August roundup

Monthly -ings

There was only 1 week this month when I wasn’t traveling or hosting guests. Which is great! I got to hug a lot of the people I love most in the world this month and it feels so good to actually have space to host people now (our guests have been delighted to see how the murphy bed works). On top of the traveling and visitors, I picked up a few subs at a yoga studio. It feels good to teach again — familiar but new — and I’m hopeful it’ll help me integrate into a solid community here. All this just makes for a slightly lighter roundup month. Speaking of which…

illustration by @jennykolan on ig

Reading

Books

• Parade, Rachel Cusk. I should’ve started with a different one but I’m interested to come back to this once I’ve read a few of her other novels.

• The Exorcist, William Peter Blatty. Catnip for a Fallen Catholic like myself.

• Cookbooks: More is More (Molly Baz), Woks of Life (Leung family), Tenderheart (Hetty Lui McKinnon), Milk Street Vegetables (Christopher Kimball).

Elsewhere on Substack

• How to let go. A tough and beautiful essay by

  Bess Stillman
  .

• The mainstreaming of loserdom. This was inescapable on Substack for a couple weeks, and for good reason.

  Tell the Bees
  .

• My breast reduction, myself. Read this while sitting in the dr waiting room to deal with some annoying body stuff and it was perfect. Guest post on

  Freak Palace
  by
  Eileen Havant Townsend
  .

• You can live the wrong life. As someone constantly plagued by the worry that I’m not doing it (meaning life) right, this really hit. By

  Michael Rance
  .

• Soft power Americana. The Americanization of the internet by

  Helena Aeberli
  .

Watching

• Perfect Days loved and have more to say soon.

• Ren Faire what a miserable creep.

• The Bikeriders the Milwaukee Outlaws bar is right by one of our fav pizza spots and lemme tell ya…eek. But anyway, I liked the accents.

• A Murder at the End of the World this was so frustrating, I’m mad I watched it all.

• Primal Fear does what it needs to do.

• Raising Arizona still cute and funny.

• High Fidelity my toxic trait is being attracted to Rob in the year 2024.

• Hail Caesar we had the pleasure of introducing Ben’s parents to this.

• Burn After Reading we had the pleasure of introducing Ben’s friend to this.

Arting

• Margaret Watts Hughes’ Sound Visualizations

• Brendon Burton’s ‘Epitaph’ photo series

Listening

• Comfort To Me, Amyls and the Sniffers. They put out a new song which reminded me of this album and then I had it on repeat for a couple weeks.

• Turn on the Bright Lights, Interpol. I listened to this episode of Broken Record and felt validated for liking Interpol in the early 00s despite every cute hipster boy I wanted to impress telling me they were ~derivative~.

• Endless Summer Vacation, Miley Cyrus. I want to get on board with some of the new pop girlies but I’m struggling. So I turn to something more reliable.

Writing

• Tiny moments of delight. On a couple low-stakes noticing projects.

• Don’t it make you feel alive? My first time guest posting! Had fun thinking back on LCD Soundsystem and my Chicago days for

  Tracks on Tracks
  .

Otis of the month

Performing the gravity defying Big Sit.