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Everything is amazing and no one is happy. A curated walk-through of a modern day home which points out all of the mundane things that we were once fantasies to the everyday person.

A collection of 20th century Japanese lottery tickets.

I'm watching The Leopard. Beautiful film, but it would be completely nonsensical if I didn't stop every ten minutes to do a deep dive on obscure events in Italian history. Also, did you know that on set each actor delivered lines in their own native language -- from English, to Italian, to French -- and then they dubbed everyone to Italian in post. This means the star of the film -- the American Burt Lancaster - Wikipedia -- is never actually heard by the audience.

This looks good.

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, “Is it good, friend?”
“It is bitter—bitter,” he answered;

“But I like it
“Because it is bitter,
“And because it is my heart.”

By Stephen Crane

Let's watch the belly of the beast hemorrhage
It's not a problem, I released it
I repeat, I released it

My new office set up. Lots of bright sunlight and plenty of robots.

Digging this MacOS app named Portal that allows you to turn your Device into a beautiful high-res video display of various nature scenes that automatically change throughout the day, starting with morning scenes and transitioning to afternoon and finally night scenes.

A few days ago I watched Salò, or the 120 Days of Sodom for the first time. I'm still thinking about it. I did a fair amount of research before I watched it, which was critical — seeing this film without context makes it nonsensical. I'm not sure what I want to say about the movie. I guess: it's possibly the most powerful film I've ever seen; it's horrible in ways that language fails to express; it's important. I don't think I'll ever see it again and I expect to think about it constantly for years. If you know nothing about this film, don't just go watch it. Understand what it's arguing, why it uses the approach it uses, and really think about if you can stomach its execution. Deciding not to watch it is the right decision for almost everyone (Ebert famously never saw it, even though he owned it), but I'm glad I've now seen it.

There was once a scientist who traveled to Papaya New Guinea to study a rare brain disorder that caused shaking and eventually death, and was spread via cannibalism. He made great progress, and then he started adopting the children whose families and towns were afflicted, bringing them back to the United States where they lived in his home. Over decades he systematically sexually abused the children and when he was caught received a crushingly light sentence. People are monsters.

Update (9/13): The New Yorker also has this video on the same story.