Category: Me Myself&I

People ask me what I think about the rather big strike in Hollywood.

I don’t think much about it. It feels like it should have happened when streaming took off, over ten years ago. When the crews, the workers were in demand and could have re-negotiated those rights because they had leverage then.

But everyone believed that they would make it, move to West Ho, work for Netflix, and “get rich” in overpopulated and temporary creative fields.

Those contracts were bad then, and now they’re rotten. CEOs still make that much more than everyone else but now everyone is broke, tired and mad. Hence strikes.

Solution? Again, UBI.

L stands for Living room, D for Dinning room and K for Kitchen.

Still going through thousands of architectural layouts from all over the world and through time.

Historically, the three of them were separated but as we went through time, they started to blur.

First L and D kind of merged because we like to have food where we live. Having separate rooms didn’t make sense anymore. And we had given up on maids as well.

Then K slowly merged with the other two thanks to “islands” and “bars”. Again, it totally makes sense: we’re together, we like having food together and we can do it all in one room with variations of space.

Technology enters the chat.

I’m realizing right now designing my kitchen of the future that thanks to technological innovation, the kitchen is disappearing. An air fryer/pressure cooker combo, an electric kettle and a couple induction cooktops —three devices, allow you to make quickly and effortlessly all the meals in the world. Outside of the mandatory fridge, the kitchen is more and more reduced to a flat surface to prepare food, and a sink.

L/D/k I guess. Financially and layout-wise, this is great.

Sleep deprivation due to moronic tenant is beating my ass my right now.

Time to mtfo.

I spent summer going through it! I hadn’t watched it since the 90s.

I remembered the song when Trunks arrives, it was dope to hear it again so long after the first time.

I had totally given up on the Cell arc, beyond stupid and not making sense at all after Freeza (robots? Really???). Listen, it made sense to go from a kid who can drill a hole in a car with a Kamehameha, to fighting a destroyer of planets. After that Cell and Buu simply don’t have the drama and sense of urgency that Freeza’s arc has. It just drags on forever and the added humor with Mr. Satan is foul to me. But OK!

The sound design triggers nostalgia. When I didn’t know how to make those sounds. Now I do! “filtered slap on a slab of meat + filtered kick drum + filtered white noise through delay and a slight synth (probably MS-20) layer with pitch-bend.” And there you have your fist impact in the enemy’s face. I wouldn’t have enough of those sound effects growing up. Big subconscious sound design career push, right there.

Even though I felt like having a wide variety of settings in hands (European, 70s 80s and 90s comic books) in my fictional worlds, Dragon Ball still brought something different and still does today. I think it’s the Big Asia’s influence designed by Akira. Brown and black bystanders, beaches with palm trees, high technology and traditions. Akira drew his inspiration from the East of this planet; Vietnam, Indonesia, China, Korea of course Japan. It is still fresh to a Westerner like me. Love that.

When it comes to the importance of RSS to me, it is moral, almost spiritual. That might sound like I’m overstating it, but hear me out.

There is lots of interesting content out there. For an individual to develop themselves, they need free reign to information. RSS allows and enables an individual’s learning about reality (on the web).

The reverse is mediated information. Corporations/governments would rather steer you to where they want you to go – to the sandboxed areas, the paddling pools of the internet. Many people think the internet is just youtube, facebook, instagram and twitter. These are social mediating platforms.

RSS is probably the most anarchic technological development of the internet we have had. More important than crypto or mobile phones. Continued unmediated access to the information you are interested in, without being distracted is what every individual should be striving for.

No wonder Google bent over backwards to try to kill it.

Truth.

It was making some noise, recently. So I went to see my mechanic.

“When was the last time you did an oil change?”

Me: “Uh… Years?”

Him:

No oil gauge to find, he opens the oil tank:

It’s not oil. It’s like pudding. The engine is probably clogged like crazy, hence the noise and shaking.

And so I go on my bicycle to go buy some oil flush that he doesn’t have in stock. He did almost three flushes.

He kept repeating “that’s insane that it didn’t break. You’re lucky.”

Suzuki Gang! Sorry, it’s just that there are three identical cars like mine around and we wave at each other sometimes. Anyway, the car is now back to purring nicely. And yes, in six months, oil change. I’m so sorry.

(I think I avoided the worst by driving rather smoothly on surface streets, stressing my engine the least possible basically)

Japanese KitKats! My reviews:

Black KitKat
Unctuous. Rich. Strong.

Milk Tea KitKat
Surprising. Violet. Smooth.

Green Tea KitKat
Whimsical. Bamboo. Quick.

Cookies&Cream KitKat
Amusing. Summer. Exciting.

Caramel Pudding KitKat
Soothing. Vibrant. Light.

There’s a Lemon & Salt Kit Kat that I’m trying to taste, but I’m reaching and being a bit greedy here.

Those above were delicious though.

I looked at that hill and village over there so many times when I was a kid during summer vacation. Anxious of the future, of my future. Kind of knowing already that it would be quite different from my cousins, his/her friends and others.

I’d be proud and yelling if I knew then what’s going on for me now.

From our bed and breakfast a couple miles away from that first picture. One of the rare hour of sun I had while in France. That was nice.

I’m wondering about how they dealt with customers going from a world without smartphones to a world with them. How did it change their lives, habits, patterns? Going through the pandemic?

I’m wondering about how it feels like to move a giant vehicle, empty most of the time. Just driving around over and over. How does it feel at the end of the day or of the week? Do you feel like doing a bullshit job? How do you feel about people after dealing with customers and cars all day?

It is so exciting for me to see that what I imagined and pondered on, is real.

Seeing a brother living in a 3D printed house, as I plan to do, makes me feel so giddy. That my layout can be printed just like I printed it at small scale, makes me smile to no end. Game changer.

I also have optimized the use of built-in furniture (those will be 3D printed as well) so much that the only things I’d need to move in would be appliances, electronic devices, mattresses and pillows. Dassit.

Meanwhile the more I talk to homeowners the more I realize that yes, I am right to go for a rather small house and few rooms. That yes, attics and basements (for storage) are a waste of everyone’s time. Sell that shit. Give it away. I can’t believe my parents and I were sweating in the attic to remove 50 years old paperwork a couple weeks ago. That stuff should have been burning in the fireplace at least 20 years ago.

Don’t dream big, you’re going to be disappointed. Dream small, and execute.