Castle of Lost Dreams was on port 23
Something that weirdly prepared me for life in 2020s was hanging out in text-based, international chat rooms of the mid-90s. Not creepy ones or repetitive AOL ones with bored teens but... emergent communities. I frequented a USENET newsgroup called alt.good.morning which consisted largely of people saying, yes, “Good morning” to one another regardless of time zone. It was a friendly, maybe corny, place that didn't really have a lot of other aspects I can say as the important parts that drew members, so-called AGMers, together. Individuals ran a few “talker” telnet sites where we'd gather to chat in real time. No gaming or role-playing, no filesharing, just a group chat. One such talker site was “COLD”, which stood for Castle of Lost Dreams, and the other I would have a hard time thinking of – it was by far the less favored spot. (Why did they need two, I sometimes wondered? It was hard enough to be logged into one at a time and sometimes even COLD was very quiet.) I don't remember many particular conversations there, other than the day Princess Diana died and the time a college-aged friend recommend I listen to the band Jump, Little Children. With time, my truly, quite wholesome but a bit superficial connections to these nice Internet adults withered. I was unlikely to maintain decades-long friendships with a librarian in Long Island or an IT sysadmin in Sheffield. I imagine the group doesn't hang much anymore. Maybe they're on a Discord server together. I can think of two real-world names of AGMers. Sure, I could track them down, but what's there to say? “Thanks for being nice to a teenager on dial-up back in the day and recommending some music? So, uh, good morning again?”
What was going on in January, February, March, AND April? I have lots to share.
Reading:
I bought Maggie Smith's Keep Moving late on New Year's Eve and didn't regret it. On the flipside, I considered other lives I could have led.
An AirBNB had a copy of Road & Track, not one of my usual periodicals, and in it was a piece that's stuck withme: the pandemic has oddly led to new Cannonball Run records. At night for comfort, I read bits of Brandon Stanton's latest Humans book and the delicious Compound Butter. Shea Serrano's Angel was a fun quick read and he's a joy on Twitter.
I read a few articles that are really going to stick in my mind, like a Wired piece about how social media and our traumatic events interact, this WaPo essay about parenting during a pandemic, and pal Jillian Ivey's analysis of “professionalism” in this era. The time of the “lunchbox moment” in immigrants' kids' stories is maybe over. A guy I don't know much about, but whom I would like to have a coffee with with, shared with his father a fascination of pro wrestling. Margaret Atwood reflected on Laurie Anderson's Big Science which exploded my high school mind 15 years after its release.
My friend Kris Jansma has started a newsletter about the craft of writing. So far he's talked about The Fun and Lightness. Subscribe if this sounds up your alley!
Eating:
January pop-up fun was takeout from Super Curry Fun Club and Soul & Busan. In February we discovered the pleasures of Marcella Hazan's eggplant parmesan. Our new takeout discovery was Lazeez which has the city's best naan and Indo-Chinese options. Kelsey & I also celebrated our first wedding anniversary with lunch from Parc, just as we had on the wedding day itself. We've started making coconut ice cream, some in our ice cream machine and some via wacky YouTube recipes. (I know what I did there.) Last, I'll shout-out Penrose Diner and Alyan's for being takeout/delivery spots that really come through in clutch moments. Doesn't this section normally feel longer in a one-month newsletter? It's been a long stretch of feeling uninspired in the kitchen!!! Send me your one-pot, no-thought mostly plant-based recipes.
Beating:
I suppose I listen to a lot of different sources of music and it never feels enough. I tuned into more Kleptones Lockdown Radio in January, listened to the DJ Krush mix Holonic for forgotten reasons, and basked in Iris Dement. February brought a wide array. I rediscovered Shockra, The Antlers, and the USA mixtape from a group called, confusingly, RIAA. The latter I discovered some years ago and can't refind a source for it. It's lived mostly on my phone & memory cards, one of the few albums to do so, over and over over the years. The samples include 2 Live Crew, offensive spoken word clips that are presented in an ironic?postmodern?commentary? way, and numerous tracks that are familiar but unnameable. I also dabbled in Dusty in Memphis, WWOZ, DJ Spooky, some of those aesthetic playlists/mixes on YouTube, and '69 Dead of the Day. Did you know Willie Nelson has two albums that pay tribute to Frank Sinatra?
I've been trying to support more artists on Bandcamp Fridays. A big great find for me was Pearl Charles.
In April I listened to covers of Aphex Twin's "Avril 14th" which you will recognize. I also dug deep into Phish's Junta album for the first time and leaned heavily on Freshly Squeezed electroswing mixes for working soundtracks. Kelsey introduced me to Noah Cyrus who is of that Cyrus family but doesn't sound like it. An old friend encouraged me to build a Spotify playlist of a mix CD I'd made 15 years ago and that was fun.
Deleting:
I've been putzing about cleaning the basement (thanks to Kelsey for lots of support on this!) and my home office and my software life. I've also been thinking about the ethics of getting rid of things.
Retreating:
We went to the wee Saunders Preserve in January and also enjoyed our federal government's management of Eastern Neck NWR and John Heinz NWR. Eastern Neck would make a pleasant day trip from Philly, and it was right near our Airbnb called The Blissful Retreat. Approaching this category from a few different angles for February, I discovered WebSDR and we screamed with delight at The Durrells in Corfu. We also walked in the snow one day at Stoneleigh (below) which is plopped next to Villanova's campus. March's adventures brought us to White Clay Creek State Park. I bought an annual pass for Delaware state parks which was out of spite and hope. And in April we popped down to Burton Island Nature Preserve, relished cherry blossoms in Fair
mount Park, and housesat in Cape May. (We're still here, and it's been glorious.)
I'm writing more often, hooray. Maybe soon I'll rewatch Emily in Paris and take some time to discuss that. Would that be of interest to y'all?
Meeting:
I've recently recorded appearances on a bunch of podcasts: #US, Things I'm Working On, Amuse-Bouche, Kidflix, and Breaking Mayberry. I think that's all of them. In the world of streaming shows, the next My Dinner With... is mid-June and Noah & I have a YouTube channel for Neil Estate, our comedy game show about goofy house listings.
This newsletter was not just screaming.
Neil