the candler blog

More on Day One 2, Movies Watched and Cool New Stuff

It’s been a week since my last entry here on the candler blog, so I thought I’d give a brief update on the week that was.

Plugging Away At Day One 2

Given how much time I devoted to questioning some of the new features in Day One 2, one might get the impression I gave up on it. In fact I’m using the new app even more than I used the original. I’m putting it through its paces and getting more and more delighted each step of the way. I still haven’t purchased the Mac version, which is $19.99 until Wednesday (they extended the launch sale an extra week). I’m pretty sure I’ll break down and get it eventually.

I’m really enjoying experimenting with Workflow to get more interesting information into Day One. I started a journal called “Films Watched” just for tracking my movie intake. I’ve made myself a modified version of Phillip Gruneich’s excellent Movie Diary workflow(s) to log films. It’s fun to see a calendar view of how often I actually watch films.

I also went on a few runs this week, all logged in Day One. The new inline photos are still tripping me up, though. While on a run I took a photo of myself with the Austin skyline in the background. I wanted to quickly get this into Day One with my location and a note of my current distance. I somehow created a photo post, selected the right photo but then somehow canceled the photo add dialog instead of adding the photo. I quickly typed out “4.9,” the current distance, saved the entry and put my phone away. Then I filled in the blanks, including the photo, later.

There really isn’t a reason for me to create the entry in the moment since the photo has the time and location data embedded. But it’s nice to be able to get it in there so I know to create it later. The “4.9” entry is technically enough, but creating a photo entry used to be a bit easier. I’m sure I’ll get used to it.

As to whether or not I should even be futzing with my phone while running, all I can say is that I’m a good multitasker and I was on a trail, not running into traffic. It doesn’t really slow me down, and when I run I’m alone with my thoughts. I wish I could record more of them.

Films Watched

Here’s what I’ve seen in the past week:

  • Irrational Man (Blu-ray)
  • My Neighbor Totoro (DCP, original subtitles)
  • The Man Who Loved Women (DVD, this time the François Truffaut original)
  • Mistress America (Blu-ray)

Irrational Man is kind of silly and forgettable. If you watch enough Woody Allen films you learn that there are some films that suffer from his relentless schedule of one film a year. This is one of those. But it’s not without its charms, namely another wonderful performance from Parker Posey.

Late on Monday I saw my My Neighbor Totoro for the first time. In fact it’s now the first Hayao Miyazaki film I’ve ever seen. And I flat out loved it. It’s such a simple story but so beautiful, and it perfectly understands what it’s like to be a child. I need to see more.

I’m hoping to put together a piece on the differences between Blake Edwards’ and François Truffaut’s The Man Who Loved Women so I won’t say too much. The films are so different, and yet surprisingly similar in ways I wouldn’t have expected. I recommend both.

I wish I had seen Mistress America before I put together my best of 2015 list. I loved it. Greta Gerwig is a national treasure.

I’m up to fourteen films seen this year thus far and not one of them is a 2016 release. So I’m way behind that arbitrary goal I set for myself. But I’m confident I’ll catch up soon.

Two Things I Want

I want to play Firewatch, the new game from Campo Santo created in partnership with the Panic team. It looks so gorgeous. Unfortunately I have neither a PS4 nor a Mac that will run it that well. My iMac is getting long in the tooth and has trouble dealing with some more menial tasks. When I play Firewatch I want to make sure I can be immersed in it. Really wish it were available for iPad. Or that I had a PS4. Or a better Mac.

And I really, really want the Operator Mono, the new font from Hoefler & Co. $200 is a very fair price for five weights each in italics, but it’s a bit of an extravagance for me. I mean…this would just be for my own enjoyment while typing in Ulysses or TextMate.

Now, I did splurge on Pitch a few years back. While I still love it, I actually don’t use it in my text editors that much anymore. Lately I use Courier Prime Sans, and I just started playing around with Office Code Pro and M+2m.

Operator Mono looks like a great font to write with. If you’ve got any pics of it in use I’d love to see them.