Weeknotes 276

Happy Easter to pagans only. 🐣

I love the springtime. I’ve had several sunny bike rides where I’ve barely needed a jacket. It’s bright but still cool, and now my commute is always in full daylight.

I’m absolutely loving the four-day weekend. I’ve long since recovered from norovirus and the subsequent cough, but a frustrating week at work has kept me awake at night and prolonged my chaotic sleep schedule, so it’s been restorative to have a few days when I can doze longer in the mornings and nap in the afternoons. I think the illness has reduced my usual resilience to work stresses and I’m hoping this short break will reset me.

The gym was once again a casualty of poor sleep and I only managed two visits. Not great, but at least I’ve broken the seal. Next week I’ll get back into it properly.

The hardest part of resuming my workout routine was trying to remember what the hell the octopuses had been up to.

I bought a wooden sideboard on sale and it’s made my living room feel about five times more livable. Why didn’t I get nice furniture when I moved in? Sigh.

The second season of HBO’s The Last of Us has started. Its first episode was good and I like the choices they’ve made so far. In some ways it’s a shame we roughly know Abby’s identity & motivation by the time we see the opening credits — in much the same way as we were told everything about David before Ellie even met him — but it provides some narrative clarity and momentum that’s arguably more essential here than in the game it’s adapting, and I’m curious to see how it plays out.

It’s probably not possible for a TV show’s storytelling to be as engaging as a video game’s because of the limitations of the medium; mechanically there’s no way for this show to reproduce the game’s trick of switching up the player character unexpectedly. Within those constraints I think they’re doing a good job. I really like the casting of Dina & Abby (a small part of me misses swole Abby but I’m fully on board with a version of the character who’s strong in a different way), Jackson looks fantastic, and the addition of the excellently-performed Gail is already interesting. I‘m hopeful for the rest of this short season.

I watched The Stone Tape, a BBC Christmas horror-drama film from 1972. From the outset it feels more like a contemporary hauntological artifact than a real piece of TV history. It’s weird and atmospheric in its own way but not up to modern standards, even if you ignore the racist & sexist nonsense sprinkled casually through the script. I expect people who saw it as kids were traumatised but it doesn’t hold up now.

I rewatched Hereditary which I grudgingly bought on imported UHD Blu-ray since that seemed to be the only way to actually get it in HDR. I’d only seen it once before in the cinema and couldn’t remember any specifics beyond the inciting incident.

But it’s excellent! It looks fantastic and the sound design in particular is impressively unsettling. All the performances are great and it’s the rare horror film whose non-supernatural elements of grief and trauma are genuinely frightening. Of course it contains a dad transplanted from a different universe where supernatural phenomena don’t exist but you can’t have a horror film without that.

I also saw Companion, a film whose most interesting reveal is spoiled by its own poster. It’s silly with an uneven tone but fun enough to be an enjoyable ride.

I made the right decision about Blue Prince: even watching the sudoku men play it was almost more than I could bear. It felt so boring and aimless, an excruciating test of patience well beyond my capabilities & curiosity, and it took them an hour and a half to find a single puzzle to solve. I know the randomness would absolutely do my head in if I was playing it.

I bought Lost Records: Bloom & Rage now that its second half is out, but I haven’t had a chance to play it yet. I’m off to do that now.

If you have one, enjoy the rest of the long weekend. 💐