return.

01月

welcome to my year of media. january was a highly multi-format month - although i did not get to check out quite as much as i was originally planning due to the very short notice surgery trip.

Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations (S01)

date:

01月(started 2025年)

format:

tv

watching with nu beginnings. delightful show, not the presentation i was expecting. tonight as i watch he is getting mad about fries he just loves so much.

Tongue Relaxer - Valentine

date:

01月01日

format:

album

nu beginnings music night. maybe i need to listen to more trans folk rock.

Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken

date:

01月01日 (started 2025年)

format:

anime

a rewatch. i started it last year but watched the final arc today. it's such a treat of an anime. it is so accurate to the feeling of a collaborative creative project. i want to pick up the latest volumes of the manga soon.

Jorge Luis Borges - Brodie's Report

date:

01月01日

format:

book

'His End and His Beginning' is a favourite so far, need to revisit. less interested in his works in this volume with their focus on morality rather than metaphysics, i fear it places this era of Borges' old man attitudes on full display, but i hold out hope for later stories.

date:

01月03日

i have just read 'The Duel', damn.

date:

01月05日

i've finished the book. 'The Gospel According to Mark' and 'Brodie's Report' are both solid stories from Borges, but still the focus on morality just does not land with me the same as his works with a focus on metaphysics do.

Spooky's Jumpscare Mansion: HD Renovation

date:

01月 (started 2025年12月)

format:

game

i think Spooky is gay.

Bocchi the Rock

date:

01月02日

format:

anime

rewatching. a nice follow-up to Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken with its similar appreciation for art and the specifics of a medium. interesting to revisit now that my anxiety is largely gone; when i had watched originally i was maybe struggling the worst i had ever been with anxiety in some regards, these days the character of Bocchi is less relatable - but remains compelling.

Frownland

date:

01月02日

format:

movie

nu beginnings movie night. really relentless. enamoured by the focus on constantly shifting facial expressions and how not a single character hears anything any other character says. maybe the best representation of hyperacusis and autistic overstimulation i've seen in media.

blank banshee - blank banshee 0 (visualiser)

date:

01月02日

format:

album visualiser

wasn't aware this existed! extended cut of some songs too.

AVGN

date:

01月 (started 2025年10月)

format:

youtube

rewatch with nu beginnings. tonight, the moonwalker episode was a delight. i want to see james rolfe star in a mumblecore flick.

Stice's Satyricon

date:

01月03日

format:

movie

made me think of a lot of stuff that's been in gallery shows i've been in over the past few years. overall, not really my thing BUT two of the tracks (and one of their videos) were really really good.

Naissance

date:

01月04日

format:

game

i can see why people love this game so much, but it's VERY 2011 first person puzzle platformer. visually quite nice, but so many of the puzzles are just so so so tedious, especially the amount that require waiting for slow platform alignments and making really janky jumps.

pizza_ya_san1.bsp

date:

01月05日

format:

game (sven co-op map)

played with nu beginnings. so cutesy with the artstyle. we played with game audio muted while listening to dub and vaporwave and it was a nice experience. the cheese maze jump puzzles were annoying and the enemies had way oversized health pools (as to be expected of a sven map). i liked it a lot. i need to investigate more post-2chan artwork.

Anthony Bourdain: In Beirut

date:

01月05日

format:

tv (documentary)

really grounded and tense look at war in Beirut. awful to think it's been nearly 20 years since this episode was filmed and Lebanon is still forced to suffer under the boot of imperialism.

pizza_ya_san2.bsp

date:

01月06日

format:

game (sven co-op map)

fun part two. the grappling hook was annoying

Signal-Lead (Milosoft Season of Light)

date:

01月07日

format:

game

third installment in fen's 'Season of Light' series of releases. i fell behind on releases late last year due to failing mental health. so so so so so excellent. always blown away by fen's use of dimly lit scenes in video games.

surprise start of year surgery

date:

01月11日 - 01月17日

format:

trip

an interesting time, the culmination of one of the most stressful weeks of my life. the surgery was a success and my quality of life is already drastically improved. i'm logging this here as it significantly impacted my ability to check out new media + it being a total surprise meant i had little time to check. i played a lot of Angeline Era on my steamdeck (so glad i decided to bring it) and i watched Bocchi the Rock and a lot of AGDQ. the Twilight Princess speedrun was a real treat. my roaming allowance started to run out by the third day or so, and as such i was pretty limited in being able to find new music or videos to watch.

Skyward Sword

date:

01月21日

format:

game

picked up the game again (had to get a new charger for my switch dock!). current progress is the first dungeon clear and i have started to explore Eldin.

date:

01月31日

i have been playing pretty consitently over the last week, and all i can really say is - what a treat. such a fun game, really seems to build a lot on Twilight Princess. i made it past the part that i got stuck on as a child, and the mid-game is such a treat.

aya - hexed!

date:

01月22日

format:

album

one of the most intense albums i have heard. excellent.

Creeper World III: Arc Eternal

date:

01月22日

format:

game

a cute little game to revisit. i forgot how moody the story was.

Forever Sunset (Milosoft Season of Light)

date:

01月23日

format:

game

fourth of the Season of Light. very charming, serene, unsure if i made it to the end.

Aerial (Milosoft Season of Light)

date:

01月23日

format:

game

another short one. so so good feeling. should revisit.

Sail (Milosoft Season of Light)

date:

01月23日

format:

game

the most blinding game i have ever played. i am unsure if the gameplay was even visible or if my soul was captured and interfaced directly with the game engine. what a time.

Cuttlebone 3pt (Milosoft Season of Light)

date:

01月23日

format:

game

playing warioware in a clean room. delightful. maybe my favourite so far.

Di Gi Charat

date:

01月23日

format:

anime

nyo.

Amélie

date:

01月24日

format:

movie

such a cute movie, really nice cinematography. it was very much a girls' night movie.

Cynthoni - LAMENTING MALICE

date:

01月24日

format:

album

first time listening to Cynthoni. i was never interested in anything released as Sewerslvt, but this record feels fresh, exhilerating and deeply oppressive.

Vladimir Nabokov - Pale Fire

date:

01月25日

format:

book

Harry Potter & The Shoot-Down Order Over Phoenix

date:

01月26日

format:

video

sent to me regarding the topic of england. deeply nihilistic. i need to further explore machinima, this made me realise it is the closest visual relative to plunderphonics. everything is plundered.

angeltabris: stretch the night

date:

01月30日

format:

gig

hands down the most incredible show i have ever been to. angel may be the greatest dj alive, and people are starting to realise it.

Picross 3D: Round 2

date:

01月31日

format:

game

this game has already seriously hampered my productivity. so fun to play in bed. i forgot how perfect the 3DS is for taking on a trip.

02月

february was a very gaming oriented month, including a host of delightful singleplayer games in addition to the long overdue reintroduction of multiplayer games in my life. my utmost recommendations to drag your friends together to play free, weird multiplayer games. i was hoping to get around to more movies this month, but i'll just have to make up for it later!

this month also featured my band Pronoun Circle's second gig. it was such a delight to play with Girls Rituals & Lainxoxo.

i continued to chip away at both Angeline Era and Skyward Sword - both phenomenal adventure games.

Cortisa Star @ The Sound House

date:

02月04日

format:

gig

Cortisa Star is an incredibly exciting name in music currently and i'm a huge fan of her work - however i found this show to be a let down. her setlist was unusual (choosing to feature the same track twice!), very few of her songs seem to break the two-minute mark, the crowd was insufferable - made worse and encouraged by the stage banter, and the real energy killer for me was how little of the lyrics were performed live! despite this i remain excited to see how her music develops.

The Grand Budapest Hotel

date:

02月06日

format:

movie

motivated to watch this after a vivid dream of being a hotel concierge - a fun alignment with the movie's own intense dreamlike feel.

Oneohtrix Point Never - Tranquilizer

date:

02月07日

format:

album visualiser.

an album that didn't leave a strong impression on me upon first listen, but has very much grown on me since. the falling sand visualiser is so inspired. OPN retreads past sonic ground, however the intense depression that undercuts his discography seems reframed through the eyes of someone who is doing better; Tranquilizer captures the melancholy of getting through depression.

Crypt Underworld: The End of History

date:

02月08日

format:

game

excellent hostility to the player. the opening descent from above; a game that evokes the same profundity as Extreme Evolution: Drive to Divinity. i did not get to play for very long but i hope to revisit in coming months to finish the game.

OpenRA (Red Alert)

date:

02月11日

format:

game

a really nice thing to revisit with friends for gamenight. it feels very primitive as far as RTS games go, but the simplicity makes it a really solid choice for newcomers. i do wish the way production queues was overhauled, as it stands, building more facilities feels pointless beyond having a backup of select buildings.

SM64 Co-op DX

date:

02月11日

format:

game

such a fun way to revisit the game. we beat 70 star as a group. i'd love to revisit bingo again, ideally without lockout next time.

Rune Factory 4 special

date:

02月11日

format:

game

playing with an "everyone is bi" mod. i like being a princess. i really wanted to get into the series before, but Rune Factory 5's swap to full 3D just did not feel fun to play. very happy to revisit this properly on steamdeck with the ability to be lesbian.

a selection of A. G. Cook's music videos

date:

02月12日

format:

music video

realising just how much influence growing up listening to PC Music has had on my design sensibilities. i really need to get back into using processing for visarts.

Idyll and Silver Thread Golden Needle have some of the most beautiful use of gradients i've ever seen. the music was so good tonight that i had to clean eyebrow smudges off my glasses 4 different times because i was furrowing my brow so hard.

A. G. Cook - 7g

date:

02月13日

format:

album

such an incredible record. blown away from start to finish. deconstruct it all.

Girls Rituals, Lainxoxo, Pronoun Circle

date:

02月14日

format:

gig

live music heals.

photo: waveliker

Ribbit King

date:

02月18日

format:

game

an excellent party game, although i wish some of the maps were better - hypnotron is kind of miserable with all the void-outs and lack of stage hazards to trigger chain reactions.

Portal: RTX

date:

02月21日

format:

game

playing with ray-tracing while using a 4:3 aspect ratio is an insane experience. annoying to setup but worth it immensely for how filmic the experience becomes. it's unfortunate about the framerates with rtx, however this is one of the few implementations of the technology that i actually find visually compelling.

Portal 2

date:

02月22日

format:

game

GLaDOS hello diva~~~. i think the updated look of Aperture Science lacks the kind of coporate charm of the original game, but still a gorgeous looking game.

By Storm - My Ghosts Go Ghost

date:

02月23日

format:

album

truly an audiofuckers delight. what a treat.

Soy Cuba

date:

02月24日

format:

movie

incredible. unbelievable cinematography, excellent acting, just hands down fantastic. constant dizzying tactility. deeply human. a must watch - made even better when going into it with familiarity of Guevara's writings.

Fidel cleaning his rifle immediately after it's thrown on the ground is an excellent detail.

long live the Cuban revolution.