We had an oil spill in our basement when I was in HS—we had just moved into the house and the basement was full of stuff we hadn’t unpacked yet. And it smelled like oil for 25 years.

HOW HAD I COMPLETELY FORGOTTEN ABOUT THIS. (blocked it out but WOW the memories now...)

in general fiction? Sure. That’s basically the entire premise of the “Women’s fiction” subgenre. Or “fiction with romantic elements.” But if a book is being marketed as romance, it must have an HEA, and the relationship must be fundamental to the story (e.g. No romance, no story)

My understanding is that for relatively obscure scholars who are Staying In Their Lane his interviews are quite good at bringing out useful points, but anyone else? yikes on bikes.

I had this conversation with a lot of folks--sometimes a job just isn't a fit, and that's not great, but it important to get people where their talents and skills will do the most good!

Legit there was a place near my old apartment with two bowls—a low one held out to kids with candy, and a high one held out to adults with liquor.

Food For Free supports families in Cambridge and Somerville Public Schools with nutrition support to cover weekends when there are no free school meals.

I said “better than expected“ in that it existed, had a veneer of honesty, and sketched out a redemptive arc. ”Good” would have been that with “maybe I’m not the guy for this moment.”

Exactly.

Sometimes I feel like the only appropriate response is the Tyra Banks "We were all rooting for you!" gif.

And the apology for the Reddit stuff was better than expected, but it was also "there's definitely more" and again--the competency of the campaign staff comes into question. Some of it was probably surviveable if you can craft a good arc but now it's just...ugh.

There was some good stuff in the message! "A life of dignity and joy" is a pretty solid first principle. But the bar is in the basement and he didn't quite make it over and that makes me want to throw things.

I almost went to a fundraiser for the guy because it was a couple streets over from me in Somerville, but I just had that "ok, when's the other shoe going to drop?" sense early. A real "I want to believe!" but jfc we've gotten burned before.

It's really annoying to see people try and cram something through when you can't even pull papers for the primary ballot yet. And when someone's doing that the spidey senses often light up with a "what are you trying to scam me into?"

There’s gotta be someplace between “focus grouped into milquetoast oblivion” and “this f’n guy” but I despair of ever finding it.

The voices in the ear of a candidate/elected official MATTER and there’s a baseline competency issue here that is also ticking me off. They went to the trouble of nuking his Reddit history—they didn’t flag this??

the awful meaning of the tattoo aside, who in the hell is this dude listening to? NOBODY went through the “EVERYTHING will come out, cards on the table” exercise that any reasonable candidate goes through? This is what happens in highly visible primaries.

My kid just came upstairs to find the 3rd volume of March (John Lewis’s memoir graphic novel.)