Category: media: movies

hacking at leaves, free books, ai shopping scam

Hi, happy Friday! Here’s some links for y’all to explore:

Media

The Yellow Nineties 2.0 is a digital collection of Victorian magazines, specifically “searchable digital editions of eight late-Victorian little magazines in the context of their production and reception between 1889, when the first issue of The Dial appeared, and 1905, when the last volume of The Venture was published.” I noted it for myself because it has copies of Pamela Colman Smith’s The Green Sheaf magazine as well as an excellent scholarly introduction to the series as a whole AND INDIVIDUAL ISSUES explaining the contents and how it was made, etc. Fantastic!

Hacking at Leaves is a recent documentary released via the Internet Archive and is available for free. Summary: “Hacking at Leaves is a 2024 Austrian documentary film directed and written by Johannes Grenzfurthner. It explores various themes including the United States’ colonial past, Navajo tribal history, and the hacker movement, through the lens of the story of a hackerspace in Durango, Colorado, during the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. The film was produced by monochrom.”

Free books (and a few zines) from Cita, a feminist indie press.

Here’s a collection of public domain and/or Creative Commons films hosted on Wikimedia Commons. You can sort by year, genre, country, and there’s a few special lists like works by female or LGBTQ+ directors.

Continue reading “hacking at leaves, free books, ai shopping scam”

watched: black barbie (2023)

🎬 Black Barbie: A Documentary: Directed by Lagueria Davis. With Lagueria Davis, Beulah Mae Mitchell, Maxine Waters, Shonda Rhimes. Tracing the origin of the first Black Barbie doll to the filmmaker’s aunt, who asked why Barbie couldn’t look like her, this documentary explores her quest for representation and diversity. 🔗

I really enjoyed this! It’s a combo of Barbie history and social history, with a focus on Black American history and culture (obviously).

Has interesting interviews with people directly involved in the creation of the original “Black Barbie,” people working on the then-current Barbie line, and kids who do or do not play with Barbies. I also liked that they talked about other Black dolls available before/after Barbie came out.

It’s a very personal documentary, too, as the director’s aunt was one of the creators. And there’s personal thoughts/statements about Barbie from the director threaded throughout the doc, which I also liked.

Recommended!

💗 Film’s website / All Watched posts

📝 weeknotes (aug 24-30, 2025)

Is it still a weeknotes if I write massive amounts of text? All the other ones I’ve seen are shorter and more list-heavy. Well, whatever.

📩 Writing this from Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA, with one kitty sleeping behind me on a heated blanket and the other two dozing in the homeowner’s bedroom (one on the bed, one under it). I have the back door open and it’s great weather, mid-60s and sunny– though my writing desk corner is shaded most of the day, which makes it easier to see the screen. I can see the garden from my desk, and so far have chased off the groundhog twice from breaking in and stealing tomatoes. I have on a new-to-me merino wool sweater on that I got from a thrift store a few weeks ago for like $7, which is my favorite shade of purple: a deep wine color. It’s soft and doesn’t itch like most wool things. The WALL-E soundtrack is playing as background noise.

Life Updates

The first half of the week was spent in a semi-sick state– not actually ill, but just bleh feeling, compounded by too much computer use tbh. I finally forced myself outside on Thursday and went walking around, and found a MASSIVE burdock just at the edge of someone’s yard which inexplicably cheered me up.

🐈‍⬛ The cats have been total sweeties this week (despite one day when a cat threw up his breakfast in 3 places, and another one left a poo just outside the litter box) and keep sitting on my lap/near me– compared to where we were at the start of this sit, when they were so nervous they hid under a bet all day, this is great! But of course I’m leaving in a few days and now all I can think about is how much I’ll miss them. 🙁

The only thing that solves that problem is going to another catsit, and luckily I have another one lined up right after this one.

Continue reading “📝 weeknotes (aug 24-30, 2025)”

📺 watched: mary heilmann: waves, roads and hallucinations (2023)

🎬 Mary Heilmann: Waves, Roads and Hallucinations: Directed by Matt Creed. A look at the life and influential work of pioneering abstract painter Mary Heilmann, who emerged from the minimalist and Beat Generation scenes in California. 🔗

I’d never heard of Heilmann before and her work doesn’t look familiar to me, but I still enjoyed this documentary because she’s such an interesting person.

It’s mostly direct interviews with her, with some tours of her studio and an exhibit she was doing at the time. They did a good job of going over her work from the 1960s onward, and sprinkling in bits about her life. She’s not afraid to say personal/emotional stuff and it doesn’t feel trite.

Early on she talked about how, when you think about being an artist, you never think of the business side of it. And she said nowadays art is so commodified, if you do it professionally you basically HAVE to sell out to actually make any money. People talk more about what a piece is worth than anything else, and art collectors are thinking of investments rather than pure artistic merit.

I also liked how she said that she did art to have an identity– refreshing!

A final good thing she says is: you have to find the good things about the new art world to be satisfied with your place in it. Smart!

💟 Her website / Public collections list (Wikipedia)

📺 watched: who done it: the clue documentary (2022)

🎬 Who Done It: The Clue Documentary: Directed by Jeff C. Smith. With Colleen Camp, Tim Curry, Syd Dutton, Jane Jenkins. Clue (1985) has become a cult classic film and is loved by multiple generations. Yet there has never been a documentary created to tell the behind the scenes stories…until now. 🔗

A cute fan documentary about the making of Clue (1985), with interviews from some cast and crew members, including the writer/director, and otherwise clips from conventions, TV interviews, and so on.

Audio levels are a bit off on the older recorded bits (the director started in 2017) but overall still watchable. Very interesting learning about the history of the movie’s development, and how they got the cast together.

I thought it was funny that Clue is so popular on social media (especially Tumblr) but the director of the documentary didn’t know any other fans IRL and even the cast/crew didn’t know people loved it. Hopefully they do now, of course!

📺 watched: some like it hot (1959)

🎬 Some Like It Hot: Directed by Billy Wilder. With Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon, George Raft. After two male musicians witness a mob hit, they flee the state in an all-female band disguised as women, but further complications set in. 🔗

Queer af! And I did enjoy it, especially Marilyn who was a hoot, but if I think about it too much I start getting the heebies.

I HATE when womanizer characters trick their love interest into liking them and the love interest doesn’t get angry at him when the trick is revealed, because they’re in love. Ugh.

Anyway, now I want to see if I can find recordings of all-girl jazz bands to listen to…

📺 2025 Watched List

📝 weeknotes (august 10-16, 2025)

Life Updates

I’ve been so enjoying my time in Ann Arbor– or at least in this part of A2 in particular.

Every morning I wake up around 6, make a cup of coffee and go out to sit in the garden for an hour or two. Then, after feeding the cats, I go walk around the neighborhood for as long as I want, usually 40 minutes, come back and shower and then get to work! I sit at a high desk and watch the garden out the window, and I see all sorts of animals: groundhogs, rabbits, squirrels (three kinds), chipmunks, stray cats, and once even a deer!

The week has fairly raced by! I did make it into town once this week, to check out the farmer’s market and a few shops. I stopped at a used bookstore called Digger’s, where you literally dig around for media (books, DVDs, games, CDs), and managed to find four books for $0.75/each. Now I’m REALLY in trouble, between those and the ones I got from the Little Free Libraries earlier– and did I mention I found an UNLICENSED LFL on a walk the other day? Of course I got a book from there, so now I’m up to (I think) 10 books still waiting to be read.

Continue reading “📝 weeknotes (august 10-16, 2025)”

📝 weeknotes (august 3-9)

Life Updates

I can’t believe another week has gone by already! I’ve been enjoying myself immensely here, sitting in the garden and harvesting handfuls of cherry tomatoes. I haven’t even made it into town proper yet and I’m coming up on my third week in this housesit. Whoops!

🐈‍⬛ Cats are doing well, and the shyest one even let me pet him (once) when he saw his siblings in the same room with me. They’ve also started coming to wake me (at 6am) which I’m taking as a sign that they like me.

Media Consumption

🎧 Too Many Tabs podcast has started their Quack Month, where they focus on quacks in August. It’s one of my favorite months for their podcast, partly because Mrs. P is the one researching and explaining everything, and she’s great. (Mr. P is also good but his shtick is shouting enthusiastically about everything which can be tiring. Also if you’re looking at the thumbnails– only Mr. P is onscreen because Mrs. P doesn’t want internet fame.)

The first episode was about Liver King, who I’ve only seen on the periphery on TikTok from people talking about how horrible he is.

📺 I watched The Producers (1967) which I think I’ve seen before– but I don’t remember the entire last half of the film, so basically it was like watching it for the first time. I enjoyed seeing where they changed things for the musical (which I love) and what things they kept. I much prefer the characters in the musical, as they have a bit more depth.

I also watched The Wiz (1978)! I loved the actors/singing/music, but the empty urban pseudo-NYC streets freaked me out (maybe it was supposed to do that?) and some of the musical numbers went on way too long (the intro to Oz scene where they change colors over and over). I’m planning on watching the Live production of the musical whenever I can track it down, as apparently the stage version is much better.

📖 Finished reading Moby-Duck (reading log + review), which I overall enjoyed but I do think it needed a bit more tightening up.

Also finished Seasons of the Wild (reading log + review), which was underwhelming.

Currently reading Climate Resilience (reading log), which is a good topic and has some great tips for getting more involve with climate activism, but some of the language feels…idk…over-the-top? I’m not sure how to describe it. Like, instead of just saying “I met this person and it was great,” it’s written more like “I had the honor of being in the same room as this amazing activist who has done 50 million things and is a mother, daughter, sister, aunt and earth goddess.” :/ Also they’re edited/compiled essays from interviews and everyone ends up sounding the same because of that, which is a shame.

I think I may temporarily swap over to my Kindle and read a fantasy/romance book as a palette cleanser.

Food & Dining

I harvested enough cherry tomatoes to finally be able to make a soup, which I did. (I used this recipe.) Of course as soon as I made it, I didn’t want to eat it, so it’s in the fridge for later.

The next batch of tomatoes are going to be made into a pasta sauce. I have some non-cherry ones ripening in a paper bag, and they’re nearly ready to use. I just need to track down some jars so I have somewhere to store it all!

Web Updates

New on the site:

  • Added a new note to my Commonplace Notebook on the Notes about AI page

Posted on the blog:

I also did a lot of theme customization, which I outlined here on this page.

Looking Forward

My usual goal to write here and on my site. I’m nearly done with a guide to customizing the look of your Calibre library, I just need to finish the formatting.

I’d also like to get in the habit of leaving comments on other people’s blogs (or emailing them), especially if I link them in a linkspam post. Right now I do it sporadically and I think if I make it more of a habit then it’ll stick better.