Static to Signal#
This weekend my family and I were all sitting around reading, each of us in our own book but sharing the same quiet space. It was nothing dramatic, just the soft rhythm of pages turning and the comfort of being near one another. Moments like that are tiny and easy to overlook; they deserve more weight than we ever give them. Maybe it is the autumnal season or the shorter light this time of year, but everything feels tuned to that gentler frequency where ordinary things echo a little louder. I have been thinking about that feeling all week. Small moments settle in and stay with you. A little warmth in the familiar can be enough to keep you going, even if the rest of life keeps whispering that you really should be doing something productive instead.
Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart.
A. A. Milne
Link Shotgun Blast#
- 5 Great Spaghetti Westerns You Can Stream For Free
- My best friend in high school went through a full spaghetti western phase, and since I wanted to hang out, I got dragged into it. Before long I was hooked. What grabbed me was not just the ponchos, the long stares, or the Morricone score that makes even tying your shoes feel dramatic. It was the realization that these movies are what America looks like from the outside. They are our myths, filtered through someone else’s lens, shaped by another culture’s ideas about greed, honor, and frontier justice. Watching them feels like one of the first signs that America had developed its own distinct culture, something strong enough that other countries could remix it and send it back to us. It is strange and fascinating to see your own country reflected in a way that feels truer because it comes from outside the frame. My favorite of the bunch is A Fistful of Dynamite. Rod Steiger brings this wild, loose energy that feels bigger than the explosions around him, and honestly that is part of the charm.
- The Penny Dies at 232
- The penny was finally retired this week at the age of 232, and the reaction has the tone of a genuine farewell. There are final-minting events, reflective essays about its legacy, and a sense that something familiar in American life has reached its end. It is a remarkable contrast to the half penny, which disappeared in 1857 with barely a ripple despite having far more real buying power. The difference comes down to psychology. The penny has been baked into our collective sense of value for generations, from the 99 cent price tag to the idea that every cent counts. Its fanfare has little to do with practical use and everything to do with symbolism. Now that it is gone, I suspect it will take on the same curious emotional afterlife as Pluto losing its planetary status. Schoolchildren will protest its absence long after everyone else has moved on.
- The Edmund Fitzgerald Teaches Men How To Feel
- This week marks fifty years since the Edmund Fitzgerald went down, which explains why Gordon Lightfoot has been haunting everyone’s algorithm again. It turns out the song is not just a maritime tragedy. It is also one of the few socially acceptable ways for American men to experience emotions stronger than mild concern. This piece digs into why that ballad hits so hard, why it resurfaces every November like a seasonal depression mascot, and how a shipwreck from 1975 became the unofficial national anthem of quietly sad guys everywhere.
The Playlist: Maudlin Americana#
I’ve always liked building playlists. It scratches the same itch as sorting gear or lining up tools before a project. Order out of chaos, but with better background noise. So each Sunday, I’m turning that impulse into a weekly ritual. One playlist, one idea. If it gives you something better to listen to than the news, even better. If not, at least the music holds up.
This week’s playlist lives in the space between memory and motion. I’m calling it maudlin Americana, though I might be wrong on both counts. It’s not sad, exactly. More like a slow exhale after a long stretch. These tracks lean on strong voices, simple arrangements, and the kind of storytelling that sticks with you long after the song ends. Think quiet roads, porch lights, and that familiar pull to look back before you move forward.
Sunday Thought (Feel Free to Skim)#
What if the aliens come and we just can’t communicate?
The Ars Technica interview on the possibility of meeting aliens and failing to communicate shows how strange first contact could be. We might share a universe but have no overlap in how we send or receive meaning. It made me think of two very different examples. In Breakfast of Champions1, Vonnegut’s aliens from Zog communicate through tap dancing and farting, which humans read as nonsense or a threat. In John Scalzi’s Agent to the Stars2, the Yherajk “speak” through scent, but every subtle emotional cue they release hits humans as one giant wall of rotting garbage. Both species are trying to say something clear, yet we lack the senses or wiring to interpret any of it.
The article also raises the idea that the communication might not be peaceful at all. In the new show Pluribus3, that fear becomes the center of the story. Humanity spends the front half of the first episode assuming the strange pulses and patterns in the sky are a friendly attempt at contact. We read it as curiosity, but it is actually the beginning of our end. Our interpretation is completely wrong, and we do not understand the danger until it is far too late. It is a reminder that human ideas about alien messages are usually simple, while real communication could be dense, layered, or completely unreadable.
Some of this also loops back to the Fermi Paradox4, the old question of why we see no signs of intelligent life despite the size of the universe. Most explanations focus on distance or timing or the grim possibility that advanced civilizations do not last long. But another answer is simpler and a little humbling. What if the signals are there and we are just not built to notice? What if the universe has been talking this whole time and we keep mistaking the conversation for background noise? It would not be the first time humans failed to pick up on something obvious. And if that is the case, then the real bottleneck in first contact might not be technology at all. It might be our own inability to read the room.
Needless to say, if aliens ever try to communicate with us through me, I hope it is not subtle. I have trouble picking up hints from humans as it is. If the fate of the world depends on my ability to understand nuance, we are doomed.
Your notes keep me going…#
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