Plutonic Rainbows

This week I am reading Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies by Nick Bostrom.

I spent some time today refining the typography on this blog after noticing that my section headers and article titles were competing for attention. They had identical visual weight, which made it difficult to distinguish between navigation elements and actual content.

The solution turned out to be fairly straightforward. Rather than making everything lighter, I implemented a progressive weight scale using the Commissioner variable font's range. Article titles remain at weight 600 but are now larger, while subheadings step down to 550, section headers to 500, and supporting elements to 450. This creates a natural reading flow that guides the eye through the content hierarchy.

I also increased the spacing around article titles and tightened their line height for better multi-line rendering. The section headers now have a subtle opacity reduction to further distinguish them from main content.

These changes feel like a meaningful improvement to me. The text no longer fights for attention, and there's a clearer sense of structure when scanning through posts. Sometimes the smallest adjustments can make a significant difference in how content is perceived and consumed.

Having been disappointed with my first sample, I recently ordered another from a trusted online retailer, thinking perhaps the original had been a faulty batch or somehow diluted.

Unfortunately, this new sample smells almost identical to the first. There is no oud to speak of — just a lingering rose note. For me, the oud simply isn’t present, and I cannot understand how this fragrance has gained such a reputation as an oud powerhouse.

In any case, I will not be purchasing a full bottle. Unless the day comes when I can thoroughly test it in a department store, it will remain a fragrance I have no intention of buying.

James Leyland Kirby — better known for his haunting work as The Caretaker — ventures into darker territory with 'Bleaklow,' an album that trades his usual deteriorating ballroom memories for the windswept desolation of Northern England's moorlands. This isn't the interior decay of abandoned hotels that The Caretaker explores, but rather the outer spaces where humans can only visit, terrains that exist beyond habitation. The opening track 'Something to Do with Death' sets the tone immediately with unstable, fizzing drones punctuated by pained, high-pitched howls that transmit waves of genuine dread. Throughout its eleven tracks, Kirby masterfully manipulates sound into intimidating monstrosities — formidable sonics and fearsome drones that map out a sonic cartography of the Eerie North West, from the titular Bleaklow plateau to the subterranean cave systems and crags that dot these lonely landscapes.

What makes 'Bleaklow' such a unique jewel in Kirby's extensive catalogue is its complete departure from his sample-based turntable work, instead crafting original dark ambient compositions that feel simultaneously deeply unsettling and oddly comforting. Tracks like 'Indefinite Ridge' create that destabilizing sound that seems to pull you into the moorland itself, while 'Kirkbymoorside' and 'Ominous Sunset' build layers of industrial ambience that feel both majestic and oppressively lugubre. The 2014 remastered edition — with Matt Colton's pristine vinyl mastering and Ivan Seal's new artwork — only emphasizes the album's power, revealing new depths in these already cavernous soundscapes. As critic Mark Fisher noted, Kirby should be understood more as an artist than merely a musician, and 'Bleaklow' stands as testament to this vision — a work that shames the conceptual poverty of much contemporary art through its commitment to place, atmosphere, and the haunting presence of landscapes that remember their dead.