🎤 Testing a new drop rig setup for capturing long field recordings remotely.

🎤 Testing a new drop rig setup for capturing long field recordings remotely.

🌱 Blooming crocus in our garden.

🌱 Blooming crocus in our garden.

📚 Currently reading: The Soundscape by R. Murray Schafer. Although I just bought this book and am reading it for the first time, it feels...

📚 Currently reading: The Soundscape by R. Murray Schafer.

Although I just bought this book and am reading it for the first time, it feels like I’ve already read it through the many quotes and references I’ve encountered over the years.

The world’s first Fish Doorbell is live again in Utrecht 🙂 🐟🐟 Every spring, thousands of fish swim through the Oudegracht in...

The world’s first Fish Doorbell is live again in Utrecht 🙂 🐟🐟

Every spring, thousands of fish swim through the Oudegracht in Utrecht, searching for a place upstream to lay their eggs. But the Weerdsluis is often closed. You can help the fish continue their journey! If you see a fish, press the doorbell. This alerts the lock operator to open the lock.

🎥 Trainspotting (1996) ★★★★½

🎥 Trainspotting (1996) ★★★★½

🎥 RIP Gene Hackman, one of my favourite actors ever. When Hackman was 13, his father abandoned the family. Hackman was out in the...

🎥 RIP Gene Hackman, one of my favourite actors ever.

When Hackman was 13, his father abandoned the family. Hackman was out in the street, playing. His father passed him by, just giving a wave of his hand. “I hadn’t realized how much one small gesture can mean," he once said, looking back on it. “Maybe that’s why I became an actor.”

🔗

Want to read: Art and Objects by Graham Harman 📚

Want to read: Art and Objects by Graham Harman 📚

📺 Rewatching The West Wing and it’s quite the experience, considering how much has changed. This quote from S01E07 takes on a whole new...

📺 Rewatching The West Wing and it’s quite the experience, considering how much has changed. This quote from S01E07 takes on a whole new significance:

JOSH I don’t think it’s unreasonably macho for the White House to be aggressive in preserving democracy.

MANDY Let me tell you something. Ultimately, it is not the nuts that are the greatest threat to democracy, as history has shown us over and over and over again, the greatest threat to democracy is the unbridled power of the state over its citizens. Which, by the way, that power is always unleashed in the name of preservation.

Yet another book I definitely want to read soon: Meet the Neighbors: Animal Minds and Life in a More-than-Human World by Brandon Keim 📚 ...

Yet another book I definitely want to read soon: Meet the Neighbors: Animal Minds and Life in a More-than-Human World by Brandon Keim 📚

In recent decades, our understanding of animal cognition has exploded, making it indisputably clear that the cities and landscapes around us are filled with thinking, feeling individuals besides ourselves. But the way we relate to wild animals has yet to catch up. In Meet the Neighbors, acclaimed science journalist Brandon Keim asks: what would it mean to take the minds of other animals seriously?

🎥 Babygirl (2024) ★★½ A bold, delightfully cringy story, but with plot twists that feel too obvious and unconvincing. The pacing and...

🎥 Babygirl (2024) ★★½

A bold, delightfully cringy story, but with plot twists that feel too obvious and unconvincing. The pacing and editing also didn’t quite work for me.

🎥 Sing Sing (2023) ★★★★★ Divine G, imprisoned at Sing Sing for a crime he didn’t commit, finds purpose by acting in a...

🎥 Sing Sing (2023) ★★★★★

Divine G, imprisoned at Sing Sing for a crime he didn’t commit, finds purpose by acting in a theatre group alongside other incarcerated men in this story of resilience, humanity, and the transformative power of art.

This is a film everyone should watch and never forget. The most wonderful moment was actually during the end credits: most of the cast turned out to be playing as themselves.

Finished reading: Maakkracht by Tabo Goudswaard & Jetske van Oosten 📚 Interesting reading material. For myself and my students.

Finished reading: Maakkracht by Tabo Goudswaard & Jetske van Oosten 📚

Interesting reading material. For myself and my students.

Very happy with our latest cookbook, Easy Wins: 12 Flavour Hits, 125 Delicious Recipes, 365 Days of Good Eating. Anna Jones excels at...

Very happy with our latest cookbook, Easy Wins: 12 Flavour Hits, 125 Delicious Recipes, 365 Days of Good Eating. Anna Jones excels at creating incredible dishes with just a few well-chosen flavours and ingredients. Tonight, I made two miso-infused dishes that complemented each other beautifully.

🎥 Alien: Romulus (2024) ★★★ Perfect for watching in bed while having the flu, but I’m glad I didn’t watch it in the...

🎥 Alien: Romulus (2024) ★★★

Perfect for watching in bed while having the flu, but I’m glad I didn’t watch it in the theatre…

🎥 Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) ★★★★½ Rewatch after a very long time. It was an even weirder (and better) experience...

🎥 Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) ★★★★½

Rewatch after a very long time. It was an even weirder (and better) experience than I remembered from back then. A lot of little plot twists just didn’t make sense, but altogether make up for a great 2.5-hour watch. Classic Spielberg.

That moment in history when generative AI models experienced their transformative “aha moment”: A particularly intriguing phenomenon...

That moment in history when generative AI models experienced their transformative “aha moment”:

A particularly intriguing phenomenon observed during the training of DeepSeek-R1-Zero is the occurrence of an “aha moment”. This moment […] occurs in an intermediate version of the model. During this phase, DeepSeek-R1-Zero learns to allocate more thinking time to a problem by reevaluating its initial approach.

🔗

🎥 RIP David Lynch… Love this fitting statement by his family: There’s a big hole in the world now that he’s no longer with...

🎥 RIP David Lynch…

Love this fitting statement by his family:

There’s a big hole in the world now that he’s no longer with us. But, as he would say, ‘Keep your eye on the donut and not on the hole'.

After an unsatisfactory experiment with cross-posting to Threads from my microblog, I deleted both my Threads and (mostly dormant) Instagram...

After an unsatisfactory experiment with cross-posting to Threads from my microblog, I deleted both my Threads and (mostly dormant) Instagram accounts. Meta’s DEI and fact-checking policy changes were the final straw. While at it, I deleted my X account too. It felt like the only right thing to do.

Sunset

Sunset

🦔🌱 Testing out the great new Photo Collections feature of Micro.blog with some photos of hedgehogs in our garden, taken over the...

🦔🌱 Testing out the great new Photo Collections feature of Micro.blog with some photos of hedgehogs in our garden, taken over the years.

🎥 Triangle of Sadness (2022) ★★★★ Delightfully absurd, with a ‘Captain’s Dinner’ scene I won’t forget anytime soon…...

🎥 Triangle of Sadness (2022) ★★★★

Delightfully absurd, with a ‘Captain’s Dinner’ scene I won’t forget anytime soon… Reminded me a bit of the dark humour of Roy Andersson’s films.

🌱 The very last and very first raspberry of the year!

🌱 The very last and very first raspberry of the year!

Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar. Unfortunately, it was way too crowded to fully experience most of the works as intended. Highlights for me...

Museum Voorlinden, Wassenaar. Unfortunately, it was way too crowded to fully experience most of the works as intended. Highlights for me included Nick Cave’s The Devil - A Life, James Turrell’s Skyspace, and a beautiful sculpture by an artist I can’t recall.

🎥 Barbie (2023) ★★★½

🎥 Barbie (2023) ★★★½

📚 Very curious to read: Being a Beast by Charles Foster. A passionate naturalist explores what it’s really like to be an animal—by...

📚 Very curious to read: Being a Beast by Charles Foster.

A passionate naturalist explores what it’s really like to be an animal—by living like them. How can we ever be sure that we really know the other? To test the limits of our ability to inhabit lives that are not our own, Charles Foster set out to know the ultimate other: the non-humans, the beasts.