Good morning. Hello. How are you? #527
Happy Red (Taylor's Version) release day. I miss my friends. Teaching Jane catch. Will Farrell's Star Wars pants.
Good morning! Hello there, happy Friday. How’s tricks? Happy Red (Taylor’s Version) release day. Are you excited? I am excited. I’m listening to it for the first time right now. I could definitely tell the difference a lot through “State of Grace,” but now that we’re on to track two, “Red,” I don’t even notice it anymore. I love this record. I am very excited to get to the ten minute version of “All Too Well” that closes out the album. Swift said that all formats would be released today, including the vinyl. My vinyl copy is, sadly, not here yet, but I did get a shipping notice for it two days ago, so I am optimistic it’ll be here before the end of the day.
If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you’re in luck, as I wrote a primer on the topic today for the daily newsletter Why is This Interesting.
Programming note: Holiday cards! Please fill out this form! It’ll make our lives so much easier! Yes I am probably going to say this for a month. People don’t read every day!
Had yesterday off but still spent significant chunks of it in front of my computer writing. I have been writing so much these last few days. I wrote this Taylor article, and Noah is a very thorough editor, so that took some back and forth. I wrote my usual daily GMHHAY and Sen Fitty words. I wrote all the shit for this massive insurance application, which was a nightmare, and then sent that off to our potential new insurance broker to give her a chance to swipe the account (which took a long accompanying email explaining why and apologizing for giving her no time). I have been working on another longish writing project that’s not very far along, but is something like 15 more pages that I’ve written in the last couple days.
My old friend and editor Lisa is up in New Hampshire with her ex husband, Dave, and his wife, one of my oldest friends Heather. She sent me an email about the GMHHAY manuscript, which is coming along. She told me all the things she liked about it, which is very nice, and then mentioned it was odd that I don’t talk about my friends very much. I thought that was interesting. I feel like I talk about my friends a lot, but I realized it’s more like I did yesterday — talking about Aaron’s new record, or Willow’s new book — or, worse, like the day before, talking about a friend passing away. But then I realized she’s not really wrong. This pandemic has been so, so isolating. And of course we don’t really live near many of our friends.
But also, the format of GMHHAY is an odd one, and it’s going to be an interesting challenge for this book. Because it (probably?) reads like a traditional memoir: something someone sat down to write about a period of time in their life. But of course I didn’t do that, I wrote the whole thing to my friends, who read it every day. And there are comments sections that don’t appear in the book, where I chat with those friends, every day, about the day’s entry. And people read the GMHHAY email and then they email me and then we chat — it happened with a bunch of old friends this week and it was just lovely.
Also, of course, writing about your friends is different when they are going to read it five minutes later. Like if I were writing a memoir, I would write all this stuff about friends, and then prep them, and then they’d read it, like, months later all at once when the book came out. It’s a very different sensation to know they’re going to read it basically immediately after you’ve written it.
At the core, though, Lisa made me realize that in a way the whole project is really about coping in a period without your friends. It’s been so long since I’ve seen most of my friends. One of my best friends has been begging me for more than a year to get on a Zoom with her and I’m so terrible about it. I miss her so much, but I am terrible at one-on-one Zooms, the whole thing makes me feel so awkward, I need to get my shit together and I wish this dumb thing would end. It’s almost over, it’s over for most people, but we have such a unique set of circumstances here with our location and Janet and Jane and geography and vaccines.
But god, god. Yes. I miss you all, I miss you all so much.
Lisa also said I didn’t write about my sex life enough, to which I say, YOU’RE WELCOME. That’s Lisa for you.
My actual memoir will come out in 2030 and will be entitled The Last Man Still Under Quarantine.
Anyway, once I got away from the computer yesterday, I did some quality gardening. Took down the tomatoes, sadly. They were actually still producing a bit, but they were so scrawny, and I needed the soil. I methodically chopped up the plants and worked them into the lower levels of the soil, which had been moved to the four Birdies beds. Each of the beds is now mostly full, ready for a cover crop. Didn’t get to that part yet, that’s on deck for tomorrow.
And because I am a glutton for punishment, and have some more dirt, and because they were on sale, I ordered one more of these things, and it is going basically right in the middle of that photo. Well, slightly above and to the right of the middle. I think. With the wife’s permission. Pretty sure it will fit.
Last night I was watching Jane before she went over to Grammy’s and we played Catch with the green ball. We are trying to teach Jane Catch. She is great at throwing but pretty hopeless at catching. For a while, we got her to just hold her hands out in front of her, open, like a kind of scoop and we’d toss the ball into it. I’m not sure where that came from, I think Emma taught her that. And she loved it when the ball made it in, but, you know, bouncy rubber ball, and she would not move at all. Like the ball could land right in her arms, and slooowly roll out and she would just let it.
So now I am working on getting her to understand that she has agency over this situation and can move her hands to catch and stop the ball. I had hoped that by watching us she would intuit this, but nope. But she finally got that she could grab the ball as it flies to her, so now she waits for the ball with her arms wide open, like she is expecting a hug. She is insistent on this position. It’s weird but it works. Now I’m trying to get her to understand she needs to watch the ball. Like because of the way she originally learned to “catch,” the fact that you need to watch the ball is lost on her. But somehow, in doing this, I made it worse. And now she is absolutely, 100% insistent that she look away before I throw the ball. So her stance, waiting to catch a ball, is with her arms wide open, looking off in the distance to the right.
Baby steps.
If I ever I think my daughter is gifted I just need to look at how she tries to catch a ball.
After watching Jane, I caught up on my Youtube subscriptions (or, as the oldz would say “my stories,”) and I got through them pretty quick, not a lot on Thursdays. And so I checked out the suggested stuff and apparently Will Farrell and Ryan Reynolds pulled a schtick where they switched places on the late night talk shows and Will went to Ryan’s gig and Ryan went to Will’s, which is kinda funny, but really the star of the show was Will Farrell’s Star Wars pants, the print for which was the original Star Wars bedsheets from the 80’s. I still have a piece of my original Star Wars bedsheets, that same print. Hanging on a wall. In my house, right now. Will’s pants were amazing I want those pants so bad.
OMG we’re on “The Last Time” on Red (Taylor’s Version) and she got Gary Lightbody again, and it sounds great. You know what? Let’s put this at the beginning of A Mix vol 91 and make that today’s mix that’ll be great. I mean I suppose there are better tracks, but I’ve always loved this track because I’ve always loved Reindeer Section. I loved early Snow Patrol, but lost track of them really. But Reindeer Section? Love love love. Actually screw it let’s put “You are My Joy” on today’s mix as well.
Today I’m gonna go to the frame store and get our Mythbusters art framed. Though it occurred to me as I was falling asleep last night that the thing is huge and I need to make sure it’ll fit in our car once it’s fully framed. I mean I swear this thing is like 6 feet by 6 feet, and that’s without the frame.
I also gotta buy some blue spray paint for Emma to match the paint on these metal pieces she has and it is just occurring to me that I am, like, the worst person to give this task to. I’m so bad at color matching. Ben Palmer used to always tell me I was colorblind, and I am not sure he’s wrong. Oh, god, the stress!
We watched Shang Chi and the Legend of Ten Rings last night, finally, thank you Disney for making me wait so many days to watch this movie I am very annoyed with you. We mostly enjoyed it. Didn’t need the big, swirling, VFX-heavy battle at the end, and there were serious plot problems, but whatever, it was enjoyable. Loved Akwafina she really is one of the best. Somewhat confused how Michelle Yeoh now plays two different characters in the MCU, and not even, like, a bit part back in Hulk 1 or something — like her other part was in an end credits scene! That hasn’t been explored yet! From Guardians 2! Like WTF! Is it going to transpire in the MCU that Aleta Ogord turns out to actually be Ying Nan and that Ta Lo is secretly an intergalactic arms smuggling hub or something? WTF?
Also, in looking at Michelle Yeoh’s IMDB page, I have just learned that Avatar 2 and 3 are in post-production and Avatar 4 and 5 are filming, so get ready for a boatload of Avatar in your life. Gulp.
Here’s today’s mix. It is a Gary Lightbody sandwich. Scrumptious. Also, new Margo Price song out today that is exciting.
Have a lovely weekend! MISS YOU GUYS FRENZ.
I’m so excited for Red (Taylor’s Version)! My copy is en route and I’ll have to have a friend rescue it from wherever the postman leaves it and tuck it inside my apartment for my return. Until I get home, I’ll enjoy the digital version…O suspect I’ll start that listening party while in the shower later ☺️