Alla Nazimova as Camille - BOTD

Milky fogged up skies, the sounds of crows and owls, strange cocktails at the place down the street, home, 1930s jazz, wine, pizza, an evening spent discussing film and being grateful for our Dorothy, who has not been feeling well but whom the vet thinks just has arthritis and nothing dramatic.

If making a dramatic, swooping exit is your thing then a Maria Gallenga velvet evening cloak is the garment for you. She pioneered a particular method of block printing with metallic hues which lent her pieces a distinctive air. Black velvet, 1920s @metmuseum.org #FashionHistory 🗃️🪡

BREAKING: Judge Waverly Crenshaw dismisses indictment of Kilmar Abrego Garcia based on selective and vindictive prosecution. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

#HundenasenMontag mit Fumi Yanagimoto

For anyone who pays attention to these things, the blackhawk that was patrolling the shoreline is back tonight. (I don't normally hear loud helicopters along the lake when I am walking the dog at night unless someone is drowning or it's ICE, so I do check.)

love to be alive right now...

It's Wrong Jacket Week in Chicago, we are celebrating the changing seasons by making sure that you are 100% always wearing the wrong jacket no matter what you do

In better news:

Seems like an opportune time to remind the inhabitants of Cook County that both State's Attorneys and judges are are elected positions.

THE ELECTRIC COMPANY won its first Emmy #OTD in 1973. PBS shows like this and SESAME STREET transformed the way my generation looked at race and the world beyond our doorstep. I can’t imagine my life without it. #PBS #TVSky

oh no...

Not a person who routinely checks my texts so just now finding out ICE was at the Evanston Walgreens this evening.

lake forever windsurfers for now

She had the kind of assassinating that made men become corpses.

Yes the lake really is that color. Yes it really is that big. Yes we do have beaches with public bathrooms and lifeguards and hot dog stands. Yes winter is worth it.

Have just read some questionable reporting (interview subjects include "social media famous people with no professional expertise on the topic" and no interrogation or investigation of claims, just reprinting them) from a journalist I have long respected. Alas, this seems to be how things are now...

Can you spot the LLM-authored story? Can you guess which pic is AI? Can you tell an ad from an article? Can you distinguish your bank's header from a phishing email? Is this text a scam? Is this website legit? Are these reading glasses spyware? Is your data safe? Is your data you? Is anything real?

MischEEvious, onymouse (ominous), pickle-een (piccolina), frajeelay, Canadia, high-larious, Jorjay Borjay (Borges), comfortahblah, melk, ... I think I have a strange compulsion to intentionally mispronounce everything.

why "read" if you aren't going to read, why "write" if you aren't going to write, why "think" if you aren't going to think.... maybe just go see about becoming a sea sponge or something else less psychically deleterious

"almost certainly not produced unaided by a human" is a bar a plastic-wrapped slice of American cheese-food could clear.

Over on the RSBookclub sub people have now identified like 3 different Commonwealth Prize stories believed to be written with LLM. I read them out of morbid curiosity, and they are SO uncannily similar in such very specific ways that I now feel like a concussion victim in a Kafkaesque horror story.

I wasn't at all expecting this to be about The Terror, season 1.

Unsettled weather induced insomnia. :(

I GET LOGGED OUT. BUT I LOG IN AGAIN

LOLOLOL

Is this website broken or do you guys really hate movies?

I have read that Pauline At The Beach & Full Moon In Paris are coming to the Criterion Channel in June and am afraid to get my hopes up but if so it remains true that complaining on social media works. 🙏

After enjoying Linklater's Nouvelle Vague, I decided to give the French New Wave another go last night. I watched Varda's Le Bonheur and have been angry about it all day! I get what she was doing, I do love formalism, and kudos for eliciting a strong emotion. But it sent me running back to Rohmer.

Moments before RTing the post about dogs acting out a courtroom scene, I was thinking how distasteful I find the reality TV-esque coverage of the piping plovers to be. Do I contradict myself? I don't thinks so. Those dogs are doing a job and get to go home and live their private lives in dignity.

May 18, 1926: Some dog actors of Hollywood act out a courtroom scene. According to a caption, "Cameo, the almost human dog in the center, has been charged with intoxication," but she proves "she never took anything stronger than milk." The title of the production isn't given.

Perfect balcony weather evening though. Cool breeze, almost Parisian skies, and airplanes twinkling like diamonds as they fly in over the lake at dusk. Deeelightful.

Looking at everyone's "what a beautiful day" pics from my overcast/foggy/hazy, windy, high pollen count, nearly 90 degrees microclimate. I'm happy to thaw out after the frigid temps of the last few weeks, but the farthest I've gone outdoors today is to the balcony with my little salads and drinks.

Midnight with The Arcades Project. “Fog appears as a consolation of the solitary man. It fills the abyss surrounding him.”

I guess my only worthwhile thought on the British reaction to the British ranking great British books is some British are too wound up in class and politics to be objective about it. Sorry friends, those really are some phenomenally well-written books.

Our early mornings are often accompanied by the call of a cuckoo at this time of year. Today was especially silvery and so an Unsuitable Dog Walk Attire choice which matches the landscape but may cause chilly knees. Late #1920s @metmuseum.org #FashionHistory 🗃️🪡

Big account w/replies and quotes turned off posted about our gas prices. Evanston is served by CTA train & bus, commuter train, suburban buses, and Divvy bikes. I live near this gas station and have at least 5 public transportation options within walking distance. Oh, and Evanston is walkable.

Gemini conversationally tailoring its results to what it thinks it knows about me is some creepy shit. A search engine should feel like a reference desk, not a freakazoid stalker.

Anyway, I need someone to create a playlist based on this Sal Da Vinci banger:

TIL the song "Volare," which I - a middle aged American - have probably known my whole life, was originally a Eurovision hit song. I only learned about Eurovision in the oughts. I was born a rabid fan of ABBA, who won that year, but I would not learn about the song contest for another 30 years...

Seems uncommon for such a large ship to be in the lake? I'm all for it, so long as it isn't carrying hantavirus.

Ok Italy is my favorite, but I suspect they're even less like than France to win. I could listen to that guy all day though. 🕺🏻

France is just leagues better than anyone else in this contest. If it loses, it's because it wasn't cringe enough for Eurovision.

Kicking off the weekend with a Patou-clad Josephine Baker. Jean Patou was the first couturier to put his own monogram on his clothes.

Current* conditions near Evanston, IL:

A year in hospital and 90% lung damage: how Andrey Zvyagintsev survived Covid and came back to Cannes

#FridayFrocks This evening gown, c.1927–28, is heavily decorated with #Beadwork, making a dazzling overall impression. Loose lines of bugle beads have been caught in at regular intervals to create a tiered, festooned effect. #ArtDeco #1920s

The lilac bushes in our backyard and along the nearby Metra tracks are just now in full bloom, and the scent at night is heavenly.

Fuck every one of these Chicago news corporations with helicopters. People live here and have a right to some fucking peace.