Books

1. Atomic Habits by James Clear

• Always a great read to start the new year. I listened to the audiobook this time. Was only 6ish hours. Listened in a single work shift.

2. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

• Crazy time to start reading this - with fascism and all. Really good YA. I wish I read it when I was younger. Would have exposed me to dystopian themes earlier on.

3. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

• Not sure I enjoyed this as much as the first one but I really like the ground work it laid for the third book.

4. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

• I really enjoyed it until the end - Katniss falls unconscious at the end of the story right when things get crazy and then we miss most of the action. Wtf. Feels like lazy writing but the rest of the story and the world building is great. Shame.

5. Enshittification by Cory Doctorow

• Aside from the weird hyperbolic cringe quote-nonquotes this book outlines all the major issues going on in tech and capitalism. Though he’s very quick to not decry capitalism, but to reference Techno-Feudalism as coined by Yanis Varoufakis and, to me, his reasoning is sound. It’s a scary world we’re entering.

6. Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins

• Listened to the audiobook again for this one just like the other ones in the series. The middle while she was in the arena told from the perspective of Snow was kind of boring, something about it felt distant both literally and metaphorically but I dug the world building of the beginning and end.

7. Blood in the Machine by Brian Merchant

• Arguably the most important non-fiction book I’ve read these past few years. It already needs an update, with the advances AI has made since its publication. Especially if you look at its new role in the world of software development, its use in war, and the general rise of fascism and governmental control of populations around the world. The book stays away from being overly partisan, though it has obvious natural biases, it is the most legitimate—in the way of historical immersion—non-fiction book I’ve probably ever listened to, much more historical and factual than I imagined it would be but rest assured, Brian brings it all back home at the end with relevant recent parallels, though I feel there are even more to come.

8. Technofeudalism by Yanis Varoufakis

• Another book related to the way big tech is shaping our minds, our world, our present, and our future. These tech giants are our new feudal lords and using their products makes us their digital serfs. I implore everyone to detach from and escape from their clutches any way you can.

9. Wool by Hugh Howey

• I was immensely hooked from the start, though eventually I was ready for it to end once you could see where it was going. I enjoyed its commentary regarding class and occupation though I felt it a bit superficial. I found it becoming predictable near the conclusion as well. It also feels like it’s missing…something? I’m not a good enough critic to dissect what it is though. I feel like it, the book, the world, the language, the idea of the Silo, lives between other sci-fi like Dune and The Hunger Games. It wants to be heady sci-fi rich with social and ecological commentary but then the text itself also lives on the edge of being YA fiction and should have been marketed as such. It feels written to be palatable for the masses in every way. It doesn’t take many linguistic risks besides a vocabulary word or two in every chapter. There’s not many children in the book, yet it feels very pg-13 in both the writing and world inside. Aside from muted violence it contains little to no adult content besides a few profanities as well. The romance was almost all superficial as well, and contained almost no physical intimacy between any of the characters, which would have added slightly more gravitas and emotion to the connections between certain characters without making it smut or something, but god forbid we upset any sensitivities of potential consumers? I hate to end on a negative note, because overall I found this book and the story enjoyable. Hugh Howey created a fascinating world and I would like to explore it more.

10. Oblivion by David Foster Wallace

• Finally finished my first physical book of the year. And it was a doozy letmetellya. I was interested in seeing what the guy could do with a short story after reading Infinite Jest and one of his collections of essays ’Consider the Lobster’. The man knew how to use words and bend your mind in weird ways. The stories in this one read the way indie films watch? Idk how to explain it but they all have just the right touch of absurd yet real, pretentious, metaphorical, intelligent, witty sort of writing and storytelling that I expect from him at this point even though I often scrunch my face and get so confused at what he’s trying to say or whatever’s going on. The Suffering Channel, Good Old Neon, The Soul is Not a Smithy, Mister Squishy, Oblivion are the stories in this collection I would prioritize in mostly that order, but I feel they’re all worth reading.

11. Rant by Chuck Palahniuk

• Read this in high school and found this most recent re-read to be just as enjoyable as the first, if not more mind-bending this time around. The world in this book lives in this tiny purgatorial space between our own reality and a dystopic wasteland. Why are us Americans so obsessed with carnage? Where does love fit into this equation?

12. Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins

• I really enjoyed this prequel, possibly more than the rest of the series. What Rogue One is to Star Wars this book is to Hunger Games. I feel it made the original series so much better.

13. The Pale King by David Foster Wallace

• There’s a lot I want to say about this novel but it’s hard. The book is an unfinished masterpiece. At times it was rather disjointed, with no clear plot-line throughout the novel. Likely intentional, I’m sure, but still to a fault. But many of the chapters and scenes are on-the-edge-of-your-seat riveting in an otherwise banal place—the Peoria Illinois IRS Regional Examination center. Even after having to put the book down a little more than halfway through for a few months, chapter 19 still manages to have nestled its way into my psyche as being one of my favorite scenes in literature. Period. In the scene a handful of characters are stuck in an elevator talking about civics. The book, published in 2011, but written before 2008, set in the mid-eighties, manages to hit the nail using such casual lifelike dialog on the head regarding the issue of modern-day civics, wealth inequality, and so much more that causes so much strife in contemporary American culture.

14. The Right Stuff by Tom Wolfe

• Inspired by Artemis II, I had to get into NASA/Space Race history and read this classic. It paints quite the picture. Already one of my favorites this year.

15. Pale Blue Dot by Carl Sagan

• What an ode to Earth. This book is what being a curious human is all about. It ebbs and flows like the ceaseless tides on the beaches edge, debating itself regarding the purpose, both in the negatives and positives, about human space travel beyond our present world. As we reach the point in our modern society where it seems there is no new habitable land to discover here on Earth, we have nowhere else to explore but up. Happy Earth Day!

16. Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

• More space! What a fun thrilling novel. Onto The Martian!

17. The Martian by Andy Weir

• Another spectacular novel, great follow up to PHM. Andy is adept at distilling heady science into easily digestible bites of knowledge. Plus, he knows how to captivate. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. I honestly wish it was longer.

18. Space by James A. Michener

• This might be the capstone on my space fixation. Michener at it again, what a cool immersive historical fiction book. I felt like I was a fly on the wall watching the budding, growth, blossom, and fade of the most pivotal moments of the space race. He remains one of my favorites.

19. The Broom of the System by David Foster Wallace

• Mind you this review lacks any meaningful substance due to the fact that I’m not a philosophy student in any sense, I find philosophy to be interesting in a passing sort of way. Many of the ‘Wittgensteinian’ philosophical elements posited or discussed or fleshed out and experimented with in this novel are mostly completely and utterly lost on me. I simply find philosophy to be sort of, masturbatory. I wonder if even David Foster Wallace would agree with that statement. And but so yet I’m compelled toward the sort of content and media rich with it, such as his novels The Broom of the System and Infinite Jest. It’s impossible not to talk or think about Infinite Jest when reading David Foster Wallace’s first novel The Broom of the System. One of two pieces he submitted for his thesis in undergrad. I imagine the large majority of people reading this book read IJ first. And but so since IJ is this crazy book with a large reputation, anything else ever written by the same author will forever be judged against such an opus. So forgive me as I spend too much time comparing it to IJ, but only out of a place of amateur appreciation and curiosity. It’s exciting to see elements of IJ being developed in here. There’s a handful of storytelling devices like letters, newspaper clippings, playscript, stories inside stories, etc. that don’t just tell a story but build this absurd world the same way IJ did. Sans the infamous footnotes of course. I often feel this method of storytelling is quite similar to something like an RPG video game where the player has the freedom to traverse the map and interact with NPC’s and items and as a result become immersed in the world within. IJ uses these devices with impressive precision, and while I wouldn’t call their use in this novel careless, but just by comparison you can feel DFW playing around and experimenting in anticipation for something much bigger. You can see Signature DFW budding in this novel too. You become so used to the absurd situations, flawed characters with crazy names, fractal-like story lines, insane vocabulary and descriptive writing while reading the gargantuan 1000 page IJ novel, that you feel like you’re reading something set in the same universe while reading The Broom of the System as well. The characters are interesting and compelling. I have little idea what motivates some of them, though much of what is going on has something to do with words and language. One needs to sort of imagine what’s just outside of the frame. This feels most evidenced by Vlad The Impaler, Lenore’s cockatiel, who starts talking after ingesting some sort of experimental baby food that helps babies start talking early. The mapping of relationships between the characters is very slow and steady, and isn’t always clear at first, or at all. For instance, John Beadsman, Lenore’s brother, is referenced a handful of times. He gets into a car accident and is anorexic, and eventually leaves the hospital. Except he doesn’t interact with the main storyline at all besides being referenced by Lenore once or twice outside of the two scenes he’s in. The book follows Lenore, and she seems to be the main character, but as the book develops Rick Vigorous sort of takes the spotlight and gets the final scene, that ends mid-sentence. Lenore is a fascinating character, and well written. Though I still can’t place her desires, and I’m not sure she can either. Perhaps that’s the point. The book makes more sense the more you read it, then by the end completely ceases to be grasped in the meaningful way novels and stories are stereotypically supposed to. It instead makes you think. Deeply. Par for the course for DFW it seems.

Movies

One Battle After Another

• The most relevant film I’ve watched recently. Based on Vineland by Pynchon. Still need to read his work. Viva la revolución!

Wes Anderson/Roald Dahl Short Films/Stories:

• The Rat Catcher
• Poison

Sirāt

• An experience. Could barely understand the film (couldn’t get subtitles working properly) but still pretty much knew exactly what was happening.

Apollo 11

• Stunning documentary consisting solely of remastered NASA archival footage, photographs, and audio recordings with an occasional orchestral accompaniment paints a stellar portrait of the Apollo 11 mission.

Project Hail Mary

• I found this adaptation to be a little lackluster. It lacked his internal monologue from the book entirely, you missed out on the practical science Weir uses and it’s kind of a shame.

The Martian

• This adaptation on the other hand was great. Some things were changed or omitted and think it worked out great. It’s such a fun movie on its own too. The characters are great and portrayed so well on screen.

Shows

Mad Men (rewatch)

• Giving this show another spin and this time around I am fascinated by the contrast between the hectic bustle of the agency and the dull suburban life Betty lives at home.
• Joan has sacrificed more than anyone for this company.
• Final thoughts:
  • Hands down, one of the GSOAT. I was so sad for it to end, this was my second rewatch.
  • I wish we had seen Sal again. They gave just about everyone (fuck you Duck) fan service besides Sal.
  • Roger is a bad person why does he get rewarded at the end?
  • Happy for Peggy but this should have been threaded in sooner, there were plenty of opportunities.
  • I know I said Joan has sacrificed the most, but Betty is a close second. Good lord my heart shatters to pieces at the end for her and what she has sacrificed compared to Don, who gets all the rewards. While she…well. “He doesn’t know you won’t get treatment because you love the tragedy.”
  • Don embodies the vibe of the modern day tech bro at the end. It signals a new beginning for or individualist-centered culture in America. I’m not thrilled with these writers for making it look like a single person came up with that commercial when it was definitely ( hopefully? ) a whole team in real life coming up with something like that. I used to kind of like Don, even with his flaws, but the ending was his peak, not his downfall. He gets rewarded while most of the people (particularly women) he’s been involved with suffer. This is a departure from what nearly every other great/awful television show protagonist goes through at the end (think Tony Soprano, Walter White). Don on the other hand, learned nothing from his actions.

Black Mirror (rewatch)

I’m gonna be brief with my thoughts on this show, just watch it.

• USS Callister is wild.
• Hang the DJ ❤️
• Black Museum remains one of the most gripping episodes of this series.
• Striking Vipers was surprising and not why you’d think
• Joan is Awful
• Loch Henry I mean wtf - not necessarily about new technology but how old technology can also come back to haunt us.
• Penultimate S7 - jeez why did the characters names have to be mine and that of my cat. Ugh this one was big sad and heartbreaking.

Yellowstone

• Still on my cowboy shit

For All Mankind

• Artemis II inspired the fuck out of me, now I have Astronaut dreams again. Best I can do though is consume space content. What a cool premise for a show. Imagine the Soviets landed on the moon first and the Space Race never ended.

ER

• Yes, the 90s classic television show. Every time my wife watches it I get sucked in. I should probably watch The Pitt too.

The Pitt

• You knew it was coming - season two was great. Couldn’t stop watching it. I don’t think I caught all of season one, so I’m going to reverse course and give it a rewatch. It’s a shame shows don’t come out as often as they used to, this feels like old school appointment television, it needs a new, long, season each year, I can’t get enough of it. - I did end up going back and watching season one, then rewatched season two again immediately. By the end of S2 I was comparing Dr. Abbot and Dr. Robbie as sort of absurdist/nihilist foils for each other. The final episode is pretty subtly poignant. Dr. Robbie is outside as ambulances keep coming and coming. He has moments with a few members of his staff as this guiding light for them, but he can’t keep it together himself as person after person comes in injured from some sort of stupid mistake. Dr. Robbie is about to leave on a sabbatical to ride his motorcycle around the country, hinting to the rest of the crew that he might not come back. Many insinuate he expects to get into an accident while not wearing a helmet. He’s tired of trying to find meaning in his own life as a healer. Yet he’s trapped as these ambulances keep coming with more injured people. He feels like he can’t actually leave the hospital because all these people need his help and it’s making him miserable. When he goes inside to talk to Dr. Abbot about how difficult this is for him a nurse pops her head in as Dr. Robbie wipes tears away after pouring his heart out to Dr. Abbot and she says “Someone just blew half his face off with a firework.” Dr. Robbie looks even more exasperated at this call, but Dr. Abbott looks at him and he’s just says “Come on. How could you not love this place?”

Podcasts

The Secret World of Roald Dahl

• Amazing podcast. The man lived a wildly fascinating life and accomplished more for humanity and culture than any single one of us could ever dream. Matilda? Charlie and the Chocolate Factory? James and the Giant Peach? Fantastic Mr. Fox? Holy shit. Spending a little too much time on the laughably, comparably brief, but sure, prevalent antisemitism. With the quotes they pulled, and with a 2026 geopolitical lens it seems, maybe, idk. All of politics and religion and war are bad. I hate all of it. What I love and value is culture and creativity. I dislike even my own country for being imperialist. so ANYWAY. Good podcast, I learned a lot, but yeah.

Behind the Bastards

• Bo Grits episodes were fascinating
• The more we learn, the more Epstein continues to repulse society
• Dr. Sleep was a true menace. Stories about greedy people who place themselves in trusted positions in society make me want to believe in a terrible eternal afterlife for people like him.
• Incel culture has very unfortunately had a major influence on contemporary culture and it seems it is here to stay.

Decoder Ring

• Eyes Wide Shut! Though this episode weirdly tries to deflect. Guess who used to own Slate? Microsoft. Guess who went to the island multiple times? 🤔

Music

Brought to you by WXPN on 88.5FM Philadelphia & The Many Moods of Ben Vaughn:

• Brand New Day by Sug Daniels
• I’ll Be Your Johnny on the Spot by Ween
• Luke and Leanna by Craig Finn

TV/Movie Soundtracks

• Panic by The Smiths (Black mirror - Hang the DJ)

Concerts

• Lotus at Union Transfer 4/18

Sports

Super Bowl

• Boring, I interestingly enjoyed the halftime show though. And not for political reasons, I don’t get Bad Bunny myself but that’s okay, other people do and I dig it.

The Winter Olympics

• I have always enjoyed watching it, but only now as I get into trail running at the ripe age of 33 am I finding a new appreciation for the athleticism involved.