Looper
It's like this whole town. Big heads, small potatoes.
Hi again, I’m Steve Makofsky and this is a semi-whenever list of interesting articles, podcasts and videos that I come across during the week. I hope that you’ll enjoy it, find something new to think about, and share it with your friends. In case you forgot, this is in your inbox because you asked me to send it to you. You can unsubscribe by clicking the link at the bottom of this email.
I've always enjoyed how wackiness of time travel films. The paradoxes that they can create along with the endless possibilities with jumping forward and backwards through time are fun to imagine (counterpoint - if you're Kurt Vonnegut all time is psychological not physical).
This week's watch was Rian Johnson's 2012 film 'Looper', which imagines a future where mob hitmen are tasked with killing people by sending victims back in time to be murdered, then dumping the bodies. The job is simple: Be at a scheduled place and time, shoot the hooded figure that appears, take bars of silver strapped to the victim, then dump the body and cash in your payment.
Here's the catch: at some point the mob will send 'a looper's' future self back in time, and they will serve as their own past self's target.
Without giving away the plot, the main arc of this film is about learning what's worth saving; time travel is merely the plot device to get us there.
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This weeks "Deep Links"
This week marks the 50th Anniversary of the incredibly horrific 'exploding whale' incident in Florence, Oregon. In case you've never heard of it, the Oregon Department of Transportation blew up a decaying sperm whale with dynamite attempting to get rid of it's rotting carcass; you can watch the video for the horror that followed - More
Google released a fascinating article/patent this week around using AI for the automatic creation of videos from a web page - More
Fuck cancer. Again. And again. And again. This week we lost Alex Trebek, long time host of Jeopardy! to pancreatic cancer. 2020 keeps taking and taking - More
Did you know that in the early 1900's, it was legal to mail a child via the US Postal Service? - More
I enjoyed this post a few weeks back from Troy Hunt on dealing with 'followers' and comments on topics. To quote "people [expressing] their displeasure when I post about a topic they're not interested in then deciding to have a whinge that my timeline isn't tailored to their expectation of the things they'd like me to talk about". On a similar vein, Peter McKinnon recently posted a video on "Why Everyone is Wrong about the MagSafe Wallet" and got flack about it. Bottom line; like both, I write about all sorts of weird, random things and do it for myself not others (but I'm glad you're reading!) - More
In what has to be one of the best 'feel good' stories of 2020, I've been enjoying Dave Grohl's (Foo Fighters) epic drum battles with 10-Year-Old Nandi Bushell - More
Ever wonder where old media goes to die? A look at the CD Recycling Center in Salem, NH where the material can take one million years to decompose in a landfill - More
I am a creature of habit — and end up eating the same things almost daily. "How Bad Is It to Eat the Same Thing Every Day?" - More
From the 'I don't need this, but it's super cool' camp; someone created a huge electronic ink poster than updates daily with the front page of The New York Times. What a neat hack project - More
During this past summer, I was starting to lament the fact that I didn't take advantage of the new 'work from home' wave that was hitting where people would rent RV's, or go to an exotic location to deal with the pandemic and lockdown. Here's some horror stories from those that did - More
Sorry, I'm personally still not going to eat at McDonald's, but apparently they have revealed a new McPlant line of meatless burgers - More
'They observe the loud beasts, rather than become a beast', a look at being one of the 'quiet people' in meetings is not only an amazing skill to work on, but how active listening can make you more of a 'doer' than a 'talker' - More
End Thoughts
I don't want to talk about time travel because if we start talking about it then we're going to be here all day talking about it, making diagrams with straws.