Good Morning. Hello. How are you? #1585
Car line chaos, mood stabilization, what are young dudes into, loveliescrushing, Bari bitching
Hello hello hello. Good morning. Hi. How are you? Just back from dropping Jane off, per uszhe. There was all this commotion and hubub when we got to the school at an unusually early 7:10 AM. I sort-of gingerly navigated around it all and got into the drop-off line. And before too long a school employee came to tell me that I obviously didn’t read the newsletter this week and that from now on, on Wednesday and Thursday, the fourth and fifth graders had Chorus on Wednesday and Thursday mornings and that the drop-off line should not get in line until… 7:10 AM.
It was 7:12 when she told me this.
But whatever.
How is anyone supposed to read the school newsletter. There are six. Maybe seven. They come to my email, they come to my phone. If I read them all it would be my entire life. I have things to do, maaaaan.
But boy, she was very judgmental about this. Excellent way to start the morning.
(huh. I thought “judgmental” had an e in it after the g. Who knew.)
Glad it didn’t happen yesterday when I was still in my anger and angst and despair mode. I seem to be mostly out of that dark mood today. I have sorted one of my work emergencies, semi-sorted the other, so, you know, maybe 50% of the way there. Enough progress that I can see a light at the end of the tunnel.
Oh shit my GMMHAY topic notepad list runneth bare. That is not good. When I don’t have any topics, I default to wanting to rant about politics and Mike Johnson doing one of the most non-democratic things possible, not seating a congressperson, and how even a year or two ago it would have been on the front page of every paper for weeks and now most people don’t even know about it and how utterly our media has failed us and how ICE pepper sprayed a woman playing the clarinet because clarinets are antifa now I guess I gotta buy a clarinet. I mean, clarinet girls were always the coolest in band, we all know it.
Maybe I better just do my transition here.
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!
We are listening this morning to the beautiful new Numero Group pressing of loveliescrushing’s seminal goth shoegaze masterpiece bloweyelashwish. I am happy that this era of goth shoegaze, the early 90’s, is getting its due. Mainstream goth was turning more towards its oontz oontz phase, which it still really hasn’t grown out of, if I am being honest, even though plenty of amazing non-techno goth exists these days. And MBV’s more symphonic stuff was never that big to begin with and a sad thing about the shoegaze heyday is it was quick and the world moved on by, like, ‘94, and even Ride and Slowdive were abandoning it and MBV was an absentee godfather. And all these amazing goth-tinged shoegaze bands came out that were all just fantastic. Mostly on Projekt, some on the amazing label C’Est La Morte, which I wrote about a few weeks ago. With Lycia getting a solid vinyl re-issue treatment, albeit in Italy, and Loveliescrushing now getting attention from Numero Group, things are looking up. Now we just need a solid reissue campaign for Love Spirals Downward, the kings of the genre. Though recently a label I don’t know anything about, Lost in Ohio records, reissued their fourth album on vinyl, so we are making good progress.
Man it never occurred to me that all these bands start with L. Well, I guess except for Area/Moon Seven Times and I would lump Johanna’s House of Glamour in there maybe as well, though they were a bit more folk goth.
God what a world it was when you used to just be able to go see these bands at the Middle East Upstairs for, like, seven bucks. That Moon Seven Times show my god.
I guess when I have no topics I also ramble on about music.
So I suppose most of you aren’t as media-industry-obsessed as I am. I mean, Rex is, but not most people. And it is occurring to me that many people do not know why this whole Bari Weiss going to CBS thing is just so utterly horrifying and horrible and depressing. And I thought there wasn’t going to be anything new in it that I didn’t already know, but this John Oliver segment on the whole situation was educational even for me. So if you are curious why people are so pissed about this, this is a good way to spend 30 minutes of your time. Or, you know, 22.5 minutes if you watch it on 1.25x all hail Youtube’s speed controls.
Oh man I have resorted to posting links in GMHHAY how low the mighty have fallen on this day of the block of writers. Shoulda done the super-secret scatology edition of GMHHAY today. Maybe tomorrow.
Driving back from the school this morning, through the suburban hood, there was a man chasing after his two kids as they ran to school. And as he crossed the street in front of me, I noticed he was wearing a pair of super bright yellow hipster sneakers. He was too old for them, but hey, that’s cool, I’m too old for the band t-shirts I wear every day. Live your truth.
But it did get me thinking: Are the kids, young adults, hipsters and whatnot… are they still into sneakers? Is there still sneaker culture amongst the youngins? Like… is it like “vinyls” where kids buy them too, or is it like model trains, where old dudes are literally the entire subculture at this point. Are dude bro hipster kids into fashion at all any more? Supreme is mostly dead right?
What are they into these days besides Joe Rogan and maxing and racism and whatnot? Are there any cool subcultures of collecting and/or nerddom amongst men of, say, 18 to 30? Watches? Cars? Sex? Anything? Are they all completely blackpilled? I legit have no idea. I know a bunch of young women for assorted reasons (they apply for jobs, they babysit, my friends have kids) but I legit don’t think I know a single dude that age. What are they up to?
I kinda think I would maybe read a “Young Dude Times” newsletter.
I mean I am not one of those people who needs to keep up with the kids to try and pretend I am still young and cool I legit don’t give a fuck about their proclivities. But I do care about, you know, society and culture.
Jane and I had a talk this morning about her theory of ignoring bad memories. And I told her there was a lot of merit to it, that people sometimes dwell on bad memories and it can’t be healthy. And that she was smart to not spend too much time on them. And she liked that and felt validated. And then I said but it also helps to talk about your bad memories before you push them out, and that mommy was very good to talk to to about these things and she said “I hope I am good at it too when I am older I hope I am like mommy” and boy did that get me right in the ticker. I took the opportunity to tell her that most people aren’t very good at listening, that they talk too much instead of listening but that oh look, right now, Jane is listening to me instead of talking, and boy she loved that. That was nice. Good morning of talking. Even if I did most of the talking.
But that was maybe kind of the point.
Got a covers playlist for you today everybody loves covers playlists, amirite?
Whew. That was like pulling teeth today. BUT WE MADE IT. I hope it was more pleasant for you to read than it was to write. Xoxo
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Thanks for reading.
And hey! Maybe buy one of my books!
Good Morning, Hello, How Are You vol 1.
Ah hah! Buttondown doesn’t allow images via comments. I’ll email you directly.