I am not normally a person who would say that I like to watch 28-minute videos of people building things, but this one (via Adventure Journal) is so satisfying, maybe because there’s no narration and hardly any human voices besides the occasional joyful exclamation when something fits in place? Anyway I watched the whole thing. (video)
This is the last time I’m going to mention my writing and creativity workshop, which, if you haven’t clicked over to the website to check it out, takes place on sea kayaks starting May 7th. You do not need sea kayaking experience to join us, and you don’t need writing experience to join us, although you will be required to workshop one piece of your writing during the course. You will be required to travel through a beautiful landscape, eat tasty food, and generally enjoy yourself whilst learning about writing, creating, and humor, it’s going to be so much fun, I cannot wait to get out from behind this laptop, not look at screens, and hang out with creative people and also whales, are you fucking kidding me
I’ve been listening to John Green’s book The Anthropocene Reviewed and this chapter about Humanity’s Temporal Range hit just right in the age of a pandemic and climate change, and of course it was originally a podcast episode so you can listen to it here.
I just finished reading Denis Johnson’s 1992 wonderful, dark book of short stories, Jesus’ Son, marveling at how good it is (although not exactly uplifting) without really being able to articulate why. And then I listened to this old New Yorker fiction podcast in which Donald Antrim reads one of the stories from the book, and also finds the words to explain why it’s so revered. (Side note: I think I had heard of the book before, but somehow hadn’t read it, and then watched Todd Haynes’ Velvet Underground documentary, which led me to some Wikipedia rabbit hole, which led me to Johnson’s book, which is not about religion at all, but takes its title from a lyric in the song “Heroin.”)
This teacher shares his young students’ comments in Twitter threads and lots of them are great, but this one is particularly funny, maybe because of the diversity of responses to the question, “If you could go anywhere on a school trip, where would you go?” (ex. “McDonald’s,” “Madagascar,” “Swimming”)
I would read anything Kelly Cordes wrote, even if it were a recipe for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, but this particular piece about skiing is just full of great lines
One time a million years ago, my friends and I walked into this bar for happy hour, not knowing it was also Karaoke Night, and I remember almost nothing about the evening except that three different people got up and sang Creed’s “Higher” within about an hour and a half and when the third person did it, we paid our tab and left, not willing to risk hearing a fourth (or fifth) rendition. Anyway, this week’s Quartz Obsession is about karaoke, and by far the craziest part (in my opinion) is that in the Philippines, 12 different murders in the Philippines have “at least tangentially involved someone singing “My Way” by Frank Sinatra”.
Eight Famous Poems Rewritten By Your Asshole Cat
—Brendan