There are still mysteries of 9/11: where a Rodin sculpture found in the rubble went, if a possibly lost camera will show what it was like above the impact. Last week a documentary revealed 32 unpublished photos and their likely photographer.

I think I’ve clung to these physical artifacts and unresolved side stories to root connections I did not have, to an event that felt pivotal yet distant. 9/11/01 was physical event now mostly remembered symbolically, chaotic fluid dynamics now distilled into timelines, at a site I now live 2 miles from, which happened when I was old enough to form memory but hadn’t agency.

It was a homeschool day for me and Mom in Halifax, Pennsylvania. I remember trying to turn on PBS Kids on channel 33 for my usual morning break, but my shows weren’t working. My mom said she remembers it differently. It turns out we all do, each time.

It never felt like a profound memory, but this year I realized I’ll be among the last microgeneration to have one at all.

You are invited to the celebration of my 32nd birthday and New York City’s 401st, which will be held Sunday, June 21, 7:00pm–12:00am in the Lexington Avenue/51st Street subway station.

Proceed to the downtown 6 platform and look for red walls.

Come for any time range(s) throughout. Friends of friends are welcome. Do not bring food or drink. Both will be available for purchase nearby.

This is Geistlist. I am Jacob. You met me at a party or you’re my grandma and I violated CANSPAM to add you to this list.

I had a whole intro mind-drafted about art getting offensive again, but I’m out of time and I need to prep for the below.

Instead, I will talk about it live on the radio, and write it into a coherent theory later.

Which means that both: you may get two of these in the span of a calendar month, which I normally try to avoid; and that I am now mostly using an email to tease a forthcoming email, which I also abhor.

Hey thou,

Did you know you is actually the formal second person pronoun in English? Thou is the informal. Old Christians liked to use it to emphasize their brotherhood and ahierarchy among each other. We just think of it as formal now because of them, because they were long ago, and we falsely assume that long ago everyone was more formal.

This is Geistlist, the periodic dispatch from Jacob Ford. Most likely we met somewhere or you found me on the internet. You are welcome here.

Unsubscribe at the bottom. Reply with complaints, or to get an unpaywalled PDF of that Sam Kriss article I just linked to.

This is Geistlist.

Please consider the NYNF gala Monday, I’d love to see you there.

¶. Tuesday April 7, 2026: people stop being born

Outside Seward, Nebraska

Infinite Jest turned 30 last month. Want to finally read it with me and a bunch of other wastoids?

¶. 7pm – ?am: Closed VCR Night

The FORT90 Emergency Broadcast System, free

We’re finally getting a proper winter here, and as such the typical host of my last-monday-of-every-even-month Open VCR Night is closed. In lieu, my pal FORT90 and I will be streaming found footage all night, and this time you cannot eject. My baby video may show up.

One night. Three strange filmic experiences. Live at Wonderville in Bushwick, NYC (my dad will be there), or on your phone. Festivities begin in 2.5 hours.

Brad Neely approves, but will be unable to attend this year. (Working on 2026.)

¶. 7–8pm: Miniature Open VCR Night

free, Wonderville, Bushwick, NYC, or twitch.tv/wondervillenyc

SantaCon is an annual pilgrimage of New Jerseyans and Connecticuters to great the world’s largest vomitorium stretching from midtown to the financial district, following the mantra, lasting only one night and then vanishing with every trace.

December 23, 2023 marked the 200th anniversary more or less the first description of the man who would come to be Santa Clause: it was crammed in one of the 6 columns of the Troy Sentinel that day on page 3, under the title Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas, with no author. You probably know it as The Night Before Christmas, best covered over a trap beat by Family Force 5.

To oversimplify and misquote Santa historian Pamela McColl from what I remember of her remarks at the 200th anniversary proceedings and induction of author Clement Clark Moore into the New York Libraries Hall of Fame:

Long before Christmas there was Saturnalia, and long before a right jolly old elf there were right jolly Roman drunkards marauding through the streets every third week of December, breaking into upperclass houses, and stealing things.

Hello from the back right table at the temporarily relocated (across the street) Ben’s Chili Bowl, the restaurant that’s like if an old NYC 24/7 diner decorated a Philly steak joint, the chef subscribed to Chicago’s lax restrictions on hot dog toppings, and even more inkjet photos of celebrities sitting where you are sitting adhered to walls—all wrapped with good chili and black DC.

This is Geistlist. You met me (Jacob Ford) somewhere, somehow, and now you get this thing sometimes. Unsubscribe at the bottom.

I missed Leith Ross’s Brooklyn concert last week because I was hosting the inaugural world-famous Bridge & Tunnel Brewery Musical Bingo, so I this morning hopped a PreviousGen and found a $60/night cyberpunk porta potty to sleep in, so I can see Leith at Howard Theatre tonight before she departs the Right Coast.

Fun fact: last time I was here (2014) it was because I overslept a free NYU bus trip to see the new NYU DC campus, but managed to grab a Bolt Bus myself and find the crew, where we got a tour of Barack Obama’s favorite Ben’s seat (there’s a plaque).

A lot of physical media I worked on is suddenly materializing. Collect them all.

¶. Stereogram (Friday 7pm)

The City Reliquary, Williamsburg, NYC, $25

Hosted by Stephen Colbert’s former producer, with me slinging beers. 2 tickets left.

Hello from Sunset Park, where you truly can just Park anywhere, there are still those coin-operated unicorns in front of shops, and bakeries are 24/7. It feels like the NYC I pretend to miss.

Somehow we met, I gave you a strange URL, you gave me an email, here we are. This is Geistlist. I am Jacob Ford. Unsubscribe at the bottom.

That thing I asked you to save the date for last time is also toward the bottom: it’s a little party in a little bookshop on Saturday, November 1 in the East Village where you can buy a book I designed for a website I loved.

¶. Now: Ballistic Interests: Knurling, Elastics, Kevlar Implements Lunch & Learn

It’s been a real month for chance encounters, serendipity, and small-world moments in the great human particle collider of NYC. I (nearly literally) ran into a friend from Pennsylvania on the sidewalk for not the first but the second time this decade. This time was in Brooklyn, last time (circa 2016) was in Manhattan. Jared: three boroughs left.

Then I went to the final performance of the Flotsam River Circus, only to realize/discover that the lead troubadour is Jason Webley, writer of the beautiful Last Song, which I probably heard indirectly via Welcome to Night Vale.

Two people I met recently only to find out we were in the same room in 2016 and 2018 (respectively) via photos. One of those rooms in Ecuador.

Strange attractors, we are.

¶. Wednesday 6–9pm: Opening Reception for the COVID Material Culture Museum

The City Reliquary, Williamsburg, NYC, free

Saturday, February 29, 2020: At Mount Sinai Hospital on Central Park East, Doctor Angela Chen treated a 39-year-old woman for respiratory symptoms. Hours later, Dr. Chen diagnosed the first case of COVID-19 in the state of New York. “Pandemic” evolved from science fiction plot to household term.

Five and a half years later: I would be honored if you would join me for the first exhibition from my ongoing collection: artifacts, signage, medicine, tools, and badges from the strange era when protesters covered their mouths, government signage told us how far from each other to stand, and everyone knew who was wrong.

I’m having an Eminem phase. People don’t know he coined stanning. Other people know that as well as they know who the first president was and know it means something much darker than obsession. Or, obsession means more than we let it. Unfortunately you can’t watch the official music video because it cuts out half the verses because of Al Gore’s wife Tipper and fragile Y2K kids like me, so watch a version like this one.

Did you know Nate Ruess co-wrote a song with Eminiem about going no-contact with your mom? Another good one. Nate Ruess wrote more songs than you think. Nate now just does excellent dirtbag parody podcasts.

Sorry I thought you were a bad influence on bad kids when I thought I was a good kid, Eminem.

¶. Through Wednesday: Sleep No More Romeo & Juliette with Teenagers in Cars

This is Geistlist. For typographic reasons, I have moved links to the metadata line, below the titles.

?. Have you ever taken a photograph on February 8?

Please upload them to our collection. I will be editing into a video shown on February 8, 2025 (see below). Possibly uploaded online but note if you’d like your content excluded from that part.

¶. Tonight 8pm: Nosferatu live scored by FRIPP & Anthime

The Jews are whooping our gentile asses: this morning I saw a Prius with a 3-foot working menorah strapped to the roof. What happened to Christmas kitcsh? I guess that Prestonwood Baptist Christmas show with the flying on-fire Santa was pretty cool, in Plano. The one you saw on Reels.

¶. In 30 minutes: Harry Potter but Brad Neely voices every character

Wonderville, Bushwick, NYC, free, or say hi in the chat

A mid-COVID Christmas tradition, now five years running. Tonight: followed by Spiders & Snakes, Dear Reader, the unauthorized sequel to the unauthorized soundtrack.

This is Geistlist. Live from a brewery where we’re taping up signs for my party.

¶. Now: New York Neo-Futurists Give Each Other Stick & Poke Tattoos While I Count to 20

Bridge & Tunnel Brewery, Ridgewood, NY, $10 suggested

nynf.org/party

To the IRS and NYS in a few months, I will write off 67 drinks purchased aboard the vessel Anthem of the Seas and private island CocoCay during a Royal Caribbean cruise last March, where I was developing my experience into what I hoped would become a new tradition of nonfiction travel writing.¹ Unfortunately then Lauren and then Gary and then even Maria on my own website beat me and now the genre is dead.²

¶. Through November 14: a musical which began below deck in the crew bar of a cruise ship, presumably at a cast party for For The Record™ The Brat Pack Live aboard the Norwegian Escape en route to (or possibly from) Bermuda, and is likely to go places

The Tank, Chelsea, NYC, $25–45

It’s got some Monty Python with some Holy Mountain, some Unfinished Swan, and puppetry. It’s got Golem With One L and An E (from Jewish folklore) who owns the only independent Tropical Smoothie bar in the Southeast USA, and I have just been informed by the drummer that I left during intermission thinking the show was over (it was that strange). Will report back on the second half after Monday.

My grandma texted me hadn’t gotten an email from me in over a week and feared I was dead, so I guess it’s time for Geistlist. Unsubscribe at the bottom.

Oh real quick: I’m involved in another Kickstarter. We’re making theawl.com (RIP): The Book (OMG). I’m designing it!

$. Roll 10 dice, donate the total

every Saturday & Sunday at 10:30pm in the West Village, NYC, but see below

It’s easy to see the future. Challenge is not overcompensating for it now.

Once you’re a regular anywhere you can portend the goodbye note on its Instagram account and then countdown note on its door. Every party has its hangover, some sales are final, and everyone you love is gonna die. Saturn’s rings will eventually dissolve, and John Boswell’s video of it happening is what inspired that lyric: pre-grieving is good practice for recalibrating your now; the only trick is not to get stuck in what’s not yet.

Crest Hardware has five days left in its 22,646 day run¹. Most of you haven’t been there, but if you have, you know. It’s our big little hardware store in Williamsburg run by Joe and Liza with the staff who will tell you what spray paint is best for graffitting the subway and what houseplant won’t kill you cat, and ask you next time how it went. It was home to Franklin the backyard pig and an African grey parrot named Finlay who probably heard and said more about metals than Apollo could ever hope.

Friday is the last day of business, though there’s not much business left: the entire floor was cleared by Friday to become our farewell dance floor while the staff lounge become a tattoo parlor, and the greenhouse was portapotties and bar.