December 15, 2017

“All I want is a room somewhere / far away from the cold night air…”

1. Evocative Illustrations Show What Women Do When No One’s Watching, VICE. Women portraying themselves in art! Yes!
2. The Untranslatable Emotions You Never Knew You Had, BBC. I like that this article and lexicographical project are focused on positive, and sometimes bittersweet, emotions. (I feel gigil all the time, and shout out to sehnsucht and sukha!)
3. Why Do Recipe Writers Lie About How Long it Takes To Caramelize Onions?, Slate. This is one of many bizarre things about “recipe writers” – but reading this did prompt me to caramelize a whole bag of onions in my slow cooker. David made a shrimp pasta with some of the onions last night…truly to die for. Anyway, don’t believe the lies about a 5 minute caramelization!

4. Digital Distraction Is Bad for Creativity. This essay talks about how your “clubhouse” – a group of writers, or people in the same field, or fans of the same game – is an insuluar world and how in the past, sometimes taking leave of the clubhouse is necessary to refresh your perspective. But in the age of Internet, you have access to that group of like-minded folks always, “and now that you can choose to remain online all the time, why wouldn’t you? Who wouldn’t prefer to be diverted, to skim laterally link to link, than to pursue the interminable, doubt-filled, vertical work of mining the imagination and locating the right words? Guilty as charged.”

5. What the World Gets Wrong About My Quadriplegic Husband and Me. “When I lie awake at night, the honest-to-god truth is that I don’t fantasize about miracle cures and redemption songs. I dream of ramps.”

Bonus:

• A Seven-Year-Old’s Guide to Surviving Holiday Travel