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I had an interesting problem recently when the JSON output from an API started to return a null value instead of empty list. This broke my PowerQuery so I wanted to share a fix.

Originally, I used the built-in “Extract values (from a list)” feature, which concatenated them to make comma separated values:

= Table.TransformColumns(#"Removed Columns", {"List_Field", each Text.Combine(List.Transform(_, Text.From), ","), type text})

And that worked fine. Until the content of that field was not a list. Evidently, this field had previously contained an empty JSON list if it contained no values. I’ve never looked at the JSON itself so I had no idea. So, when the API started returning null for that field instead List.Transform failed:

Expression.Error: We cannot convert the value null to type List.

In some of my other Queries it was also failing “silently” because this step was immediately followed by a RemoveRowsWithErrors step. Whoops. Having no idea that the API output had changed (or what it originally contained) was my big problem here. Took me a while to understand what had gone wrong and how.

The fix itself isn’t complex, simply check if the value is a list before concatenation:

= Table.TransformColumns(#"Removed Columns", {"List_Field", each if Value.Is(_, type list) then Text.Combine(List.Transform(_, Text.From), ",") else null, type text})

However, that DOES make me wonder why the built-in doesn’t automatically add code to check the type. Can’t be that hard…

Watched Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) by an author from letterboxd.com
Thirty years after defeating the Galactic Empire, Han Solo and his allies face a new threat from the evil Kylo Ren and his army of Stormtroopers.

I still think that, comparatively, this is one of the better films outside the original trilogy but it’s still pretty bad.

This time I was struck by the scene in which Han and Leia explain their relationship to each other…

★★★

My review

Watched Turning Red (2022) by an author from letterboxd.com
Thirteen-year-old Mei is experiencing the awkwardness of being a teenager with a twist – when she gets too excited, she transforms into a giant red panda.

This review may contain spoilers.

I watched this with my 11 year old daughter and, as an armchair feminist, I was so confused…

[Some spoilers ahead]

The panda as a metaphor for hormones, coming-of-age and finding your true self – works 100% for me. Big thumbs up, I liked it. I liked Mei and her weird friends a lot. The fact that Mom suspects first period, when panda first appears, is also quite funny and sweet and positive. In fact, not mentioning it, given the circumstances, would feel like an omission. So, that’s really great.

However, during Mom’s subsequent stalking, presumably prompted by concern regarding panda, she bizarrely decides to use first period as a cover story. This weirdly entangles the two themes, resulting in both appearing as a potential source of embarrasment and shame AND then later something to be trapped, controlled and hidden. So, that all felt really negative.

But, I can’t tell if that entanglement was entirely unintended. Maybe that’s an intended reflection of societal attitudes: little girls, stay in your box and keep your feminity hidden?

[Major spoilers ahead]

If that’s the case, I don’t feel like the movie goes on to challenge that. If anything, it leans into it. At the end, I found myself hoping that all the women would keep their “panda” and celebrate it.

Ultimately, I’m not sure what an 11 y/o girl takes away from this.

★★★½ (contains spoilers)

My review

Watched The Boy and the Heron (2023) by an author from letterboxd.com
While the Second World War rages, the teenage Mahito, haunted by his mother's tragic death, is relocated from Tokyo to the serene rural home of his new stepmother Natsuko, a woman who bears a striking resemblance to the boy's mother. As he tries to adjust, this strange new world grows even stranger following the appearance of a persistent gray heron, who perplexes and bedevils Mahito, dubbing him the "long-awaited one."

It was OK. Certainly one of Ghibli/Miyazaki’s more “mature” entries in terms of the themes but still plenty of Alice in Wonderland whimsy/whackiness.

Sadly, I’ve reached the age where I am burdened with recognising voices but being completely unable to recall where from. Sad times.

★★★½

My review

Watched Salem's Lot (1979) by an author from letterboxd.com
Ben Mears has returned to his hometown to write a book about the supposedly haunted Marsten House. When people around the Marsten House start dying mysteriously, Mears discovers that the owner of the mansion is actually a vampire who is turning them into an army of undead slaves.

Honestly, parts of this were comically bad. The performances are decent, though. Seems the art of looking absolutely terrified has been somewhat lost since.

★★★

My review

Watched Jack Reacher: Never Go Back (2016) by an author from letterboxd.com
Years after resigning command of an elite military police unit, the nomadic, righter-of-wrongs Reacher is drawn back into the life he left behind when his friend and successor, Major Susan Turner is framed for espionage. Reacher will stop at nothing to prove her innocence and to expose the real perpetrators behind the killings of his former soldiers.

… I have no idea why I watched this again.

★★½

My review

I do find some use for LLMs when I need to make a genuine natural language query:

Is there a name/theory describing a shift in the political spectrum (left or right) that results in what were once moderate left/right views becoming considered “extreme”?

Turns out there is a thing called the Overton Window 🤷‍♀️

Though, not sure I agree with Lehman right now:

The most common misconception is that lawmakers themselves are in the business of shifting the Overton window. That is absolutely false. Lawmakers are actually in the business of detecting where the window is, and then moving to be in accordance with it.