Emchap's Shit from the Internet 06/24/20 🍠
In a very 2020 twist of fate, I learned this morning that several of my colleagues (including the one who broke up with me in the middle of a pandemic) had been laid off. I'm frustrated and sad on both personal and professional levels, and if anyone happens to be hiring PHP engineers please let me know so I can pass that along.
A friend posted on Instagram yesterday about how one of the things that has made the suffering of 2020 so hard is that unlike other things that are upsetting—big sadnesses from relationships ending or challenges from cross country moves or ended friendships that were no longer serving either party—nothing this year seems like it's worth anything. Normally I (like many people) take a sadness and I learn and grow from it and it's valuable, on some level. You emerge stronger. There is at least a trade for the grief. But this year is just a constant parade of horrible shit that didn't have to happen. This isn't "sadness was inevitable but it led to growth", this is "the country I live in is led by venal, incompetent idiots and everything is worse as a result."
That is the entirety of the essay portion for this week because I started drinking at 4 after staring at a wall for most of the day.
Shit to read
I miss New York just the tiniest little bit.
I cannot imagine the Esquire I used to read as a kid talking about facial feminization surgery; this essay is excellent.
Internet libertarianism is an ethical failing.
This thread, about a horror game which has some fascinating meta-constructs present in it, is fascinating.
As long as I stay in LA, I hope to stay in my current bungalow court.
A lovely photo essay about trans kids.
This poem made me weep.
Gotta be weird to try to not be the nazi polo company.
If you read nothing else this week, read this absolutely heartbreaking story about the slavery and unnecessary death in Cummins Unit in Arkansas.
Shit to eat
Order a cuban sandwich.
Eat half of it. Save the other half for a next-day lunchtime treat.
Learn, via a text message followed by an official announcement, that several of your coworkers have been laid off.
Have some real weird zoom calls.
When it is noon, go to lunch.
Take out the half a sandwich, which is more stale than you wanted it to be.
Debate reheating it, and then decide that it is too much work and you are too discombobulated.
Eat the cold, stale sandwich while watching New Girl for an hour, before heading back to work, where you will accomplish approximately three things in the remaining few hours of your day.
Shit to watch
Please watch these precious children listening to "Jolene" for the first time.
Shit to buy
A friend got this fish cornbread pan for me as a "sorry you got dumped in the middle of a pandemic" gift and it is genuinely so delightful, I'm obsessed. Everyone should own one.