GPOY

days late, dollars short

That moment when. Ben Franklin: getting shit done. Would a joke about the California penal system be inappropriate here? The wives and widows of ISIS. Why people love to hate Duke. Stuck playing Google Feud. Germanwings, Richard III and acts of God. Seven signs you might be clueless about income inequality .Haruki Murakami gives advice. Inside Adjuncting.  I followed my stolen phone to China: a story of globalism, friendship and Internet celebrity. Hire like Google. How a millionaire escort does money. (Incidentally, her TinyLetter is pretty damn decent, too). Tatiana Maslany is my shit. So is Toni Morrison. An ad praising you for your refusal to be swayed by other, lesser ads. The tiniest skateboarders in Kabul. Employment rights challenges to the on-demand economy. Chola fashion and folk feminism. Where are 1.5 million black men missing? From Ferguson, for one. Ladies in smart tweed suits. Gentlemen in smart tweed suits. Aviatrixes, and other unsuitable financial role models. Resume virtues vs. eulogy virtues. On being good and being great.

aaaaaaand


Tove Jansson draws a Moomin!

The Writer's Technique in Thirteen Theses

1. Anyone intending to embark on a major work should be lenient with himself and, having completed a stint, deny himself nothing that will not prejudice the next.
2. Talk about what you have written, by all means, but do not read from it while the work is in progress. Every gratification procured in this way will slacken your tempo. If this regime is followed, the growing desire to communicate will become in the end a motor for completion.
3. In your working conditions avoid everyday mediocrity. Semi-relaxation, to a background of insipid sounds, is degrading. On the other hand, accompaniment by an etude or a cacophony of voices can become as significant for work as the perceptible silence of the night. If the latter sharpens the inner ear, the former acts as a touchstone for a diction ample enough to bury even the most wayward sounds.
4. Avoid haphazard writing materials. A pedantic adherence to certain papers, pens, inks is beneficial. No luxury, but an abundance of these utensils is indispensable.
5. Let no thought pass incognito, and keep your notebook as strictly as the authorities keep their register of aliens.
6. Keep your pen aloof from inspiration, which it will then attract with magnetic power. The more circumspectly you delay writing down an idea, the more maturely developed it will be on surrendering itself. Speech conquers thought, but writing commands it.
7. Never stop writing because you have run out of ideas. Literary honour requires that one break off only at an appointed moment (a mealtime, a meeting) or at the end of the work.
8. Fill the lacunae of inspiration by tidily copying out what is already written. Intuition will awaken in the process.
9. Nulla dies sine linea -- but there may well be weeks.
10. Consider no work perfect over which you have not once sat from evening to broad daylight.
11. Do not write the conclusion of a work in your familiar study. You would not find the necessary courage there.
12. Stages of composition: ideas -- style -- writing. The value of the fair copy is that in producing it you confine attention to calligraphy. The idea kills inspiration, style fetters the idea, writing pays off style.
13. The work is the death mask of its conception.

Walter Benjamin -- 1928

Gonna Break my Rusty Cage and Run

Lost in immigration.  Confessions of a comma queen. Taking Dorothy Miller Richardson off the second shelf. Own your loser edit. Describing the shape of the manosphere. The fight for the soul of My Little Pony. Welcome to Shitphone. "Her game thrived as folk game, played by a constellation of left-wing intellectuals who began to start calling it 'the monopoly game.' " Rick Rubin annotates lyrics on RapGenius, notably the inestimable Johnny Cash. Similarly, Michael Chabon's thoughts on Kendrick Lamar are worth a scan. "In the West, there’s a tendency to approach censorship with a high-handedness that would seem inappropriate if applied to other issues of development, like poverty. There may in fact be more similarities than we realize." The talking heads behind climate change skepticism. "There is absolutely nothing in this world like the feeling of sucking at something and then improving at it. Everyone should do it every ten years or so."

Ten Satisfying Ways of Letting Your Enemy Know That You are Ignoring Her, While Still Ignoring Her.

It's not the quantity but the quality of our free time that's changing. The most unusual sound in the Swedish language. Chocolates that represent Japanese onomatopoetic words.The ineffable taste of Doris Lessing. Edible fruit stickers and the rise of the spornosexual. Sweating like a pig, feeling like a fox. 10 Things We'd Like to Hear Virginia Woolf Say to Jonathan Franzen. The slave who posed as a master. These bathing women seemed like goddesses to me. What They See. Chicago, the last great capital of cartography. We all have the ability to transition. It's just a question of what the person inside you will look like. Modern masculinities. The ultimate WikiGnome. O California. Zadie Smith does Key and Peele. Damage (long but WORTH IT). Meet Tink.

Hard Times Valentines

Fantastic article about homeless couples in New York City, how they met, how they stay together, what life and love looks like on the streets. (via)

The story of Ayotzinapa and the 43 disappeared students.

Life advice from Haruki Murakami.

Is marijuana withdrawal a real thing?

The enduring dystopia of the Handmaid's Tale.

Do we have to ask these questions simply to fall in love? Can't we ask them of all our friends, too?

Get rejected every day with Rejection Therapy!

Righteous anger - 100% men. Shine a light.

Life, love and parenting lessons from Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Debbie Harry in LA, 1977

clearing the desk

So glad Chris Rock's new movie is playing, first because we get to watch it, second because there's no better time to have this man speaking out regularly in the news. The chain is around the brain: the sexual exploitation of children in California. The boy from Jurassic Park's college admissions essay. Thierry Cohen's Darkened Cities. Adult siblings and happiness. Ever conscientious, the New York Times takes a moment to explain 'ants on a log' in this article on the life of a pot critic: 'the children’s snack of raisins and peanut butter on top of celery'. Beautiful Norwegian passports. Where to begin with Ursula LeGuin. The junction, the gapers, the merge. 'Let’s just talk about how impossible it is to keep your life from spiraling out of control when you have no financial cushion whatsoever. And let’s also talk about the ways in which money advice is geared only toward people who actually have money in the first place.' Women sing waulking songs of Scotland. Thank me later: an interview with Drake's voice coach.

And finally, the Nakasendo Trail, an old road in Japan that connects Kyoto to Tokyo. It was once a major foot highway, the in-land equivalent of the Hokkaido, traveled by nobles, samurai, and artists like the poet Basho. Today, small sections retain some of its historical feel. More pictures here.

first and foremost

Like many of us, I've been riveted to the news unfolding around Mike Brown's murder; Ferguson, Missouri; and the non-indictment of the grand jury. I click links and read until I feel too angry, or sad, or sick to keep going.

Over the weekend my family and I had long talks about what we'd read. We talked about what a mess everything was. What this said about the state of race relations in our country. Whether we'd made any progress as a nation since the civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s. How devastatingly far we still have to go.

But I haven't participated in this conversation online at all. Not a peep. Mostly, I use social media feeds as a reader, as places to consume, not create.

That now seems insufficient. It devastates me to think that, on a matter that so preoccupies me, this silence could be read as apathy. Our country is crumbling. We are all at stake. There is, to me, no more important conversation being had.

So here we are, in this little attic, a place where I sometimes fling my odds and ends so I can return to them later to rifle through, hold things to the light. And in the spirit of this tiny corner, here are scraps of what I've been reading. If you're looking to learn or commiserate or challenge yourself, these might be good places to start:

on waking up and smelling the water. how to argue eloquently about Ferguson. how to address the riot shamers. riots as a 'language of the unheard'. riots as 'exactly what’s supposed to happen when an injustice is happening in your community'. MLK Jr. on the stumbling block of the white moderate more concerned with 'order' than with justice. #IfTheyGunnedMeDown. Last Words. 12 things white people can do because Ferguson. and, closer to home, the demonization of Gary, Indiana.

only a fraction of the preponderance of important, thoughtful things being said right now, buy it's a start.

like a whale

Let's all sit under this beautifully drawn language tree and read the Diary of Samantha Pepys. BRB, getting my B.A. in Internetology. Chicago and the criminalization of homelessness. I was an intent, anxious, too-serious boy bent over a heavy novel in the slop-strewn eating hall of a traveler's block in Shanxi province. At night, anxiety made camp in my body, keeping me awake as I fretted over what I could do to make money and where I would live. The self-imposed challenges of owning it. Chris Rock, Duke of Doubt. A breathless, exquisitely written and rather long birth story.

aaaaand

dated to about 7000 BCE, probably the oldest mask in the world

something in between

They take the elevator down from her sixth floor apartment and walk out into a snowy yard. The fox, on a leash, runs out and immediately starts tunneling into a pile of snow.

Irina's fox is named Viliya and is both a pet and Irina's dissertation project. Irina is a graduate student at the Institute of Cytology and Genetics outside of Novosibirsk, the capital of Siberia. 

She walks Viliya through apartment blocks and playgrounds. The fox waits patiently to cross the street. 

As they walk, groups of women coo at the fox, “what a beauty,” almost like it's a baby. Grown men stop, stare, and snap photos of Viliya. An elderly woman walking past asks, “Is that a wild animal? Or a domesticated pet?” Irina answers that the fox is somewhere in between. 

In fact, Viliya is the result of decades of calculated selection to see if it's possible to repeat the domestication of a wild animal, like a wolf, into a pet, like a dog.

More here.

i got this foliage going nuts

But what do you mean by basic though? Naruto x Fashion = both 2004 me and 2014 me internally squealing. The last FBI Burglar emerges after 43 years (filed under: badass ladies from Philadelphia; horizontal vs. vertical life). It's the very pursuit of happiness that thwarts happiness. Let the nazi fall off onto his head. Nicki Minaj will not explain her ass to you. Bristol Palin, Malala Yousafzai. Head, heart.

ayo shouts out to wisconsin foliage last weekend. i see you, boo.

never catch me

Find your beach.  Put on your cutest shit and go to the fucking party and run it. A singular exhibit for a singular starman. Navigating all the fringe beliefs in LA. What I semi-seriously believe early childhood development to look like, moon allergies, witch hands and all. 10 grammar mistakes people love to correct that aren't actually wrong. For moms everywhere, I will find Oprah at this Oprah weekend. The reclusive, doll collecting copper queen of New York. Mongolian throat singing in the hands of a trained soprano.

the haunting, and curiously joyful:

Never Catch Me - Flying Lotus feat. Kendrick Lamar

pie and coffee edition

Drinking a cold G&T in a rattan chair with a fan overhead — I like that a lot. Some of these zones really speak to me. Artistic advice from an awesome mom.  We cook to make ourselves indispensable and special. Delivering the mail, our collective secret dream job, not always so dreamy actually. What happens when your pet gets internet famous or, more generally, why do we meme? Artisanal cartography in the age of ArcGIS. This humpback whale goes Full.Damn.Breach.“My past,” she told the room, “is littered with the bones of men who were foolish enough to think I was someone they could sleep on.” Fictional cities and fantastic architecture.

Aaaaaand, in honor of some damn fine news yesterday:

suggested undergraduate thesis titles

"The Poetry of Tiana Pyer-Pereira:

Using Extended Nature Metaphors to Explore the Contours of a Failed Relationship"

for your coffee break

Daphne du Maurier: the original Gone Girl. Female sexuality and how our feeble imaginations constrain what we can see through science. What is the Midwest?: An inquiry in 41 maps. Shonda Rhimes and being the Only One. "The obituary as a form has moved beyond protecting the family's narrative". Personal aspirations for fall. Do's and Don'ts in the age of the never ending first date. White girls who make jokes about 'white girls' as if this category doesn't include us OR the importance of friendship diversity. Welcome to Stealthy Starbucks.  9/11 and how cities become a part of you. All of Harry Potter summarized in a single comic.

Vic Mensa - Down On My Luck

Reviving my blog to effervesce about this song / video / Mensa in general. Dude's going Groundhog Day on a song that will probably define my entire summer.

too poor for pop culture

Miss Sheryl, Dontay, Bucket-Head and I compiled our loose change for a fifth of vodka. I’m the only driver, so I went to get it. On the way back I laughed at the local radio stations going on and on and on, still buzzing about Obama taking a selfie at Nelson Mandela’s funeral. Who cares? 

No really, who? Especially since the funeral was weeks ago.

So begins D. Watkin's article 'Too Poor for Pop Culture'. The rest of it gets even better.

Reading this piece reminded me of two other essays that attempt to uncover the dangerous ways we think and talk about race and work. The first dismantles the destructive work mythology of 'Do What You Love', highlighting the implicit class divisions inherent in this credo and shedding light on the labor mill that is adjunct professorship. The second, a report titled 'Moving the Race Conversation Forward', takes traditional media to task for focusing on exceptional individual stories instead of working to expose systemic racism. Watkin's article seems like a good place to start if we want to reverse both of these pernicious public dialogues.

By the beard of Herman Melville

A partial list of all the euphemisms Herman Melville ever used for beards:

• the crop
• suburbs of the chin
• homeward-bounders
• fly-brushes
• long, trailing moss hanging from the bough of some aged oak
• love-curls
• Winnebago locks
• carroty bunches
• rebellious bristles
• redundant mops
• yellow bamboos
• long whiskers
• thrice-noble beards
• plantations of hair
• whiskerandoes
• nodding harvests
• viny locks
• the fleece
• fine tassels
• goatees
• imperials
• sacred things
• admiral’s pennant
• manhood
• muzzle-lashings

Source: unknown. I've had this as a saved email draft since February 2011. Who I meant to send it to still remains unclear.

Tupac Lives

(more here)