Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1208
Americas Sweethearts, Biden and Bedtime updates, MBTA contactless payments, Dishwashers, South Korea demographic implosion, GenX's miserable retirement planning
Hey there. Morning. Greetings from the playroom. Jane wanted to play upstairs this morning, fine, but she wanted me to come up with her. “But my computer is downstairs,” I said. “I have to work.”
“But you have a laptop too,” she said.
“No, kid. My love of three monitors and faster processors trumps my love for my kid,” I said.
I did not say this. What could I say. I am upstairs. She is playing with LEGO.
The need of an artist (I am calling myself an artist today even though I am, obviously, just a fraud) to protect their routine and their art time is absolute. Pathological. The number of times I have seen on the face of a child or spouse or coworker something along the lines of “what the hell is wrong with you” when I am clumsily making an excuse to carve out my sacred time to write this stupid email, well, that number is large indeed.
Thank you all for letting me vent yesterday about Ridin’ with Biden. It was selfish. We all want to vent about Biden but we can’t all vent about Biden because a significant number of us have to stay true at any given moment to make it look like none of us are nervous about the election. A mass illusion, I get it. I failed. I did not do my part.
I’ve been watching America’s Sweethearts, the (latest) reality show about the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, who are apparently still a thing. It is insane. Just this entire world of sexless nepotism and god showboating and absolutely insane mental fortitde along the lines of Olympic gymnasts. And they get twisties too, and they get in their own head, and one day a perfectly good cheerleader can just sort of go insane in the membrane, and their performance gets impacted and the creepy-looking southern lady of death will cut them from the team at the drop of a hat. It is insane, the pressure.
But let me tell you, I understand where they’re coming from. It’s just like being a Biden supporter! You can’t think about it too much! You gotta hit your marks and perform and stay with the program and just jump up in the air with your arms attached to another teammate and land in a splits without fear because if you think about it you’ll fuck up the jump splits for you, and your teammate and American democracy.
Well, yesterday I fucked up the jump splits.
It’s funny, too. My wife? Does not want to talk about it. I strongly suspect she is very annoyed with me for publicly airing my annoyance with Biden. She has always had better messaging discipline than me she would be great on the campaign trial, I swear to god. Hahaha imagine. But she would.
But it felt so good to just say it all.
But it was so selfish.
And now when Trump wins it will be all my fault.
Relatedly, per Felix Salmon in the Axios Markets newsletter today:
Fully 50% of them say their main retirement planning mechanism is to avoid thinking about it altogether
I am so proud of you GenX. We have really committed to the bit. We’re in our 50’s now, and still as cynical and apathetic and useless as we ever were. Nice job. I’ve spent a good 30 years trying to be less cynical and am now maybe in the “average” category. But i sure am thankful for my GenX cohorts because they make me feel like a fuckin’ saint and they make me feel like the most brilliant financial genius ever, not that I use a financial planner either, like sixty percent of my GenX compatriots.
Man if I belonged to any other generation I’d be so jealous of GenX. It really is the best. Just absolutely ignored, and absolutely right in its firm belief that generations are stupid anyway.
This is where I tell you what I am listening to today, but I am not listening to anything but the click clack of LEGO bricks.
My wife also did bedtime last night. She read yesterday’s post and it triggered something in her, said I never have to do bedtime again if I don’t want, and she loves doing bedtime and will do it every night. N.B. she does not love doing bedtime, at least not all the time. I definitely took the gift and let her do bedtime last night and, I’m not gonna lie, I sure am tempted to take her up on it and never do bedtime again, or at least take a break from it. But I know that is wrong, and that will not help my relationship with my daughter, and it will not help my quest to do half of the parental chores (where, I often say, I am far closer to half than most fathers and still very far from half).
But, then, Emma hates mornings so I just do them all! It’s not a crime to not like certain parts of the day!
But, then, you do mornings and Emma does afternoons, which are longer and more work.
The family as a whole also had a little chat about bedtimes and daddy last night. I told Jane I love bedtimes but that I have a hard time with the part where she never lets me go, and it always ends with me leaving and her screaming and how that makes me sad. We discussed a possible new tactic I haven’t tried, which will maybe work, I will try it, I am not holding my breath.
Being a human is a pain in the ass. Being a human in a family is a pain in the ass. Look, obviously these things are great. I want to be a human and I want to be in a family. But they’re also a pain in the ass sometimes.
The thing about your life being good is that the better it is, the more annoying the difficult parts are. No, that’s not quite right: they are obviously less annoying than, like, poverty or paraplegia. But you focus on them, you obsess about them in a way that you don’t when you have real problems. It is so, so hard to avoid this. It’s a brain trap. I tell myself all the right things as a mantra, but also, I am getting older! I am tired of annoying things! I just want to relax!
I wonder if anyone has ever mastered this quest. I strongly suspect everyone who acts as if they have — from buddhist monks to those smug people on your Facebook page — are all acting.
Obviously, people who never think about things (the majority? maybe? maybe not!) don’t have this problem. Thus they never had to master it. So, not relevant to this line of thinking. Though I am wildly jealous of people who don’t think, of course. All of us who think too much are wildly jealous of those who don’t think too much. Having a brain and overthinking everything is such a curse but I don’t think I’d have it any other way. I’m too far gone into this schtick. It’s my whole being, right? Sunk cost.
Oh hey looks like the MBTA is finally going to let you pay for T Rides with your phone. I don’t need this Charlie Card anymore. I am both happy and sad about that. I enjoy the little ritual of loading up my wallet with my Boston things when I’m heading up there: My Charlie Card and my Man Ray VIP card. Honestly, what else do you need when in Boston.
Anyway I am a little brain dead this morning. I am doing Summit prep, for our work summit next week, down here in Chapel Hill (god knows how I will manage GMHHAY next week with my entire company down here). I got the travel and accommodations and dinners and all that sorted (hrm, actually,I think I still need to make one dinner reservation), and I got the agenda sorted, and I have all the various empoloyees working on their assorted presentations. Now I just need to finish my presentation. I got the structure of the deck, and I only have three more days to fill it out — I can’t work on it right up to the summit cuz I have to go to Megan’s funeral this weekend. Yesterday I got through the “money” section, which was so, so hard. Money is hard even when money is not a problem. Oh actually I just remembered that I need to make another slide in that section. Now I am working on the goto market section for a new product offering, which involves this complex cohort analysis of all of our clients. It’s so much work!
Here is a fascinating video I watched about South Korea did you know that South Korea is dying? Total demographic implosion. Just a perfect storm of shrinkage. It really is nuts.
And here is another fascinating video (boy I am being lazy today) about dishwashers. This guy should just teach the America’s home economics class. Just put every teenager in front of him for an hour a day and everyone would be so much better at owning a house, a car, at managing a household. It’s a “technology” channel, but not really: it’s really a channel that explores the everyday mysteries sitting right in front of us: that we know we should be smarter about, but don’t have the time, and (see yesterdays GMHHAY) the internet is absolute garbage at helping us with anymore. I really do love this nerdy midwesterner, dude deserves a Kennedy Center honor or a Presidential Medal or something like that.
Forgive me father I have sinned I have offended the newsletter gods and fallen back on the crutch of, gasp, links.
I’ve hit the halfway point of wearing this boot for three weeks. Did you remember I am wearing a booth? Excuse me, a BREG BL525007 Genesis Mid-Calf Full Shell Walker. I am fairly sick of it, murder on my shin, weirdly, but also… it is fine. It has not risen to the level of live annoyance like bedtimes or Biden. I think I reserve that for things that don’t have an ending in sight.
Yesterday someone tried to cheer me up by saying something like “don’t worry she’ll be back in school soon” and I was immediately filled with dread, being reminded that I’m going to have to start waking up at six again, for the second of, like, ten more fucking years. Fun fact: waking up at 6 AM sucks. It sucks so hard.
Jane is singing a made-up song right now. It is hella-cute. She is really a great kid. It’s absurd to complain that each night she says “but daddy I love you sooo much, pleeeease don’t go.” It’s so fucking cute and heart warming, even as it is soul destroying and guilt-redlining. What a world, what a world. Also she just drew a picture, while on the pot, of a book titled Books. I have included it in this edition for your perusal. It is less than five minutes old. We’re real-time here, people.
Now for the hard part where I need to make a playlist on my laptop, which is always a pain. But lucky for you I listened to a ton of new albums yesterday, and I think I have a few playlists in the can. Let us investigate. Lettuce investigate. Lettuce tomato.
Ahh yes, here we go. A moody and quiet playlist, everyone’s favorite, we are old. Did I cheat by putting a seventeen minute song on here? Yes, sort of. Thank you, Bill, for alerting me to the new Squrl and the fact that I had let my Sacred Bones record membership expire, the one subscription I wish had an auto renew, and it does not. Because they are good people, Sacred Bones. I have duly renewed. Also there is no Claire Rousay on here which is really weird because I have been listening to the last two Claire Rousay albums constantly for like a month now. Just the most beautiful moody and quiet music. But i keep forgetting to star tracks and add them to the Moody and Quiet playlists, so you are missing out. New Idaho is great, another band that took a 20-year break and hit the ground running (Drop Nineteens, Slowdive, Ride). Mick Harvey has never taken a break, still crajnkin out great music for thirty-plus years and I deeply admire his work ethic. I also admire Jeff Tweedy’s work ethic and community building (and his studio loft in Chicago) even if I don’t love new Wilco as much as old Wilco, I will still support him in his endeavors and check every album out, though I confess I have stopped purchasing them. He is happy now. That makes us different. I have happy moments, but I have not achieved that higher plane of enlightenment that Jeff seems to have reached (even though he’s probably faking it, see above).
Until tomorrow. Keep the faith.
Loved your line about being an artist.
Reminded me something Thomas McGuane said about artists of his generation and the ones that have lived to see old age, (roughly phrased) Careers in the arts have a great capacity for tragedy because it’s an all or nothing commitment. The survivors know how to balance it… the key is knowing when to start tapping the brakes a bit.
Glad to see your newsletter today, even if it was tapped out on a laptop.