Mid-year grab bag
Hit and Miss #460
It’s rare that I start drafting this newsletter after 9 pm, but it’s a rare week—I’m here on my own as T set off with G (very early) this morning for a backpacking trip in BC. Optimistically, I’ll be able to take the week properly off. It’ll be the first bit of vacation in a while, especially just being at home, and it’s sorely needed. We’ll see how I did in next week’s issue :)
- Mandy Brown contrasts the attention economy to the reading economy. Absolutely brilliant—I’ve a feeling this’ll join my Mandy Brown canon, along with “Energy makes time” and “The case for rereading”.
- Thursday, the internet learned that Om Malik had passed away. Seeing the post pop up in my feed reader stopped me in my tracks—published to Om’s own site, where his writing in recent months had felt so undeniably alive that death just didn’t feel possible. Matt Mullenweg, a close friend of Om’s, wrote his own remembrance and has gathered those of others.
- Literally after sending issue 458 two weeks ago, which included a link to a “young adults despair because of the state of the job market” piece, I read “The Kids Are All Right” by Dan Cohen. A nice counterpoint to news of doom and gloom.
- Paul Wells sat down with Alexander Shelley to reflect on his eleven years as music director of the National Arts Centre Orchestra.
- Advice for surviving a heat wave from Ava in Germany—offering advice for individuals, but also societies. (Also, I never knew there were portable mini splits!? Like the Midea PortaSplit. Brilliant design.)
- Found these different “levels of agency” interesting. Simplistically, one might to aim to be level 5 all the time, but it’s also a useful lens through which to analyse power dynamics: are there people stuck or not given the opportunity to take more agency, for reasons outside their control?
- You’ve heard of Dewey Decimal, but have you heard of Hornbostel–Sachs?? A hierarchical system for classifying musical instruments. Delightful.
- Deeply researched stories of named pigments. Today’s? “Dragon‘s blood”.
- Ribbie streams MLB baseball games as an 8-bit-style pixel art animation. Works so well for baseball, with its highly structured nature. It’s even got a commentator mode?? Delightful. (via Jason Kottke)
- Star Trek DS9 season 4 and VOY season 2 as the first two seasons where the shows were “on their own”, post-TNG, offer unexpected previews of where each series would end up.
- Finally, THE VIDEO I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR, a tour of the Cliff Energy Centre, the district energy plant that heats and cools 50+ federal buildings in Ottawa and Gatineau. 14 km of pipes!! All part of the eloquently named Energy Services Acquisition Program.
WHEW! Can’t tell whether I’ve: read a load this past week; had more to share because I didn’t include links last week; have a totally broken filter because I’m operating on bizarre-o sleep and been working much of the day. All of the above?
All the best for the week ahead!
Lucas