strange days

some comfort from the ny times coronavirus newsletter (i subscribed???? i dunno — just feel like — better to know than not know) — what folks are doing in these uncertain times:

and this one, too

i keep thinking about this dog

we’re all in this together

an interview with Frank M. Snowden, a professor emeritus of history and the history of medicine at Yale, in “how pandemics change history”:

I want to start with a big question, which is: What, broadly speaking, are the major ways in which epidemics have shaped the modern world?
One way of approaching this is to examine how I got interested in the topic, which was a realization—I think a double one. Epidemics are a category of disease that seem to hold up the mirror to human beings as to who we really are. That is to say, they obviously have everything to do with our relationship to our mortality, to death, to our lives. They also reflect our relationships with the environment—the built environment that we create and the natural environment that responds. They show the moral relationships that we have toward each other as people, and we’re seeing that today.

That’s one of the great messages that the World Health Organization keeps discussing. The main part of preparedness to face these events is that we need as human beings to realize that we’re all in this together, that what affects one person anywhere affects everyone everywhere, that we are therefore inevitably part of a species, and we need to think in that way rather than about divisions of race and ethnicity, economic status, and all the rest of it.

cherise was right

this IS a great song

ps i was avoiding school + taxes and watched hulu’s high fidelity — it’s kind of sweet, in its way

this is GREAT

sarah miller’s real-but-sad-but-great “The Diet Industrial Complex Got Me, and It Will Never Let Me Go”

coolin’ out, just bein’ cool

we all need some of mac’s swagger these days

father principe

on the drive, i listened to martin scorsese’s recent fresh air interview, and i love this part about his childhood mentor:

SCORSESE: But yeah, there’s one priest, Father Principe, he made a difference. He told us, you know, you don’t have to live this way. Don’t get married right away if you don’t need to. Think, explore the world.

this is EXACTLY what i want to do here, but how to do it, gently? how did father principe do it?

P.S. MARTIN SCORSESE IS ON INSTAGRAM

wow what a day

today was a lame day, encapsulated by someone at work saying, “you’re the one who seems stressed!” WOOF. just straight up woof. in retaliation, focusing on what i’m grateful for:

• going to austin, even though it was too quick
• pretty decent podcasts for the road
• ordering a healthy bowl from some cool place and having it delivered and then old-school binge watching i’m not okay with this with john and nancy until the wee hours
• drinking a smoothie with caroline
• reading books with thomas
• holding eloise
• going to mother’s (!) with john, nancy, carolyn, ben, levi, and eloise
• rainy monday morning tacos with chad
• going to FOUR grocery stores, might have even been five, tbh
• doing a doctor-doctor shot with carolyn
• my new manicure
• the best two minute back massage in the history of manicure back massages
• my new jumpsuits my sister got for me FOR FREE
• my new pouf! ! ! ! ! ! (clearly a materialist at heart)
• going a weird accidental way home — “KEEP IT FRESH”

one thought unrelated to gratitude — is the american dream inherently screwed up? does it lead to selfishness cuz of its very nature? or can it exist in a kind way with everyone achieving their dreams, but not by crushing others and/or the environment.