Tag: books

Lorne Malvo as Woland: Unmasking Evil in Fargo Season One | September 05 2024, 18:56

We’re revisiting the first season of Fargo. You know who Lorne Malvo (the one on the right in the photo) reminds me of? Woland.

Just look. He awakens the evil he sees in people and tempts them to act upon this evil, which is characteristic of Satan in Abrahamic religions—to tempt and entice people into sin. His collection of tapes can be seen as a symbol of “soul collecting”.

He creates chaos literally without any reason, like when he incites a kid to pee in a gas tank and then reports him, just like Satan, who perpetrates evil simply because he is evil, and to have a bit of fun. He phones Hess’s sons, lies to them and manipulates them into fighting, again, for no apparent reason. Or he scares the children living in Lester’s old house.

Somehow, he managed to escape from Lester’s basement, although there was no exit—a normal person couldn’t have done that. The character is often linked with religion: he pretends to be a priest, quotes biblical verses to manipulate a wealthy man, etc.

I barely remember the second half of the season, we are still watching it. But it seems to me that there will be even more evidence that Lorne is Woland 🙂

Pickleball | September 04 2024, 18:08

Yuki first saw how “parents” buy a ball for themselves and play with it. He is impressed by the day. So we’ve made it to pickleball. Now we need to make it to the court. It’s right in front of our house, but still, we need to get there! For instance, the pool, which is also in front of the house, I managed to go only once this year, and last year—not at all.

Binge-Watching Fargo Season 5: A Cozy, Old-School Feel with a Modern Twist | September 01 2024, 04:12

Last night we started watching Fargo Season 5, “Nadya, just the first episode then sleep,” and by this evening we binged all 10 episodes. It’s been a while since nine hours flew by like one.

Fargo is the only series that hasn’t dropped the ball after five seasons. It has this “cozy, old-school” vibe, like it’s supposedly 2019, but the feel is all late 20th century. The only jarring thing in the fifth season is the “all husbands—infantile and a bit cuckoo, all wives—strong women, sometimes victims, and also a bit cuckoo,” but given its other merits and the overall Fargo format, it’s forgivable. Overall, the plot is quite… naive… but again, it is compensated by the way it’s filmed, turning the series into a piece of art. Generally, there’s some caricaturization, but it seems intentionally stylized.

Exler wrote well: “… It’s specifically emphasized that the main villains are precisely Trump’s core electorate. Sheriff Tillman, never without his cowboy hat, a definite alpha male, abuser, racist, zealous Catholic and all that, and why his hat doesn’t scream MAGA in giant letters is like a script oversight. The sheriff’s wife must, first, shut up, second, do as her husband commands, and third—there will be no third, because the first two are enough for a happy married life. And if the wife disobeys, then the sheriff will beat her deadly, because how else to command respect from a woman who swore before God to belong to you body and soul? No other way.”

Now I want to rewatch the first season. It was absolutely beautiful, and I’m not sure that the fifth surpassed it, comparing the emotions post-viewing. But the emotions from the first season remain with me (it was very good), yet ten years on I barely remember it (well, I remember faces).

Now it’s time to get to True Detective.

Churchyards Rising: The Surprising Depth of History | August 26 2024, 20:42

From the book “At Home” by Bill Bryson:

“…Have you ever noticed,” asked Brian as we entered the churchyard, “that country churches almost always seem to have sunk into the ground?”

I admitted that I had never thought about it.

“It’s not that the church itself is sinking,” he continued. “It’s just that the churchyard has risen. How many people do you think are buried here?”

I glanced at the gravestones and responded, “I don’t know. Eighty? A hundred?”

“I think that’s quite a modest estimate,” said Brian with good-natured imperturbability. “Think about it. In a rural community like this one [Norfolk. – my note], there are usually about 250 inhabitants. That’s roughly a thousand adult deaths per century, plus several thousand more of those poor souls who didn’t reach adulthood. Multiply that by the number of centuries the church has been here, and you’re not looking at eighty or a hundred burials, but likely something around twenty thousand.”

Reuniting Liza with Her Beloved Cat: A Family’s Journey | August 24 2024, 21:26

They cleared out everything from Liza’s closet and took her favorite cat. Now the daughters have moved away: one lives in Italy, the other – in Blacksburg. The kitty lived with us for eight months, now we are taking him to Liza. Yuki said he would provide moral support.

Contrasting Portrayals of Kensington’s Plight | August 24 2024, 16:47

One really good thing about Kensington — this incredibly criminal neighborhood of Philadelphia, just teeming with dying drug addicts on the streets, a couple of hours away from us. Varlamov traveled there to report on “Kensington: Zombie Apocalypse in the Middle of the USA”, and after seeing Peter, watching Varlamov is revolting. Such different approaches to the same topic. Varlamov presented the neighborhood as a form of entertainment, while Peter shows what life there is like, from a very kind and humane perspective.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWGwCbSUECw

Unearthing Hidden Horrors in Unaudited Projects | August 24 2024, 15:41

I’ve noticed time and again that if I perform an audit on any part of a project where no one before me has, I invariably stumble upon some horror. It’s almost worth taking bets on it soon.

Simply take something that’s been somewhat working for years, that no one has bothered to look into because it works, and you’ll discover that a process is being triggered 50 times when once would suffice, or there’s a security breach, or something else.

The reasons for this are usually an excessive adherence to the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” principle, and not enough attention paid to “what could go wrong” during the development phase. It’s just that things “going wrong” don’t always lead to noticeable problems. If you have five million products in your catalogue, 10,000 broken ones hardly make a dent. Until some customer reports it, that is.

Maybe I should have gone into testing? I’ll go check what courses are available.

Cat Watches Movie: A Tail of Distraction and Departure | August 24 2024, 00:32

My animals have discovered the television. Yuki is sad. Tomorrow, her beloved cat is leaving for a very long time, and they’ve also put this cone on him. I put on a movie for him. He’s been watching for more than an hour. The kinaesthetic cat came, and the movie got a plot.