1.
I’ve had a project deadline of August 26th since July 7th. Yesterday, August 26th was finally here. It didn’t feel like a big deal anymore.
2.
Watching Cubs fans brashly hail cabs, like the Cubs aren’t 20 games under .500 with a player named Patrick Wisdom.
3.
There are nights I think Sal Paradise was right but most days I’m just trying to feed my family without explaining myself to the articulate.
4.
I had to write a “list of trigger warnings” this week and got weirdly into it. I liked using semicolons to separate them. Semicolons themselves are trigger warnings anywhere else.
5.
A weird thing about the internet is the flattening of the Sunday New York Times. Used to be you knew A1 and B1 contained 50 pages about war and oil and New York. Now the “Styles” section is on the same plane as 9/11.
6.
I had to wait for something yesterday so I listened to two indie lit podcasts. Both writers said if they went back to David Foster Wallace now, it might seem like the reading from their youth. I got to thinking it might revitalize DFW’s reputation to position him as a Children’s Author.1
7.
“You’ve got to understand the world doesn’t revolve around Jesus Christ” was a dope line from The Rehearsal. Weird Richard Brody didn’t like it because he loves the crabs at Sam Wo’s.
8.
Among certain white men “that Joyce Carol Oates tweet” is Selma. As a white man, the thing that shocks me about some white men is that they think they could ever be persecuted in America, just for being white. I want to be like, my brother, haven’t you lived?
9.
On Wednesday afternoon I really had to wait for something so I listened to a podcast with an “extremely online” right-wing guy who was talking about “memes” and soon after I became physically ill and wanted to die. Why do I hurt my ears in this Lena Dunham kind of way?
10.
This week I destroyed a burger alone, watching a lone woman destroy a salad.
11.
So many cranky male tweets about New York Culture should be quote tweeted, “somebody get this genius to the Girls Season 1 writing room, stat.”
12.
If Nabokov were writing today he’d be self-publishing or an affable indie guy, but also super woke, if only for all the alliterations he could make with all the new words.
13.
A puzzling line in the Kaitlin Phillips spread was the one that suggested Joshua Cohen won the Pulitzer Prize because he hosted an evening of theatre in his home.
14.
I sang “Bulls on Parade” a few times this week after my government fed the war in Ukraine another Big Mac. It’d be hard to explain to the Youngs, if they asked, what Tom Morello’s DJ-scratching-on-guitar meant to hip-hop kids raise on Dad’s necking-at-the-drive-in Rock.
15.
Carbon dioxide, which is used to stun animals before slaughter, is in short supply. This is bad news for consumers, bad news for meatpackers, and even worse news for the animals.
16.
Stressed out because my student loan is $10,001 but comforted by the fact it isn’t $10,002, $10,003, $10,004, $10,005, $10,006…
17.
On Thursday I saw this chalk drawing by Watteau and for a few minutes I thought about nothing else. Then I thought of The Kreutzer Sonata.
A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again already sounds like a Children’s book title.
Stuart—I don’t know what this means, but as long as I’ve been aware of it I’ve always enjoyed your sharp, witty writing. Keep it up.