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     This is the first fiction book I've ever read that was written by a non-speaking autistic person, which immediately caught my attention. It revolves around Upward Bound, a daycare for adults with disabilities. Each chapter focuses on a different person who is a client there, works there, or is connected to it in some way. The central character is Walter, who seems to be closely based on the author himself, as he is also non-speaking but has a university degree and aspires to be an author. Through the different characters, we get a lot of looks at the people who make up a place like Upward Bound, as well as how it's run.     There's so much about this book that I found revelatory and thought-provoking. Through Walter we get to learn about the inner life of someone who isn't able to communicate in traditional ways, having to rely on a spelling board and someone trained in that form of communication, but because Upward Bound doesn't have the resources to suppl...

⭐9/10 This is now my second McCarthy book and I am a believer. What a bold, unique talent he is, and I wish I would have gotten to his stuff earlier. It's everything I like in books, a literary look at big-picture stuff like the nature of violence and greed, the soul of a nation, death and morality, all told in nice prose that can turn on the jets when needed.  This is also the second book in a row I read which was adapted into an all-time great movie, so I had a bit more context with which to understand it. Unlike the Godfather, I think there is a bit more going on under the surface. Even when a major character basically has a multi-chapter monologue at the end, I still wasn't totally sure what this book was trying to say, but it gives you plenty to think about and I think questions are always more valuable in art than answers.  I think this book works on a lot of levels with an engrossing plot and vivid characters. Chigurh is an all-time movie villain, but his ro...

⭐10/10 There is no way I can have a normal opinion about this movie. Jess recommended it as one to watch with an edible, and so while we were fairly zooted, we were pretty much dying the entire runtime of this movie. It is a mockumentary about show dog handlers as they prepare for a big show, and they are predictably all deranged and ridiculous.  It is a very, very strange movie with a sense of humor that is hard to describe. It felt very Tim Heidecker to me, lots of following strange people saying strange things, much of it presumably improvised. It opens with a couple in a therapy session talking about how their family dynamic has not been the same ever since their dog walked in on them having sex, and then it gets weirder and weirder from there. It features a ton of amazing names from Jennifer Coolidge, Parker Posey, to Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara (once again) being the most dysfunctional couple ever recorded. It also features a Cam-and-Mitchell type couple whic...

⭐10/10 Again, I don't need to tell anyone that this movie is a masterpiece. However, unlike part 1, I was really thinking that this one would fall short of the original. It has been at least a decade since I've watched it and forgot most of the details, and my primary thought while watching was that it was a beautifully shot movie with awesome locations, that it features awesome actors giving compelling performances, but ultimately that it was too long and the main characters too tiresome. I thought it lacked the sun that was Marlon Brando that everything else could orbit around.  The ending of this movie proved me wrong. Spoiler warning for both 1 and 2.  I'll try to keep this a little more brief because nobody needs my thoughts on this movie in 2026, but yeah, my main complaint was that Michael was too unlikeable and his insistence on certain principles too tiring to hold me for over 200 minutes of a movie. He's a terrific character, and that glower is unm...