Good morning. Hello. How are you? #409
Nabisco Twigs, style points in earning money, non-participles, Evermore vinyl sales fraud, recluses, Sinema stupidity
Good morning! Hello! How are you? Wow, #409. Formula 409. Do they still make that stuff? Hrm, well, peeking at Wikipedia, that turns out to be a sort of interesting question:
In early 2020 Formula 409 became impossible to find in stores and disappeared from the "products" listing at the Clorox website. Some websites say Clorox has discontinued the product. There has been no announcement or news release, and the website www.formula409.com is still active.
I assumed it was still around, and was going to write a passage about how I used to love that stuff on rely on it, and it was my goto cleaner, but then somewhere along the way my brand preferences changed and I didn’t even notice and I wonder what Byron Sharp would have to say about that. And I guess that’s all still true. But it’s much more interesting that last year the stuff just mysteriously disappeared. Even though I wasn’t using it anymore, I am now bent out of shape. Bring back Formala 409! Someone get the domain name and the Twitter handle! etc. etc.
Actually, if I were going to bring back a product from the dead it would be Nabisco Twigs. I fuckin’ loved those, lived off of them as a kid. They were the best. No Nabisco product compares. And look! There is already a petition to bring them back. But it’s been like thirty years now, I suspect that ship has sailed. But, god. Twigs. They were the best. My childhood was Twigs and Underdog. I just downloaded all of Underdog this week, so now I really want Twigs.
With the AMC stock shenanigans going on, I feel like it time for me to re-up a core and explain to you a core tenet of my life — something that has guided my actions and beliefs for over thirty years. This is the concept of “style points” in making money. You see, making money is like the Olympic High Dive. Yes, climbing up that ladder and jumping into the pool is an accomplishment. You did it. It is something. Not a lot of people will do that (note that I said will there, not “can.”) But the Olympics (aka life) are not judged by simply climbing up the ladder and jumping into the water. There are actual points. There is actual grading, and you win or lose based on the grace and finesse of your dive, not the existence of your dive. If you belly flop, or you just sort of flail your limbs on the way down, or, say, strike a pose of manliness and alpha, the judges are going to give you a bunch of zeroes and you did not win the competition.
Being an investment banker is a high dive belly flop. Yeah, you got down, but it was ugly, it was crude, and pretty much anyone could do it. Zero style points.
The assignment of style points change over time. Being a pop star, for example, has had its style points ebb and flow, depending on how easy it was to make a fortune as a pop singer. It’s harder these days, so there are more style points.
I cannot stress the importance of this enough: making a shit ton of money is maybe not great, but how you make a shit ton of money is far, far more important. I have absolutely zero respect for someone who made their money off of a belly flop, no matter how high the diving board, no matter how much money. I definitely have some respect for the Forrest Gump of a kid who climbed up that ladder for the first time in their life, jumped off not knowing what they were doing, but out of sheer luck, he managed to get his hands in front of his head and make a small splash as he went in. Some.
But the most respect is given to people who earn their fortunes in the most stylish, least destructive ways. They made the smallest splash, and their flips and twists were perfect.
Style points matter, and we should all judge fortunes accordingly.
Related to this, is the concept of the corporate world as a canvas for art. If this sounds of interest to you, please consider reading this manifesto.
I was thinking about non-participles the other day. I was trying to explain them to Jane. Sometimes this works! She’s pretty good at complex topics. Last night I taught her negotiation and coming to an agreement and she seemed to get it, we’ll check in on that tomorrow night. But the other day she used some non-participle noun in the incorrect plural and I corrected her and explained what a non-participle was. And then yesterday, as we were working on breakfast, it hit me: I fucking love non-participles. Now, I am not a grammar expert. I mean, if I stop and think about it I could tell you what a preposition was, and thanks to Star Trek, I can remember what a split infinitive is (“to boldly go.”) But a lot of grammar terms just sort of elude me. I am generally okay at the grammar itself and I could probably diagram a sentence, though not label it.
But non-participles? I still remember the exact moment I learned about them in school. I remember instantly getting it. I remember the teacher used rice as an example. I remember I was in complete awe that I already knew all of this. That my childhood brain had already picked up what nouns were participle and what nouns were non-participle. It was amazing. It was an epiphany.
I still think about that moment all the time.
Oh and another recent non-participle event in this household was when Emma and I were watching the semi-final of a Great British Bake Off season, and they were working with meringue. Meringue is both a participle and a non-participle. You can make several meringues of meringue.
So here’s some BS for you. This week, Taylor Swift’s Evermore was “released” on vinyl and it broke just about every recent vinyl sales record. Here is a People Magazine story on the topic. First off, good for Taylor, it’s a great album (though no Folklore). But I have to say, this is BS. The devil is in the details, with this passage:
According to Billboard, the recent release date of the evermore vinyl record was boosted by demand for the vintage version, as pre-orders for the vinyl format were first made available five months ago.
So, okay. I am one of these people that pre-ordered this album. I pre-ordered this album within minutes of it going on sale on Taylorswift.com, because I waited a day or two with Folklore and it took me, like, six months to get the album. It has now already been six months since I pre-ordered Folklore. Now, I pre-order a lot of vinyl, and do you know when you are supposed to get your vinyl? A day or two before the album is “released.” Or at least that day!
Yet my copy of Folklore has not arrived. Now, sure, Three Lobed Recordings recently emailed me to apologize that the silver vinyl version of the new Six Organs of Admittance album, The Veiled Sea was delayed and they apologized profusely. But no such apology has been forthcoming from Taylor, oh Taylor you break my heart.
So, I ask you. If the record did not go on sale on the release day, and the record is not buyable on release day, and no one received a copy of the record on release day, then how, pray tell, is the album released on that day?
Sheesh.
(Taylor Tweeted that it was available “at your fav indie record store, Target, Walmart & Amazon” but, as you know, I checked the vinyl section of Walmart yesterday, and there are only 9 copies available on Amazon, with delivery more than a week out, so, yeah.)
There is an unopened vinyl package in my entry way. Watch it be Evermore and I’ll have to retract this entire section tomorrow. Except that package arrived yesterday and Evermore came out six days ago.
I also have a vinyl copy of Fearless on order, I assume that one will be delivered in late 2021. And that this will happen with Speak, Now (Taylor’s Version) as well. I will be waiting for Taylor Swift vinyl for like three years of my life by the end of this.
Also, is there going to be a Red (Taylor’s Version)? Yes, right? That’s gonna be bananas.
My friend Rob posted this on instagram yesterday, and boy, do I relate:
I will keep this all anonymous: A friend of mine was once internet dating, and dated this woman who told him that her father had recently left the whole family. All his kids were grown up, and he was done with the whole thing. He handed them something he’d written called “A manifesto for Recluses” or something like that and announced he was leaving to go spend the rest of his life alone in the wilderness.
I think about this guy all the time.
All the time.
“Rent free in my head,” as the formulaic Twitter gang would say.
To clarify, I don’t want to leave my family I like my family. Still, this guy. He had vision. Stuck with things, got the kids out to college, and then was out of there.
Maybe if we spread this story far and wide enough, it will inspire Krysten Sinema and Joe Manchin to do the same. Good riddance. Here’s Krysten’s latest nugget of genius:
The reality is that when you have a system that is not working effectively... The way to fix that is to fix your behavior, not to eliminate the rules or change the rules, but to change the behavior.
Yes. Preach, Krysten with a Y. The crew of the Challenger should have just flown better. Those people thrown through windshields of cars should have just stayed in their seats through better behavior. The people of Flynt should have been more careful drinking that water.
Here’s a Drone Rock playlist for you. I could have been a bit more diverse in this – I ma listening to Can’s Live in Stuttgart ‘75 right now – but this is what made the cut. Basically you got three approaches to listening to this: 1) sit real still for an hour, 2) drive real fast in a car, at night, with the roads slightly wet, preferably through a really long tunnel with yellow lights, or 3) put it on while you’re working but make sure you have enough energy from within you and are seeking to do a task that requires concentration. Good luck!
Okay! Hope your day is swell. Hope your plants are getting some rain. Maybe if this all works out they’ll have gotten some nice rain all week, so I don’t have to spend 30 minutes watering every day (really gotta set up the drip) and then this weekend it’ll be sunny so I can garden! Fingers crossed!
what is a non-participle?? google gets me a bunch of non-(insert other word here)-participles but no non-participle
hmmm, i'm not sure i know what you mean by participle and nonparticiple noun. a participial noun is one made from a verb (sharing is caring!), so a nonparticipial noun would be... all others?
synema and manchin are dopes just digging in their heels because they want to seem like they think for themselves. dum-dums.