Letters; Love Your Enemies; and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
I’m going to send out a letter this week making the public-health case for government funding for cultivated-meat research. If you’d like to submit your own writing, take a look at this: https://slaughterfreeamerica.substack.com/p/how-to-write-letters-to-newspapers-6eb
Anyway, it’s time for (Cell) Culture Talk. Here’s what I’ve been reading, watching, playing and listening to lately.
Book — Love Your Enemies by Lisa Sowle Cahill. As someone who knows next to nothing about the subject, I found this historical overview of the theological debate within the Christian tradition between proponents of just-war theory and pacifism to be very informative.
Movie — Black Blag. Cate Blanchett and Michael Fassbender lead the well-crafted spy thriller, directed by Steve Soderbergh. The following might be a silly criticism, since it’s a central theme of the film, but all of the characters are so icy that I had trouble connecting with them.
Movie — Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. I’m going to guess it’s been at least 20 years since I last saw the wuxia classic, directed by Ang Lee. Zhang Ziyi, Chow Yun-fat and Michelle Yeoh star as 19th-century Chinese warriors battling over possession of a legendary sword.
Game — Balatro. The iTunes store describes this as poker mixed with solitaire. That seems right. I haven’t mastered all the different variables. However, the title is pretty addictive. It doesn’t require too much mental energy and you can play in short spurts, which is good for me.
Music — My Aim Is True by Elvis Costello. Every once and a while, my daughter will be watching the artist’s duet with Elmo on Sesame Street, that reminds me of my affection for the former’s first album. It’s so great. There’s not a single skippable song, as far as I’m concerned.