INs and OUTs for 2024: A List (offered without commentary) OUT: Himbos IN: Litbros OUT: rotting in bed IN: bringing wine to parties OUT: millennial vs gen z fashion discourse IN: the all-ages appeal of dressing like a Miami coke dealer circa 1980 OUT: perfectionism IN: the "good enough" job OUT: obsessive punctuality IN: publishing an ins and
Some Thoughts on New Olfactory Experiences I’ve noticed something strange about myself over the past few months, which I can only attribute (wholly non-scientifically) to a springtime bout with COVID: my sense of smell has gotten significantly better. I have always had a middling sense of smell. It has never been the primary way in
Jock Time, Part II I wrote and then abandoned a version of this post where I talked a lot about gamification and self-tracking (further revisions might have yielded additional discussion about the neoliberal encroachments on life, the anxiety that even a newsletter I started for my own amusement has become a source of neurosis
Dealbreaker Back in undergrad, my friends used to play a game. Whenever the party was winding down and we were sitting hunched over our last dregs of alcohol, swirling hideous concoctions around in red plastic cups, not quite ready to go to bed; or when we were bored and waiting in
Interlude I: The Doppelgänger Two weeks ago, I was sitting on the Thomson House terrasse, drinking iced coffees and pretending to work on my dissertation. There was a sense of gleeful energy: the end of the semester before the comedown of grades, the start of warm weather but not yet the lazy hot days
Jock Time, Part I I ran 15km last weekend, partly by accident. I did it again this weekend, deliberately. This probably marks the point where I can no longer credibly claim to be “reinventing myself as a jock” as a bit, although I’d hoped I could keep up with the pretense until I’
All of my Friends are Dressing like Lydia Tár This afternoon I went to a coffee shop to work with friends before my driving lesson. Another friend walks up to our already-seated group wearing large pleated dress pants and a sweater: “Look! I’m dressed like Lydia Tár,” he announces. I stand up and gesture to my own large
Some Thoughts on Portraiture I tend to think of portraiture in terms of two ideal types. At least, this has informed my own approach to art, and I’ve moved back and forth with respect to which predominates in my practice. First image: the painter as evil wizard, painting people to appropriate their souls,
Covid Robot Hours I had the misfortune this week of coming down with a second bout of COVID. Its effects have generally been quite mild, except that I’ve almost completely lost my sense of taste. This has turned out to be surprisingly unsettling for me, not least because “regularly enjoying food that
Undergraduate Drink Mixes Offered in lieu of a longer piece I am still working on about friendship and virtue, here are some of the alcoholic beverages my friends and I consumed during undergrad, often on multiple occasions: Peach schnapps, vodka, orange juice — this was a mainstay in first year for pregaming parties. Drank
Tattoos as Modern Dandyism Content note: Mind the links, some of them involve people engaged in potentially unsettling bodily practices. Over the past year, I have been getting increasingly tattooed, and have also been thinking about a framework for how I understand this way of engaging with my body. People have discussed their own
Iris Murdoch Lit Bros: A Typology Loosely based on a series of conversations I have had with my fellow Iris Murdoch-enjoyer friends over the years. Obsessed with Demonic Men: -Read The Black Prince once, convinced he is Bradley Pearson -claims to be dangerous and Machiavellian because he thinks it will make him more interesting to women,
Some Thoughts on Cringe as an Aesthetic Category There has been a lot of commentary on and discussion of cringe recently – the Contrapoints video on cringe [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRBsaJPkt2Q&vl=en] , as well as the New Inquiry article on trans assimilation, cringe, and dysphoria [https://thenewinquiry.com/cringe/]. Both of these, however, focus
