links week eleven
Welcome to a new world without toilet paper. Seriously, it’s fucking depressing seeing pictures of grocery stores post-hoarding. I hope everyone reading this cares for your fellow humans more than building a fort out of sanitizer and toilet paper.
Here’s a cat to help you feel better:
Sorry for starting on a bummer note, but it’s kinda wild out there, eh?
I hope you’re taking care of yourself, washing your hands for 20 seconds, using lotion to protect your skin, and breathing deeply. In this midst of the wild times, I bring you links and love from a train in Japan traveling 200 miles per hour. Everyone is wearing masks, and it’s gently raining outside of the window as we pass Mount Fuji.
Ok, here’s the links:
- It turns out, on some sites it’s ads all the way down. I personally use an adblocker for many, many reasons. It really helps with page load times too. If you’re feeling fancy, you can install one on your router, or use something like an Eero that can handle blocking for you with no installation.
- This piece was written for our current world about the Netflix show I Think You Should Leave and using Tim Robinson’s absurdist comedy to cope with dread. I loved this show, and have watched it more than once at this point. If you like it, I also recommend Nathan for You and Review, both of which are equally strange and oddly comforting. I know for some of you reading this, your empathy extends to fictional characters on tv, and makes watching “cringe” shows essentially impossible, but if you are like me, and enjoy some good old-fashioned schadenfreude… “Absurdist humor is a means to express the core disillusionment that lies at the heart of the millennial generation”.
- A comic about trying really, really hard not to touch your face. I always think “hot hands!” which helps a little. A habit I picked up from conferences, which are always hotbeds of illness, is to never touch my face or food until I’ve washed thoroughly. It even helps to wash during “transitions,” like, getting home, going to the restroom, etc. Soap: it’s really good.
- This link might be a little odd considering we’re all working from home indefinitely, but here’s a bit about how folks are using mute and noise-cancelling to escape the world around them.
- Today, I’m off to Kyoto, which is trying to attract tourists currently through an odd campaign. I’m only there for one night, to enjoy a hotel room designed by EYヨ. It promises to be an interesting experience. Hopefully I’ll have photos to share with you next week. Here’s one of my favorite albums by Boredoms, the band that アイ started.
- Finally, for you documentation nerds out there, I think this is a pretty interesting solution for folks who like using Github and Markdown to write. It’s not particularly mobile-friendly, but theoretically one could edit and write in a markdown tool of choice, then use this app to do the collaboration bits. I still don’t really like Google Docs, and I fear for the future of Dropbox Paper, so I’m glad to see more work on open standards.
That’s it from me today in 日本. I hope your Saturday is quiet and relaxing, and you’re able to have a great big belly laugh every day this week. Love yourself, and those around you, and as always—see you next week, space cowgirls~