Please killer whales, save the day with murder
Rubalee, book by Javier Antonio González
It probably helps to know this sentence was sung, not spoken. Theo and I saw a workshop production of the first act of this musical back in 2023 at the recommendation of an old friend who no longer lives in New York and is friends with the theater company developing it. It's about whales, as in the main character is a North Atlantic right whale. Last week the same old friend forwarded an email announcing a reading of the full show at Pregones/PRTT, forgetting she'd sent me to the workshop years ago, so Theo and I decided to go see how it had progressed. And, well, the second half has killer whales who (spoiler, sorry) serve as a kind of cetus ex machina for the finale.
Our nation's pigs have answered the call to protect the president's slime
Submitted by Kelsey last week but I forgot to add it, sorry Kelsey.
Yet it is there that we are worn down and disintegrated, that constant vigilance like a vibration that shakes all our atoms loose and tumbles them ever downstream.
"Umyazu", Mandy Brown for her blog A Working Library
Water, the color of fresh Mountain Dew, laps at their thighs as they dredge the bottom with poles like cranberry farmers on a faraway radioactive planet.
"The 13 Steps of a Trump Fiasco", Charlie Warzel for The Atlantic
Submitted by Anne. The reflecting pool story is such a gift for writers. Such an evocative, goofy situation.
We talk from time to time around here about my favorite postmodern comedians, the people who design user interfaces for Citigroup Inc.’s internal software.
"The Stock Market Will Get More Stock", Matt Levine for Bloomberg
I lost track of this one in my sentence bookmarking, so it's old, but I still like it a lot.
I was having a hard time connecting with anyone who hadn’t locked eyes with a particular sort of darkness.
"Around a Dark Corner", Amanda Petrusich for The New Yorker
Submitted by Jacob.
She had an affair—not because she didn't love her husband or because he was unkind or uninteresting, but because she was transforming into a machine sort of thing or maybe a superhero.
Minor Robberies, Deb Olin Unferth
When a request comes in, your PHP source is handed to an AI that reads it, runs it in its head, makes up whatever it needs to (the database, the clock, the network, the truth), and hands back the HTTP response it reckons the code would have produced.
README for VibePHP, Mattieu Napoli
It's mostly the parenthetical, I admit.
Market cap is eggs plus robot Goose alpha.
"Untethered Goose Game", Bryce Elder for Financial Times
It looks like they're brewing Yodas in there.
"Promises Made, Promises Kept: The Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool Absolutely Looks Like Shit Now", David Roth for Defector
Submitted by Chris.
It was for the Eucharist, then, that I was wrestling a thick anti-intercourse pair of tights up towards my waist.
"A Tradcath Wedding", Patricia Lockwood for London Review of Books
"Nobody's laughing at us anymore," said the man filling in for Milli Vanilli.
"I Went to Trump’s Great American State Fair. It Was Bleaker Than I Expected.", Kate Corliss for Washingtonian
Submitted by Isaac.
Alex was a sort of inert piece of social furniture—only her presence was required, the general size and shape of a young woman.
The Guest, Emma Cline
I'm about three years late to reading this and can only really do it in small doses, being easily overwhelmed by the overarching dread permeating the narrative.
To note that man is still vile, though, is to leave open the possibility that someday man might not be, which is to say that it could be a kind of patriotic sentiment.
"Happy Fucking Birthday", Christopher Hooks for Harper's
Submitted by Kelsey.
These are but a fraction of the several hundreds of billions of pennies issued since 1793, most of which have suffered a mysterious fate sometimes described in government records, with a hint of supernaturality generally undesirable in bookkeeping, as “disappearance.”
"America Must Free Itself From the Tyranny of the Penny", Caity Weaver for The New York Times Magazine
Submitted by George.
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