Below you will find pages that utilize the taxonomy term “Myself”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Astro City (MetroBook 4), by Kurt Busiek, Brent Anderson, and Alex Ross
- kudos:It’s not the best of Astro City (and it feels awkward when trying to work with race and gender), but it’s not the worst either. I enjoyed reading some stories I hadn’t read before, and some of them were really well done.
Star Wars and non-violence
- kudos:I’ve been reading up on (and aspiring to) non-violence recently. As I noted in a series of posts almost a year ago (here’s the one that wrapped up the series, and it links to the two earlier ones), I’ve been trying to figure out what that means for playing games and consuming media. I don’t necessarily believe that a commitment to non-violence means that you can’t play through an epic battle in D&D, but I think the question is worth thinking about.
📺 tvblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for The Acolyte
- kudos:This was good! Not perfect: there were some rough edges, it’s hard to take some scenes seriously if you’ve watched The Good Place, and there’s a bad case of the Force working as the plot needs it to. Despite all that, though, I love the franchise leaning into a “actually, the Jedi kind of suck” story, and there were some interesting fight scenes and compelling story elements. Happy to see Star Wars experimenting like this… though, of course, it should be moving into the public domain so that everyone (not just Disney) can do that experimentation.
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Moi dans un parking ce matin: “Why is that bus marked ‘Autocar Chartrand’? That sounds too French for Kentucky. Ah, tiens, il vient du Québec, celui-là. Je devrais leur dire que j’écoutais Les cowboys fringants en voiture ?”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for My Peer Group's Smoochy Chart Is Basically Now an Ouroboros (A Thirteenth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:Well, I did it! This is my second readthrough of Dumbing of Age (up through Book 13 at least) in 2024. I enjoyed it, and I’m glad I’m done so I can read some other PDFs I’ve been waiting on. I like where this series is going (mostly), and I’m sure I have a lot to learn from it still.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Her Hugs Are Traps (A Twelfth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:I think this collection has some of my favorite Joyce moments in them. The way Willis treats religion is something I really respect. Past me might not have loved it so much, but he gets a lot of things right about faith transition, including the way some people immediately take up new dogmas that are just as inflexible and judgmental as the ones they left behind. Can’t believe I’m almost caught up!
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for I Excised All My Anxieties into Cartoon Characters Who Definitely Don't Have Feelings for Each Other (An Eleventh Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:Comic continues to be good post timeskip! I am glad to almost be done with this reread, since I’d like to turn my attention to other books, but the reread is totally worth it for additional Willis insight and bonus strips.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Renounce Magical Thinking and Embrace Empirical Evidence (A Tenth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:You know, I’d kind of been dreading getting to this book because I remembered the climax, and I remembered not liking it. After reading it, though, I’m starting to think that it’s better done than I remembered but just that it stresses me out. At any rate, this comic continues to be good, and I also feel like we’re getting more Carla, which I appreciate. She’s the best.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Now Let's Go Commit Something Mildly Subversive (A Ninth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:This actually has an absurdly long(er) title that I refuse to include in its entirety. I appreciate the effort, but I think it might break something somewhere on my web workflow. It’s interesting to read this volume with knowledge of what’s coming up in the series! I can see plots being set up that I might not notice otherwise. Not all of those plots are my favorite, but I still really like this comic, so I’m looking forward to them anyway.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'What France and America Know About Each Other'
- kudos:This is clever, spot on, and sometimes hilarious. link to “What France and America Know About Each Other”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Up Here We Can Be Garbage (An Eighth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:In some ways, I can’t at all relate to Dumbing of Age because my college experience was so wildly different. Yet, it’s funny how I can relate so much to parts of it now, well after my college years. I don’t know that I would have wanted to have this freshman year (especially not the melodramatic bits or superhero fights), but I do wish I could have learned some of the lessons in the story earlier in life.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Just Put Down the Ukulele Only Then Can the Healing Begin (A Seventh Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:This continues to be good, the bonus material keeps getting better, and even though I can’t be bothered to write thorough reviews for these volumes (still 6 to go!), I’m really glad I own them.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for The Machinations of my Revenge Will Be Cold, Swift, and Absolutely Ridiculous (A Sixth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:The lines between books continue to blur, and as much as I like Becky’s growing importance, I’m not always a huge fan of Amazi-Girl scenes. This continues to be a good comic, though, and I’m enjoying the reread.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Hey, Guess What, I'm a Lesbian! (A Fifth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:Lots of plot developments that will go on to define the comic here, and I enjoyed revisiting them. The bonus material is also really starting to pick up here with the inclusion of Patreon strips, so that’s fun, too.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Amazi-Girl is Always Prepared for Anything (A Fourth Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:To be honest, the collections are starting to blur together some, so I don’t exactly remember where the dividing line is between this one and the last. The series continues to be good and fun, though, so it gets this rating nonetheless! I think one reason I like DoA so much is because it’s so different than my own college freshman experience. Some of that is clearly because it’s a work of fiction, but it’s also because BYU is a very different place than other universities, so it’s still interesting to consider different experiences.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Your Stupid Overconfidence is Nostalgic (A Third Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:DoA can get kind of melodramatic sometimes, and there’s plenty of that in this book. Sometimes it strains credulity, but it doesn’t get in the way of a fantastic webcomic.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for I Beg You, Don't Cast Your Body Into the Cragged Shame Pits of the Lustwolves (A Second Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:Like the first volume, this was familiar (since I’d just read these comics a few months ago) but worth rereading—both because the comic is good and because the bonus materials are interesting.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for This Campus is a Friggin' Escher Print (The First Dumbing of Age Collection), by David Willis
- kudos:It was just earlier this year that I archive binged this comic, but I recently bought PDFs of the collections through a Kickstarter and decided to reread it with the commentary and bonus material. I can see the rough spots that have been improved in over a decade of webcomic history (in art and choice of language, for example), but this still makes for an excellent introduction to the universe, and I feel such a connection with Joyce that it’s interesting to meet her again in her original characterization.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'What’s the Difference Between Mastodon, Bluesky, and Threads?'
- kudos:This is a helpful EFF overview that I’m posting to bookmark for later. link to “What’s the Difference Between Mastodon, Bluesky, and Threads?”
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Ça faisait longtemps que je n’avais pas de jeu sur mon portable, puis on m’a rappelé Mini Metro, et maintenant je crains perdre pas mal de temps avec ça.
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En anglais, un assassin, c’est un tueur à gages, un agent secret, ou parfois quelqu’un qui a tué une personne bien connue. Je sais que ça signifie qqch de plus général en français, mais quand la RTS parle des « assassins mineurs », je suis quand-même un peu choqué avant de me corriger.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Lexington’s 2-mile downtown trail system wins another national award'
- kudos:Lexington has lots of room to improve, but I’m glad they’re getting credit for the good work they’ve done. link to “Lexington’s 2-mile downtown trail system wins another national award”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'La droite française se déchire sur une possible alliance avec le RN en vue des législatives'
- kudos:Quelle honte ! link to “La droite française se déchire sur une possible alliance avec le RN en vue des législatives”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Apple WWDC 2024: the 13 biggest announcements'
- kudos:I’ve been feeling for a while like I need to move away from Apple eventually, but I’m so entangled in the ecosystem that I’m dragging my feet on it. Seeing the company drink the AI Kool-Aid is definitely accelerating my plans—and will even more so if there’s no easy way to turn these featutes off. link to “Apple WWDC 2024: the 13 biggest announcements”
📺 tvblog: ❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤 for Pushing Daisies (Season 2)
- kudos:This season isn’t as strong as the first; I’m glad I watched it (for the first time!), but I feel like it got too tangled in storied and then trying to wrap things up for the end.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for The High Crusade, by Poul Anderson
- kudos:The book has a fun premise for science fiction: An alien craft lands in medieval England, a series of forced worldbuilding details makes the English knights stronger than the aliens, and before you know it, they’ve gone to space and conquered themselves an empire. The book also has the benefit of being written in a way that anything that hasn’t aged well can be attributed to the fictional characters narrating the story.
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Half-serious question as I belatedly remember my library’s summer reading program for adults started last Monday: Does a radio adaptation of a book count as an audiobook?
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Wallace & Gromit's New Movie Will Bring Back the Greatest Villain In Animation History'
- kudos:I suspect the return of Feathers McGraw will ultimately be a disappointment, but I love the character enough to be very excited in the meantime. link to “Wallace & Gromit’s New Movie Will Bring Back the Greatest Villain In Animation History”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou Deluxe Edition (Volume 1), by Hitoshi Ashinano
- kudos:Manga is one comics tradition I’ve never really gotten into, but I was impressed by someone else’s description of this series on Micro.blog and decided to give it a try. There are some manga conventions I’m still getting used to, and I don’t know that I fully “get it” yet, but it’s fun! The “cozy apocalypse” vibe it gives off is nice, and I’m looking forward to reading the next volume.
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My current RSS reader (feeeed for iOS) boasts Fediverse integration. I always figured it was just through grabbing accounts’ RSS feeds, and you can do that, but it turns out if you subscribe to it as a Fediverse account, it works as a quasi-client, with additional data pulled in. Neat!
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤 for Social Fiction, by Chantal Montellier
- kudos:I’m glad that so many French comics are now available in American libraries, and it’s a pleasure to read something that came from the influential Métal Hurlant. This is one of those reads, though, where I understand why the work is important, but it just didn’t land with me.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The hidden potential of bicycles'
- kudos:What a great ode to the bike. link to “The hidden potential of bicycles”
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My brother misheard “fediverse” as “feta-verse” on a podcast, and I’m now soliciting your best cheese puns for Mastodon, Pixelfed, etc.
📺 tvblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️🖤 for A Gentleman in Moscow
- kudos:My spouse has been trying to get me to read the book for years, so we had to watch the show! It’s an interesting premise with compelling characters (who are well cast and well acted), and I enjoyed the whole thing. My biggest irritation with it is how the main character’s nobility is seemingly celebrated. I’m no Soviet apologist—it was a repressive country that committed unjustifiable wrongs—but I would have preferred to see the Count reflect on the unmerited wealth and power he held as a member of the Russian nobility rather than be a simple victim of Marxist zeal.
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤 for On Basilisk Station, by David Weber
- kudos:I have really mixed feelings about this book! I’ve read it at least twice before, and after looking at the series on TVTropes, I decided to give it another go. I understand that the series is done now, so I thought I might try reading the whole thing. It’s an interesting premise, with detailed worldbuilding, a compelling narrative, and characters that are fun to follow. I enjoyed reading the book, and I can see myself enjoying the rest of the series, too.
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Any recommendations out there for CBD teas? I’ve found CBD chews invaluable on particularly anxious days, but since I’m already a tea-drinker, I’m interested in trying the intersection of the two.