Hello, Friends. How are you? How was your week? Ours was really good. The kids holiday break starts today and they were so happy when they got home from school. Olive will be joining us from Paris on Sunday (and I’m trying not to think too much about Ralph and Maude spending Christmas so far from us; I miss them so dang much).
A lot of my time lately is spent on renovation tasks. There are daily meetings and check-ins with tradespeople, tasks like choosing cupboard knobs and lighting, issues to solve when problems arise (like the radiator pipes in the kitchen need to be moved), plumbing parts to track down, and errands like having paint mixed. Everything takes longer than I think it will. Hah!
I suspect that things could slow down a bit renovation-wise for the next two weeks as people take time off for the holidays. I think we’ll try to tackle some projects that we can all work on as a family — like doing a traditional Danish soap finish on the wood floor in the attic.
Ready for your link list? Here are a few things I’ve wanted to share with you:
-People Thought Covid-19 Was Relatively Harmless for Younger Adults. They Were Wrong. “New research shows that July may have been the deadliest month for young adults in modern American history.”
-The connection between quantity and quality in art.
-“The thing I regret most is that I ever called 911.”
–The Most American Religion. On faith, identity, and what the Mormon story says about America.
-“President Trump is on the verge of leaving behind a federal government, and perhaps a large number of major industries, compromised by the Russian government.”
-From Moira Donegan: “I wrote about Pornhub, and how conflicting left wing impulses surrounding porn has abdicated criticism of the industry almost entirely to the right—people who will not helpfully address porn’s mosaic of gender and labor exploitations.”
-Fed-Up Teens Are Outing Their Rapists on TikTok.
-Do you have a favorite Christmas Carol?
-Someone reminded me of Egyptian Magic cream and I just ordered a jar.
Here are some tweets I’ve saved for you:
-A beautiful, heart-felt, love-filled thread. Worth your time.
-A helpful thread explaining how the vaccines works.
-This made me laugh out loud.
–How would you describe cramps to somehow who hasn’t felt them? The responses are worth reading.
-What’s on your feminist reading list?
–Two different Americas depending on skin color and wealth.
-A thread about the case against Google.
-Let those who are most impacted lead. Read this thread.
–I feel the same way about hotels. I really enjoyed reading the responses.
–Hahaha.
I hope you have a fantastic weekend. I’ll meet you back here next week. I miss you already.
kisses,
Gabrielle
The “quantity and quality in art” article reminds me of your swim meet post and how the no-pressure and abundant swim meets really helped the swimmers excel. Interesting to see the same thing applied to art.
Thank you–I so look forward to “A Few Things.” Quantity and Quality!
I think your link posts are my favorite thing I look forward to every week. Some of the posts I have read, but I don’t ever come away without being so grateful and more informed, asking more questions, etc.. I especially was blown away reading about The Russian Hacking, the Porn Hub article, and the use of tiktok to out rapists, followed directly by christmas carols. The Juxtaposition was shocking, but made me reflect on how this whole year has been nothing but juxtaposition. My family life has grown so sweet even with deep pay cuts, but then I can’t stop informing myself and involving myself in what continues to go on in the world every day. Thank you for the links and the twitter threads. I can’t wait to show my husband the period thread!
It isn’t technically a christmas carol, but today is the dark turn of the year, every day will be a little longer from now until Midsummer, and for solstice I love listening to Gregory Herford’s poem set to music:
I hear a bird sing
in the dark of December
A magical thing
and sweet to remember
“We are nearer to Spring
than we were in September”
I heard a bird sing
in the dark of December
I love the variety of your links and I always learn so much! Here’s another topic I bet your readers would like, about the radical philanthropy of MacKenzie Scott, who divorced Jeff Bezos and got 4% of Amazon’s stock. Imagine what Jeff Bezos could do it he had a quarter of her generosity.