The suns is out which means people are socialising.

Earlier this week I jumped on the train and headed down 3 stops to meet up with Julian Bleecker from Near Future Laboratory, and the NFL podcast.

It was super nice to meet IRL, I think I just monologued at him about regenerative agriculture for ages lol. I fell in to a cyberpunk cringe hole in the cab on the way home. My driver told me he lost £5k on dogecoin. 🙁

Thursday was the students final presentations on the solarpunk module we’ve been working on, so back up to wolves lane in wood green for that. Hilight of the presentation was one of the students playing whale song SUPER LOUD for the cacti.

After the presentations, it was essentially the students end of term party – hosted at Wolves Lane.

Ahmet A. Sabancı, came along as he is over in the UK doing ‘something or’ at the Guardian head office.

He was last over in 2019. Super nice to see him! We had good chats about weirdo internet stuff. Check out his Patreon.

Friday night we had friends over for a garden party, and I drank a little bit too much.

Then yesterday things were very slow. One of my oldest friends in the world came over for drinks and pizza in the evening.

I’ve been so social. I need a week to recharge after the last 2 weeks!

The last two weeks have been about as busy as ‘the before times’. I can’t belive I used to be this social all the time. I’m exhausted, was I this tired all the time in my 20s? I’ve really noticed that depleted social batteries effect my ability to churn though all the stuff I have on my list of things to do.

Photo 365

We have been looking after this pea brained idiot. He’s so cute.

Permanently Moved

Computing Books

I realised I knew very little about the history of computing. Here’s two books I read recently correcting my ignorance.

The Ministry Of My Own Labour

• Fell down a huge rabbit hole writing this week. Clarifying my own thoughts on subjects, deciding that I have no opinions on others. Personal journal/diary writing is a practice that has changed my life.
• Last week with the students this week. Thursday was spent at the cactus house – They came up with some really good project proposals.
• Writing project has kicked off
  • Learning A LOT about Scrivener.
• Calls, endless calls.

Dipping the Stacks

From ‘Black Panther’ to ‘Cats,’ the VFX industry is in trouble — here’s why

VFX workers are struggling to get by. Speaking to Inverse, four visual effects veterans describe an industry marred by brutal deadlines, slashed budgets, mass layoffs, and industry-wide burnout.

New ‘Smart’ Cheese Rinds Help Fight Parmesan Fraud | Food & Wine

The Consortium has teamed up with Kaasmerk Matec — a leading producer of casein cheesemarks — and p-Chip — which creates digital tracing technology — to put tiny, food-safe transponders in legitimate wheels of Parmigiano Reggiano.

‘Phones are like a scab we know we shouldn’t pick’: the truth about social media and anxiety | Social media | The Guardian

Overdoing screen time can lead to a catastrophic emotional crash

SimCities and SimCrises – International City Gaming Conference keynote

SimCity games promise endless possibilities. “Build the city of your dreams”. But in reality you always end up with something that looks like Phoenix, Arizona.

How Contemporary Chinese Literature Made Western Modernism Its Own ‹ Literary Hub

Mythorealism does not definitely reject reality; it attempts to create reality and surpass realism.

Reading

I read Effortless by Greg McKeown this week. It’s the follow up to his 2014 book Essentialism – which I read last year. Effortless isn’t as good as Essentialism, I woudn’t recommend reading them back to back. But having had 6-9months between reading the first book and this one, it serves as a nice reminder. The best ‘Self Help’ book I’ve read in the last few years is definitely still Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman.

I started listening to the Audio Novella Bookkeepers Skull by Justin D Hill. Its a warhammer horror story and very well written. I think I’ll read the other non-horror books in the series once I’ve finished this one.

Music

thejaymo.net Spotify Playlist

From Capelton Hill – Stars

I haven’t written bout stars on the blog before. From Capelton Hill is their first album since 2017, their first album since I’ve been writing week notes and recommending music.

Stars have been making and creating music for neigh on 20 years at this point. I’ve been listening to them for just as long. I feel like as I’ve grown as a person, matured as a listener, Stars have grown as project too. From Capelton Hill, is a very ‘mature album’. The opening sample on the albums opener Palmistry feels like call back to 2004’s Set Yourself On Fire (one of the best indie albums of all time).

This album is ‘mature’ in the sense that it is not so self assured. All the things that make Stars who they are: 80’s pop synth sensibility, call and response vocals, lyrics grounded in a sense of place: are all present.

But just as I find myself in my mid 30’s a little adrift from a sense of mission, or over arching vision, the same feels true of From Capelton Hill. Stars have also pulled back from their disco/club influence they were leaning into in the mid 2010’s. There are no huge drops on this album unlike 2014’s No One Is Lost.

Things are different from they way there were before, people creatively need to find their new places and position int he world, and this is reflected in the music I think album.

So nice to have a new Star album I’ll be listening to it all Summer!

Watch The Ride X Nia Archives – Mash up The Dance

Remember Kids: