progress: at 50 epochs, even w/KL annealing, 32dims is not enough for the VAE latent vector to represent much of anything. leads to reconstructions that are probably just the orthography model doing its best with next-to-noise, but sometimes amusing, e.g.

cart → puach
liotta → pinterajan
intellectually → aching
capella → pellaka
photometer → augh
sympathizer → disteghway
butrick → jorserich
botha's → szine
clayman → tsantiersche
sparkles → trenlew
calamity → muliss
thermoplastic → tphare