|
Why Australia's favourite marsupial needs your help and much more! $$PLAIN_TEXT_PREVIEW$$
MY FAVOURITE THINGS | These Boots Are Made For Walkin’
|
“If koalas aren't crushed by the impact of their tree falling, they're left vulnerable to threats such as cars, dogs or starvation as they search for a new home. Prolonged droughts and more frequent bushfires are also putting their lives at risk. Now, there are less than 48,000 koalas remaining in NSW and southeast Queensland and nationally 95% of our koala populations are gone.” — WORLD WIDE FUND FOR NATURE
|
|
This past Tuesday saw the worst haze hit the city of Sydney from bushfires that continue to rage all through New South Wales and Queensland, two of Australia’s most populous states. I’ve been doing my best to turn my attention from the worst of the news but there was something about this intense smoke — the air quality index recording eleven times above the hazardous threshold — that made me stop and think. I’ve never seen anything like this in my lifetime and it pains me to see our leaders refusing to label the last few months as nothing more than a freak occurrence. What will it take to stand up and fight for climate initiatives? When will we hold ourselves accountable?
|
|
I was chatting with Holly Ryan, my amiga (and uber-talented jewelry designer!), this week about the bushfires and was moved to discover that she is designating a portion of her profits to the World Wide Fund for Nature. Such generosity goes directly towards the preservation of our native Koalas, a movement that has become sincerely imperative in recent years. I was stunned to discover that 95% of these furry marsupials have disappeared in the last few decades. In the wake of the current bushfire season, over two thousand (!!!) of these cuddly creatures have perished in the devastating fires to date. I still remember holding one of these little fellers while visiting an animal habitat with my folks when I was a youngster. Just knowing that this cute little guy was native to the Australian continent left me feeling warm all over. To realize that my grandchildren might only know them through digital archives is a terrifying thought, a nightmarish vision that compelled me to donate to this worthwhile cause. So get in the festive spirit and adopt a marsupial in need by donating to the WWF today. I’ve gone and signed up for a monthly donation and it’s the best decision I’ve made in yonkers.
|
|
I remember where I was when the Twin Towers fell. Watching these skyscrapers crumble on the evening news was one of the most surreal experiences from my adolescence. Scott Z. Burns’ brooding political drama dives into the aftermath of America’s knee-jerk response, revolving around a hungry young staffer who is tasked with reconciling the facts around the CIA’s torture program in the years filling 9/11. While enhanced Interrogation techniques or EITs as they are labelled in the film are at the heart of the film’s plot, fear itself is the resounding theme of this dialogue-heavy film. In many ways, Burns takes things back to basics, examining the pros and cons between the carrot and stick approach and Adam Driver does a stellar job finding a way through the noise. As his title character makes plain, the United States got hella scared that their days of supremacy were behind them and started seeing the boogeyman in every nook and cranny. I must admit to feeling rather emotionless (I’m sorry to say I’ve seen it all far too often in the past decade) seeing these poor young men being subjected to the most horrific conditions at these CIA black sites. To discover that almost none of these torture programs yielded any significant advantage in the so-called ‘war on terror’ proves yet again that violence is not the answer.
|
|
Dr. Joe Dispenza has done something rather remarkable with this book. Published in 2012, the self-help manual dives deep into the psychology of habit and looks to the intrinsic inter-relationship between body and mind for answers. The American psychologist is a big believer in the power of quantum theory, a groundbreaking scientific notion that argues that the most infinitesimal field of energy has the ability to effectively influence the spatial energy of others. In other words, our own thinking and feeling energy can directly re-shape our entire personality and in so doing our future experiences. While quantum theory still ruffles many feathers in the scientific community, Dispenza’s findings prove that the last few years of my life were not just pure coincidence. So much of the first half of the book made me reflect on my year living in Berlin, of falling into the same holes no matter how much I dreamed of stepping over them. It was only when I made the decision to turn a new leaf, to admit defeat and go in search of help that I learned to replace self-loathing hate with love and possibility. In doing so I inadvertently gave my body and mind new direction and a way forward. Breaking The Habit of Being Yourself shows you how to put our bad habits behind us by replacing them with the goods. A profound read.
|
|
Say what you will about this Adam Sandler, the man best known for making the man-child a staple of broad comedy in the nineteen-nineties. And while I will concede that the American comedian has made far too many shlocky pictures jam-packed with inane fart jokes and questionable archetypes, it cannot be denied that Sandler has cut-through, his comedic sensibilities leaving people giggling the world over. All the same, the Brooklyn native has the ability to surprise at the best of times. After reading this incredible NYT Magazine profile by Jamie Lauren Keiles on Sandler’s latest role, I was hungry for answers. Uncut Gems is the kind of film that can only be made by a certain type of storyteller at a certain time in their life. Josh and Benny Safdie, two filmmakers born in the Reagan eighties in Queens, New York, are known for making the kind of hard hitting dramas that leave you in need of a stiff drink. I still remember sitting down with their second feature after coming across Pete Davidson rant and rave about it on The Jimmy Fallon show (a year after it premiered mind you!) To say that Good Time left me drained is putting it mildly. Watching Robert Pattinson and Benny Safdie run all around the five boroughs of New York for close to two hours was a revelation. While I’ve only been able to absorb the trailer to date, I’m so excited to get my eyes on their latest visual rollercoaster. Just knowing that it took the brothers TEN years to bring this project to the silver screen (including attaching the maestro himself) is reason enough to start salivating.
|
|
I’ve been having an absolute ball enjoying Spotify’s tailor made playlists to mark the end of the decade. It’s helped me stumble back down memory lane, reminding me that the past — namely our ever-changing music palette — has so much to teach us about our present moment. Loretta Lynn’s seventh solo studio album was one of those acoustic treats hailing from my 2017 playlist, an album that first came to my attention after consuming Michael Apted’s Coal Miner’s Daughter. The 1980s autobiographical musical drama, featuring Sissy Spacek and Tommy Lee Jones, offers such a profound look at the Kentucky titan. The album was Lynn’s first to top the charts, the twelve-track LP featuring cover versions of Nancy Sinatra’s ‘These Boots Are Made For Walkin’ and Dolly Parton’s ‘Put It Off Until Tomorrow’. Much like Parton, Lynn was brought up in a one-room shack and had to swallow some serious sexism in order to find her feet in a man’s world. Unlike her fellow compatriot, Lynn’s songwriting hints at a certain sadness, expressed in hit singles like the one above. All the same, there is something uniquely tantalizing about this 1966 record, imbued with an indomitability that made her an almighty superstar within the country music scene.
|
|
While enjoying the final chapter of Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism, a well-argued treatise on how to bring the world technology under our thumb, I came to learn of the life of this infamous inventor. Morse, whose name has since become synonymous with the first form of e communication, was born in Charlestown, Massachussets in the late 18th Century and would go on to devote himself to painting, an avocation that brought him much success through his life. Of curious mind, Morse was attracted to innovation and would come to stumble upon a bright idea upon meeting Charles Thomas Jackson, an academic well versed in electromagnetism, aboard a steamer bound for New York in 1832. The pair would labour over the birth of the single-wire telegram for the next twelve years before showcasing their invention on May 24, 1844. Sent from the Supreme Court chamber in the basement of the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., to a train station in Baltimore, the line was officially opened as Morse sent the now-famous words; “What hath God wrought”. Morse would devote the rest of his life travelling the globe, educating heads of state to the benefits of his creation and marking the advent of a new age of speed and automation in the years to come. The father of telegraphy would devote much of his wealth to charity in his later years, succumbing to a natural death in 1972 at the age of eighty.
|
|
Thanks for tuning in. If you like this newsletter and want to support it, forward it to someone who’d like it. Until next time. Xo
|
|
|
|
|
