kept getting caught and had to kill my way out of a lot of situations than by real choice.
- Also picked up DRG again (shoutout to Adell from the forum). Hopefully when things settle down a bit, I can play more.
- I might write a separate entry about Absolum. God damn. This game has me in a vice grip. The fact that I haven't been inhaling it nonstop is a testament to my will and also probably my ADHD but it's fucking good, y'all.
What I've been Watching
- Smartypants on Dropout is a lot of fun! It's goofy powerpoint presentations with friends and I love it
- Watched Rebel Without a Cause recently and I get it; good ass movie.
- Love is (not) Blind season 9 is crazy. Mint said in chat recently it might be the best season and to go back to any other is probably going to be disappointing and I agree. It took me a minute to get hooked cause shit in the pods didn't like, pop off immediately, but boy howdy it gets u n h i n g e d.
- We been watchin' spooky stuff in the discord, ones I hadn't seen yet: M3GAN 2.0 (it was fine) and Silent Hill (really good! also watching it with El for the footnotes was actually an awesome experience).
What I've been Reading
- Therapists caught using ChatGPT - this just kinda sucks. Like, I get on a basic level being like "I don't understand this", but your reaction then should be "okay, let's see what we can learn about it to help" not ask the plagiarism machine that makes shit up. There's a point in this article about burnout among therapists and I get that, I do, but this still sucks.
- Gentrification of Video Games - Pretty sure someone shared this in the forum before, but it popped up again and so I gave it a real read this time. Super interesting stuff here.
- Finished Over Sea, Under Stone, started the second book in the series, The Dark is Rising. Feels disconnected from the first book, but also it just jumps right in, in terms of the magical stuff, so that was fun.
- kind of stalled on this cause of the one below
- Also started reading The Stonewall Reader that the New York Public Library put out around 2019. My friend and I just walked around this neighborhood and we stopped in a bookstore, so I grabbed a few books and this was one! I am actually like so fucking excited; despite being a collection of mini-autobio pieces, something usually not my jam, it's engrossing for me.
- it is cool to learn this stuff, it's frustrating more of it is not taught unless you take a specific sort of class at like, the college level
- Liftoff: From Couch to Barbell - Mint-recommended ™ book for getting into lifting. I've been sleeping on reading this, but I recently sat down and started up again. It's good! It makes me want to lift! I gotta get healthier and I think this is one of those things that will really push me.
- John Oliver on Bari Weiss - it continues to rule that John Oliver is allowed to just kind of go off on whatever topic he wants. Glad that he fired shots at Bari Weiss cause what an obnoxious and self-aggrandizing little cretin she is.
- How to Like Everything more - fusing this with You Don't Need to Log Off, You Need to Become Sensual and This episode of It's Been a Minute to create some kind of praxis against the horrors. Will explain more when I can more cogently explain it.
Dissertation Stuff
- very little progress recently. I've been working a lot between two jobs and it's been killing me.
- 'a people dispossessed of their own history... are always already struggling to repossess that history in its former totality and unity by rehabilitating the very material things... which are authorized to constitute a national heritage'
- this struck me during one of my readings recently. It's talking about materialist recovery of national heritage in terms of England and Robin Hood, but I think the concept of looking for the history you've been denied and trying to find any way, especially material, to regain that rings pretty intensely for a lot of people, but in my context, for queerness.
Other general thoughts, etc.
- I have just been having a bit of a tough time lately. Again, working six days a week and I won't say much, but things have been a little rough at home.
hey, if ya like what I post, you can toss a few buck here. I don't like shaking the change jar, but it's hard out here, y'all.