Good morning! Hello! Happy Friday. Ooo we are so close to issue number 700. That is insane. Insane. I can’t believe how long I’ve been doing this.
In the “congratulations to people I know but haven’t seen in years” column, congratulations to Sharon for this amazing article in the Washington Post about her curatorial predillictions as a librarian in the East Bay who loves finding things left in books. So fantastic.
Also in the “congratulations to people I know but haven’t seen in years” (CTPIKBUHSIY) category, congratulations to Bijan for being nominated as the US Ambassador to the Czech Republic. That is crazy! Bijan was my “boss” for a while in the sense that he was on the board of a company for whom I served as an executive. The firm for which he works is still sort-of my boss as they are sort-of on the board of my current job at which I am an executive, but I haven’t talked to Bijan in years save for positive comments on his fantastic photography posted on Twitter. Man. Crazy. An Ambassador. I haven’t known an ambassador since… Well, I guess since college. Knew a lot of ambassadors in college. My college advisor was an ambassador. Been real downhill on the ambassador front since then.
All ten episodes of Sandman are out. They’re just sitting there, on Netflix, waiting for me. I cannot believe that that is so crazy. Will it be good? God, I hope so. Don’t tell me anything, speak not of it, I will do the same for you, let us absorb this alone, in splendid isolation, in tragic beauty.
Somewhere in this house I have a copy of Fables and Reflextions signed by Gaiman and, more excitingly, Dave McKean and P Craig Russell. I cherish the oversize, 2913 Omnibus edition. Gaiman can be a little cheesy these days, the poly thing can rub a little thin, he is Very Online, but man, I re-read Sandman a year or two ago and it still holds up, and the trailers for this show look solid.
So much crazy exciting TV coming.
Man remember when TV was no good and the best and only good thing on TV was ER and Nick would watch ER every week and we all thought he was weird because who watched TV anymore.
Thank you for your trash racoon memes. They really are the best.
Went to Walmart this morning, mad times, mad times. No Top Gun Maverick on UHD yet, but we knew that wasn’t gonna happen. No organic peanut butter. No individually packed sunflower seed snacks. No new exclusive Walmart Edition vinyl. Oh that’s not true there’s a new exclusive black (lol) edition of Metallica’s Black Album, but come on that thing is so so in print this new edition will never be worth anything. Also, to be fair, it was black marble. Kind of clever.
I was doing that tedious thing where I was checking every check out row for Cinnamon Ice Breakers and running that internal monologue in my head about what I would say to some Walmart employee who asked what I was doing, and explaining “well I wouldn’t have to do this if you guys refilled the one-stop-shop end cap where all the Ice Breakers are supposed to be” but then I was interrupted by arriving at the aforementioned End Cap and… it had been refilled. For the first time in, like, a year. Crazy! Except! It had been refilled with everything except cinnamon and peach iced tea! Walmart is fucking with me, I am convinced.
My internal monolog was stumped.
Also Walmart was playing “Regret” by New Order inside the store and I have absolutely zero shame so I just sang the entire song out loud as I shopped.
The other crazy thing about Walmart is that there is a new size of box for the BinaxNow tests. I mean, I don’t know how it is but this new smaller, more svelte box has made its way to podunk Chatham County. Very exciting. Such a sexy smaller box. Also I have had two Binaxnow tests in the last month only include one and two-thirds tests in the box. Both were missing the second bifold card on which you drop the drops. Unless I am going senile. Which seems entirely possible. Maybe this constantly stinging head is leaking smarts. (Emily suggested fibromayalgia which actually seems kind of conceivable except my pain is localized and it has a source in my fused neck. God this fucking neck. It’ll be the death of me.)
Then I left Walmart and out in the parking lot Walmart Radio was playing a segment where someone who ostensibly worked in the shipping department of a Walmart (A-117 I think he said) called in to namecheck his workers and say they were just working hard to keep the shoppers and trucks safe. He did not request a song. Uh huh. I am convinced the dude was an actor. What do you put on your resume when you are a voice actor for Walmart Radio. You’re not an announcer. I guess you just say you did a corporate gig or something. Walmart Radio is so weird I actually think it would be pretty fun to run it. You could really have some fun with Walmart Radio as your feifdom. This Tennessee parking lot at 7AM needs to hear some Yo La Tengo who’s gonna notice or say anything. No one. Because I am probably one of like eleven non-Walmart employee people in America who listen to or care about Walmart Radio. Hrm. Google tells me it is called Walmart One, and used to have a pretty significant online presence, but right now it all seems down. Is that permanent? We will have to keep an eye on it.
Then as I left the lot, I was parked at the red light next to a car with illegally tinted windows and I don’t want to get all Seinfeldian here any more than I already am but what is up with the preponderance of illegally tinted windows in cars. I mean I swear to god it’s like 50% of all cars have illegally tinted windows. Where do they get their inspections approved? When we moved here we had too-dark tint on Emma’s car cuz it was still registered in Florida and it was legal there but then we switched the registration and then the place would not approve the inspection until she got it first. But half the freakin state is driving around with illegal tinting. And I have mosntrously, notoriously bad eyes (my eyes is going crazy) and no doctor, ever, has offered to give me some prescription for illegal tinting.
This is exactly that Seinfeld episode with everyone knowing where to get copies of keys which say DO NOT COPY on them. Everyone in this state but me knows how to legally get illegal tinting.
I was in the secret attic area formerly known as Narnia yesterday putting some framed artwork back into storage and I was hit with a smell up there. I don’t know what it was or how it got there, but whatever it was, it was just placed in the attic recently. Something Emma must have just moved up into there. But the smell — whatever it was it suddenly and surely hit me. Hard. A smell I’d not smelled since my grandmother’s house. My mom’s mom, the homestead in Wasilla that my grandpa built in the 40s and they both lived there until he died, and then my parents lived there through the oughts and man I don’t know what it is but it was so visceral, so immediate. It has been a long time since a smell brought me back so quickly. Usually whenever this has happened in the past, it was perfume I’d smell on the street. Some perfule that would remind me of an ex that used to wear it: Cacharel Lulu, D&G light blue, Chanel no 5, YSL Paris. But this, this was a quicker and more intense hit, and a journey to a point way further back in time. It was.. wow yeah. It was something. I felt like that chef in Rattatouille when he has his mind blown.
Jane survived her vaccine with nary an exhibit of sickness yesterday. She had some crankiness but was generally okay. She spend the night at grammy’s. Fingers crossed she wasn’t a holy terror to grammy.
Third round of peppers dried a lot quicker than the first two rounds, and the humidity out there is much higher. I have zero idea what is going on with these things but we are making steady progress.
I got the two things done on which I was procrastinating at work so that makes me a good human being and capitalist worker. Praise Ford.
I am rewatching all of Westworld because I like the new season so much better I want to go back and see if it was better than I thought but nope. The new season is actually better than all the other ones. Man. I forgot how many boobs were on this show at the beginning. They really toned down the boobs. Good for them. I’m glad HBO got over its boobs thing. I mean, I like boobs don’t get me wrong, but, well, it was kind of tacky, kind of an 80’s throwback if we’re being honest.
And of course speaking of HBO apparently now HBO Max has to merge with Discovery+ which seems weird but I mean I guess could be okay if they don’t screw it up and cancel all the decent shows on HBO. Except The Rehearsal they can cancel that, that show freaks me out and makes me scared and uncomfortable. The rumors have been wild — but if they just merge the two apps into something more milquetoast like Disney+ which also has the Simpsons but no one watches it there because it seems weird to be in the Disney+ app except I am making that up I actually have no idea if no one watches it they probably do, this trend toward mega apps is probably necessary because everyone is tired of paying ten different TV bills, which, god, I told people would be the case. Back in the oughts I used to relentlessly, vociferously argue about this on the internet with people: that people really didn’t want unbundling, that we’re all gonna pay more, but no one listened and here we are. And this was back, when, like, I was very into Twitter and interacted with people who could actually influence things and they would answer and I didn’t just right a self-defeating email newsletter about nothing. Waaaah waaaaah. Also in the oughts I thought Uber was gonna fail so what do I know. I was right about Juicero, though.
Wait that might have been the teens or tens or whatever you call them.
Okay I’m babbling sorry. I will go.
Okay modern synthpop playlist for you today. I went deep yesterday on weird new synthpop bands. Lotta good stuff going on. Hadn’t heard about half of these but I ended up listening to like 10 good new synth pop albums and/or EPs. This is the fruit of my labor. Before last week I had only heard of, like, five of the bands on here.
Have a lovely weekend. Will talk to you Monday where I will regale you with thrilling tales of gardening and podcasts.
Good morning. Hello. How are you? #698
Weirdly, as I read this at 1 pm in Anchorage my niece and nephew are at this moment watching Simpsons in the Disney app on tv. So, it’s happening. 🫠