Stories as footprints
Stories are the most valuable footprints left by others in the sands of time. This is a space where I trace those footprints and leave my own. I hope you find them of some value.
Content here falls into three main categories: finds — summaries or reviews of stories and books I've discovered; blog — essays and thoughts on storytelling and other topics; and tech — posts on programming, development, open source, and community.
You can learn more about me here.
Featured Posts
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How to safely migrate a Django unique constraint to be case-insensitive in production, handling duplicates and avoiding database locks
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WeasyPrint enables PDF generation using the familiar HTML and CSS, but global pagination and layout can lead to severe performance degradation for large, structured documents. Learn why this happens and how restructuring reduced PDF build time by 94%.
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A few weeks ago, I watched Ponyo for the first time. Early on, as the little fish basked in the underwater sun and drifted too close to human activity, I tried to guess what incident would knock her life out of balance and start the story. My first thought was …
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What this blog is about, and how Longfellow’s metaphor shapes the way I see and experience stories.
Recent Finds
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Ikiru
Kurosawa's Ikiru follows Kanji Watanabe, a lifelong bureaucrat who learns he has a fatal illness. Stunned into realising he has never truly lived, he embarks on a final, desperate quest for meaning.
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My Neighbour Totoro
After watching this film, why do I feel so joyful, so sure of the world’s goodwill? Is it the way every gesture, background, and movement carries the animators’ love? The jaunty ending theme that sings watashi wa genki — “I’m okay” — and actually means it? Or is it that …
