Someone told me about the Texas Water Safari a few years ago, and I thought it sounded fun, in the way that ultramarathons are “fun.” This video I think probably captures the feeling pretty well, including but not limited to the hallucinations and chafing. (video)
LAST CHANCE: If you want to spend some time in April 2025 on a Grand Canyon river trip with myself and Dr. Len Necefer, or alternately, with Rebecca Solnit and Craig Childs, you have one more day to get it together and sign up here.
Maybe you have to know a little bit about Friends, and a little bit about Dune to enjoy this joke, but if you do know a little bit about both of those things, I think you will agree with the commenter who replied, “Don’t care who you are. That shit’s funny.”
I was scrolling through some social media app/site/whatever yesterday and noticed I was just slowly sinking into despair, because every post I read seemed to be outrage, negativity, complaining, or making a joke at the expense of someone else. I started thinking, “this app is just a cesspool of negativity,” and then wondered, “wow, could you say the same thing about most/many of the social media channels we interact with on a daily basis?” Maybe you could. But that would be giving up. I did not give up, but did go to the Oddly Satisfying subreddit, where I found this post titled “A perfect fit from two unrelated sources,” which feels small, and maybe unimportant, but you know what, as previously discussed, it’s kind of a low bar, and we can choose to delight in things like this.
Thank you to Brian, who sent me this video of a parallel parking competition in Pittsburgh, making me wish there was about five more minutes of footage tacked on the end.
I think this article could have used some actual video embeds/video links of ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt doing his thing, but as is, it’s still a fun read about a media personality who is comfortable just being himself, and not trying to create a hugely successful personal brand.
I get a lot of PR emails, and a lot of emails from people asking if I’d like for them to write an article for my website—I’m not bragging; I think these people are emailing lots of people, and have perhaps grossly overestimated my website traffic and/or influence, or maybe not even researched my website and just added my email address to their list. A few weeks ago, someone emailed me asking if I’d be so kind to add a link to their energy gel product to the article about energy gels on my website. Which is hilarious, because said article is about “Substitutes For Energy Gels,” and includes canned whip cream, mustard, mayonnaise, and ketchup. So when I was browsing Substack for interesting and funny things for this week’s Friday newsletter, was I excited to find this wonderful piece by Liz Cook titled, “Introducing: Barbecue Running Gel,” in which the author details the [actually quite involved] process of making her own barbecue energy gel? I was. And I was not disappointed.
I am not a stamp collector, but I am definitely into these Ansel Adams stamps, and will probably buy a sheet of them and not use them, which I guess maybe makes me a stamp collector.