- The phrase “grift-positive.”
- The woman with an uber-hip buzz-and-sidelock haircut that kind of resembled Chasidic payot.
- The Lyft driver who described bringing his favorite Beastie Boys CD (The In Sound From Way Out!) to massage appointments to listen to it during massages.
- Dad’s first show of 2023 at Largo!
- Skywoman’s systems for sharing ag-business knowledge and lifting others up. Inspiring, I think, to people in other industries who have a desire to open doors but have so far only done so informally.
- The story of Papa Roach’s “Last Resort” [see 2023-01-03].
- The truth about bears’ fecal plugs.
- Louise Glück, via Austin Kleon: “To get born, your body makes a pact with death, / and from that moment, all it tries to do is cheat.”
- The construction worker installing a round, recessed ceiling light which dangled in front of his head, appearing as if it were his head.
- The banjo on stage, untouched, teasing, during Dad’s fourth night at Largo.
- The gutter of La Cienega Boulevard in LA, rushing with rainwater like a small river.
- The impossibly adorable website for Whirly Birdie, a font.
- Abraham Joshua Heschel: “The task of religion is to be a challenge to the stabilization of values.”
- The train rider in Champion-brand graphic sweatpants rocking out to Bob Seger’s “Night Moves” in headphones on repeat, playing air guitar inches from Dad’s face for the entirety of the train ride, lifting our spirits.
- Landwerk No. 3 by Nathan Salsburg.
- Casey’s twenty-eighth birthday!
- The Gulf War vet at the karaoke bar, buying everyone drinks, toasting to his dad’s birthday.
- I feel skeptical of the “everything is a story” / “all artists are storytellers, regardless of medium” way of thinking. Aren’t some works just a little burst of sensory information? Is everything really two-dimensional in time?
- Dry Cleaning at Thalia Hall 🤩
- News of Yukihiro Takahashi’s death. His song “Flashback” is one of my favorites of all time.
- The array of small, red heat shrink tubing shrinking under a heat gun’s stream, undulating like a coral reef.
- The launch of the new installment of Wilcoworld Radio. (Have I ever mentioned that I love Wilco’s longstanding domain name, and that it’s a .net? Wait long enough and just about any trend will come around.)
- Craig Mod in his TOKIO TŌKYŌ TOKYO pop-up newsletter: “I am always astonished by kindness and never astonished by cruelty, and in this way my mind feels broken.” I’m astonished by both.
- Artist (and my acquaintance) Noah Gunther’s portfolio site.
- More audio cable crimping and pinning work.
- A visit to the Illinois Holocaust Museum.
- Casey and me babysitting our friends Devin and Brendan’s baby.
- An array of heat-shrink tubing activating and undulating like a coral creature.
- The first edition of Casey and our friend Kerry’s Star Power karaoke show, at which comedian Jerwin Gabriel Santiago performed as the Green M&M… with boobs.
- George Saunders: “I think I’m a bit like a pitcher with a limited repertoire of pitches – just a fastball, a curve, and change-up, let’s say. So I have to keep using these pitches, trying to make them better within their own limitations … Somehow, I feel this as a sign of maturity: the acceptance of one’s limitations and a resolve to work energetically and quirkily, and in a slightly ornery spirit, within them.”
- Fascinating footage of Phil Collins (and drummer Chester Thompson) from 1990.
- The sidewalk glistening with snow crystals.
- A Tweedy Show episode!
- Rehearsing with the Tweedy band for Cayamo cruise.
- This video about the electric fish barrier in the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, which helps prevent invasive carp from reaching the Great Lakes.
- Having trouble sleeping, having watched too many bewildering videos of the new-prog band Polyphia.