What if...algorithm-free reco list, no. 17?
Shop cats & other small delights
Hello!
I am completely fried. Full husk mode. Totally natural time to assign myself yet another task.
So here are some things that have been keeping me the tiniest smidge above the sanity threshold.
Oh, also! An announcement! Due to popular demand (exactly two people), the holiday romcom haiku reviews will indeed be back. I’ll have a batch brewed in a few weeks once I swallow down a critical mass of Hallmark clunkers. Yes, I have already watched Hot Frosty. Please respond to this if you want to unpack it in detail or add any other recos to my list.
Animals Doing Ballet (sort of)
The caption will give you all the actual details behind the Royal Ballet & Opera show, but I prefer to stay ignorant. Pretend these lil’ freaks are just doing their thing. I’m partial to the frog, but that big booty goose is not without her charms.
Watching Multiple Episodes of Love Island Daily
Sure, this is research for a larger project I’m working on, but it is also a balm. Season 3 UK is a rich text worthy of deep examination. Or at least that is what I tell myself as I blow through yet another episode and carefully mark down my corresponding annotations. All this to say, it’s delicious to watch Love Island in the winter with the same cadence I’d normally apply to a current season. The only thing it’s missing is pals to gossip with live, but I’m determined to fix that in future archive dives. (Accepting pre-emptive volunteers!)
Scrivener
If you’re working on a book length project, Scrivener is elite. It has everything I love in a tech product—a website with the aesthetics of a small town gift shop, zero AI bullshit, and an offering that actually works. I promise you can just ignore all of the overwhelming functionality and go in cold. Use what you want, ignore what you don’t, the end. If you’re not satisfied with that and are determined to get the absolute most out of your (currently discounted and not too wildly priced to begin with) software, author Jaime Green teaches a class.
“Shop Cats Show”
Nothing but a wildly charismatic interviewer touring NYC bodegas to meet their cats in a super snappy format. It’s like it was made in a lab just for me.
The Jammys
Scribble, a non-profit counseling center in Highland Park, hosts an annual event where musicians sign up, get sorted into bands, and have a day to write and perform a song to a panel of child judges. The winner gets a record deal to record their song. I mean, just look at this promo:
Dead Weight: Essays on Hunger & Harm by Emmeline Clein
Extremely good and also beyond compassionate in the way it handles eating disorders (including the author's own). If you like the podcast Maintenance Phase, the book Strangers to Ourselves, or anything written by Leslie Jamison, you’ll probably like this.
Somebody, Somewhere (HBO)
I’ve recommended this before, but there’s a new season airing, and it continues to be a near-perfect show. I hate to be all “now more than ever,” but it is very much that—especially as it pertains to the joy of real community care in the face of a whole lot of garbage.
“Who Gets Shipped & Why?”
Sometimes I forget The Pudding exists then I spent a solid hour catching up on things like this deep dive into ten years of fanfic couples or this series of mazes that reflect abortion access in each state or this look at romance covers over time.
Dropping Whatever I’m Doing & Going On a Walk
I am now a daily sunset time checker, and the second 4:45 (ugh) or whatever comes along, I hit the bricks. The efficacy of this remains to be determined.
This newsletter brought to you by:
The specific, near-feral desperation to make (and finish) something for myself I often feel when I’m burnt the hell out. The making and the finishing sort of helps. Maybe.
A platform I will not name that I use for the aforementioned off-season Love Island streaming. Would not be culturally literate without her. <3
Two-packs of Vons bakery cookies so I can finish them before they get stale. Preferably chocolate chip, but lately I’ll even do the oatmeal cran-raisin or the kind of play-doh-y sugar w/M&Ms if that’s all they got.
Lmao when I went to the website to buy scrivener i thought I was being phished