Well. The time since my last weeknotes did not go exactly as according to plan. But that’s nothing unusual for me. Here are the highlights:
- A few print deadline scheduling changes meant planned writing was either scrapped or put on the long finger. Ultimately that turned out to be a good thing, as I made the time to wrap up my fourth Noises On! column for Thumped: long, long delayed, but hopefully you’ll find something of interest in it. Of course now it’s up, all I can think of are the records I didn’t mention. FOMO and all that.
- Only two film reviews, as previously linked, for Free Fire and A Cure for Wellness. Scheduling conflicts meant a bit of a screening drought for a few weeks, but in recent days I saw a couple of late April/early May releases, and have another one on the agenda for next week. Still trying to spend less time with passable movies in my leisurely viewing, which has meant more TV than films in my diet; lately we’ve been flying through The Legend of Korra of an evening.
In other comings, goings and doings:
- I spent a few mornings and afternoons at the turn of the month on a regular seasonal subediting job for Afloat, as well as more recently writing up a couple of longer articles; more taxing work, but it makes a nice change from my usual daily contributions. It’s easy to get burnt out, though, so I’m taking today off to reset my brain.
- Site updates! Since last month, via the magic of plugins, my tweets now post to my WordPress install and appear on the main page, with a little curation after the fact. Meanwhile, some functions.php malarkey means said tweets should be excluded from my RSS feeds, after making a mess of it at the start. Besides that, I’ve made a few cosmetic tweaks, and added a format template for single image posts to match what I already had for videos. I suppose you could say I finally have a proper tumblelog now, a decade or so after my first aborted attempt to wrangle Movable Type to do that (and then Tumblr happened, etc).
- I’ve also been editing older blog posts, mostly for formatting (as I’ve laid out before) but also for things I don’t stand by anymore; the kinds of things I would second-guess about posting today. Even though I’m trying to abide by the principle of my blog as a personal record, of growth and change as much as memory, that very growth and change is at odds with the always-now of the blog archive. While I can factor in the time dilation; others may not. Hence, I’ve culled quite a few things into the drafts folder; not deleted, just no longer necessary. Holistically, the blog remains as what it’s meant to be.
- Anyway, going through my older posts, it’s struck me just how much I’ve matured about certain things, and not grown much with others. Me from 15 years ago sure liked to overshare, and write even more informally than I do now. I did not have a house style (good grief). And boy, did I swear a lot. (I mean I still do, but I feel I choose my moments more wisely.) It took some doing not to bin the lot, as I imagine hundreds of thousands of other embarrassed former bloggers have done. But I wouldn’t be where I am now if it wasn’t for what I did then. It is what it is: then, not now. I’m OK with that.
- The week(s) ahead: more new music in my life, some better writing on movies, and making the most of these longer, drier days, on foot and by bicycle (once I get my bike serviced in the coming days).