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The mid-term elections were held in the United States and the Democrats won on a scale that I suspect we won’t see again for a long time (ABC News). Donald Trump will still be the president for another two years so it’s difficult to assess the impact at this stage but I hope it portends a broader rejection of authoritarianism in Western democracies.
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It felt like it’s been a while since I went to an art exhibition (it was back in July) and even longer since I last visited the National Art Center, Tokyo (it was back in 2023). I saw that they had an exhibition of works from the Louvre that sounded like it could be interesting and so over their objections I dragged John and Rowan to it. I must admit that I preferred the 2023 exhibition. That one was built around a coherent theme (light) whereas this was much more of a grab bag of works from ‘the Renaissance’. The centrepiece of the exhibition is a Leonardo da Vinci painting that the Louvre officially labels as Portrait of a Lady from the Court of Milan, wrongly called La Belle Ferronnière. Wikipedia has not got the memo and their article is titled La Belle Ferronnière.
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Fortuitously, I started reading the next book in the Adventure Island series to John and Rowan. The Mystery of the Missing Masterpiece is built around the disappearance of a (fictitious) Leonardo work. I was extremely pleased to be able to tell the boys that they’d just seen a work by the same artist.
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In less fortuitous news, John has come down with some kind of respiratory illness which he had dutifully passed on to me by Friday. So far it doesn’t seem to have infected anyone else in the house so hopefully everyone else can dodge it.
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In even less fortuitous news, Reportage was rejected from the App Store. Apple claims they need additional information to better understand the app. I don’t think that’s really true and suspect this is a way for an overworked member of the App Review staff to quickly mark off a submission from the queue. They’re asking for a screen recording of me running the app on a device (why would they need this? don’t they run the apps as part of the review?) and since I’m using Reportage on my phone with real data that means I need to set up a proper testing device.
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Last week Brandon invited me to try out Muse and this week it was Hark. I gave it the same task that I tried for Muse, create a summarised version of the evening screenings of subtitled films at the two closest cinemas to me. I immediately preferred the design of Hark. Muse really, really wants you to think in terms of chats and feeds. Chat is a central component of Hark but so is its ‘dashboard’ (called Home). This provides a natural location for information (like what movies are on this weekend). This is much more appealing for how I think I want to use this kind of agent.
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I quite enjoyed Patrick Willems’s latest video essay, this one on how Interstellar has become such a beloved guy film. As a guy this of course prompted me to watch it again and I can confirm his central claim checks out and it is indeed beloved.
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The Criterion Collection’s YouTube channel has a 10-minute video about the ‘How It’s Done’ sequence from KPop Demon Hunters. I’m not sure why this video exists but it prompted me to go back and listen to the song again (Apple Music).
