Welcome to week 26 of Internet of Literal Things. The weird, wacky, wonderful, and wild of the world wide web seems to be several-too-many “w’s” and a perfect place for me to start. I’m Sara Nason, a fellow person on the internet, who happens to have many hours on hand to read random articles that are tucked into multiple crevices in my phone.
I write to you today with a sleep-deprived hangover, non-hangover due to an unplanned visit to the emergency room with my neighbor last night (I’m fine, so is she, I was the designated driver). When I woke up at 7:30am, I could feel my body screaming “go back to sleep, please, I beg you.” The problem with this plea is right next to my bed is a four-month old puppy who usually rises at dawn (6:15am) and will not settle until she’s had the following: (1) a pre-breakfast walk around the park; (2) breakfast in the bowl she likes, but I always make her start in the bowl she doesn’t like; and (3) an hour-long fast-walk/slight jog through the state park near my apartment. And only then does she sleep the entire rest of the day.
All of this is to say that I’m writing to you in a state of self-imposed sleep-deprivation that was not cured by the hour-long nap I took just a bit ago. And instead, I’m entering the next few months of perpetual self-employed h-e-double-hockey-sticks that arrives annually with the joys of fourth quarter meltdowns at every corporate space in America. The joy, the estimated taxes, the months-long foggy brain experience. Join me on this hodge-podge journey as the intros will only get weirder, and my humorous anecdotes will only get more obscure.
So, strangers of the internet, here we go. a quarterly, corporate w arning for the Internet of Literal Things #26.
(While we’re at it, become a paying subscriber for $5 a month to support all of the links that bring this W-focused newsletter your way every Sunday.)
What I’m Reading
Articles
How Susan Sontag influenced Patti Smith’s reading life (NY Times)
Malcolm Gladwell reaches his tipping point (The Atlantic)
The trouble with America’s water (CityLab)
Was Etsy too good to be true? (Vox)
Teens explain the VSCO girl—and why you never want to be one (Slate)
Tina Turner is having the time of her life (NY Times)
In Conversation: Liz Phair (Vulture)
Chicago opens a mental health clinic for infants and toddlers (Chalkbeat)
We’re getting these murals all wrong (The Nation)
Kickstarter’s year of turmoil (Slate)
The history of how school buses became yellow (Smithsonian)
California bans private prisons (The Guardian)
Is transit ridership loss inevitable? A U.S.–France comparison (Transport Politic)
I quit social media for a year and nothing special happened (Josh C Simmons)
It’s tough being a young skyscraper in New York (NY Times)
Don’t move people out of distressed places. Instead, revitalize them (CityLab)
NC lawmakers start drawing new political maps. You can watch it all online (Charlotte Observer)
Books (c/o my local library and my current unwillingness to spend a bodacious amount of money on new books and also dear friends who know that a good gift is always a good book)
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong
The Source of Self-Regard by Toni Morrison
Mostly Dead Things by Kristen Arnett
Normal People by Sally Rooney
Jane Jacobs : the last interview and other conversations by Jane Jacobs and others
What I’m Visually Experiencing
Legend (A Portrait of Bob Marley), 2005 (Vimeo)
Finalists for 2019’s Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards (digg)
18 stunning portraits of women in Kabul (Buzzfeed)
What I’m Listening To
New Birth in New England by Phosphorescent (Spotify)
Cynic by Noah Kahan (Spotify)
Dirty AF1s by Alexander 23 (Spotify)
Wanted by OneRepublic (Spotify)
🏆 A Photo of An #UglyDogs Related Thing On The Internet 🥇
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