Slow running
Today I’m shocked to find myself recommending an article from the New York Times, a publication that has been bugging the hell out of me lately. I will not...
The counterintuitive power of forever
Editorial note: You can now read my Weird Covid essay in Slate! Thank you to Shannon Palus for helping me polish it up for a wider audience. If you’ve been...
Weird Covid
I tested positive for Covid on January 20, 2021. This was before vaccines were available beyond healthcare workers and the very elderly, at a time when all...
Why I write this newsletter
Lately I’ve been thinking about how and why I write this newsletter, and I’ve gotten some questions about it too. Here are the basics: I usually write a...
Fun with music
Since I wrote about getting off Spotify a few weeks ago, I’ve been exploring other ways to listen to music. I thought I’d share a few discoveries and...
Black and white
This newsletter has been a Four Thousand Weeks fan account for a bit now, and I’m sticking with the theme this week, sort of. I say “sort of” because I’m not...
Three myths of time management
Myth 1: You have enough time to do everything you want to do. Sorry, you don’t. No one does. The hard truth is that there will never be an end to your to-do...
The problem with burnout discourse
Long time readers of this newsletter will remember my obsession with the monks of the Monastery of Christ in the Desert, initially sparked by this article by...
Reclaiming my taste
Last week I canceled my Spotify premium account, a step on the way to deleting it altogether. I’ve gotten off a lot of apps and platforms over the last...
Why I have to start at the beginning
While exploring your warm-ups a few weeks ago, I promised more about my conflicted relationship to outlining. It turns out my relationship to it is even more...
On post-plague disappointment
For my apocalypse book, I’m researching the Black Death. It’s probably the most stereotypically “apocalyptic” event I’m exploring, in terms of its sheer...
A round-up of your warm-ups
Thank you to everyone who commented or sent me notes on your writing warm-ups! No one does it exactly the same way, and the diversity of approaches was...
What’s your warm-up?
My husband is a musician, and I’m always learning new things about the creative process by watching him work. Lately I’ve been thinking about scales, and the...
Finally some helpful book publishing advice
Writing a book is an emotional minefield. Not only are you doing the hardest intellectual work of your life, but also at regular but random intervals every...
Three ways writing a book is different than covering news
When I set out to write a book, I thought it’d be basically the same as writing magazine stories, only much longer. On the surface, I’m doing the same sorts...
What I’ve learned writing about apocalypses, during an apocalypse
What's wrong with back to normal
My best productivity advice
I’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback on last week’s issue about stopping work even when you don’t want to or think you can’t. (Thank you!) I want to...
Why stopping work is just as important as starting
In my last newsletter of 2021, I included this note about recalibrating my work and rest schedules: When I was doing mostly news and feature articles, I...
A frontier double feature
Hi friends! I’m back from a holiday break that managed to be both relaxing (because I spent most of it cross stitching at my parents’ house) and stressful...
The Antihero Trilogy, part 3
It’s impossible to watch Breaking Bad in 2021 and not think about Donald Trump. At its core, the show is the story of a white man who thinks the world owes...