Good Stuff for Your Weekend

Vol. 7

Some Good Stuff… Ten links, two bits of true crime, and a book with a great cover, a killer title, but not at all for me.

But first, a quote:

You don’t have a right to the cards you belive you should have been delt. You have an obligation to play the hell out of the ones you’re holding. ~ Cheryl Strayed

PICTURE

• Busy Phillips is funny

• So is this person… (Genevieve Turley)

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• “Breathless as an Emily Dickinson poem” and free “of the responsibility of clear ordered thought” is the exact vibe I’m going for… Long live the em—dash! (Wallflower Chats)

• Sometimes I read something that makes me so curious about the author… One of my favorite Substackers laid out a history of her life’s work as a Gen X theater kid and parent advocate for her child with autism, and MANY other things… It’s so interesting I can’t even describe it. (It’s Like This)

• I’ve heard the Gen Zs like to watch videos of high schools in the late 90s… and I totally fell down this rabbit hole

@originalnostlgiaHigh school in 1998 was a vibe 🕺🏻 #nostalgia #highschool #throwback #90’s

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• I love a good sober story (Janelle Hanchett)

• Some people are just better than others… RIP Carl Dean (New York Times)

• I love when authors recommend books (Elle)

• When one person’s grief heals the hearts of many…

  thedrewbarrymoreshow

  

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• The dad from the Christmas Jammies Family got a colonoscopy and it was so relatable! (The Holderness Family)

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Watched

American Murder: Gabby Petito

Really well produced and touches on much bigger topics that just one girl tragically murdered by her boyfriend.

The Search for Instagram’s Worst Con Artist

In a world where social media can shape public opinion, this series explores how unscrupulous influencers can exploit misinformation for their own gain… Also, it’s really satisfying when a con artist gets caught.

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Recent Reads

I Love You but I’ve Chosen Darkness by Claire Vaye Watkins

This book made me feel so uncool. The main character suffers from PPMD after her daughter is born, and after that I can't relate to her at all. She leaves her daughter for a year plus to go on a sex-filled quest to what? ... "find herself." It's good writing, but more than once I was just grossed out. There was also this undertone that she (the author) was daring me not to like it and call me out as a prude and a bore... Welp, I guess I am.

There was just so much happening in this book,.. The letters from her mother to a cousin we never meet on the page didn't really go anywhere, Charles mansion makes and appearance, there's a dead ex-boyfriend, I could stop thinking about the Vagina Dentata and way too much period talk... Some of it could have been interesting but I was too distracted by everything else.

I read this was a piece of autofiction and that her dad really was involved with Manson somehow and many of the details are true. It's just hard to put a whole life in a book and have it be about something other than a crazy story.

Gorgeous cover and a title that any author would kill for.

In case you missed it:

Don’t worry, you didn’t. No essay this week, but I’ll be back next week!