I'm on the road again, for work. I'm behind on work. I almost always am. Projects take longer to complete that I expect, and I'm much, much more eager to agree to do something new than to finish something old. It's hard to describe how much work it is, writing and rewriting, cutting and killing your darlings. It's painful. But now, I feel like a whiner, because of course there are many harder jobs I could be doing to earn even less money. I wish I could be organized and efficient, but I think organization and efficiency are the killers of creativity. I've never found a way to whip a story into shape without letting everything get dangerously messy first. I think that's why I started this newsletter, to impose something a little more orderly and regular onto my days.
Onward and upward.
What I'm Writing:
For my Beast column, I wrote about the regular Arkansans who hated Arkansas's discriminating against gay marriage law Religious Freedom Restoration Act. I like to, whenever possible, write about regular people behind the news.
What I'm Reading:
Ann Friedman wrote about the same law in Indiana: Liberals, keep your condescension to yourselves. My good friend Clare Malone makes her New Yorker debut, about the spread of rock-climbing. Jamil Smith goes back to Ferguson to cover the election. Columbia Journalism Review investigates the Rolling Stone rape story debacle, and every reporter's worst nightmare. Rolling Stone is still blaming the victim. Nicole Washington on how eggs are everywhere during the Spring.
What I'm Listening To:
Devil in the White City, about a serial killer during Chicago's world's fair. For awhile, I was listening to it as I was falling asleep at night and that was...a bad idea. I've had more than one dream about Jack the Ripper, Hannibal, and generally the monster-in-the-closet variety of nightmare.
What I'm Watching:
Sometimes, you want to watch a television show that isn't about zombies ripping people apart or 1960s sexism on Madison Avenue or the bloody, fiery political exploits in a fantasy realm of medieval power-grabbers but instead want to watch a show that is simply about kind nurses delivering babies, and an unapologetic love letter to the welfare state. Also, the Breaking Bad prequel, Better Call Saul, is one of the best shows on TV right now.
What I'm Recommending:
I'm stuck in rural Arkansas for the moment, and I worry a lot about the kinds of meats I may be eating (especially because I stopped at McDonald's while I was on the road. Gross but also, yum.) But I did find Bell & Evans chicken at the Whole Foods in Little Rock. The company has animal welfare standards which are better than most and, most importantly, does not dump it's chicken into a chlorinated water bath after it is slaughtered. Which is to say, it also tastes much, much better than many factory-processed chickens. Maybe it's because I grew up seeing, and smelling, the outside of a chicken-processing plant near my middle school, but factory chicken grosses me out more than almost anything else.
Cute Animal Pic of the Week:
It's tough being Milo.
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