6/12/17

i'm thankful, i think, that taylor swift's music is back on spotify. i'm thankful that generally i think artists should want to be on spotify and that it's actively harmful to their legacy when they're not—i'm thankful for jay-z, who i think is probably permanently damaging his long tail by taking his songs off spotify (unless that crosses over to the other side and his absence helps him appear underground to the young heads of the post-spotify era (as opposed to the ridiculous ubiquity of the early 2010s), which helps burnish his myth in a new way). i'm thankful that taylor is an interesting case. i'm thankful that though i feel shitty towards her silence during the election and about her constant victim playing cf kanye cf everyone and her general enh, i still like a lot of her music very much. i'm thankful to have realized something, though, which is that her long absence from spotify (my primary channel for music) means that i'm not used to listening to her music in the context of other music, since for so long if i wanted to hear it i'd need to go to youtube to directly seek it out rather than having it come up by surprise in a shuffle or algorithmic daily mix or a playlist. i'm thankful that this fits the way that her music, while taking part in lots of the aesthetic tropes of contemporary pop is kind of at the same time weirdly sui generis—she likes to talk about haim and ed sheeran and kendrick, but her music doesn't, i don't think, fit neatly into a mix with their songs or sounds, which means that having all of it in the context of everything else now feels strange.

i'm thankful to have listened to some very good podcasts on long runs and rides lately. i'm thankful for the episode of the ezra klein show with yascha mounk (which got me to start listening to his also great podcast), as well as his episodes with masha gessen and (despite myself) tyler cowen. i'm thankful, since i have grown bored of reading the book of game of thrones, that i can listen to this podcast about it. i'm thankful because of my affection for austin walker from the waypoint podcast to have started watching his streaming series with patrick klepek, breakfast and battlegrounds, which is pretty entertaining despite (or because of) the fact that the game they are playing involves very little actual stuff happening. i'm thankful to have beaten my second divine beast in zelda. i'm thankful to have my switch for our visit to d's family in california in a few weeks, since i think there are some fun games we can all play together. i'm thankful that i am normally opposed to party games because i don't need cues or excuses to say interesting things and ask people probing questions and also i have a low attention span for rules and the math required for keeping score, but i'm thankful to have enjoyed the jackbox games on multiple occasions, even if the name of them sounds like a masturbation-themed subscription box.

i'm thankful for this picture of lana del rey with a fidget spinner. i'm thankful that though my new antidepressant has been on backorder it is supposed to come in today. i'm thankful for special jolly ranchers. i'm thankful that i spent too much money on turmeric/curcumin products. i'm thankful that i too will buy anything that promises "calm, focused energy." i'm thankful for this pup in a popcorn cup and this corgi getting married. i'm thankful for the names of scottish candy. i'm thankful that d and i watched an episode of kardashians last night while eating large kardashian salads and croissants. i'm thankful that khloe and kourtney's name for kim when they want to make fun of her is "fancy nancy." i'm thankful that she and kanye are in japan right now, which is a place that d and i want to go. i'm thankful to have eaten some mediocre but still enjoyable maple flavored cookies. i'm thankful for nadiya's assertion that "sometimes, just sometimes there is just no need to worry about calories !!!" i'm thankful for "outie belly button."