a few random things i've been thinking about

into the fog

after listening to that great episode of the ezra klein show with george saunders yesterday, i've definitely been pondering how to get more ideas and less netflix into my life. one big step would be just to read more actual books. after four years of being glued to my phone by the latest antics of the former guy (twitter's new name for him, thanks to biden), i feel like i got dumber. hell, the whole world did. i think we're going to have to have to claw our way back to intelligence, one great book at a time.  and we need to have deep conversations about those books. in fact, we need to have more deep conversations in general. 

i feel like my ability to understand the world has degraded. perhaps because i more or less stopped reading books. i didn't stop reading - i just do most of it on my phone these days. and that's clearly not good for me, nor for my understanding of the world. after four years of constant abuse at the hands of a sadistic narcissist, i feel bruised and damaged and my brain is fogged and confused and it honestly feels harder to make sense of things. mostly because truth is so strangely up for debate. i hope it's not a permanent state, but i feel like i will need to work hard to make sure that it's not.

even just my ability to understand people and their motivations and actions feels like it's degraded. perhaps it's from working at home and not seeing or being around other people - more or less not really seeing anyone but husband these days. and all those old people i try to avoid at the grocery store don't count. i feel like i'm forgetting how to be around people. and communicating via messenger and email and teams doesn't help.

as usual, i find myself bewildered by people who don't look like who they are. that's kind of ironic, since right here on this blog, i wrote a post about how i didn't look like who i was. but in this case, the person looks super creative and alternative and fun and turns out to have the equivalent of a very straight-laced, persnickity, finger-wagging, rule-following accountant on the inside, without actually being an  accountant, in fact, i don't really know what this person does for a living, but it must involve following lots of rules and even coming up with new ones to also follow. maybe i object because it's so disappointing. i think if it was the other way around - someone who looked like a straight-laced accountant, but was actually super creative and alternative - i wouldn't be disappointed, but pleasantly surprised. and maybe even a little bit giddy. which is maybe why the actual situation leaves me confused and maybe even a bit sad.

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oh oh, bye-bye laughing emoji. i guess it's gone the way of thumbs up.

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found a new substack - psychopolitica
i'm hoping it helps with the whole deeper thoughts and conversations thing.

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there's also the sad news that they will stop making the dumle suckers. that delectable caramel, chocolate-covered goodness handed out in danish primary schools. the child is bereft. and i may be wondering if we can get into germany at the moment, so i could run for the border shops.

brain fog or how she talked about bin laden and the garden in one post

i had all sorts of bloggy brilliance in my head this morning during blogger's scheduled maintenance downtime. and of course, as soon as blogger was back online, all that brilliance had slouched off into a kind of soupy fog.

actually, it was one of those mornings where i woke up exhausted from involved and crazy dreams involving the american embassy in copenhagen. i'm clearly still scarred by last week's experience.  i felt like i needed a nap already when i woke up.

since i couldn't blog, i actually sat down and worked diligently for two solid hours. i didn't even open flickr or pinterest, which is big for me. i did check in on facebook, to see if my nephew had had his mouth washed out with soap for the string of swear words (which i believe were actually song lyrics) he posted as his status update last evening. (he had.) but i didn't linger.

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i checked in a bit on the news. they're beginning to release some information about the documents they found in bin laden's house. what's being said is how involved he still was in the day-to-day leadership of al qaeda. a guy who was holed up for five years in a completely unwired house next to a military academy in pakistan was just working from home? i have my doubts.

i have tried both working at home and having a long-distance manager and i can tell you, that works in the short term, but not on a long term basis. and it especially does not work if you are not connected. it smacks a bit of justification and reassurance to me. yup, he was still really important and running the show. i don't think so.  but time will undoubtedly tell.

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we planted the bulk of the rest of the garden - beans, peas, beets, onions, corn, carrots and most of the brassicas (that is my new favorite word). tomorrow, we're going to move out the kale and brussels sprouts (more brassicas) that were started indoors, along with the leeks, squash and pumpkins. the lowest it should go over the next week is 5°C, so we should be out of the frost danger zone.

i also started some asparagus from seed and tho' i completely didn't follow the complicated directions on the back of the package, every single seed i planted came up. but i may wait for their little roots to get a bit more robust before those get planted out. you can't pick asparagus for the first 3 years anyway.

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have any of you read jonathan franzen's freedom? i'm reading it now and although i don't even like this patty woman, i can't put it down. franzen just captures something so essentially middle class and midwest, that even when you don't like the characters, you can just so RELATE.

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well, i've bored you long enough, so i'm off to see if i can unfollow anyone else on twitter for posting stuff that's just too personal or evangelical.