T w e n t y S i d e d

I have spent a lot of the last few weeks “being a parent.” I have also spent about half of that time extremely sick with, the best I can tell, a bad cold. Everyone but me complained of flu symptoms (body aches, etc) although that only hit me very briefly. Not to brag, although saying that is inherently bragging, but I handled this about as well as I could handle an illness. It was clear everyone had been/was/was getting sick, so as soon as I felt it coming I started taking NyQuil every six hours. I slept for about 2 1/2 days straight (not in one sitting…the most I’ve ever done from sickness in one sitting was 18 or 21 hours). Following the sleeping, I would take one DayQuil (my spellcheck says I should replace this word with Gayquill, or something like that, which is funny) during the waking hours then one or two NyQuil appropriately. After a couple days of that, I was down to, and currently am, taking DayQuil only if the congestion gets bad…which it hasn’t (gotten worse than it normally is…we live in an *extremely* dusty area.) Along with getting meds for a few other people and making sure they take the medicine, the last few days has primarily been focused on horror movies, house cleaning, and YouTube. And being a parent.

An important lesson of parenting is that you can’t really solve your kids’ problems. Your children might not even agree with your solution, and you never thought there was a second (or third, or fourth) way to even *think* about the problem. So, maybe you can *help* sometimes…but don’t go around thinking you know the answers. Does it work for your life? Great! Don’t change it unless challenged with something you take seriously. And I do want to advise everyone to keep an open mind. I’ve been wrong, very wrong; about many, many things. But I also used to think I knew a great many things. I had solved many problems, some of them significant; greater than anything others may even consider. And I was so wrong about so much of it. To borrow a (para)phrase from Rev. Ed (whom I happen to be watching right now), “we are always supposed to improve; to be more than we are now, to be better than (pointing to self) *this*.” The only thing I will ever tell *anyone* they are wrong about is if they think they can’t be better than they are. And it isn’t arbitrary…don’t misunderstand. But you *can* be better, and you get better every day, even if you don’t think that’s true. Even if you don’t think it’s important, *everything* improves you. That’s not a “thing” from any particular set of beliefs, although I’m sure you can point to many that make the claim. It’s a *human* thing.

Horror movies sometimes even use that teaching as a message, but it’s usually the opposite. The foundation of most horror is that it *doesn’t* matter…nothing does. One particular horror anthology I watched yesterday featured this message in the first short. The anthology is XX, the short is “The Box.” There are spoilers for this story to follow, as it pertains to the discussion. If you don’t want to know until you watch for yourself, the movie is available for free on Tubi. And you probably shouldn’t read any more. “The Box” is told from a young mother’s perspective. She has a happy marriage in the suburbs of a large city; her and her two preteen kids take a train “home” to their house after shopping “in town.” It is Christmas time, and her boy child asks a strange man with one fake eye what’s in the wrapped-for-gift-giving box he is holding. Although the mother and sister lightly chastise the boy, the man responds that he doesn’t mind and lift the lid of the box just enough for the boy to see inside. The boy is clearly disturbed by what he sees, but not disgusted in any obvious way.

But he stops eating. He’s fine otherwise, he just stops eating. He refuses to eat for a week and his taken to the doctor, who starts questioning the status of his parents and home life. Although the short movie plays a bit with expectations (I was wrong about my prediction), nothing is introduced that is held out as a red herring. The mother has a dream that the family is happily eating her flesh like well-mannered cannibals; this is presented as the only significant “could this mean something?” After a week and a half, the boy tells the girl what was in the box. She says it makes no sense before the mother enters the room. All the boy will say about the contents of the box is that “it was nothing.” All the girl will say about their conversation, or what the boy told her, is “nothing.” Another week or two, and the boy whispers to the father what was in the box. All the father will say about what the boy told him is “nothing.” In the end, all three die from refusing to eat food. The mother rides the train every day hoping to find the man with the box to find out what was in it. The final line is presented, then, from the mother: “I’m so hungry.”

This is, IMO, a prime and direct example of cosmic horror. Most people have associated this genre with Monster-style crossed with cult-style horror, with the stipulation that the movie is trying to convey the idea that the monster and its cult is so horrible you can’t actually mentally process how horrible it is. This works…fine…for several movies, but they don’t really communicate “cosmic horror.” “The Box” does. What’s in The Box? I think there are two possible answers, both of which go in the same direction. The first is “nothing,” as a “thing.” One of Douglas Adams’ Hitchhikers stories was about a device that for one brief moment managed to show *one* person (the adjudicated guilty, in most cases) INFINITE REALITY, and YOUR POSITION IN IT. It drove most people mad, as in laying in one spot drooling on yourself mad, because (and here’s the joke within the reality) realizing how utterly unimportant you REALLY ARE destroys you. The boy, when he sees the doctor, replies to the explanation “We have to eat, after all” with “Why?” And the boy’s response to “Because otherwise we die!” is “So?” That’s one answer.

The other answer is literally “nothing,” but the expectations are the driver. The boy was meant to expect some kind of Christmas Present, there was nothing in the box, and via magic this was communicated to the boy in way that grabbed his mind. It feels like the movie wants us to see it this way, as the communication of nothing from the box, to the boy, to the boy’s sibling, to the father, while excluding the mother and everyone else causes the refusal to eat. The mother is never told *in the same manner* as anyone else. She has the dream that she is feeding her family with her body, which of course isn’t real; we are meant to understand that she is *willing* to feed her family but literally cannot. It is *not* within her ability to solve the problem. Why this solution doesn’t work for me is the magic element required. The activation of the “sickness” or “realization” is the phrase, not what’s in the box, per se. Nothing is in the box, as a Christmas Present. That doesn’t make sense. But somehow, if the contents of the box, nothing, are communicated without the mother knowing, it causes each recipient of the answer to stop eating, and to stop thinking it’s important to live. Of course, that’s only if everyone is being honest about what’s in the box when everyone asks (until they’re told).

Of course, with the first answer we have to assume the boy can somehow communicate absolute nothingness to the boy’s sibling, and then to the father. Which I suppose also involves an element of “magic.” I still like this answer better, likely because I appreciate the concept more. Either way, the mother’s final line “I’m so hungry,” implies *either* that the mother is “hungry for the knowledge” of what’s in the box, or that she has now “stopped eating” because she is finally so obsessed with what’s in the box that she can’t eat…or something like that. It’s a stinger of refrigerator logic that actually prompts the entire thing to fall down if you think about it. It’s either a commentary on an unrelated topic, or an insight that the second answer was correct and it has finally disturbed the mother “enough.” As I said, the movie really seems to want us to view with the second option in mind, but I don’t think it works as well.

The second, third, and fourth shorts in XX are less notable and more standard. That’s not entirely true…the second, “The Birthday Party;” builds tension throughout its length despite frequent comic moments. The ending provides the expected final relief in an almost textbook, yet unexpected way. It is so well done I would recommend this segment as well. There’s no point in recapping this short, as viewing this movie is by far the most appropriate way to interact with the story. The third segment is well-done but forgettable. The last, “Her Only Living Son;” is fairly predictable until it changes direction right at the end. Worth seeing once. Generally speaking review rankings put this at 65% to 70%, which seems to match my own feelings. The first half is highly recommended and the last segment is fine. Only the first segment is worth the discussion, but not everyone likes cosmic horror.

In the “haunted location” genre I have repeatedly recommended 2007’s Emily Blunt film Wind Chill. While Ashton Holmes’ “the boy” character would be…less acceptable these days, I would imagine, he manages to not only receive punishment narratively; he redeems himself in the end. The movie repeatedly focusing on his pet phrase “I would have told you everything” actually manages to lose the film some of the points it gains from his actions. One of my kids mentioned how little Blunt has changed over time. 24-year-old Blunt only barely managed to pull-off a straight-from-high-school college-aged student in 2007, but quite honestly the Emily Blunt of 2025 only has a thinner face and maybe two more wrinkles. I make no assumptions about make-up or surgery.

Currently sitting on pause from yesterday is Behind You, a demon-in-the-house-supernaturally film primarily featuring Addy Miller. So, fairly recent. 2020, if I remember correctly. If it’s worth it, I’ll mention in the future.

I spent *this* morning trying to get Infinity Nikki to install and run on Linux. I can get the Launcher to run just fine, but nothing past the launcher. And that’s through the Epic launcher first. Using the Steam Deck install I have not been able to actually load the launcher, only the base Windows installer. Which won’t load the launcher using the Steam Deck method. None of SteamDB, ProtonDB, or Lutris Games list Infinity Nikki yet. Sure, I could just install it on my phone (allegedly) but what would be the point in that? Other than that being the primary point of the game…it’s a mobile game.

In Star Wars: The Old Republic I have spent most of my time getting all my max-level characters “even.” That is, I have been completing all the same things (story-wise) with each to get them ready to move on to the next area. I haven’t made up my mind whether I will try this time to complete the three stories that are…umm…not, currently; or try to move on with at least one character. I want to do something different in the middle expansions, which of course will likely affect who I take to the later expansions as well. The first character I ever did the middle expansions with was an Imperial Agent, but the middle expansions are very Force-prevalent. There is a broad consensus that the stories work better with Force characters, which aren’t my favorite. And as I haven’t even *leveled* a Jedi of any kind (only Sith) I might be leaving some cards on the table. As much as I like Lord Khundast Zeele, he exists almost exclusively for his spouse, Vette. Right now, I have the other Sith Warrior Teers Quendrutus and the Sith Inquisitor Trada Visi. Teers was created to try a Dark Side romance with the third companion, Jaesa Willsaam. I have also managed to do some other unique things with Teers, but I’m still working on this character. Trada is a good candidate to move on with, as I’m pretty happy with her companion status. I pursued no romance options in the base story, although I have done the male companion Andronikos in the past. He’s fine…quite good; actually. Just not the direction I was thinking with Trada. The Inquisitor doesn’t really have many romance options.

Also, spellcheck HATES Star Wars.

I’m tired of writing now. That’s it for this week; see you soon!

Paige Francis He/him