Here are the details and where to get tickets for my appearance with You’re Being Ridiculous at 8:30 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 27. I hope you make it out to some of these other events throughout the weekend too.
You’ll laugh. You’ll cry. You’ll fume. You’ll hate life and love it in the same breath. Basically, you’ll experience the daily ~*emotional roller*~ coaster experienced by all your creative friends! See you soon.
When you live in a small but comfortable apartment in a major city, you forgo some at-home amenities for the sake of living somewhere super cool.
It forces you to get creative. For example, Justin and I have turned what’s supposed to be our living room into our bedroom and what’s supposed to be our bedroom into our home office and recording studio.
I long for the day I can own a couch again, as well as cute, meaningless baskets set up around each room for visual effect and no real purpose other than to carelessly throw the occasional magazine. But for the most part, this set up is awesome. We won’t be here forever, so I can still Pinterest home décor ideas without fear that my mid-century modern dreamboat dining room will never come to fruition. Not owning a home allows you to live in, metaphorically, the space where you can dream to your heart’s content.
The only bad part is that space is at a premium. And as one half of a couple willing to compromise, I have to give up a few fights.
Like, the one about why we don’t put the tool bag in a closet instead of having it on the office floor (no more room).
Or why we can’t put the dust spray with all the other cleaning supplies instead of leaving it on the bookshelf. (He “likes it there” because we use it all the time to spray down our TV trays and no one visits us anyway. That’s another nice thing about living in a city — you rarely host friends because there are too many other, better places to meet and hang.)
Our apartment lifestyle is focused on function. Not form. For better or worse. Or at least until we’ve saved up enough for a down payment on a house.
Or a Westy.
#livingthedream
Because we’ve committed to this way of life for the time being, we have saved a lot of money… which we sometimes spend on stupid things.
Like Justin’s latest purchase: A freaking in-home sauna.
He heard about these on Joe Rogan’s podcast. (Lol. True story.) Something to do with “heat shock proteins” and reducing inflammation?
Justin knew a JRE recco wouldn’t sell me on it though, so he came up with a good sales pitch:
“We would have a sauna! How cool is that! These are the luxuries we can have before a baby gets made.”
“It’s to help us feel healthy and good and it’s cheaper than buying a membership to a place that has a sauna.”
“Look how funny I look when I’m in it.”
I blame you, Joe Rogan.
Number three was definitely the dark horse angle in this race. I can’t help but giggle when I turn the corner to find his head sticking out of this stupid tent thing, like he’s buried under sand at a beach.
But what really sold me was when I tried it the other day after a run. Damn it, I thought, as I began to relax, a warm hug enveloping my body. Uggggh. I think I like this.
I agreed we could keep it (like it’s a puppy he brought home or something) but I just have two rules.
That dumb thing gets packed up and put away after it’s aired out and we’re not using it.
The other person has to be home while it’s in use. I do NOT want to be the subject of an episode of some “Wacky Ways to Die” TV pilot because I got trapped in a zipper-clad polyester pressure cooker.
I’ll get a couch again someday. And, thanks to our stupid freaking sauna, I’ll be able to swoon on it with my proteins fully engaged… K, brah?
A few weeks ago, Justin and I went out to a show with some friends, but first we hit up Replay, a bar in Lincoln Park that has nostalgia on tap. Retro arcade games, pinball machines and Skee-Ball tourneys await after you’ve grabbed a drink at the bar.
I don’t drink anymore, but I can still appreciate reading a loaded menu of throwback craft cocktails spiked with a pun. Try, for example, the Salt-N-Pepa: House made strawberry and jalapeño infused tequila and lime with a chili lime salt rim.
Justin, earning the pinball wiz-ard title (you’re not the only one who can do puns here, barkeep), had to pee out his nostalgia cocktails an unusual amount of times. So we’d put our KISS pinball competition on pause, and I’d saddle up to a table and watch the video playing on the big screen while I waited.
They show old music videos, action flicks, Christmas movies. I hope old TRL episodes make the rotation. Remember when you had to wait for TRL to come on to watch a music video? Dark ages.
This night, though, they were showing WWE footage from the late ‘90s/ early Aughts, particularly matches that featured The Rock as a buffed and polished 20-something.
Uh waaaay back! (You think that fanny is nice, wait until you see what the one in back is packing.)
I chewed on my straw and tried to figure out what was bothering me about this imagery—beyond Jake the Snake’s super amazing man tights and desperate flopping. (I like to think of older era Jake the Snake more as Jake the Lovable Lost Sea Turtle.)
Something was off here. Something I needed to notice.
This happens to me sometimes. My visual intuition knows something is different and I can’t leave until I figure out what it is. I blame all those “Spot the Difference” game on menus I played as a kid, back before parents had, you know, cell phones to distract us.
I once spent a dumb amount of time in front of a black and white photograph at a tractor machinery museum trying to figure out what about it, exactly, was scratching the back of my mind. The photo showed a row of stern looking men in suits sitting in a dusty office. They were the executive leaders of some machinery factory in the early half of last century. Looking. Scanning. Taking in their creviced faces with mine, a mere century and a few inches away.
I caught it eventually: Despite their fancy mustaches and serious-looking jackets, they were all wearing beaten up boots, covered in dirt and dust. Quite different from the imagery of CEOs and executive leadership you see today. You don’t expect to see genuine evidence of their presence in the actual plants like their workers.
I knew it was something similar with this wrestling match. It was something other than the glitter and spandex and jacked bodies.
Boom.
There it was: In the audience.
Every single person in the stands was watching with rapt attention. These people were actually watching what was going on in front of them! In real time!
I watched for a cell phone in front of someone’s face. I watched for a smartphone hoisted in the air to snap a photo. I looked for a head down, typing on a tiny screen. But while I watched them, they watched the action in the ring. The whole time. Their whole selves invested in just one thing.
IT WAS SO BIZZARE. It was almost too intimate. I kind of felt like I needed to look away.
During another Justin pee break, I watched two burly wrestlers body slam past the ropes and throw themselves into the audience. Dear GoogleGod! Can you imagine if something like this happened today? No one would actually be watching the action right in front of them. Instead it’d be seen, witnessed, through the screen of their smartphone. But during this late ’90s romp, not a cell phone was in sight. It was charming, actually, to see the crowd physically interact with the wrestlers, undistracted. They patted their guy on the back, yelled at their foe. The closest it got to anything like you’d see now was one woman in mom jeans squaring up to take a flash photo on a film camera.
Guys, this was barely 20 years ago!
I watched in shock. Compare this scene to that of Kendrick Lamar’s recent halftime performance at the National Championship. So many people were on their cell phones, they looked bored. The camera operators eventually stopped panning to the audience because it kind of looked bad when you’re going for a jubilant reaction shot to see someone typing on their phone, likely sharing a photo of themselves or Kendrick on stage.
It’s no wonder some performers and musicians have started barring cell phones from their performances.
Oy. And this not a post meant to judge these people. I AM these people. I do the exact same thing. That’s why watching people *not* doing this felt so foreign to me. That’s why watching people *not* doing this was more fascinating than The Rock twirling a man in underpants above his head.
I bought the dress I wore to the New Year’s Eve polka party we attended SPECIFICALLY because I thought it would look hot in an Instagram photo. It did. But… maaaaan, is that who I am now?
I never turn my phone off. I check my email 24/7. This is a choice I’ve made after a lot of thought—a choice that makes my freelance worklife possible, a freelance life that comes with a LOT of freedom—but how many people do not have this luxury? I can feel the difference of personal attention I get electronically—or lack there of—since I joined Facebook 13 years ago. (Yes, 13 years ago. They sent me a Faceversary notification the fall day it happened.)
Yikes. Untag.
People I email are so slammed with added responsibility, expectations and, ironically, emails, they don’t respond as quickly or as diligently as they used to. Just writing emails for others is now, literally, a full time job you can get out of college. It’s no wonder direct mail (read: mail mail aka paper mail aka snail mail) is making a comeback. I, too, am more likely to trust and actually read paper mail than the seemingly worthless junk that shows up in my Gmail “Promotions” folder. Deleting it before I even read the subject line feels like an accomplishment.
I’m 100% pro technology. It can equalize our society in ways never possible before. Hell, it already has! But we have to take personal responsibility for how we let it affect our own lives. There is a social media mental health crisis looming and we’re responsible for protecting ourselves while it goes down.
Does your opinion matter if it’s not liked a hundred times on Twitter?
Does one really run if said run is not recorded during run into a running app?
Does the patriarchy truly fall if no one hears it in the streets at a Women’s March?
Speaking of the Women’s March, I didn’t attend this year because I had a nasty head cold and wave of the blues, but I did try to spend my time doing something more productive than posting photos and fighting about it on Facebook, which was super tempting.
Instead, I worked on a short story that I originally started from the viewpoint of a female character… then changed to the male character’s point of view… then changed back again to being told by the female character. That’s because I realized my own internalized misogyny in thinking that a male’s POV on a subject was more believable than a female’s instead of trusting my gut.
Saturday, I also read a great article in the February issue of Writer’s Digest about how to subvert your characters that are actually really destructive romantic tropes, like the Manic Pixie Dream Girl or the Sensitive Intelligent Alpha Male. This is where I think our power in making change lies—in our everyday actions and internal examinations beyond the screen. As a feminist writer, I can change how a little girl or boy thinks romance, consent or dating works, just through a story. I have more power to change the world there than on a Facebook post trying to get likes.
TLDR: I feel totally drained by social media. Scrolling through Facebook feels emotionally violent, right? The news is all alarming. No one is listening to each other. We’re too quick to break each other down, rather than the opposing argument. I don’t long for the late ’90s or the mom jeans or the film cameras. But I do think there’s something beautiful about not being on your phone all the time — visually and intra- and interpersonally beautiful.
I really want to put an effort into taking more time off my phone this year. Time to to put my cell phone away. Time spent IRL, paying attention to just one thing.
Join me won’t you?
I think we could all make this world a better place if we gave ourselves more time to stop and smell, well, what The Rock is cooking.
Oh shit! Go get this book! Tudor’s debut novel is a hell of a ride. Nothing preachy, nothing to learn. Just a good old heart pumpin’ and jumpin’ psychological thriller.
Opposite here: Lots to learn in this baby. Written by an Argentinian writer, I can’t even find it on Goodreads. But my local library recommended it as one of the best of 2017. Indeed, I’ve never had a book affect me physically until I read this one! It’s more than frightening. My skin crawled and itched from about page 20 onward. It had me checking and double bolting the doors. But, alas, the real terror was all around me…
Here’s another one I couldn’t recommend more. I needed to read Jessa Crispin’s argument about how the feminist movement has gotten off course in its attempt to commodify and convince all women they are feminists. I didn’t agree with every point she made, but, as she so convincingly writes, that’s the whole fucking point.
I particularly appreciate her call out of feminist righteousness and how we need to center it back to human rights (ALL human rights, not just female human rights):
“No one talks about toxic femininity, but certainly if we look at certain feminine modes in contemporary culture, it exists. But we would prefer to think of toxic masculinity as innate, and any problems with women’s behavior as being socially created. It’s convenient. Saying or believing that women are special also, by default, dehumanizes men. If we are special because we are caring, then men must be uncaring. If we are special because we are compassionate and nurturing, then men must be emotionally dead and destructive. And if these qualities are innate, then we can dismiss the entire male gender.”
This book is brutal but brilliant. Proceed with caution, but certainly proceed. Marzano-Lesnevich took ten years to write it and it was worth waiting for. She changes the genre of memoir. “The Fact of a Body” intertwines her story of family secrets, hidden crimes and ignored molestation with the story of a child molester she learns about in law school. What I liked about this book was that it questioned the limits of empathy.Is the death penalty humane? Are there limits to empathy? Should victims be allowed to have that? These are tough and personal questions. But it’s a relief to see someone asking them — and asking them in a new way.
I’ve been on such a Roxane Gay kick lately. This month I’m returning to where I first fell in love with her: in her comforting gray worlds of fictional short storytelling. She’s the best at uncovering darkness and enchanting you to look. No really, look at it. See their scars. These tales are for and about those whom a careless world made brave hearted.
NDT 4-Life! Neil DeGrasse Tyson makes nerding out about the wonders of the universe fun and fast in his latest book. I like how little it feels in my hand. My hand made of stars. 😉
I did some Google searching and I’m still not sure what this sign means. But it’s definitely attention-getting. Thank you, Charley? I think?
Sometimes it’s hard to see. But love is there.
Remember that!
And that.
When I first read this copy on our monthly electric bill, I thought it meant they would actually come pick up the gross old food containers I have in my fridge or freezer. Ha! Maybe my subconscious is trying to tell me to do some cleaning…
This sign hangs on the door to the milking parlor of our family farm.
A helpful reminder on my first commute back to a work gig in the new year. You know, when you don’t even remember what email is.
I know your newborn nubbers be but as bitty and tender as an earlobe, but please pause that Little Drummer Boy mixtape and see to this, my latest request.
Please, oh heavens, please… do not let this little throat tickle and creeping-up cough be the first sands of many to tinkle through the hourglass of time to be spent recovering from a cold. Bedridden, miserable and relentlessly unproductive/ therefore unAmerican (destined to be older you’s least admired trait, OK?).
May the golden nectar of this Airborne dissolved in tap water have the healing power of a Eucharist washed down with wine on your fave day. May this shimmering orange liquid ensconced in a DayQuil pill behold the power of holy water disinfectant.
Through the marble gates where your cousin goddesses reside, babble to them my wish to be as whole and bright as their Supermoon. Turn on that otherworldly, childish charm to which they so easily succumb and convince them to grant your wish, widdle baby savior of the world!
Next, spirit up to St. Blaise and, like, just humor his conspiracy theories. You don’t have to stay long; I know your swaddled clothes always stink when you leave. When he hits the holy pipe for the third time and the clock strikes three and he starts talking about aliens, ask him to send healing waves down to my earthly throat and lungs, his specialty. (Also, if possible, the burner number to reach “his guy.”)
Finally, coo to your mother, who always knows how to make everything better when the world feels shitty–from the chicken noodle soup to the tea with honey to you, young prince.
Today begins 2018. Hello! Yay! I hope your headache wears off soon and you get to eat nachos in bed and watch Netflix! (Might I recommend the new Dave Chappelle specials? Controversial, yes, but those headlines aren’t doing it justice. Perhaps we may all dig deeper this year? You’ll notice the beginning of a theme here.)
I love New Year’s Day. It’s an overachiever’s dream holiday. “You mean, we get to be applauded for our outrageous efforts to do/ achieve/ improve/ get better at whatever it is we dream? We get to spend the whole day setting up lists and spreadsheets and myriad assortment of other technological trackers designed for successfully marking things off our to-do lists?”
Yasss, bitch! You’re scratching me right where my neuroses itch. Get. Shit. Done.
Via a Google search for “overachiever problems.”
I’m very aware of the pros and cons of being a “trophy hunter,” as Justin calls me. He and I are complete opposites in this area of our lives, so his c’est la vie attitude is very helpful for me when I need to remember the little things matter most and, well, chill the fuck out.
This year, I’m committed to finding a balance between the two. I don’t want to completely give up my go-get-em mentality, but I don’t want it to push me to extremes anymore either–or, more specifically, I don’t want it to push me to extremes on paths that I don’t give a shit about. Do you know what I mean? When you end up *nailing* the 200-word freelance assignment because you spent six hours on it instead of spending a sane and appropriate three hours and channelling your other two hours into researching for a creative essay you want to write.
There’s gotta be somewhere to rest in the middle, right? Somewhere that I can focus my extremes into achieving my ultimate, singular, soul-igniting goal?
Via a Pinterest search for “overachievers get shit done.”
Well, I think I’ve found a solution. This will be the year in which I attempt the impossible for my extreme perfectionist brain: Consistency.
Here’s an excerpt from my Best Self Co. journal workbook that explains why this works/ why I’m putting faith into trying consistency over achievement:
“If you want to crush your goals and reach greatness, you must focus on consistent and long-term personal performance.
In the book Great By Choice, author Jim Collins shares the story of two explorers, Amundsen and Scott, who each led separate teams on an expedition race to the South Pole in 1911. The journey there and back was roughly 1,400 miles, which is equivalent to a round-trip from NYC to Chicago.
While both teams would travel the same distance through extremely harsh weather conditions, each took an entirely different approach to the journey.”
OK PAY ATTENTION THIS IS WHERE THE GOLD CAN BE MINED:
“Scott’s strategy was to walk as far as possible on the good weather days and then rest up on the bad days to conserve energy. Conversely, Amundsen’s team adhered to a strict regimen of consistent progress by walking 20 miles every day–no matter what the weather. On good days, Amundsen’s team was very capable of walking further, but Amundsen was adamant they walk no more than 20 miles–to conserve their energy.”
WHICH TEAM SUCCEEDED? YOU SHOULD KNOW THE ANSWER BY NOW BUT STAY WITH ME:
“It was Amundsen’s because they took consistent action. And this same principle will be true for your goals.”
We are what repeatedly do, which, like, I know. But this anecdote clicked that knowledge into place somehow. It offers some relief: If I dedicate an hour a day, for example, to writing for my book, or promise to run one mile, and only one mile, every three days at the gym, I take the decision making out of it. It becomes a habit. And, I can’t push my work or goals off to a day when “I feel like it” and then, when I finally “feel like it,” feel overwhelmed by the 48 hours of work and 10 miles I expect from myself in one day.
Patience. Restraint. Courage. That’s what’s going to get me across the finish line. These are skills I haven’t cultivated in my past–and haven’t really needed to. But not knowing how to be truly patient with myself and others and situations has proven a detriment exacerbated by my trophy hunting perfectionism.
It’s probably affected you too, this fast-paced immediacy and expectation of comfort. I think we could all benefit from taking a step back, reading the whole article, watching the special, getting our hot take from something more thoughtful than a tweet, seeking out the facts, embracing the nuance intrinsic in waiting, letting others have opinions different from our own.
See also: We won’t elect a new, non-idiotic president until 2020.
So buckle up, loves. The life you’ll be changing this year is your own–and if you do it right, you’ll do it in a way that the change lasts for years to come.
Chicago to Lawrence, Kansas, to Denver to Las Vegas to Phoenix to El Paso to San Antonio to Austin to Memphis to Indianapolis to Chicago.
Whew.
We drove all that in two weeks, with the main purpose of spending Thanksgiving in Vegas wearing matching velour tracksuits and hitting the 24-hour Thanksgiving dinner casino buffet tour.
One of the most memorable moments happened somewhere in Utah, though. Can you tell me the shape of Utah off the top of your head? No cheating! I couldn’t either. (Answer: Utah is shaped like a square with a cute little shelf in the northeast corner. For storing bibles and guns, presumably.) But here we were, making an overnight drive through the state beloved by Edward Abbey, when nature called.
I pulled off into a rest stop area, checked the time—11 pm—and ran into the women’s restroom. Yes, ran, because by nature, I mean I had to, as they say out here, numero dos. Ten minutes pass. I’m humming. I hear a mother and her son come into the restroom. I go mute, as is polite.
My main concern is that it stinks and I feel the familiar poop shame we all share when we do it in a public restroom. This mother’s main concern, though, quickly became me.
Well, not necessarily me as me, but me as what she imagined I was, a conclusion drawn (again, presumably) from my beefy Doc Martens and black pants and the fact that the rest stop seemed completely empty at this time of night because we had parked off to the side and this poor woman with her child thought I was some hoodlum or drug dealer or creepo looking for a beej.
A creepo? Sure. Looking for a beej? Nah.
“Hurry up,” she whispered to her son in the handicap stall. “Stopping here maybe wasn’t a good idea.”
At this point I’m still oblivious, gently humming inside my head. I wonder, “Oh no, why?!”
The handicap stall opens. The child exits. I see his small white shoes make their way to the sink.
“No no,” the mom says, quickly. “We don’t need to wash our hands. We need to go go go.”
That’s weird, I thought. Does it smell that bad?
When I left the restroom ~five minutes later, I asked Justin if he saw a mom and kid leaving the women’s restroom.
“Yeah, they looked terrified,” he said. “They were running. I almost went in to check on you. They looked Mormon maybe? I figured they just were scared because this rest stop is scary.”
When I was finally able to stop laughing, I explained my theory of why they were afraid–it was me and my big boots. They seemed fine until she had time to judge that there was a weirdo in the stall next door. I thought I looked country-punk-chic. They thought I looked like a gang member from “A Clockwork Orange,” thirsting to drink their innocent blood under the bright Moab moon.
If only they had seen me–a small woman with just a smile and a tune on her lips, y’all! A kind person who just likes badass-looking boots and who just had to sit and shit for a long time.
It was apropos. Fear unwarranted and breaking through it. That was the whole point of this trip after all–besides Vegas buffets. Here’s how it went down.
This is somewhere in Arizona. I swear I saw new colors on this trip. Or at least I saw colors I’ve known my whole life organized in totally new ways.
San Antonio Riverwalk.
San Antonio was warm. In a lot of ways.
Kansas. Basically.
More Texas. There’s a lot of Texas.
In Vegas, even the trees seem unnatural.
THIS IS A REAL PHOTO NO FILTER. !!!
Our drive through the Rockies was one I’ll never forget. No wonder people outside the midwest wonder how we can live in a place so flat. It’d be hard to have this drama dominating your view every day and then try to find majesty in a cornfield.
Vogueing at Nevada’s Red Rock Canyon, as one does.
Yes, hi, I’d like to recommend the one-way scenic drive through Red Rock Canyon at sunset. Justin rented us a convertible for the day for two reasons. 1) So he could go from 0 to 80 in seconds on the highway. 2) So we could see this with the top down. Saying it was majestic is cliche, as is saying I cried as we witnessed a mountain tucking in our sun for bedtime. But I don’t give a damn–both are true.
New color inspiration.
Here we are taking photos at Red Rock Canyon and trying not to fall lest we unwittingly become “those people.”
Justin: Comedian, trip planner, BFF. America is for lovers.
Also for lovers? The jungle room at Bonnie Springs Ranch Motel right by Red Rock Canyon. Rawr! We didn’t request this room but they couldn’t have put us in a better one. It even had a velvet painting of a jaguar on the wall.
“Heeeeeeyyy.”
Speaking of velvet paintings, look at this dream boat in velour. We wore matching tracksuits on Thanksgiving Day in Vegas. A hilarious sartorial choice indeed, but also a strategic move. When one can hit up all the casino buffets with their 24-hour all-access pass and eat a lot of pumpkin pie, turkey, lobster and the ever decadent ham and green bean platter, one needs a waist band with leeway.
A survivor at the Bonnie Springs petting zoo.
Also, ghosts at Bonnie Springs Motel.
But you can’t never leave!
Part of the beauty of doing this trip as full-time artists/ freelance writers, we got to see a lot of touristy things on days not frequented by tourists. Because all tourists except for us suck.
For example, the Briscoe Art Museum along the San Antonio Riverwalk offers free admission on Tuesdays. AND WE WERE THERE ON A TUESDAY.
Taco spots are always busy though. We ate a LOT of tacos on this trip. Are tacos the new hot dogs? The new American staple food? I see nothing wrong with that. I’d rather have a taco at a baseball game than a hot dog, you know? We’re in that weird mid-paradigm shift where what it means to be an American is as varied as the people living in it–and the people who used to…
As we traveled, I recognized that significance of traveling on land some people stole from another people during a holiday where we celebrated and reimagined that theft.
It was best addressed–meaning unflinchingly and truthfully–in San Antonio. The cathedral light show didn’t keep the truth in the dark, and the art museum, where there was a painting titled, no joke, “Last of His Race” honored the cultures that were either squandered or lost to time–black, brown and white alike.
I found this interesting and chalked up points for SA as one of my favorite spots during the trip because it’s also located in Texas, home to The Alamo, no less, and Texas is good at, I don’t know, ignoring the bigger picture unless they’re the star of it. Or at least that’s what I assumed.
Vegas “medicine man.” Yikes. Was there ever a better–and by better I mean worse–visual metaphor for what was done to the Native Americans?
OK, maybe this. No teepees. No tents.
I sent postcards from every state we visited to my niece and nephew of reading age. Of course I tried to subtly express the urgency of my opinions without being an asshole (PLZ HELP ME FIND A BALANCE, BABY JEZUS). I found postcards that showed cowboys and Indians communicating, sharing, bartering. I loved this orange postcard below that listed the symbols some tribes used to write and what each symbol meant (with an Auntie-drawn frown face by the swastika). 🙁
These postcards made me muse on how much has changed since the first Thanksgiving, like the way we talk, how we talk, the words–and sometimes symbols–that are and are not OK in 2017. It’s pretty incredible, the scope of those changes.
I thanked every star under the big, azure Arizona sky for living in a time when I, a woman!, could work and write from the road. With a hot spot connection, G-Suite toolkit and awesome team of understanding colleagues back in Chicago, I worked my dream profession (writing) while exploring America. What’s the native symbol for Fuck Yeah This Is Awesome?
A virgin pina colada on the Riverwalk.
Non-virgin marijuana in Denver. Grape Kush = 10/10, man.
Some very Texas memorabilia. People are different. People are all the same.
We accidentally stopped at this family owned gas station and it was perfect. Although, we did get a couple comments about being from Chicago where “everyone gets shot.” <eyeroll> Southerners stereotyped us just as much as we did them.
But I did get the BEST coffee-infused blackberry jam here. They put the word “organic” all over the label, which I thought was cute. Not because they thought it would sell urbanites on buying the $8 jar of jam–but that it would, in fact, sell urbanites on buying the $8 jar of jam.
Because Americans of all stripes are nothing if not predictable. But they’re mine. And I am theirs. It’s difficult to face the truth of our country’s past and the flesh and bone it cut its teeth on, but like the grandiosity of the Rocky Mountains or the sheer scope of the Red Rock Canyon–it’s better to face the sprawling perspective, reconcile the violence and beauty, and acknowledge the overwhelming depths head on. In person. Side by side. I don’t want to ever be afraid of this place and I want to make it better so others feel safer here too.
If you’re interested in gender, sexuality, choice and human rights news, sign up for The #MeToo Moment, a new email newsletter produced by The New York Times. It curates stories on these subjects into a streamlined list of reports and has additional content that’s both informative and interesting.
The short story “Cat Person” in The New Yorker
Of course. Of course! The first short fiction story in New Yorker history to go Internet viral is about cats. It’s also about consent, dating, hooking up and connecting with another human during a cultural paradigm shift. Read it or listen to the author read it here!
New music
“Soul of a Woman” is the posthumous Sharon Jones album with her band The Dap-Kings. Listen to all of it. Dance. Swoon. Cry that she’s gone. Smile that she lived. Repeat.
Pharrell is a genius. Like, greatest musician of our time. His band’s new album, “No One Ever Really Dies,” isn’t their best but it’s still great, because Pharrell. This song, “Don’t Don’t Do It,” is my favorite. Deceptively catchy, complete with a banging Kendrick Lamar verse, its hyped up beat belies the song’s infuriating subject matter: police brutality.
Beauty despite chaos. Respite despite rage.
Only Sufjan Stevens could write a song that humanizes Tonya Harding. So he did.
Hey also, if you haven’t watched the “30 For 30” about Tonya Harding–which reminded me Tonya Harding has a story that’s worth humanizing in the first place–do it on your holiday break.
My work on Mildly Depressed has made me a fangirl of embroidery art of all kinds. I love seeing the varied ways people take on this timeless craft. Mid-rabbit hole search on Instagram, I found these two artists, @memorialstitches and @adipocere, and I want all of their pieces. Not only does their aesthetic look punk rock cool, I dig the symbolism of reinterpreting the disreputable legacy of woman-as-witch through a skillset traditionally reserved for “nice women.” Also, men doing cross stitch and embroidery = awesome. Creative mediums shouldn’t be gendered spaces.
Trying to decide what museum membership to gift myself for Christmas so I can feel motivated to do cultured things next year and also deduct on my taxes before the new tax bill gets rid of such wonderful things
“Thoughts While Attending the First Symphony in the Series My Wife Wanted to Buy” performed by Jim Gaffigan
Before
After
Smile Direct Club
This is my last month of wearing invisible aligners from Smile Direct Club! These were my 31st birthday present to myself. I never wore my braces properly (sorry, Mom) and my teeth were shifting something fierce. What sold me on them was that they were nearly 70% cheaper than Invisalign AND I only had to do one appointment for the whole experience. The rest of the time, my aligners were mailed to me. At my first–and only–visit to their offices, I received a wand scan that sent photos of my mouth to their labs somewhere magical. They then formed a plan for moving my teeth slowly each month. At the beginning of each month, they’d mail me three sets of braces. Two sets I wore for one week each, and the last set I wore for two weeks.
I’m so happy with the results. The complaints that this genius company gets dinged for in online reviews are true: The aligners can cut into your gums and can be painful, but I would just trim mine with the kind scissors I use to cut my bangs (really) and then softened the plastic with the nail file they provide (yes, really); also, they haven’t gotten down the timing of mailing these things yet. I think they get backed up with orders because they’re growing so quickly. That said, every time I called customer service to complain about aligners that were delivered a few weeks late, they’d give me money back. They also gave me free retainers (around $100). So, total, my new smile only cost me about a grand. Worth every penny. 🙂
After Abraham Lincoln’s son died, the president reportedly went back to the Bardo (tomb) to literally feel his loss in his arms. Yeah. He was so full of grief he hugged the boy’s dead body on several occasions. Allegedly. Saunders turns this tale into an incredibly creative ghost story like you’ve never experienced. Really. I’ve never read anything like this.
I picked this up for our roadtrip through the west, which included a drive through Abbey’s beloved and now besmirched Utah desert. I love his cantankerous outlook. It feels oppressively appropriate considering how disrespectfully we continue to treat our land (hello, Mr. President) despite protestations by scientists like Abbey.
This came out in spring and it finally came through via my library hold request. Roxane Gay’s honest stories about her body feel at once entirely her own and completely universal. Finger snaps.
This is another feminist text from this year I’ve been meaning to read for months. It wasn’t until I started reading it that I remembered that the line “the pursuit of happiness” comes directly from a Declaration of Independence. My — and everyone else’s — distraction from this fact is exactly why Filipovich wrote this book. How would we all benefit if we made laws and policy based on what made people — especially women who were historically disenfranchised — happy?
Have you ever not read a book because someone who hurt you loved it? For shame! Also: Same. A college ex of mine loooooved “Dubliners,” thus, I promptly pushed my desire to read it to the back of my brain after we broke up. After recently reading in a writing textbook one of the short stories from JJ’s greatest hit. I decided to pick this up and let that shit go. I found this cool Centennial version on Amazon.
