I got some filini because it was on sale, figured I’d hate it and needed the laugh but it’s a fun little variant on my pasta meals (baseline “normal” now is either half spag/rig or 50% spag/rig, 50% filini, plus occasional dips into weirdness w/sales other than bucatini; fuck bucatini straw fucken bullshit ... also no on any ribbon-ee pasta ... thanks for asking). They’re so tiny. Smol pasta is smol. I have to dial in where to add it to the end of radial heatin’ for my regular pasta but that’s a me problem, you don’t need to worry about that but thank you for your cards and letters and non-helium balloons and non-chocolate candies. I bought enough that I think I’m going to be out nearly on the nose when the shared expiration date drops.

Confidential to De Cecco: Your website does not load at all in LibreWolf, Waterfox, Firefox, Palemoon, Opera, or Opera w/Opera VPN. I bet it works in Chrome. Brilliant, promote your cousin to CTO. I can switch all my pasta gits to Rummo, E-Z.

I don’t know why they put the enlarged photo of filini next to the package like that w/o any sort of zoomie indication, they’re not that big.

jeez that’s big

Five am. There’s a commotion in the street. Sirens, ambulance SCHRONNNNNNK SCHRONK emergency signal, bullhorn yelling. Takes a second to realize ... it’s the jagoff from two days ago.

Perhaps I missed yesterday’s performance.

I applaud the devotion to art, except yeah if we could nudge the time up a little, I have a regular thing.

Defunctland After Dark: Chipotle “Documentary” ads [15min]. Yes, I fortunately see very little in the way of commercials these days but instead of seeing these weird 15-sec Chipotle ads I watched a 15min breezy explainer about said ads. So what. It’s my life. I can do anything I want. [FX: spends three years constructing a 1/16th scale working Métro parisien rapid transit system out of spaghetti] See?

Someone came walking up the street at 5am today. It sounded like they were talking backward, and their footfalls were electronically amplified beatboxing?

[backward talking]
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
[backward talking]
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

I encourage this sort of creativity, but please, operating hours only. Luckily, none of the neighborhood’s hair-trigger dogs went on thirty-minute bark alert, valiantly protecting 10x20 patches of concrete from Unidentified Beatboxing Situations.

A poem.

KEEP OFF GRASS
bare piggies touch blades
nanobots enter bloodstream

Cheese in the Home, November 1930, Extension Service of the College of Agriculture, University of Wisconsin. Inner front cover.

Not Just Bikes: Trams are Great! So why are the Streetcars SO BAD!?

There has been a fire at the Museum of Jurassic Technology. For more information from Lawrence Weschler, please read SOS: FIRE AT THE MJT. “The loss in ticket revenue and gift shop sales alone will likely approach $75,000, and then there’s the longterm challenge of refashioning and restocking the shop itself.” To donate please click on “donate,” earlier in this sentence. Thanks to Jon for bringing this to my attention.

The Wheel and cycling trade review, February 18, 1898. Here’s the Highest Gear.

Hanzi: A documentary on Chinese typography [3min]. Hanzi is available on Kanopy which is free if you have a US library card etc.

Hoog: The message NASA wants aliens to see [17min].

Buckeye Manufacturing Company, Hardware & Carriage Specialties, 1898 letterhead (auction).

“You want a logo ... for a door latch?”

“The ‘H.W.’ Door Latch. Yes please. Also The ‘Lightning’ Drain Cleaner, etc. All of it. Single-Tree Key Straps! So many logos!”

Pancakes Across America, a favorite from 1999, updated for 2025.

Jaiden Animations: My Funniest Fan Interactions [16min]. Double-troll.

Taskmaster: Season 19 Outtakes ‒ Part 2 [16min].

I was adding a stub to a bookcase with a drill when a tiny spider started crawling up one side. Started drill, spider immediately jumped off the other side and lowered itself to the ground on a spider-strand. It was dramatic. Sorry little spider.

Not Just Bikes: The Best-Designed Town in the Netherlands (and therefore, the world) [25min].

Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster #252: Jason Mantzoukas [1hr 20min].

[cardhouse] Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate (2015). Notable Bugs, Tips, Strange Observations, Fun Diversions, etc.

Idles: Pop Pop Pop [4min].