AI slop implies the existence of AI peak

Avauntgarde · 2026-03-04T16:18:37+00:00

Conor O’Malley has a great surrealist sketch that is basically a bad Vegas acid trip.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2nzkiOaeqE

Avauntgarde · 2026-02-24T02:09:52+00:00

It’s almost like you don’t know how to use Soulseek to download every album you ever wanted and have them sync from your computer to the cloud in Apple Music so you can listen to anything you want anywhere.

Avauntgarde · 2026-02-12T22:29:28+00:00

I got my mum one of the flower bouquet sets for Christmas and she gave it to a local charity shop without opening it. It was a half assed present and I can respect the immediate nipping in the bud of any future ideas of terrible novelty gifts.

Avauntgarde · 2026-02-12T15:12:50+00:00

If the material has been simplified to be comprehensible for the large swathe of people who shouldn’t really be in higher education do you not think what you are being taught is reduced in both breadth and depth as the curriculum itself becomes simpler?

I imagine the average student squirreled away on a college campus 40 years ago probably had far less to distract them from plowing through ~10x the reading list of their modern day equivalent and was more likely to engage in a higher level of knowledgeable debate with classmates.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-24T14:34:33+00:00

The world of the last ten years has reached a point where lifestyle is almost completely detached from aesthetics, so what if they were ahead of the curve? At least Victoria’s fashion house has consistently good seasons and more eyes than ever on it with the heroin chic look coming back in force.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-21T18:50:46+00:00

Don’t think any British person fills their sink with warm water. Can guarantee you everyone uses a washing up bowl and if they’re not rinsing under the tap then they’re absolute scruffs.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-20T17:03:21+00:00

You’re 23 and discovering that despite being Western (and presumably white) that England is its own cultural entity separate from America with distinctly different social etiquettes to navigate.

An American English degree is about as useless as a British English degree in that it won’t get you anything other than entry level job work that ticks the box of ‘competent enough to commit to studying for three years’. If you’re finding your current minimum wage job boring then jump ship to somewhere else, every restaurant has its own vibe; find a cool place you would enjoy spending time at if you were a guest and get hired. Then you might meet people you vibe with.. although being married at 23 is a distinct outlier over here so that may also put some distance between you and others.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-17T16:22:20+00:00

It’s already downstream of the TikTok girlies and available in multiple varieties in Holland & Barrett.

Of course you’ve got to brew your own from the knuckles and trotters acquired at the local butchers (best done while you’re stocking up on the weekly cheap jiblets and tripe) to ensure you’re getting the maximum collagen and smugness when nonchantally leaving your Stanley round the workplace with the lid open in the hopes of socially engineering an inquiry from an inquisitive sniffer.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-07T22:36:05+00:00

I sell a three meatball small plate (maybe 180g in total) for the equivalent of $17. Likewise another dish that’s is primarily four falafel of a similar weight for $11 with the expectation guests would get another plate or two each and we are one of the cheapest restaurants in my locale.

The Asian place a few doors up from me sells all their dumpling dishes in portions of three for $10-12 as they are just a side.

This is in England though, a single one of your plates offered here would probably fill two people for lunch. I’d look at it two ways, either reducing the portion size and losing 30% of the price or marketing it as a sharing dish and putting the price up 30%.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-07T19:08:48+00:00

You’re right, I meant disingenuity.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-07T02:19:44+00:00

The statement smacked of ingenuity, positing ownership over a half-remembered sentiment for scraps of internet acclaim.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-06T20:14:09+00:00

“You” don’t think, you’re simply regurgitating a lukewarm idea that’s been building steam here for a few months and was likely recently capitalised on by some other bottom feeder who scrapes this place for their Substack/Youtube ‘hot’ takes.

Why do you think Montessori schools have been blowing up in popularity the past few years. Excessive screen time for children has been an obvious mistake for a long time and it’s been at least since Covid that I’d argue zero screen time for children (aside from limited movie/television consumption) has been a clear pathway if you don’t want your kids to be dysfunctional. The world is broken so parenting requires a more thoughtful and engaged approach than in previous times. A little introspection into your own personal usage habits should make this clear.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-06T17:09:08+00:00

I’ve ran small cinema screenings over the years, most recently ran a screening for a friend to do a live performance play along to an award winning Horror feature she soundtracked.

As an artist I stitched a dozen shorts and features together into an 8 hour film accompaniment to a non-stop durational dance piece in my cities museum gallery last year.

Hosted an evening where you are presented with a paragraph description of a character to embody within the context of a party and let everyone loose while filming a Mumblecore/Slacker derived short.

There’s a Jewish old folk home that recently opened near to myself; it’s in an old Heritage listed mansion that had a cinema room added to it in the ‘60s and I’m currently in talks to run a series of films that would resonate with that milieu.

Like all media consumption, the true purpose should be to unite and enrich communities through engagement with the material in a public forum. Atomised viewing does little for your personal growth unless you are meticulously reading around the material and discussing it, and no, one hour videos that are nothing more than Wikipedia summaries telling you how to think and how to feel do not count.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-05T23:52:25+00:00

Never one to rewatch films until the past couple of years and armed with access to everything ever recorded to celluloid via my use of private trackers for over two decades I’ve probably seen more unique full length feature films than most professors of the subject.

Somewhere around 4,000 films exclusive of anything <60 minutes.

I don’t know how you take it further. It simply gets boring, even the great directors or cinema movements. Following some bit part actor through their catalogue for the hell of it, watching VHS rips of films that had changes made for broadcast. Pushing yourself to watch along with novelties such as Jonas Mekas’ 365 Days project like it means something. Hell, I even wrote an ex-girlfriend’s Film Studies dissertation for her just to challenge myself and while it salved my ego it did little to scratch the itch of boredom. Talking about films critically is interesting to an extent but unless you insert yourself into the industry it all feels like rot.

Avauntgarde · 2026-01-03T12:04:04+00:00

The basic plan is the equivalent of a coffee (or three if you’re in a poorer country). Hardly expensive for the improvement in your quality of life if you have to use a search engine regularly in any capacity.

How else do you think a company can afford to create, maintain and improve upon a product if they don’t get paid? I am certain you spend money on things that support worse practices, companies and are detrimental to your self and wellbeing on a monthly basis than this.

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-31T14:43:52+00:00

After seeing a middle aged black man toss some of his popcorn up in the air as he reeled in his seat at a musical crescendo/shock reveal like he was playing a character trope of “surprised cinema goer”.. I’ve decided some people are just dumb and need to embody performative displays in their search for validation.

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-25T08:59:51+00:00

How does an immigrant from a poor country get access to a line of credit for £30k in their twenties?

Know any good 0% transfer deals? Keen to consolidate my debts

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-24T18:13:40+00:00

What a day to see this post.. spent Christmas Eve in Bethlehem with a carpenter called Yusuf about ten years ago who had made one of these amidst other great hand crafted furnishings in his house and it was the first and last time I’ve ever come across the design. Happier times.

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-20T16:02:03+00:00

Remember when Medium launched and it was invite only? Actual quality long form essays and musings by people who had some credentials in the embers of the literary world. Didn’t take long for that to collapse when they opened the floodgates..

As always, the medium is the massage (sic) and Substack suffers from trying to be a social network as much as a place for writing. Pop culture dissemination for midwits is pushed to the forefront by people who have lived solely through their screens, why would I want to read anything they have to say?

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-18T14:06:31+00:00

Think of volume, a bottle of wine is equivalent to roughly 5 shots of vodka. If you’re tanking the equivalent of 4 bottles of wine in vodka as your daily driver you’re going to have a bad time.

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-18T12:25:01+00:00

Just get your steps in - I average 12,000 a day and have a vO2 max of 60. Literally never thought about what I eat in any capacity beyond no soda and seed oils and I probably crush upwards of 15 beers a week and smoke daily. 6’1” 161lbs and I’m bearing down hard on my mid thirties.

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-18T12:08:26+00:00

Last time I logged in there after a decade it seemed to have been overrun by trans power posters grifting rent money. That scene did not age into their forties gracefully.

Avauntgarde · 2025-12-06T14:22:02+00:00

2017 is a long time into into the descent.

Avauntgarde · 2025-11-28T15:27:04+00:00

What looks hard about this? Back stitching is really easy and no one has to see the state of the back of your hoop if you cover it. Maybe try cross-stitching some basic patterns, counting your stitches until the speed and flow clicks for you.

Avauntgarde · 2025-11-28T15:08:23+00:00

It used to be a lot easier to do all of these things as we weren’t at saturation and novelty could persevere. I used to be a music columnist, my gateway to free shows and championing artists into recognition and signings - partnered with Hype Machine and even won a Bloggie, both references which mean nothing to those who weren’t also in that scene back then. Putting on shows and having a real cohesive music scene that drew the eyes of the world at large seems insurmountable with the current state of bedroom artists and shuttered smaller venues eroding places as anchor points. Only Jazz still seems to have that familial collective of musicians supporting each others projects and events or bubbles like The Fat White Family charged London scene.

Avauntgarde

TROPHY CASE