Weeknotes #185

Elon Musk renamed Twitter to X (New York Times). I was surprised by my emotional reaction to it. While I haven’t used Twitter since I stopped posting at the end of November, I guess part of me hoped that somehow it could return. Twitter never impacted my life in the way it did the Internet famous (and sometimes actually famous) but it resonated with me in a way no other platform has. I’m sad that’s gone.

While I’m in a melancholic mood, I was thinking about how isolated I feel as a fan of podcasts. There’s a lot of talk these days about the parasocial relationships (Wikipedia) that social media engenders but one of the aspects that seems under-discussed is the way in which, for fans of creators, it’s very difficult to discuss this content with the people with whom we have normal social relationships (which I suspect only heightens the desire to have a ‘relationship’ with the content creators). I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of friends who listen to a popular geek podcast like The Talk Show, for instance. And with the vast majority of the podcasts I listen to, the number of people I know who listen to them is literally zero. I had this thought as I was listening to a podcast but it’s almost equally true of the video essays I watch on YouTube or the blogs I read.

I forgot to mention last week that I bought new AirPods. The right AirPod had stopped charging reliably and I decided that, with my upcoming hospitalisation, I’d be doing a lot of listening. I ended up buying another pair of the second generation AirPods (i.e. the ones with the longer stems that you tap to control). I wonder how much longer they’ll keep manufacturing them.

After spending years diligently keeping my passwords and 2FA codes in separate apps for ‘security’ reasons, I decided to move most of them to Minimalist. I of course haven’t used my Mac much this week which is where I’d notice the benefit. And now I’m supposed to be in hospital for the next week or so. Excellent timing as always.

I finally watched another Wes Anderson film—in this case The Darjeeling Limited. I thought it was fine but it’s probably not a great sign that the aspect that’s stuck with me the most is the scene where Jason Schwartzman uses an STD line which triggered a memory of the term ‘STD’ which in turn caused me to look it up (Wikipedia). It’s a real thing! Or at least it was in Commonwealth countries like Australia (and India). It seems so weird in retrospect that it was the same acronym as that used for sexually transmitted diseases. I was too young at the time to notice.

I also saw Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One. It wasn’t what I’d hoped it would be and if it’s even possible I feel even more convinced that it was a mistake to abandon the different-director-for-every-film approach after Rogue Nation. I can understand that Cruise probably doesn’t want to mess with a good thing but if he’s going to keep making these, I’d prefer he adds variety that way rather than with increasingly contrived stunts.

I will say that, as lame as it is, I have enjoyed walking around listening to the soundtrack (Apple Music).