🍿 I watched First Man today.
Making a movie about real events can be difficult because the audience likely knows the outcome of the story. The movie felt boring to me most of the time. But despite that, I recognize the cast was great, and the filmmakers included a lot of details to make the movie authentic to real life.
Finished reading: How to Resist Amazon and Why: The Fight for Local Economics, Data Privacy, Fair Labor, Independent Bookstores, and a People-Powered Future! by Danny Caine 📚
Good overview of Amazon’s workplace conditions, unions (and union busting), data collection, and effects on the economy, small businesses, and politics. The book is written from the perspective of a bookstore owner, but a lot of his points apply to any kind of small business.
My favorite part of the book was the end, which encourages people to be pro-small business and engaged in your local community.
Here’s the list of movies I watched in 2024. Titles with an asterisk after them (*) are ones I recommend.
If you’d like to see movies I’ve watched in the past, I have a list going back to 2015. 🍿
I had a slow year for reading books in 2024.
Here are my favorite 2 from the year:
And the other 3 I read:
I have a whole bookshelf of unread books, so here’s to more reading in 2025.
If you’d like to see books I’ve read in the past, I have a whole list going back to 2011. 📚
Perks of living in the snack belt. Potentially unnecessary flavors, but fun to try. 🤭
📺 Doctor Who Christmas special - “Joy to the World”
The acting was great, and the concepts were interesting. Plot was a bit messy, and the last few minutes got really sappy. That made the episode feel flat to me. 3/5 ⭐️
Cutting out some magazine images for collaging. No plan. Just gathering stuff.
My December newsletter is out. A little zine preview, some links to share, and what I’ve been watching.
Does anyone have strong opinions about moving a company/business site from WordPress to Webflow? (Specifically from a marketing perspective, because I would not be doing the development or design work.)
📺 I finished watching Black Doves (streaming on Netflix). They left an opening for a season 2 but I would be fine if this were the only season. It’s a complete story. 4/5 ⭐️ overall but 5/5 ⭐️ for casting.
📺 Currently watching Black Doves (streaming on Netflix). It has some awkward moments, but overall I like it so far.
I mistyped my email address on an online order (at a pretty major retail site), and customer service cannot correct the email address on their end.
But their site is clearly tracking me with cookies and sending customer survey emails…to my correct email address.
We’re living in the future. 🙄
Pocket chess game where each piece gets promoted after you move. So your pawn becomes a knight, and then a bishop…up to king. It looks fun but also chaotic. 😆
I updated my phone to iOS 18, and I don’t hate the new Photos app. To be fair, I didn’t like the previous version of the Photos app either. I just put up with it. 🤣
Sometimes when people read my zines, they say, “This is so clever! How did you come up with this?” Or another version, “I would never think of making a zine about this topic. It’s so cool that you did.”
Those comments are always meant as compliments, and I say thank you for the nice words.
But I feel the exact same way when I read other people’s zines. 😅 There have been SO MANY times I read other people’s zines and thought, “Wow, how did they even think of this?”
This post is for WeblogPoMo AMA, a challenge to write AMA-style (“Ask me anything”) blog posts during November.
I’m answering my own question today. If you decide to answer this question in a post on your site, please let me know.
Where do your ideas come from?
For context — Earlier today I visited a graphic design class at a local college. The professor invited me to talk to the students about making zines. I gave a short presentation about my process and brought examples of zines made by other people.
During the Q&A, the professor asked how I come up with ideas for zines. How do I decide what topics to make zines about?
My straightforward answer is, I just come up with stuff. But that’s not helpful. If someone is asking you how you come up with ideas, it’s because they realize coming up with ideas is difficult. They want to know how you move past that difficulty.
My more complete answer is, I look for inspiration in a lot of different places.
When it comes to movies, TV shows, and books, I lean toward sci-fi and fantasy. But I go broader than that, too, because there are lots of different things to explore in other genres.
I read a lot of articles, newsletters, and blogs from a wide range of people. I read a lot of non-fiction books, on all kinds of topics.
I make a habit of paying attention to ordinary things. Some of my zines were inspired by a random conversation with a friend or an interesting observation on a normal day.
I keep a running list of zine ideas, and I add ideas even if I’m not sure I’ll ever make a zine on that topic. Then when I have time to sit down and work on a zine, I have a list of topics to choose from. There isn’t any pressure to come up with an idea, and it doesn’t feel like I’m starting from scratch.
It’s officially fall weather, but I drink iced coffee all year round. 😋
My November newsletter is out!
Today finally felt like fall in Lancaser, PA. ☺️🍁
Zoom in on this last photo to see ducks napping. 🥹
🍿 Somewhere in Time (1980) - Streaming for free on Tubi. It’s a well-made movie with a great cast. I feel like it was probably well-received when it came out, but I don’t think it aged well.