[Seth Says] A Nice Hot Cup Of Spiders

I wish I did, friend. 

But it's 4 in the morning and I just went to use the bathroom and noticed a spider on the ceiling, and so I caught it in a cup, and then I noticed another spider on the ceiling, but the first one was going to escape and I didn't have a lid for the cup and also wanted the other spider in the same cup, so I had to constantly shake the cup like it was a dice cup to keep the first spider from climbing out. Meanwhile I was climbing up the sink to reach the other spider, which I finally managed to knock into the same cup, and then I shook my cup of spiders all the way through the pantry, living room, and porch to open the back door and toss the spiders out into the night. ("What'd you roll?" "Spiders!")(Anyone playing D&D on Halloween should roll 2dSpiders for initiative.)

It's not the most fun way to end an evening, but I hope it's a fun way to start a newsletter. 
Also, now that I've publicly shared the layout of my home, I don't need to buy a Roomba for Amazon to map my house, so that will save some time.
 

Opening newsletters or conversations with pleasantries is so 2010s, am I right? I guess I've never been much for pleasantries to begin with, as many people who find me unpleasant will be glad to tell you. You don't have to lead off being solicitous unless you're trying to get roast fowl from someone. Then you should open with pheasantries. If you were a medieval serf, you'd open with peasantries. (I think SNL was funnier back in the Tim Kazurinsky era.)

But I was having a conversation with someone about the value of small talk -- by which I realize I mean I was making a comment online about an article someone posted about small talk, which itself as a medium of conversation eliminates small talk because rather than opening with pleasantries, there's already a conversation about something happening, so I can just jump right into that conversation. *Boi-oi-oi-oi-oing!* (Always jump with a Looney Tunes sound effect, if you can help it.)

Said article was about small talk being less appealing for Neurodivergent folks, and having followed neurodivergent twitter for some time, boy howdy do many of the observations of how ND people experience the world ring true for me. I like the label because it's a wide enough umbrella for me to fit under comfortably, with no medical testing or diagnosis required. I don't want to lay claim to inaccurate terms just because I feel I have things in common with e.g. autistic people on the internets, lest someone argue that I'm inappropriately appropriating. But no one is going to dispute that I'm neurodivergent. I definitely think funny.
 

And with this issue's columns, hopefully also funny you think! Or at least one of them. As ever, I continue to be trying to write fun humorous things that make people smile, while also living in a world that is filled with serious problems which I feel like I ought to comment on and occasionally point out that people who are being terrible might consider being less terrible. And do I achieve a perfect balance between these two things in each and every column? 

No. 

(This reminds me that today I came across "Betteridge's law of headlines", the adage which codifies and states an ancient principle: "Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no." Because if the answer were yes, they'd probably just phrase it as a declaration. e.g. "Is Cryptocurrency a good investment?" vs. "Seth should close this parenthetical statement now.")

But my way of balance is often a one and one (which for the drinkers among you, is 14% as good as a seven and seven). So. You actually got a tiny sneak preview of the funny column if you read my last newsletter, since I mentioned that I had inadvertently acquired a cricket. But if reading more details about that won't bug you, I think this is a pretty funny column, and includes a line that still makes me laugh every time I read it (the one about my old neighbor). Please enjoy: Enter the Cricket

At least it has a hoppy ending. And then on the current events side - still with a little humor, mind you, it just gets outweighed a bit by the fact that this column is more focused on the world in which we live - I encourage you to read this Letter from your new school board

If nothing else, it can serve as a book rec for "New Kid", because graphic novels are awesome and especially if your children are not naturally given to voraciously consume literature, graphic novels are a very appealing format. (Also, I love graphic novels and am an author of a half-dozen traditional books. GRAPHIC NOVELS ARE REAL BOOKS. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.)(Or Seth talk?)(That could have been the name of this newsletter, but I still think "Give me emails or give me Seth" is funnier.)
 

These problems are very interesting, but our session is only supposed to run an hour, so I'm afraid I'll have to cut me off there. Tune in at the turn of the month for next issue, same Spider-time, same Spider-channel.

Thanks for reading this Web exclusive.



Spins a Pun Any Size,
Seth