Funny. Last month had a strong thread of Shakespeare that’s trailed into February. The novel I read this month began with a scene from King Lear and other Shakespearean bits appeared throughout.

How is it only February? Feels like I’ve already had a year full.

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This month’s playlist:

Station Eleven

The tastemaker has been hawking this novel for years. Only when a tv adaptation drops do I begrudgingly open the Libby app. Now this dumbass fool has to endure a weeks-long hold because everyone and their mother “want’s to read the book first.”

Melancholic and hopeful, without diminishing the grim realities of societal collapse.

But what impacted me most were a pair of pre-collapse characters.

“… once I built forts with my little bother in the forest, once all I saw were trees and all those things sound false, it’s like a fairy tale someone told me.”

“… but all of this was completely unremarkable because everyone else we knew did these things too, and here in these lives we’ve built for ourselves, here in these hard and glittering cities, none of this would seem real if it wasn’t for you.”

They lived on a remote island off the coast of Canada. They took a ferry to school. And when the both moved to the city, their childhood experience was so far removed from the social conscious around them, the only touchstone they had for home was each other.

These musings of memories of a far off home which current surroundings threaten to destroy alarmingly resonate with my feelings of my childhood growing up in Thailand. I’ll be pondering these words for some time.

Nightmare Alley

Had zero interest in seeing this movie in theaters. However, when the director announced new screenings in black-and-white, it became a must see. Guillermo del Toro said, though they released in color, choices of lighting down to color pallet were driven as if they were rolling on black-and-white film.

And it shows. I can’t imagine this film in color.

Excellent all around.

Peacemaker

Best superhero series on tv. Insane. Violent. And possesses actual living, breathing characters. Just might tug a tear from your eye.

Yakuza Kiwami

This is my first experience with this long-running series, and it is such a delicious meddle. Button mashy, hyperbolic street brawls. Operatic story and cut scenes. Goofy sidequests. And a huge selection of mini-games, some of which are impressive simulations.

Eating well.

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This month I also spent too much time on Twitter and playing video games.