good thing, belated thursday night edition

A BABY FALLING ASLEEP IN ONE’S ARMS

garfield

my mom sends me 20 dollar bills tucked inside work articles from the ny times and garfield comics about how hard it is to get out of bed. BEST MOM. yesterday i found out some disturbing power play moves among power players in marfa, which affect my job and our programming, and i got upset, but honestly, whatever, it’s so boring, who even cares anymore? it’s just. so. boring. it was like the final dumb nail in the dumb coffin. everything pushing me towards this thing. so i went to borunda’s and had cheese enchiladas with melissa and i finally decided what i’m going to say to fairfax next week and then went home and watched RED 2 with ross and fell asleep and had my first good dream in months, about a party with scott prendergast and the guy who played ross on day by day.

BABY UNCREDITED

not really following world cup but give it up to this

(via cordjefferson)

so–paris. with forty dollars and a one-way ticket

james baldwin (via cordjefferson). reminds me of this quote from this great paris review interview with baldwin:

Well, in retrospect, what it came down to was that I would not allow myself to be defined by other people, white or black. It was beneath me to blame anybody for what happened to me. What happened to me was my responsibility. I didn’t want any pity. “Leave me alone, I’ll figure it out.” I was very wounded and I was very dangerous because you become what you hate. It’s what happened to my father and I didn’t want it to happen to me. His hatred was suppressed and turned against himself. He couldn’t let it out—he could only let it out in the house with rage, and I found it happening to myself as well. And after my best friend jumped off the bridge, I knew that I was next. So—Paris. With forty dollars and a one-way ticket.

the racism beat

cord jefferson on “the racism beat”:

I wasn’t surprised when a website I liked asked me to write about the case of a white man of little note in New Hampshire calling a hugely powerful black man a “nigger.” But then I realized I didn’t have anything to say.

Or maybe it wasn’t that I didn’t have anything to say. Maybe it was the realization that writing anything would be to listlessly participate in the carousel ride: an inciting incident, 1,000 angry thinkpieces, 1,000 tweeted links, and back to where we started, until next time. Perhaps it was a feeling that writing anything would finally be too redundant to bear, a pursuit of too many sad and obvious words to heap onto so many other nearly identical words written down before, by me, by thousands of others.

If this doesn’t eventually happen, I wonder how many more writers of color will come to the conclusion, as my colleague did, that this life we’ve made for ourselves is unsustainable. How many essays can go up before fatigue becomes anger becomes insanity? How many op-ed columns before you can feel the gruesomeness of trying to defend another dead black kid slowly hollowing you out? How many different ways can you find to say that you’re a human being?

SALVAGER OF CHAOS

the deranged maester, NBD.

mainlining chamomile tea

not really because today i didn’t even have time to make tea, but i PLANNED on mainlining it. though actually yesterday i drank two cups, so yes, i am basically mainlining it.

work is incredibly stressful, 18 [6] projects all happening at once, on top of major work reshuffling, two coworkers resigning, angry coworker re: resignations, and my own planned resignation. when to do it, when to do it, when to do it, when to do it. when also to do laundry. when also to have more time in the morning so as to avoid looking like an old weirdo. when also to read the rest of annie baker’s sad plays. when also to read marvel comics story. when also to savor the good times of austin (johnny, great engagement parties, great family, great friends, thai food, spicy juices, kale smoothies, john’s a/c, late night cab ride to cap city, solo trip to waterloo, oil changes at westlake jiffy lube, ETC).

when also to learn about making scented candles and making mad BUCKS!!!!!!!

more clouds

i love dave chappelle

“Sometimes I listen to a Jay-Z record and it starts to make me feel bad about some of the choices I’ve made. This guy’s had more fun on two songs than I’ve had in the last 11 years.”

catch up vacation post

realized i didn’t say ANYTHING about my california vacation. thrown hard back into work and i didn’t have time to ruminate or reflect or appreciate exactly.

BUT THE HIGHLIGHTS

• renting a yaris
• drinking champagne at the bachelorette party
• weirdo old timey, too familiar maître d
• the town of inverness
• wood buildings in general
• being a bridesmaid
• getting to know the other bridesmaids
• going over to susannah and alex’s cottage and doing wedding prep on thursday and eating a lot of wintogreen mints and feeling useful
• wearing a beautiful, inappropriate bridesmaid dress (but honestly shouldn’t all bridesmaids show a little side boob)
• admiring my handwriting on the table cards and place settings at the wedding (“that looks fresh actually”)
• seeing erin kimmel
• dancing dancing dancing
• sitting on muir beach and zen’ing out
• the ocean
• enjoying nothern california but NOT getting tricked into its charms
• seeing emily and her awesome kids
• seeing gerard and carolyn and their awesome kids
• all said awesome kids immediately being completely open and friendly with me, such as: sitting with me in a treehouse; giving me a hug; talking about the american revolution; etc.
• reading flamethrowers while lying on a couch in inverness with the sun streaming through the windows
• reading flamethrowers on a saturday night in bed and no one getting upset
• visiting the point arena thrift store
• visiting whole foods in wonder
• visiting two farmers’ markets in wonder
• visiting a groovy half moon bay grocery store in wonder (“lou this is probably gonna take a while”)
• eating leftover thai food
• dinner in bernal heights with margz and lou
• taking a beach walk with aunt lou
• toodling around the peninsula with lou
• having a tuna melt and glass of white wine with lou
• getting my shoes repaired! as soon as noticing they were busted! “big cities”
• falling asleep to foyle’s war
• going bananas and spending a fortune at the awesome american airlines terminal at SFO —  buying coffee, cheese, almond croissants, greeting cars, shampoo, chocolates, caramels, cold pressed juice — and then marveling over the water bottle refill stations, and compost bins. i was like tom hanks in the terminal.
  
• watching grand budapest hotel on the flight home (?!)