Bo Laurent

The Secret of Me SXSW 2025 Schedule | It’s 1995 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. During a feminist studies class, college student Kristi opens her textbook to discover something that turns her world upside down. For as long...

schedule.sxsw.com/2025/films/2...

Yoda rubbing his head

Takashi Shimura as the lead Samurai in Seven Samurai

Today I learned that Yoda rubbing his head is a George Lucas homage to Kurosawa (Takashi Shimura as the lead Samurai in Seven Samurai rubbing his bald head; I couldn't find a photo of a him doing that but fans will surely recall his habit)

x.com/SWshotbyshot...

pbs.twimg.com/media/D1fPmB...

A German company that sells cleaning equipment used its pressure washers to create a giant image of Godzilla on the Iwaya Kawauchi Dam in Saga Prefecture.

[Image from Karcher Japan's Instagram: www.instagram.com/p/DCqQeKtAJ7... ]

My colleagues discovered ways to destroy forever chemicals. Amazing stuff.

Small sandwich-type sign on a French street. Arrow pointing to the left says "crêpes chocolats". Arrow poining right reads "Monde cruel" (cruel world)

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood

a man covering his mouth with his hand in front of a red wall ALT: a man covering his mouth with his hand in front of a red wall

Scary Friday thought:

Given what we know about how parasites manipulate hosts, is it inconceivable that a parasite could worm its way into the brain of a prominent politician to influence them to take over and then dismantle the entire US healthcare system, for the future success of all parasites?

Hadn't realized the Godzilla on Iwayagawauchi Dam was the work of a team from Kärcher of Germany, using their high pressure cleaners. The firm has released some photographs. prtimes.jp/main/html/rd...

Introducing a Yokai from Amami Ōshima—the kenmun.
It is said to favour hanging out on top of certain banyan trees and disguises itself by camouflaging its long legs amongst the dangling roots. Its body is covered with reddish brown orange fur, —the orang utan comes to mind.

A few blurry pictures from a fabulous opening night.
The two calligraphic works by Tong Yang-Tze #董陽孜 in the Great Hall of the Met (left and right panels)

行於其所當行，止於其不得不止
Go where it is right, stop when one must (Su Shi)

他山之石可以攻玉
Stones from other mountains can refine our jade (Book of Songs)

www.babelbible.net/genkai/genka...

This toilet is seen in the lovely film Perfect Days (the main character cleans toilets, including this one).

Across a lake at night a small house can be seen in the shadow of an enormous tree. The light from the window is reflecting on the water.

This print always gives me Studio Ghibli vibes, it especially makes me think of Swamp Bottom in Spirited Away.
🎨'Rain at Omiya'- Kawase Hasui, 1930.
#JapaneseArt #shinhanga

The article says パン is from Spanish, but it is from Portuguese! As are タバコ、天ぷら、サボテン。

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossar...

Grid Storage: Batteries Will Win A short and spicy post. There remains, even in 2023, a substantial fraction of the “future of energy” hivemind who are still convinced that the solution to all our problems is to build …

caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2023/07/12/g...

Wow, thank you for bringing this to attention!

Kris Jenner looking at a computer

me watching Bluesky's user count grow by another million in a day

hello and welcome to all 19M of you! 🥳

@okazu.bsky.social

Use This Extension to Find All Your X Followers on Bluesky If you're looking to finally leave Elon Musk's X, Bluesky is one of your best alternatives—and Sky Follower Bridge is a web extension that will easily help you find all of your X followers there.

lifehacker.com/tech/use-thi...

How Bluesky, Alternative to X and Facebook, Is Handling Growth The fledgling social media site has been flooded by people seeking alternatives to Facebook, X and Threads. It hasn’t all been easy.

“More than 116,000 people in the United States deactivated their X accounts on the web the day after the election—the most U.S. deactivations in a single day under Musk—according to data compiled by Similarweb… Total deactivations could be much higher.“ Gift link: www.nytimes.com/2024/11/17/t...

I read this novel in Japanese translation earlier this year and was deeply moved. It’s now out in English translation!

Especially for Japanese history buffs, yuri genre fans, foodies, and railroad lovers.

www.graywolfpress.org/books/taiwan...

YouTube video by Tatekawa Shinoharu 立川志の春 【"Tenshiki" Japanese Comedy Rakugo in English by Shinoharu Tatekawa】（英語版「転失気」立川志の春）

More self-intro: in the past decade "my boom" is rakugo, the traditional Japanese art of comic storytelling—a kind of "sit down" comedy. Last year we did a big show including Tatekawa Shinoharu, a Yale grad who's now a major rakugoka. He sometimes performs in English.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=XT02...

Kore-eda!

Sometimes I dream of understanding the languages of other animals, and now I fear I’d be rudely awakened 🫣

photograph of a black kelpie in tasmania called "izzie" who is entirely surrounded by sheep (charlie mackinnon)

"okay! i've got all the sheep! hallo?! boss?? I HAVE ALL THE SHEEP!"

Korea under Japanese rule - Wikipedia

For readers less familiar with Japan’s history, that’s Korea, occupied by Japan 1910-1945

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korea_u...

This! 💯

I complained about Japanese media coverage of Trump yesterday but @tobiasharris.bsky.social makes a fair point about print media being generally better at it. In this case, my frustration is definitely aimed primarily at TV news coverage. I think that still leaves me wondering...

black and white photo of Wong Kim Ark, American of Chinese descent. He is looking straight at the camera.

A thread on birthright citizenship I wrote in 2018, that unfortunately remains relevant.

I always thought this was where it was all headed. Abolishing birthright citizenship for the non-white and non-rich. And why I teach on United States v. Wong Kim Ark every semester.

Who was Wong Kim Ark? 1/

Samurai in Japan, then engineers at MIT A new exhibit at MIT, “From Samurai into Engineers,” explores the Institute’s first Japanese students, who arrived as MIT was taking flight and their own country was opening up.

Grateful for the MIT News covering the ongoing exhibit I’ve had the pleasure of curating:

news.mit.edu/2024/from-sa...

Correct. We made the organizational shift because of Musk, but now that I’m here, I’m just really enjoying consuming interesting material without having to filter promoted MAGA content or screen for rapey antisemitic shit.