#tbh i was looking for the 1993 song by beyond

[naptimed]

a playlist that contains both 情人 by cai xukun and 情人 by beyond.

[toastywatchesstevenuniverse]

S1 E48

Story for Steven

He looks like Bowser from the 1993 Super Mario Bros. Movie.

That or he looks like Drew Gooden after going through a villain arc.

Anyways Pearl was being one salty ass lesbian this episode. I love her.

Also idk why they laughed Pearl literally CAN sing, has sung before in this show, & she has a voice that is fucking beyond God tier. My girl can SING & I think that everyone should be supportive of her damnit. Don't mock my precious gay blob of anxiety. She deserves nothing but love & praise. She has talent & her voice is fire. I will be writing a very stern letter to CN Studios about this. I know this episode aired like a decade ago-

(And typing that out made me fully realize 2013 was 10 fucking years ago & now my 22 year old ass feels like an aging fossil & I hate that. I don't like the fact that I am growing old & I cannot stop the inevitable continuing force of time. I wanna go back please I hate being an adult it sucks this sucks I want to get off this ride GET ME OUTTA HERE AAAAAAA-)

-& CN as a company probably won't give a shit about my letter. However my counterargument to that is this:

You're gay & your butt smells.

Anyways Pearl is a talented singer & tbh if Rose rlly chose Greg over Pearl then it's her loss because like-

Bro are you serious you had the most amazing woman right there. She was in love with you.

Don't get me wrong I love a daddy type too. I see the appeal in Greg. I don't think she was crazy for choosing him. But choosing him when you could have chosen PEARL? That I do think is insane.

Like Pearl is Pearl. Greg is not Pearl-Tier partner material in the slightest from what I have seen so far. SMH Rose you really missed the best thing of all time. But this was what led to Steven so probably was a good call. But like if I was in that position I wouldn't hesitate to hold Pearl's hand that's all I'm saying.

Look, I just want to see Pearl happy & flourishing. Please let my girl smile. I just want to see her do well. Let my girl win.

Anyways good episode. Also Greg's song at the beginning was a banger ngl. I do love a good 80s type beat. Tubular.

[trislosherfan25]

Radiohead Fun Facts <3

Fun fact about Radiohead: I know none of the names of the guys and i only know what the one singer guy’s face looks like bc i saw it once somewhere

Fun fact 2: I should probably learn about the individual guys but I don’t because I dont really care that much

Fun fact 3: i should learn abt the bassist tho bc im a bassist and he’s a pretty good bassist so maybe i could learn a thing or two (like this guy is a REALLY good bassist)

OKAY NOW IM GONNA TALK ABT THE ALBUMS IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER BUT ONLY THE ONES IVE LISTNED TO

Pablo Honey (1993) - this one is Radiohead's first album and tbh it’s not very good. even if you don’t listen to this band or care about them you probably know the song Creep which is on there. tbh that’s probably the best song on the album and the Radiohead guys themselves don’t even like it that much. They were like “Creep? more like Crap!” (tbh the song isn’t *that* bad, just nowhere near as good as their later music) I’ve tried to get through this album a couple times but i could never do it bc it’s just not that good!!! It seems like it was riding off the grunge wave that was really popular at the time. This means not only did the album not have that much of an original sound but also there were tons of other bands doing this sort of thing and doing it better. Creep is probably the song that has the most unique sound compared to the rest of that album. Also grunge (while more of an era than a genre) is mostly known for who it was sparked by, Nirvana, and Nirvana is punk rock through and through. The Radiohead guys are way to big of nerds to do punk rock. The Bends (1995) - this is Radiohead’s second album and I like this one a lot. It bares some similarities to Pablo Honey in terms of keeping with a little bit more of a rock sound but it doesn’t feel like it’s trying to copy anybody. The lyrics on this album are WAYYYYY better. Like a vast vast improvement. The guitar solos are much better too. The most popular songs on this album I’d say are High and Dry as well as Fake Plastic Trees, these also are probably my least favorite songs on the album because they’re slower and I don’t like the vocals in them as much as other songs. My favorite songs from this album are Just, My Iron Lung, and (Nice Dream), these ones all have more of a rock element than the ones I mentioned previously and the instrumental parts are So Good! Even though I think this album is a vast improvement from the first it still doesn’t completely have it’s own unique sound just yet. I don’t see that as much as a hinderance on this album, just something that puts it below some of the later albums.  OK Computer (1997) - THIS ALBUM! This is the album where Radiohead really comes into their own sound, it still has that rock element but it feels different. All the little details and textures in their sound come together in this great album and puts Radiohead on a clear track for where the rest of their sound ends up in later albums. This album seems to be *The* Radiohead album that most people would know them for beyond knowing them for the song Creep. This album also is pretty special/nostalgic to me because it was the first Radiohead album I listened to. Deadass I spent most of my middle school years listening to that album on and old hand-me-down mp3 player my dad gave me that just had his old music saved to it. I don’t know if i have a least favorite song on the album, all the songs on this album are really good if I’m being honest. If I had to pick a few favorites I’d say they would be Exit Music (For A Film) and Paranoid Android, I like these songs because they feel like they’ve got a lot of story to them just shown through the instrumentals and everything. Also fun fact! I know the bass part to Paranoid Android, it’s still difficult at some parts for me to play but I still love it.  Kid A (2000) - Okay ngl I still haven’t given this one a good listen just yet. I’ve listened to the thing in full maybe once or twice but I don’t remember it well. I have listened to the songs Everything In Its Right Place and How to Disappear Completely quite a few times tho and these songs are amazing. From what I’ve heard from this album/remember from it it seems like a pretty logical next step sound wise from the last album going into the next one. It’s not completely different from OK Computer but it’s definitely it’s own unique thing. The songs on this album are a bit more depressing and more of them seem to be slower and more experimental. You also see a stronger ambient element enter Radiohead’s music here. Amnesiac (2001) - DREAD!! DEVESTATION!!!! This album is really good, I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite album but by god it is a good fuckin album. I’ve listened to this one in full quite a few times in full but it’s been a while since I’ve done that (I’ve just been listening to a song or two from it every so often) because when I first gave this album a full listen I was at a pretty low place. This album has the strongest ambient element Radiohead’s music has had so far, the sound is slower, darker, and heavier. It feels like you’re sitting in the cold rain just soaking wet and not moving at all. The songs are even more depressing too tbh. Once again I don’t have a least favorite song on this album, at least not one that I can remember. My favorite songs would probably be Knives Out, I Might Be Wrong, and You And Whose Army? Top 10 bangers to listen to while absolutely falling apart imo 10/10

Hail To the Thief (2003) - This album is also really good, I actually own this one on vinyl. This album sees that distorted rock element come back a little but this album does have some of the ambient vibe to it as well. It feels a bit more experimental and emotions wise it feels angrier than other albums, not in a punk rock kind of way but just in feeling. I think this album starts to have some crazier rhythms, I’m not sure how to describe it. It feels more advanced than some of their previous music. Some of the songs on this album I’m not the biggest fan of but they’re still good songs it’s just some of the other songs on this album really outshine some others. My favorites from this album are 2 + 2 = 5, Backdrifts, There, There, and Myxomatosis. If I’m being honest while I do like this album a lot I don’t have too many strong feelings about it.

In Rainbows (2007) - OH MY GOD!!! THIS ALBUM!! OH MY GOD!! I love it so much it’s so beautiful. It really encompasses everything I love about Radiohead it’s almost hard to describe. The rhythms are hypnotic, the lyrics are great, the vocals are stellar, the instrumentals- just oh my god I love it to death. I own this one of vinyl and it puts me in a trance whenever I listen to it. There are different emotions in each song on this album but it never falters. It reminds me of something my dad said once where we were listening to a song and he said “just ride the wave” - this is that type of music, the kind of music where you just sit back and ride the wave. I love every single song on this album but Weird Fishes/Arpeggi and Jigsaw Falling Into Place are my top picks for this album. I’ve been working on learning the bass part to Jigsaw Falling Into Place and while I’m not musically literate enough to express exactly what’s happening in this song because I’m not a fucking nerd but I can say that playing this song is like riding the wave, it’s not exact or repetitive but it moves and flows perfectly with the song. Learning music like this as a bassist has taught me to think differently about my own playing. It’s hard for me to pick a favorite Radiohead album for many reasons but if you put a gun to my head and made me choose one I’d say this one is it. 

A Moon Shaped Pool (2016) - There’s a big time skip here because I haven’t listened to The King of Limbs which came out in 2011 but the sound of this album is definitely something that seems like a more evolved version of what Radiohead did on In Rainbows. Holy shit though, this album. THIS ALBUM. This album fucking knocks it out of the park it’s one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever listened to. A lot of people like to say this is Radiohead’s most depressing album, they’re wrong, I can’t speak to albums I haven’t listened to but I can say that Amnesiac is much more depressing than this album. I would call this Radiohead’s saddest album, it has that feeling to it but it’s not draining to listen to in the way that depressing music can be. While the album is sad it also brings me a feeling of peace when I listen to it (though this could be in part because of the associations I have with this album from the first time I listened to it). While In Rainbows is like riding the wave I’d say this album is like floating in dark water, its got that sense of flow while being more gentle about it. The first song on the album, Burn the Witch, doesn’t seem to fit in perfectly with the rest of the music but it’s not a completely jarring difference from the rest of the songs either so I don’t see it as any sort of hindrance on the quality of the album. Once again I love every song on this album, they’re all beautiful and ethereal, but my top picks would have to be Decks Dark and Present Tense. One of my most favorite things about this album is how every song seems to flow into the next, it really is the sort of album that’s meant to be listened to in order and as an entire piece of art. I really appreciate albums that do that sort of thing.

Alright those are my Radiohead thoughts for the time being. I haven’t listened to In Rainbows (Disk 2) or The King of Limbs in full, I haven’t really listened to Kid A much either but I figured it was important to mention anyway bc people talk about that one so much. I also didn’t mention any singles or EPs just bc I haven’t listened to all of them and didn’t feel like talking abt the ones I have listened to. 

IF YOU READ THIS FAR WE CAN MAKEOUT!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU THANK YOU FOR READING!!!

[nelson-riddle-me-this]

Rules: tag 9 people with excellent taste

Colour(s) I’m currently wearing

Mostly white - I’m wearing my bathrobe. My mom got it for me and it’s great. It’s not the softest but it’s good and it’s got cool blue and grey horizontal stripes on the bottom. Normally it’s very frustrating for her to try to get clothing gifts for me, but she hit the nail on the head with this one.

Last band T shirt I bought

I’ve never bought a ‘band’ t-shirt. The artists I really love don’t have much in the way of t-shirts and if they do, they look really corny. Like I’m not gonna get a Streisand t-shirt and look like some middle-aged empty-nester out grocery shopping.

Last band I saw live

I guess our evening Jazz Ensemble - it’s professional adult musicians - at my school’s Jazz Ensembles concert. They’re great. As for non-school performances, I think? the last concert I went to was a Brian Setzer concert at the Hollywood Bowl with my mom a while back.

Last song I listened to

I tried listening to some contemporary pop from the Love, Simon (2018) soundtrack today and it was really difficult so now I’m at the computer enjoying some tumblr-time and listening to my most-chill and most-favorite Doris Day album.

Lipstick or chapstick?

I used lipstick once for my Katharine Hepburn halloween costume last year and - tbh lipstick is so much work - makeup in general. Like it would be fun to be a girl and wear dresses and be super pretty and stuff - but wo-MAN it’s so much work!

So chapstick. The tube I use is some Burt’s Bees pink grapefruit that I really love. This might sound weird but I only have it because a boy I had a small crush on once asked me to hold it while he changed clothes and forgot to collect it from me..

Last movie I watched

I went to the movies last weekend with @adamsberg​ and another one of my best friends and saw Love, Simon (2018). I really really really really loved it.

I hadn’t even heard of it until a few weeks ago I saw a trailer on YouTube, but I thought it looked great and it was everything I hoped and more. I have this soft spot for angsty contemporary teen dramas like this [The Fault In Our Stars (2014) and The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012) are also in this micro-genre]. While I love my classics, I also love these great movies that are being made here and NOW! Sometimes I feel apart from the rest of the world - and not in a good way. I wasn’t friendless in high school - but I wasn’t anywhere near as close to any of my friends as any of these movie teens are... as accepted and loved as I am to/by an amazing, small, group of my friends now. I have no horror stories, but I don’t have very many stories and that’s just it - I could have had so much more, but I didn’t. Part of it was because I wasn’t out yet and this film so wonderfully explored that. I highly reccomend it - and not just for the good plot, it’s hilarious and an overall great experience.

Last 3 TV shows I watched

911 (2018-present) 

Sometimes my mom’s taste in first-run television is pretty bad (NCIS stopped being good like a decade ago) but in this case I am totally on-board. Angela Bassett [WAIT HOW IS SHE 59???????] is an inspiration (I WANT HER CHARACTER’S HOUSE!), the writing and production values are generally very good - it’s a solid, interesting show. Still, can anyone tell me what the deal with that middle-aged white lady (who’s a few years younger than Angela Bassett but lowekey looks 20 years older) who dresses like a suburban mom trying to dress like her teenage daughter - like what’s the deal with her dating that guy in his 20s? 

Frasier (1993-2004)

My mom and I watch this show somewhat regularly as it’s on like every flippin’ night on the scourge that is the Hallmark Channel (generally decent reruns, but I hate the channel itself and their original programming is complete trash). In a lotta ways I really love it - it’s hilarious, witty, sophisticated, adult, and has the power to  create a real poigniant moment like you rarely see so fully-realized in sitcoms. 

It has its issues though. Frasier and Niles (especially in early seasons) can get annoyingly whiny/snobby. I get that their characters are kinda built around that, but there’s a point at which they take it too far and it becomes disengaging. Also it’s a super white-people-centric show (I wonder why Hallmark likes it so much...) so diversity could be a lot better. Still, it’s generally a high-quality program.

Gosh I don’t remember what else I watched last. I haven’t had a lotta TV time lately so Imma use this opportunity to plug...

Stranger Things (2016-present)

One’a my best friends, Grace, introduced me to this show and I absolutely love it. The period’s really well done - not just accurate, but alive and real and relatable. The acting and casting is great. Winona Ryder is a treasure and I have a shameless crush on Joe Keery’s amazing hair and the person it belongs to. The scoring is effective, interesting, and very different from the kind of film music I usually am exposed to (I’m really making an effort to expand my horizons beyond classic orchestral sounds lately). The production values are great - it’s just an amazing show. 

Last 3 characters I identified with

1.) Simon Spier from Love, Simon (2018)

While there are some things about him I definitely don’t identify with (message me personally if you wanna know specifics- I don’t want to spoil anything), I very much identify with his coming out story and coming to terms with his sexuality on his own terms. 

I feel like there are people who will criticize the film based on Simon’s extreme normalcy - like he’s honestly a fairly stock white, middle-class, suburban teenage boy and, aside from his involvement in theater and ‘ya know liking boys he doesn’t do much that would be considered “gay” - but that’s kinda the point of the film. Being gay is just something that is and anyone can be gay - they’re not weird or whatever just for being gay - that was one of my fears - that I would be treated (or even just feel like) some strange unwelcome outsider just because of this one thing.

I had a long conversation tonight with an older kinda mentor’y friend of mine (though I’m more of the mentor) who’s gay and who was having a really rough night. Among the lotta things he said was that all gay men cheat that there’s no true monagomous love in the gay community and like lightning I shot him down with a fervor and wisdom and riteousness that would make Kate proud (wayto blow my own horn). 

That’s the exact kind of idiotic prejudice that makes people afraid to come out in the first place. It’s fear that kind of small-minded judgmental behavior which was most responsible for me remaining closeted in high school. It’s a hard thing to explain to someone who hasn’t been there because after you’ve been through it, it can kinda feel like nothing afterwards -  all this fear and conflict and it’s really kinda purposeless. You find that people still love you and the people who don’t are really not good people anyway. I wish I had come out in high school, I could have been happier. But I am happy now.

2.) Tracy Lord from The Philadelphia Story (1940)

Dedicated followers may remember I rewatched this one a few wks ago on what would have been a date with me and my crush until he cancelled. That time I saw Trace and Kate herself through lenses less tinted than ever before, but still she’s there in all her glory and all her not-glory. Tracy is riteous, despises drinking and gets very contemptful of what she views as weakness, such as her ex-husband’s drinking problem or Mike’s cynical view of the rich. I am often that way (in large part due to the second-generation effects of my mom’s own east coast catholic upbrining) which has it’s merits certainly - that specific east coast almost ‘puritan’ toughness (I think Dick Cavett, said Bette Davis and Kate both had it) can be a tremendous source of strength and sense. It can also easily become cold, prudish, snobbish, and condesending. I have tried to unlearn these aspects and I am still working on that. This is kinda what Tracy’s arc is about, learning to be human and be loved and to love others.

Though it’s not as recent, the next one that comes to mind is

3.)  Nancy Wheeler from Stranger Things

I already mentioned that my friend Grace got me into this show, but I didn’t mention that I only ever watch it with her. Not that I don’t really love the show - I do - but I like saving it for when we’re together - it makes it more special. 

Anyway, more than perhaps any other single character on that show, I identify with Nancy Wheeler. Regular suburban teenager who’s better - not just a regular suburban teenager - she’s aware of the sort of suburban ‘don’t do much with your life ‘cept rasie kids [not that there’s anything wrong with having and raising kids, that’s wonderful] trap. I also found the episode with her at Steve’s house really resonated with me. Barb telling Nancy “this isn’t you” really got to me. Part of me still has an internal ‘Barb’ that kinda ties in with the whole east-coast ‘puritan’y’ morality but there’s also the part of me that wants to be young and just a person and do cool things with my friends and kiss boys and watch great angsty contemporary teen dramas. They both have their merits and drawbacks - the young side has life but can be stupid and reckless - the old side is wise and careful, but can be paralyzing and stagnating.

Books I’m currently reading

I have a whole slew of books checked out that I’m supposed to be reading (for my own enjoyment).

The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard     by   Leonard Bernstien

I loved his The Joy of Music so I figured I would like this too. He’s a great music lecturer. I’m only like 5 pages in so far.

Elizabeth Taylor: A Private Life for Public Consumption      by    Ellis Cashmore 

This one I’m a little further on, though most of that was just the introductory timeline of her life with a key notating each illness/medical episode, marriage/actual or rumored romantic relationship, and neaar-death experience (her life is such ‘drama’).

I also have a book about motifs in Hitchcock’s films with the car picnic from To Catch a Thief (1955) on the cover. I haven’t started reading it yet.

And I have some book about Lerner & Lowe, the duo responsibly for My Fair Lady, Camelot, etc...

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This was really really wonderful to participate in. Thank you, my amazing friends, so much for tagging me @adamsberg​ and @in-the-key-of-d-minor​. I’ve enjoyed lots of asks and tag games, but I’ve never felt this good about one before...

I tag

@hildy-dont-be-hasty @tyronepowerbottom @reluctant-martyrs @thevintagious @littlehappyrock @n2ninvisiblegirl @solasdisapproves @hepburnandhepburn and @her-man-friday

If I didn’t tag you but you wanna participate, have at it!

What’m I gonna do, fire you?

[bmichael]

January stuff: activities, books, and such

I’ve never been, and never will be, a diarist. I realized today was Feb 1 and that I’d closed a few threads (or semi-closed) that I wanted to think about and process.

I attempted one of those “Dry January” things people do. On paper it actually seems to be quite good. I once had a roommate that fasted once a week. It wasn’t a big impact on his life, really, and it meant his body ended up processing 1/7 the food he’d ‘normally’ eat. Which, actually, is quite healthy. I have no idea if he’s still doing this, but it struck me as intelligent. Not drinking for a month (a 31 day one, at that) seems similarly healthy. That’s a whole 1/12th of the year you’re not drinking alcohol, which, if you drink a lot (...?!) then that’s good. I was mostly successful, drinking only about three of the 31 days. So not really successful at all, strictly speaking. It just goes to show how hard it is to get rid of vicious habits.

In a lot of ways. it was actually much easier to do an 80 day running challenge, which I completed on Jan 6.

The challenge for me was to run at least a mile every day for 80 consecutive days. I think I averaged about 3 miles per run, which ended up being less than my usual weekly/monthly mileage. The experience taught me a lot about sticking with a habit and pushing through mental resistance. I almost never run after work, but during the 80 day run streak, I ran after work about half the time. I bought a headlamp as this all occurred in the fall and winter. I ended up going for a very drunk run after the Ohio State - Michigan game, and I fell down on the sidewalk and really scraped myself up. I realized an easy one mile run can turn into a really fun, energizing three or five mile run. I think I’ll probably go for another run streak, although by the end I was constantly tired and sore.

January was a disappointing month from a health and fitness perspective. I ended my 80 day run challenge, and immediately picked up a new one: to run ten miles more than the previous month’s mileage, for at least six months. The problem was, I had run about 90 miles in December, so I had a goal of 100 in January and an eventual goal of 150 in May, which would be about my maximum monthly mileage. As I mentioned above, I was really worn out from the run streak (how do people stack up years-long streaks?) and turning my mileage up to a very high level was a bad idea. It didn’t end up mattering anyway, as I got to be very sick for the last two weeks of the month (just feeling better now) and I haven’t run since Jan 20.

I picked up another challenge, but one without a time component. Spurred by a friend’s push-up streak and an oblique reference to it from a Learned League question, I decided to train to do the “Sally Up” challenge:

If you don’t watch the video above, the gist is to do push-ups, planks, and whatever you call holding yourself off the ground, but with your elbows bent to 90 degrees - all to the tune of Moby’s “Flower”. The song samples a blues song with the lyrics, “Bring Sally up / and bring Sally down / lift and squat gotta tear the ground”. On “bring Sally up” you push up and hold until “bring Sally down”, at which point you bend your elbows to 90 degrees but don’t rest your body on the ground. It’s quite hard. I’d come across it maybe a year ago and only made it about a minute in. My only training for it was to do it after running, and I went from about 1:20 to 1:45. But I haven’t done it since the 20th. I also haven’t researched ‘strats’ for it, but I presume that by just doing the activity I’ll improve at it. Of course, I do pull-ups as a counter motion to this, but I end up feeling some tendonitis or something in my right elbow from doing a lot of push activities, so who knows if I’ll ever be able to do this.

Another reason why I know for a fact I’m no diarist is that I had attempted to chronicle each of the 80 or so runs I did during my run streak. I made it to run three, and then penciled in maybe number 80. Like, utter failure. I don’t know why I can take up physical challenges pretty easily, but forcing myself to do ‘work’ is infinitely harder. I have a form of discipline, but it’s not that one I guess.

I have a few other self-improvement projects, like learning Spencerian penmanship. As I also have a more than vague interest in pens and things, I thought it was stupid to have bad handwriting. Similar-wise to drawing. I’ve wasted so much of my life being fixated on things. I’ve always loved pens and art supplies -- notebooks, pencils, rulers, markers, paints -- but I’ve never taken any kind of instruction or tried to learn anything artistic. So I had and have been working on that. It’s relatively easy to be able to draw forms and figures if you practice, but being creative can’t be taught.

Over what I like to call the ‘Winter Break’, I received for Christmas and read Masha Gessen’s book about Putin. It’s quite good. I don’t know anything about Russian history, so I have to remind myself constantly to temper my reactions to her stories, but it seems... hella fucked up? It’s improbable and frightening how quickly Putin gained, consolidated, and abused his power. Obviously, there are many, many parallels to Trump. It almost seems by design, which I wouldn’t discount. I’ve constantly found many leftists chiding this new-found Russo-phobia to be consternating or outright puzzling. I know Glenn Greenwald is aware of Russia’s policies in re: freedom, press, minority and gay rights. But he seems pretty non-plussed about it all. Like liberals in the US are just continuing the cold war or something. Which, I think is probably sort of true. But also, the motivations here seem totally different? The political apparatus opposing Russian interference in American political life doesn’t seem like it will gain much materially from its actions. And the opposite faction actually has everything to gain. I don’t understand.

One book that’s helped me to understand somewhat is The Devil’s Chessboard, a long history of Allen Dulles and the CIA, written by David Talbot, who founded Slate. Again, I know very little about anything, so I’m constantly having to remind myself that there are countervailing interpretations and views about all of this. But if even half of what Talbot writes about is true, Allen Dulles and his brother John Foster Dulles are two of the most powerful and little-discussed (in the mainstream, popular press or history curriculum) men in American history. The Dulles brothers ran the CIA and State Department throughout from WW2 through the Kennedy administration. So: they ran the official and unofficial foreign policies of the most powerful country in the world during the period in which it gained the majority of its power. With little public accountability. And their only guiding principles being to topple Communism and make money for their former clients and friends in the insanely affluent world of international business. Take away about 80 points of IQ and trade Islam with Communism, and you have today’s state of affairs.

My thinking has been dominated by trying to contextualize all of what’s happening with whatever accounts of the past I can find. This book on Dulles has been an amazing resource for that, and if you’re unfamiliar with the political context of the cold war, then I’d recommend it. It’s very relevant. The whole of American foreign policy, official and secret, can be traced directly to Allen Dulles. From collaborating with Nazis to creating pan-national corporate states to destabilizing foreign regimes to promote or protect the interests of those states to utterly ignoring the rule and spirit of the law to accomplish all of the above. It’s headspinning, breathtaking, whatever. It’s literally incredible, and I’m looking forward to reading something more ‘basic’, like Halberstam’s book about the 50s, to get some more perspective. But it’s beyond a doubt in my mind that America right now is just where it deserves to be.

I haven’t been listening to as much new music and such this month. I came very late to the Kevin Gates album. He’s been consistently one of my favorite rappers, even though he has a plethora of corny songs (”Hard For” is a major cringer). But his flow is ferocious and his voice is just about singular. Whereas it seems like all the other young rappers have moved to welp-like squeaks and squawks for their vocal style, there’s something strangely transgressive about his deep throated gravelly sound.

I’ve rediscovered my love of Phish. It’s just happy, great, energetic music. I just found out Phish is playing a 13 day stand at MSG, and I hope to go to one of those shows. But, TBH, I could live in the summer 1993 tour and be happy forever.

Up until the election, I listened to so many political podcasts, and then after the election I stopped finding entertaining political ‘news’ and journalism. Especially Jon Favreau. What a smarmy fuck. I hope his new podcast “saves america” or whatever, but I highly doubt it will, unless he can find a way to weaponize the uniquely grating sound of condescension and overconfidence masking his one good attribute in life: having a great boss, once. 

I’ve recently discovered an older podcast (though still ongoing!) called Tincture. It’s a post-apocalyptic one, like listening to an alternate universe version of Fallout. Like, if Fallout 3 were actually amazing and somehow influenced by Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series (but only the good parts). It’s awesome, so far. Highly recommended, along with Doughboys, my favorite comedy podcast of the last year. It’s started off a little ‘ehhh’, but the last episode with Jon Gabrus (who also has a pretty good podcast, High and Mighty) was an achievement. Maybe a little too up its own ass for new listeners, but that’s sort of the whole MO of the Doughboys. Maybe you have to get frog-boiled accustomed to it, though. 

There are lots of other things going on in my life, and January has marked an inflection point in one of them. I’m hoping that things somehow the general situation improves. Going to the women’s march in New York was inspirational for the size of the crowd and the diversity of the voices, but it was just one day. I know people are protesting and resisting throughout the country (and world), but I fear that unless the resistance can become commoditized into some form of media or consumption (basically, subsumed into capitalism) a la Fox News and MAGA hats, then it’s doomed to fail. It’s not fun to stand outside in the cold all day yelling. It’s fun to have well groomed people on TV telling you things you agree with. That’s something you’ll do every day and spend money on, perpetuating the messaging and power it has. I just don’t see a way out until people on the left can start to coexist and consolidate their world views into something sustainable in some form that’s empowering and most of all easy to do. I know that’s not very revolutionary, and making a liberal Fox News sounds like simultaneously an unambitious and meager, sham-like goal. But just being practical, everyone tearing everyone else apart on twitter all day is the opposite of productive. There has to be something else.

(I know it’s ironic that I’m calling for some sort of agreeable mass media to give leftist views a mainstream platform for consolidating and propagating their views just a few lines after slamming the Favreau podcast. Maybe I’m just not the target audience for it, so I walk my condemnation back a little and say, more power to you and good luck.)

January is over. Tomorrow is James Joyce’s birthday. I might go for a run today, but I probably won’t. Twenty-eight days later, this post will almost certainly not see a sequel.