Friday Inspiration 517

This is a fun idea, and as someone pointed out in the comments, probably one of the safer things Red Bull has sponsored (thanks, Hilary) (video)

thumbnail from Attempting To Launch a Plane By Bike

I don’t know what it is but something in these Illustrations from “The House Of The Future” scratched a nostalgic itch for me, probably involving photos of humans using jetpacks and flying cars in a school textbook when I was in third or fourth grade.

Gabe Bullard moved to Switzerland and found himself suddenly caring very much about the snails he saw everywhere. My favorite few lines from this piece: “I asked Estée Bochud [who manages the Natural History Museum’s malacology collection] if moving snails like I was doing might cause them stress. She said it seemed fine, since snails can start on an adventure and not realize what they’ve gotten themselves into until it’s too late. I understood the feeling.” [GIFT LINK]

Someone linked to this piece, Thin Desires Are Eating Your Life, somewhere, and I apologize, but I forgot where and can’t track it down, so apologies to that person. I can say that I am now thinking of things as Thick Desires vs. Thin Desires: “The business model of most consumer technology is to identify some thick desire, find the part of it that produces a neurological reward, and then deliver that reward without the rest of the package.” (via Kottke)

I imagine this [satire] headline will resonate with you if you have ever done laundry in your life: Study Finds Missing Sock Will Only Appear Once Matching Sock Has Been Executed

This appears to be a tweet from 2022 but I am laughing at it and considering doing it myself.

I read this story that Hanif Abdurraqib wrote on Instagram sometime just after Christmas, and I am pretty sure the reason I’ve read four of his books is because I assume Hanif Abdurraqib moves through the world like this all the time, and probably tells stories like this all the time too. But don’t take it from me, take it from the 17,000+ other people who clicked the heart icon on this post.

I am still cranking out episodes of my new podcast, My Favorite Things, and the latest episode is an interview with my friend, writer and running coach Mario Fraioli, who snuck in a couple extra favorite things into our chat, which was fine by me (also, Mario would like it noted that his audio settings were off and he sounds “like a chipmunk”).

thumbnail from My Favorite Things Episode 6 - Mario Fraioli