Reading List: “Sticking Fingers In Ears And Saying LALALALA” As A Service
Mein Leibchens! Happy Friday, happy November, happy two months from 2020 (hyperventilates into paper bag.)
Do you enjoy hanging out with fellow nerds over drinks and weird history talks loosely based around one-word themes? If you read this newsletter every morning, methinks you do. A reminder that next Tuesday November 5th, I curate and host Odd Salon HERO at Public Works in San Francisco! I talk about Odd Salon a lot with y’all, so if you can, why don’t you get yourself a ticket or two and come say hi next week? Odd Salon is great for dates! And not-dates! In general, it’s awesome! Come join us next week!
LET’S DO THIS!
Marc Tracy, How Deadspin Imploded (The New York Times) - As we discussed earlier this week, if you’re not following the absolute awfulness that is the fall of an amazing website, you should. And if you ever need a reference for “worst possible statement a corporate media overlord who just caused alllll of their staff to quit could release,” you’ve got it.
Fred Pearce, Amazon Watch: What Happens When the Forest Disappears? (Yale Environment 360) - Friend of the Missive Schuyler sent this in, as well as this NYT op-ed on how Climate Change Will Cost Us Even More Than We Think. Now, I am not one to shy away from tough historical subjects (did I recently swap books on genocide with someone I’d just met? Yes. Yes I did,) but I find it very difficult to read about climate change right now, just as I find it difficult to read about the fundamental damage the current administration is doing to our democratic norms, as well as just how stacked the judiciary will be for generations. For me, there’s some comfort in reading history: maybe we’ve learned something, maybe the next time we’re beset with calamity, humans will make a better choice. And then I read pieces like this and realize I fall into the same category as those who thought there was no way Trump could ever win, in that I’m in absolute denial that the worst could ever happen, and I subconsciously refuse to read those pieces, because… despair. (That’s it, that’s the blurb.) And don’t get me started on how much Farhad Manjoo’s piece It’s the End of California as We Know It freaks me out… (ty FotM Liat and Mum of the Missive Barb for sending it.)
Andrew Russell and Lee Vinsel, Let’s Get Excited About Maintenance! (The New York Times) - And related: SO many NYT pieces today, I know, but as California continues to battle fourteen fires around the state, FotM Tre reminds us via this 2017 piece that we need to make maintenance and upkeep sexy, mmmkay? Which is pretty hard when a for-profit utility is also a monopoly and spending money on upkeep doesn’t make shareholders happy, but still! Let’s fix stuff!
Carolyn Gregoire, Are Baby Boomers A 'Generation Of Sociopaths'? (HuffPost) - Leaves this here, runs for the hills where none of my boomer readers can find me and lambast me for my early morning trolling ways. LOVE YOU ALL!
Stay safe, be kind to each other. And be kind to yourselves, ok?
xoxo Amy