SUPERMAN, No. 664 (Busiek / Pacheco, Merino; DC, 2007)

Every Wednesday morning, I make a blind pull from Siri's (randomized) choice of one of the 20 alphabetically-organized shortboxes that constitute my comics collection, (re-)read it, write about it, and publish the resultant review / memory / whatever. Earlier installments live here.

(Box17): Now entering the weird, post-INFINITE CRISIS / pre-FLASHPOINT back half of the DC naughties when nothing quite clicked though, in theory, it should have: Busiek and Pacheco (RIP; if there was anyone born to draw Superman) are a phenomenal team but even they couldn't bring magic to the character and his world as it was then. Not that this is a bad issue – it isn't, not by a long shot – but I won't remember any of it after writing this; starting to lose some of it even a few moments after reading it: it was wholly there in its thereness.

(IIRC, Morrison and Quitely's ALL-STAR SUPERMAN was unfolding in stuttering release parallel, an unenviable position for any team on the main books to find themselves in.)

If anything, this makes evident why the New52 (and the ensuing decade+ of rebirthing and rebuilding) came into being: there was clearly a need to revitalize the line (though the Bat-line came through unscathed, as it was quite good then, IIRC: Morrison again); it was only in the shoddy, haphazard execution via "editorial bloodsucking" of said revitalization that the New52 failed to leave little more than a bad taste.

Though I'll admit, the pie was a nice – if unsubtle – touch.

remarkable 2: first work session

Majority of first impressions have been altered: while I initially thought the remarkable would be a replacement for the Drafts app and not a journal, it's already proven to be the opposite; I'm giving it this week to replace my paper and pen journal (which, unless things drastically change and/or it decides to erase my jottings, it's already done); figured out the left-hand thing and am now a leftie writing on a leftie-oriented device with a digital Papermate Flair (I've found a setting – marker, medium, black which makes it so) and have ordered the Lamy stylus that's basically an AL-Star with a stylus nib so I can fully merge both worlds; a leather cover, not dissimilar to my journal one, is on its way. Hopefully will find a way to keep index cards, post its, and perhaps my CW&T Pen Type-C in there alongside for quick notes and jottings. Once the Lamy arrives, it'll be quite something, I think.

File system so far:

• Journal: one notebook per week – pretty similar to what I do here – with one page per day (scrolling journal is fantastic!) and written in the same scrawl as with my 14+ years of paper journals. When the week is done, I'll transfer a PDF over to Obsidian and save it there and start a new one. Given that I've never gone back and consulted one of those journals in the 14 years of their existence, I see no reason that I'll start now: their purpose is to get the shit out of my brain. Hopefully, as I get more acclimated to creating with it, the notebook there and the notebook here will more fully merge. Biggest thing: I didn’t miss the paper journal, not once.

• Legal Pad: so named, ruled, for when I need to draft things or think things through on the Main Things.

• Considering adding "Whiteboard" for mindmaps, etc - though I could do that on the Legal Pad, IDK. Doubt I'll save these, as I tend to manually add to Obsidian / main project doc as I go.

• Quick sheets for quick jottings - sticky notes section, accessible from the main doc, would be great, but that does, I suppose, go against the guiding ethos of deep work / thinking that the remarkable inculcates. A little too much friction between brain and scrap in this case.

I've neither found the typing function / typefolio to be very useful since I'm so used to speed-freak/mistake-laden huntnpeck on a Mac with my split keyboard (if I want to add typed text, I can always add it to the note via the app and move it over) nor have I tried reading or marking up PDFs, though I've a feeling that it will be a fantastic editing and revising tool.

Battery power is down from an unboxing 67% to 28% at the time of posting this - that whole purported "two week" battery life must be in a constant period of sleep – so I'll have to plug it in in a bit but that's nothing I'm not used to: I, do, after all, have to plug in my cyborg pancreas every few days so I can stay alive so I suppose I can live with plugging in my cyborg brain as needed.

Love love love.

remarkable 2: first use / impressions

I've had the reMarkable 2 for about half an hour now (writing this on it) and three things are apparent: one, my handwriting is shit in physical or in digital form and I'm really glad I bought the TypeFolio - keyboard is quite excellent (though I'm still getting used to the layout); two, while I can see me using this for writing drafts and braindumps (like this one - indeed, I bought it as a replacement for whiteboards and legal pads), I can't yet see it replacing my paper journals (UPDATE: SEE COMMENT BELOW)); and three, the design for lefties like me leaves a bit to be desired: I have to write with it set up for a right-handed person because my left hand constantly hits the x on the top left corner of the screen and closes the doc in progress (UPDATE: SOLVED; SEE COMMENT BELOW). Other than that, no complaints; have a feeling that the more I work with it the more I'll find to do with it. Will update accordingly.

BATMAN FOREVER (Schumacher, 1995)

(Directed by Joel Schumacher from a script by Lee Batchler, Janet Scott Batchler, and Akiva Goldsman; starring Val Kilmer, Jim Carrey, Tommy Lee Jones, Nicole Kidman, Chris O'Donnell, Michael Gough, and Pat Hingle. Released 16 June 1995; (re)watched 2023w28 via Max.)

While Tommy Lee Jones and Jim Carrey still grate on the nerves (it did help, somewhat, to think of them as multiversal iterations of The Joker who happened to collide in this universe) and Nicole Kidman had to make the most of an under-written and -utilized role (she did, after all have to follow Michelle Pfieffer’s legendary Selina Kyle), FOREVER is far more excellent than I either a.) remembered or b.) let the bad taste of its sequel let me remember: amidst an intriguing psychological drama seasoned with cool Bat-jumps from tall buildings and a great car wrapped in something of a prescient story surrounding The Riddler's Apple Vision Pro, the Gotham of FOREVER – I view Schumacher's films to be in their own little universe, separate from the Burton-verse, this great fan trailer and Hamm's BATMAN '89 comic showing us how amazing a Hamm-penned, Burton-directed Billy Dee Williams Two-Face could have been – conjures a cyberpunk BATMAN: TAS channeled through the mind of Grant Morrison and the pencil of Kelley Jones (a pairing which MUST happen at some point), set to the kaleidoscopic music of Eliot Goldenthal's circus-meets-Elfman's-DICK-TRACY-score, and protected by the only cinematic Batman that I can imagine not only needing a Robin – Kilmer's Bat should serve as inspiration for the Gunn-verse's THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD – but surviving a fall from space (as the comics version did several months back in Zdarsky's excellent run). You may fully count me among those who wants to see the mythical Schumacher Cut: it's no masterpiece, but FOREVER is something special whose full canvas deserves to be seen. This one was a joy to revisit.

three things i did today that i rather enjoyed

• Made moss poles for K's philodendrons by cutting up PVC pipe with my new Japanese pull saw which I absolutely love. Have all fingers.

• Ran in my usual 5k circle and midway through chatted with Randy the Chihuahua's human (RTCH) who informed me that Randy the Chihuahua (RTC) had to be put to sleep in January as I handed RTCH his newspaper and we shared a brief "aw damn" moment. Not sure that "enjoyed" is the right word here but it was definitely a human, empathetic moment. I'll miss that little shit (RTC).

• Read the first issue of Ryan North and Iban Coello's FANTASTIC FOUR and got hooked. Excellent, excellent stuff.