Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1553
Inflation is making everyone crazy. Men, man. Ocean State Job Lots. Talking to a teen. Correct PFAS terminology from my geologist sister.
Good morning what's up coming at you live from the playground. Jane is on the monkey bars. There is a dead rabbit. Killed by a dog or raccoon or something. Would visible on its neck. It's a white rabbit. With spots. The kids are all very fascinated.
I have an update from my geologist sister about PFAS:
Hello! Chiming in as a professional: PFOS and PFOA and the acronyms for the two individual chemicals. If you’d like to refer to ALL of the forever chemicals, the correct acronym is PFAS. Per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances=PFAS.
So that is good to know. I should be using PFAS.
Turns out that Putin Trump summit is at JBER Elmendorf or whatever name they went to when they combined all the bases in the 90's. Oh wait. It's Richardson isn't it. Well that is a much easier word for iOS spell check so that's nice. Seems weird to me we're letting Putin onto a military base lousy with top secret shit everywhere? But hey what do I know.
Join the GMHHAY slack! Reply to this email and ask for an invite if you’re a human who likes chatting with other humans about topics such as these within!
Listening to a gentleman, two gentlemen actually, named David Kauffman and Eric Caboor. I have no idea why. It is sparse, ambient folk with a little country and a little post-rock. It is great. Album is called Songs from the Suicide Bridge.
Boy is it nice that literally no musician is MAGA and you don’t have to check into every musician to make sure they’re not supporting fasicsm. The irony here is even the old fascist musicians of the 90’s like Boyd and Douglas probably don’t like Trump, huh? Actually, I don’t know that to be true. But I’d bet it is.
Went to French Club last night. Was so tired. So tired. My predominant emotion this trip is being tired. Emily told me a story from her massage career about how her suite-mate put a futon in the suite and then all of the sudden every single one (save one) of her male clients got weird and started to try and out the moves on her. Because there was now a futon in the office. That Emily didnt even put there. There is a dark humor to the absurdity of these men inferring this; but mostly the story is just depressing and confirms I don't know anything about men. If you asked me how many would do this, because a piece of furniture appeared, I would guess one; maybe two tops.
I did ask her if they all made their moves in the same way or they all did it in their own special unique fumbling way and it was the latter. I guess this makes sense. I was thinking that they would Google "how to hit on your massage therapist" (though of course these dudes would use the word "masseuse") and get some Barstool Sports article or, you know, a Youtube video from Bill Belichick. But no. Of course. They saw the futon and they just went for it. No plan no logic.
Emily got out of that space, of course, but the woman who put the futon there in the first place also seems to have some challenges, because eventually it disappeared.
Men.
BUT I also got to go to Ocean State Job Lots in Stoughton, MA with an old friend of mine and her 17 year-old daughter. Drove down listening to some awesome tunes real loud. Was about to change the fader ro kick in the rear speakers but remembered I have a kid.
Being a parent means you never get to use the fader knob on your car stereo.
Anyhow Ocean State Job Lots rules.I bought almonds and caramels and a shit ton do cheap paint brushes. Just the most random shit. It is so great. That store should be everywhere.
I learned that, among this group of teenagers, at least, when they have sensitive relationship talks with their significant others, they often have third and fourth parties on the line: sorta like lawyers, or advocates, but also communication facilitators. I would be shocked if this is a widespread phenomenon amongst the teens these days but hey. Maybe. It definitely should be. Seems really smart.
I also conferred with the 17 year-old about malls and she and her friends are indeed very much into getting dropped off at the mall by their parents and they all just wander the mall in packs. Economics are an issue: some of them have more money, some of them can buy nothing.
Which leads to my new theory: inflation is making everyone crazy. This is on top of our AI angst and our political fascism angst. Inflation has been going on for what? 2-3 years now? And we weathered it okay but... it's still going! And it... I dunno man. It's making people do insane things. Everyone is fucking sick of it.
I'm definitely projecting here a bit because this week I am just done with it and pretty done with buying anything at all. Fuck em all. All of America needs to stop buying shit. We all know this. But we will continue. But, man, $5 for a soda is insane. Zoe's green beans were TWENTY DOLLAES last night. And yeah that is delivered but Chinese takeout and delivery existed long before Uber and GrubHub and I used to get Zoe's delivered for free. The green beans used to be, like? $7. It's insane. I'm so tired of it. And I'm rich! I can't even imagine what this is like for a normal American family how the fuck is anyone still voting for Trump.
Zoe's though. An American treasure. Julia Child used to say it was her favorite Chinese restaurant. This is mayhaps apocryphal but widely spoken in these parts and definitely believable.
Is there a bronze statue of Julia at Smith College? Their should be.
Looks like all the kids at the playground are headed off on the day's activities and we will head inside. Jane and I are playing a game where we take my amazing wonderful email-myself-app, and we type a prompt in for the other person and they finish the sentence. And she loves the game and; for now at least, does not consider it to be a situation of daddy asking probing questions so she mostly answers the prompt honestly and I feel like I've unlocked some sort of cheat code for communicating with my daughter and today thusly holds much promise.
"I love...."
"I love my daddy but he is going to die someday and then I will be very sad."
Valar Morghulis, kid.
Oldies playlist today, mix of old and new. Hahah just kidding. ALL OLD. It’s an oldies playlist. Okay that was a dumb joke.
Have a lovely day. I am off tomorrow. I think I’ll write? Probably? But no promises.
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Thanks for reading.
And hey! Maybe buy one of my books!
Good Morning, Hello, How Are You vol 1.