Good morning. Hello. How are you? #1059
Love signs, CVS is depressing, iPhone migrations, Trash and its stationary tendencies, SAD, horror films at too young of an age, Disney is gonna be our neighbor
Good morning! Hello. What is up. It is cold. But Jane Handled it. She wears a coat now. Well, sometimes. Not into the school. But at recess, and she was wearing it when she comes out yesterday. Baby steps, baby steps.
My head hurts.
Look. Okay. The toothpaste cap holder is a love sign. Apparently that is distinct from hang loose, which is distinct from the devil’s horns. I’m not a frickin semiotician over here. The only Umberto Eco in this house is Name of the Rose. I am a man in his fifties I cannot be expected know these things. So I guess instead of being punk rock, or goth, it is… hippies with blood? What is that? Altamont? Helter Skelter? Those are pretty good I can work with that.
(Wasn’t there something about the cop who wrote Helter Skelter? Like he was bad or something? Do I want to go down this Wikipedia rabbit hole again?)
Anyway, I am enjoying my toothpaste cap holder. And you have all convinced me that that this is not a breakthrough product for the masses, and you guys can keep using your pumps or putting the cap on the counter in the other direction or doing some complicated hand maneuver (Eddie Izzard: “I have invented a man-oo-vruh.”). But I am happy with my progress.
I still think the egg cracker is a good idea, though.
Hrm my notepad crashed again yay Sonoma (and I know it’s Sonoma because it crashes on both Macs) and I promised you guys topics. One moment.
Topic 1: Took mom to CVS to get her flu and Covid shots yesterday. I know that was a lot at once but it was fine for me and she wanted it. I will let you know if the gamble paid off when she wakes up in a few hours. But man, I gotta say, and I am sorry Jussi. CVS is just the most depressing place. Are there nice CVSs anywhere? I suppose they’re probably slightly nicer in New England since there’s more corporate supervision? I don’t remember them being this universally depressing when I was younger. I mean they were depressing in different ways — and I gotta give em props for stopping selling cigarettes that was a real baller move. But god. Can you imagine going to pharmacy school and then working at a CVS? It’s so depressing. Plus they have the self checkout machines that are totally anal about weight on the scale after you scan something so they’re always yelling at you. CVSs just bum me out.
Topic 2: My mom was rocking an iPhone 7 whose battery now lasted about an hour, and what is a trip to see your son without a little IT support, so I spent a good chunk of yesterday transferring her over to an old iPhone 11Pro I had laying around. This includes the jump from button to no button, a taller aspect ration, and Facetime, so I got to sit next to her in bed and move a phone around her face for five minutes or so, so that was a thing that happened. Anyway, personally, I never use the “transfer my shit from iCloud backup” when I am setting up a new phone — fresh install, every time — but I was feeling lazy, so I used the feature and… it worked? Maybe after twenty years Apple finally has its act together in its cloud services. Hold please. Lol. Three weeks in and I still can’t download a photo from my iCloud. Maybe not.
Topic 2: Congrats to Taylor for person of the year, I guess. Zelensky, Thunburg, the Metoo heroes, Taylor Swift. Checks out. And no I have not (yet) read the whole article, and I know it was the sensationalist pull quote, but it is just manifestly not true that “Trash takes itself out,” not in reality, not as a metaphor, Scooter Braun and Donald Trump and many others are doing just fine. Kanye, different story, but as much as I don’t like the guy I see no reason saying such words about what is clearly mental illness. Also the whole “I know what it’s like to be down and out” or whatever (I am paraphrasing here) is so bonkers. I mean I know it must have been horrible when Evermore only stayed number one for four weeks and only sold a million copies in its first week. I dunno, man. I just don’t know. Maybe she’s fine, I’m fine, everyone’s fine maybe Taylor Swift is really the extreme manifestation of a prophet of what I call pedestrianism and it’s just fine she barely speaks out on politics or anything else and just makes everyone sort of feel better for some ineffable reason and that is enough doggone it. I suspect the problem for me is Jane is currently making me watch the “Me” video too many times and boy that is a rough song to listen to a lot. It’s brilliantly clever. I kind of get it. You have an idea like “Me” you gotta see it through, it’s just so good, even though it’s kind of self-defeating. Like naming your book Agency even though its not really just about Agencies and the title will put people off who think they don’t want to run an agency, with all its baggage, even though that is exactly who the book is for, but the pun is just too good, but then you tell people all that and say that the pun is just too good and then they look at you and think “what pun?” Oh wait. Anyway, watching the “Me” video 3-5 times a week? Not recommended.
(That’s a thing we’ve been saying in our house lately: Jane does something and says “is this recommended?” And Emma or I will say “not recommended.” It is great.)
Topic 3 (why am I numbering topics today): It is coming to me slowly, then all at once, that I am permanently fucked up from watching The Exorcist, Halloween and The Omen at too young of an age. Like so young I thought they were real. Like so young I can’t look at a frame of any of those movies without freaking out. Like so young I can’t watch horror movies at all. I’m not 100% sure who is to blame for this lapse in parenting. I mean, not my mom, that is for sure. Mayyybe my dad — he was responsible for a few other movie lapses like Sean Connery’s Outland and that gang movie where they tie a cinder block to some dude’s testicles and throw it over a bridge yeah I did not need to see that before 12. I think The Wanderers, maybe? But my dad was not a horror fan. I think this might have been my neighbor Mike, but it might have just been the introduction of cable, and the gap between then and adults realizing just what they chose to beam into their house and monitoring it. I may well have done it to myself. In any case, I mentioned it casually in a group Slack a week or so ago and since I mentioned it, it’s really hit me how much that screwed me up and here I am no in my 50’s still feeling the ramifications and Eli Roth seems like a really nice guy but nope nope nope nope nope.
Topic 4: Disney — yes, Disney — is going to build 4,000 homes and an entire Disnified neighborhood about 5 miles up the road from us so that is completely insane and weird and I am just not sure what to think about this. They are calling it Asteria after a native flower, good name. It will be the first neighborhood of its kind on the east coast, the second in America. These things seem sort of different than Celebration, FL, the Disney community in Florida, with which Emma and I both have a love-hate fascination. Celebration is amazing, sterile, otherworldy, terrible and oddly compelling. I am definitely kind of obsessed with New Urbanism. Easton Town Center, in Ohio, was a Barbarian client and absolutely one of my favorites, what a completely bonkers situation.
Topic 5: I think I might have SAD this year, me, an Alaskan, a goth, who used to cover his windows in tinfoil (the absolute best material for blackening out windows, btw), and lived in a house with no windows. But my god do I hate the cold and grey this year. I know part of it is my weight loss and cold, and part of it is my mom being around (sorry mom), but… I dunno. Winter sucks. This is the first year of my life I’ve ever found myself caring about it and I am not psyched about it at all. Not at all, nope, no siree….
Jane bedtime was lovely. We snuggled and watched videos, she made a LEGO diarama of two people diggng up a treasure chest which included a LEGO pile of dirt that was just great, she drew an amazing picture on her Magnadoodle of Christmas, we did a great bed party, and, most importantly, Daddy Jane Dance Party did not include a Blackpink song, at her request. We got Robyn, St. Vincent, Olivia and, yeah, “Me.”
Three out of four aint bad.
OK well here is a mix I basically just made in the last five minutes but it is awesome and it’s a bunch of stuff we all don’t listen to enough and should listen to. All the songs are oldish, not like 20 years old but a couple years old. Except for, hrm, Ad Frank and Fan Modine. The Bostonians. Oh and House of Love. Man I wish I saw that tour.
Talk tomorrow, fine feathered friend.
Hey Rick, sci-fi, thoughts podcast would love to do an interview with you about Trekonomics. Email me at LancerKindATyahoo.com and we’ll set up a time to record.