In my history during the summer of 2025

Published on 1 October 2025 in In my history - Lire en français

Just a month ago, I stepped onto a slippery slope: I dug out my sewing machine, which had been gathering dust in a corner for almost 10 years, set up my overlocker for the first time, threw myself into it, and it's been a blast!

When I first tried sewing 15 years ago, I bought some inexpensive fabrics, but then I was afraid of messing up and ‘ruining’ them, so instead of using them, I stored them at the bottom of a drawer, and moved them more than a dozen times. None of that this time: worst case scenario, I'll have a few box less to move next time! Strangely enough, this approach is "a little" more satisfying, especially since I've succeeded in all the projects I've attempted so far!

So I fell fast and hard in that sewing rabbithole, watching videos, reading detailled explanations of fabric types or specific techniques, looking into all the pattern creators, or searching for the best stores for nice fabrics that delivers to France without 300 € of fees (Mood Fabric 😭), so I didn't have time for much less, especially reading or watching cool things to list here…

So, well, my "In my history in July" turned into "In my history during the summer", and we'll pretend September is part of the summer ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I'll try to write an article listing all the cool resources I find about sewing, but I'm not promising anything, we all saw the result with the long-promised, never-delivered knitting resources article. Or we didn't see, in fact. You get what I mean.

There's not a lot of things about sewing in this month's IMH, but brace yourselves for the future ones!

Let's start with my ‘top 10’, the gems you shouldn't miss if you don't have the time to read everything!

#1

Kayfabe – So, I saw this video pass by on Mastodon so many times, but I must admit the title didn't appeal to me: « Professional wrestling can help us understand Trump » But then, so many interesting people shared it, that I took a chance. It lasts around 3 minutes, and it's crystal clear.

[erm, you have to imagine the Mastodon post integrated right here, but it took me sooooo long to publish this that the post was deleted in the meantime. So here's a link to the video instead.]

For those of you who don't like watching videos, here's a summary:

He presents the concept of « kayfabe », which comes from wrestling and differenciates it from theater: in theater, we know it's fake, we know it's a story. There's the 4th wall. In wrestling, there's a illusion of truth. Everybody knows, but there's a suspension of disbelief.

« We know that it’s fake [...] We know that they don’t hate each other, but the collective sense of suspended disbelief that we all have to engage in to enjoy it? That’s unique to wrestling, and that’s called kayfabe »

And then, he explains that Trump does that with politics.

When you think of fascism, you think of Hitler, Franco, Mussolini, and they are all very serious. They take themselves seriously. They are humourless, solemn:

« Solemnity is not being serious, it’s the performance of seriousness. »

Everytime you introduce humour in a solemn space, solemnity falls apart and it reveal absurdity. And that's why Chaplin's The Great Dictator is so efficient, he introduces humour in what was solemn and that totally desarms it.

The Trump administration doesn't use solemnity. For example, they are deporting people to Venezuela, which is without any doubt a fascist act, then the official White House account tweets a comedy video of the people being deported with ASMR.

They are asking us to engage in kayfabe, as if it was all a big joke, as if it wasn't extremely grave, as if they were not really fascists. As if, like the wrestlers, it was all pretend. Except it's not.

We cannot really use humour against them as we did against the previous fascists, because they defused it by using humour first.

I liked this extract so much I watch the whole (really long) interview of Blindboy by Ash Sarkar, and I really recommand you watch it.

#2

Climate – Heatwaves: a widely underestimated danger to our bodies and society, a very good summary of the situation, with all the figures needed to shut up that relative who thinks they're clever when they say, ‘It's summer, of course it's hot.’ ».

#3

Roaming – Lex Peregrinorum : Una pax omnibus necessarius est. Excellent article on roaming, hiking, bikepacking and class war. Read it.

#4

Activism – I agree with that 100%.

#5

Genocide – Journalists killed in Gaza, legitimated by French media.

#6

Resistance – very good vulgarisation video on the the Glières Plateau maquis in Haute-Savoie:

#7

Sex work is work – Rebellyon has published a brochure recounting the 1975 prostitutes' revolt. They occupied Saint-Nizier Church in Lyon, and the movement spread to most major cities in France. You can download the PDF from the Rebellyon website.

#8

Comicbook – Anti-racist, anti-colonialist and anti-sexist: Yoko Tsuno, the high tech genius who makes waves. I've always loved Yoko Tsuno, it's my favourite comic book, and I've read the first 15 or 20 volumes about 50 times each. This lovely article pinpoints what makes her such an unforgettable heroine. She is not sexualised. She is intelligent, curious, empathetic, strong, skilled and courageous. When I grow up, I want to be like Yoko.

« Elle mène la danse, décide, impose : un modèle féministe qui n’a pas d’équivalent à l’époque dans la bande dessinée franco-belge. Sans pour autant s’attribuer des caractéristiques virilistes.  »

((litt.: "She calls the shots, makes decisions and imposes her will: a feminist role model that was unheard of in Franco-Belgian comics at the time. Without, however, embodying any of the virilist characteristics.")

#9

Too many cooks – (Sorry I put that worm in your ear 👀) I love totally useless experiments recounted in very long and very detailled articles with a passion. So of course I loved Dicing an onion the mathematically optimal way.

#10

Politics – Budget Bayrou : qu'est-ce qu'on attend pour foutre le feu ? Do you read Frustration? No? Well, you should.

11. Commons – A super interesting video on the commons, enclosures, the industrial revolution, fragmented manufacturing, concentrated manufacturing, and the Luddites. It complements very well the conference on digital commons and free software that I saw at the JDLL a few months ago. Really, if like me you know little about the subject, go for it, it's fascinating and very accessible, and there are plenty of sources for those who want to dig deeper.

12. Graphism – The visual identity of Porto is a real success (via Pierre)
13. Curiosity – On The Kids should see this, you'll find tons of videos curated for curious children, with topics ranging from chemistry to dance, history, animals, food, space and more. I spent two hours watching various videos when I stumbled upon the site, so let's just say that there's no maximum age for being curious!
14. Stupidity – More Than 100 Hikers Have Died in Italy This Summer. What the Heck Is Going on? Well, people set off without any preparation, wearing unsuitable footwear and with no equipment, venturing into restricted areas and, in the most foolish cases, ‘researching’ via Chat-GPT... Add to this the instability of the terrain due to climate change, which causes landslides, and the result is deadly.
15. Cinema – Quentin Tarantino : le marketing de l'abjection cool.

    « Commençons par le plus évident : le « style Tarantino ». Un style inimitable (à noter que dans le cas présent, l’inimitable se manifeste justement par le fait qu’il peut être très facilement imité) »

    (litt.: "Let's start with the most obvious: the “Tarantino style”. An inimitable style (note that in this case, the inimitable is manifested precisely by the fact that it can be very easily imitated).")

    « Hommages et références (ou bien vols et plagiats ?) peuplent et surpeuplent son cinéma. Là encore, il faut se demander ce qu’il fait de cette profusion, à quoi elle sert artistiquement. La réponse peut fuser aussi vite que celle de Godard précédemment : à rien. »

    (litt.: "Homages and references (or theft and plagiarism?) populate and overpopulate his films. Here again, we must ask ourselves what he does with this profusion, what artistic purpose it serves. The answer may be as quick as Godard's previous one: nothing.")
16. Move fast and break things – WS, la start-up immobilière française qui saccage Paris. I hope (without really believing it) that the law will be enforced and that they will be ordered to repair all the damage, carry out high-quality work to restore the premises to their original condition, and that they will only be able to continue their business if they declare it properly, with the appropriate restrictions. A girl can dream.

    

17. Handmade – I really enjoy Katerina Ivanova's videos, such as her tutorial on sewing a wrap skirt, because she always starts with a bit of fashion history, reviews the technical properties of the different fabrics she uses, and explains why a particular fabric is or isn't suitable for a particular type of garment. And last but not least, because she takes the time to create perfect finishes. I can't see myself wearing such classic clothes, but I think that all handmade garments deserve such clean finishes. She reminds be a bit of Bernadette Banner.
18. Ferrovipathe – A great video about line C of the Lyon metro, the only rack-and-pinion metro line in the world, which has to tackle a 17% gradient between Hôtel de Ville and Croix-Paquet.
19. Sous/mal-traitance – A hidden network handles chats for OnlyFans stars. AI could soon take over Twelve hours a day chatting with lecherous old men, some of whom are violent, trying to sell them more and more photos and videos, in precarious conditions, for £2.50 an hour, only to be threatened with replacement by AI. Great.
20. I'd watch that –

    « I think there should be a reality show called Alpha Island, where they take all the men who call themselves Alphas, and put them on an island, and then leave them there. »

21. Bookshelves – My banker is so grateful those Bookshelf tavern signs by Ambrosia & Honey are sold out. I sort my books by color anyway, but I still wanted those.
22. Makeup – Those multichrome eyeshadow by Lethal Cosmetics are magnificient. Very expensive, but magnificient.
23. Woodworking – There's nothing more relaxing to me than watching woodworking videos. Today, we're building toold storage for a workshop. So it also appeals to my organisational instincts :D
24. Research – All of humanity's discoveries in the form of a skill tree: Historical tech tree. Brilliant.
25. Manipulation – Charlie Kirk : « L’extrême droite tente de béatifier un homme qui professait la haine ». (litt.: The far right is trying to beatify a man who professed hatred.’) Long (1 hour) video on Mediapart, to put things into context. Very comprehensive, I particularly enjoyed all of Sylvie Laurent's contributions, it makes me want to take a look into her books.
26. Burrow – builds a hobbit house out of clay. Quite different from his usual videos, but very cool!
27. Fascism – Democracy only dies if we let it die. Salomé Saqué, always spot on.
28. Tourism – The simplest, hardest way to "live like a local" ❤️
29. Illustration – Carlos Arrojo work is really pretty :)
30. Key – The day return became enter, a great long read on the eveolution of keyboards from the carriage return lever to the Enter key we use daily. Thanks Enwin!
31. TV – Yup. I want to watch that.

    « So, so tired of cop shows. I want a series about three generations of an activist family. The grandparents were part of the anti-war/civil rights movement in the 60s. One of their kids is a slightly conservative gay corporate lawyer, the other manages a community center, and her kid is a trans college activist who's angry all the time. Throw in friends (and enemies) for all three generations, and start filming. »

32. 911 – Have you seen The Pitt? No? Well, watch The Pitt, then watch this video where two doctors, including an emergency doctor who works in a level 1 trauma center, react to the double episode on the mass casualty event at the end of the season. And by react, I don't mean screaming and overreacting without contributing anything interesting, I mean commenting on and explaining all the medical decisions and organisational specifics during such an event. It's a real treat.

Funny pics

Small pleasures