Reading List: [Googles Hibernating For Humans And Whether It's Socially Acceptable To Just "Nope" The Entire Month of December]
Lovelies! It’s Friday and it’s still 2020! But in good news, I’ve been informed by people much smarter than me that this year cannot, in fact, last forever, and that soon enough we’ll be blinking our eyes in the bright light of 2021. We’re almost there, my darlings, let’s hunker down, wear our masks and get through this together.
Reminder: I’m in basement quarantine this weekend, so SEND ME MOVIE RECOMMENDATIONS (and if you can beat the trashy fabulousness of Friend of the Missive Max’s Con Air recommendation from a couple of weeks ago, you win.)
TO THE READING LIST!
Naomi Alderman, The Power - That’s right, after fellow Odd Salon Fellow Lydia Pepper suggested it, I am once again reading this masterpiece fictional take on what would happen if one morning women woke up with the innate ability to terrorize and kill. And I can confirm that on second reading, it is still SO DAMNED GOOD.
Scaachi Koul, TikTok Was 2020's Only Silver Lining (BuzzFeed News) - I have such a love-hate relationship with Tik Tok, in that while I have used it to find so many resources and entertainers on depression, anxiety, being a former overachiever, relationships with narcissists, growing past divorce, dating in 2020, moody farm animals, and twerking ducks, I sometimes have to delete the damned app so I don’t use it as a bingescroll crutch. But I one hundred percent agree with Koul when she says that “TikTok’s greatest accomplishment this year, which I’m sure everyone can agree on, is stopping me from swallowing my own tongue.”
Rachel Gutman, Sorry to Burst Your Quarantine Bubble (The Atlantic) - Over the last nine months, I’ve engaged in the kind awkward interpersonal connection conversations relegated in the before times to healthy polyamorous relationships (full and utter transparency about each and every outside pod contact and/or risk factor since talking in person without a mask is the new physically intimate relationship. Think “in full transparency, I had a socially-distanced picnic in the park today without masks.”) Because let’s be honest, if I hadn’t had a friend pod this year, I would have fully lost my damned mind by this point. So it’s interesting and disquieting to read what other people consider a “pod” or “bubble”. 2020’s a trip, my friends.
Emily Lordi, The Grit and Glory of Dolly Parton (The New York Times Style Magazine) - All hail the legendary song-writing, sky high hair-wearing, COVID vaccine-funding, refreshingly honest and hardest working woman in the music business. We must all bow down to the queen.
Charles Duhigg, How Venture Capitalists Are Deforming Capitalism (The New Yorker) - Haven’t read this one yet, but as someone who’s fully enjoyed the fruits of distribution of venture capital wealth during may past 12 years in the Bay Area, I’ve seen what this sub-head is talking about: “Even the worst-run startup can beat competitors if investors prop it up.”
Maria Aspan, Why the power to change the female-founder double standard rests with VCs (Fortune) - Related to the above and the below.
Kristi Coulter, Why Do We Put Up With “Mantrums”? (Dame Magazine) - As we watch the GOP establishment indulge and enable a delusional narcissist burn the house down around him, I found this piece particularly infuriating.
Stay safe, wear a mask, and be kind to each other!
xoxo Amy