“But there is always a November space after the leaves have fallen when she felt it was almost indecent to intrude on the woods…for their glory terrestrial had departed and their glory celestial of spirit and purity and whiteness had not yet come upon them.”
― Anne of Windy Poplars
Happy weekend, ducklings, we made it through another week.
This week was bonkers in the world of work as I’ve had to work on some of the most high-profile stuff I’ve ever done that wasn’t consumer facing…I loved it. It was stressful and fast-paced, but I enjoyed the opportunity a lot. Now, however, all I want to do is sleep and stave off the migraine attack that’s threatening to strike after a week of all too much coffee and not enough healthy food.
Jeff’s birthday was this week so we’re celebrating that this weekend, and starting to plan for the holidays which kick off next week with Thanksgiving. I cannot believe how quickly November is rushing by.
Here is a nice batch of links to get you through the weekend, share what you enjoyed in the comments!
Relevant to my…well, not interests so much as poor habits.
Answering a political question I have never thought to ask: what happens to all that campaign merch?!
I really loved this piece about charm–a highly underrated thing in this day and age.
This piece is a couple of weeks old, but is still worth a read. What does it say that some of the leading tech and platform developers work hard to limit their own children’s access to the things they helped to build?
Move fast and break democracy. (I am the millionth person to make this joke, by the way.) Joking aside, I think we’ve proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that Facebook may not be an evil organisation, but it’s far too powerful for what it is and it’s a mistake to not consider its lasting implications and impact which have had a global scale. No organization is blameless or perfect, but why does a company this ubiquitous, rich and powerful keep getting to screw up on the scale it does without consequences?
Surprising literally no one at this point.
Alex Trebrek is a figure of my childhood and I loved this profile piece.
An interesting piece at Politico about how Republican gerrymandering works…for a party system that no longer exists in the post-2016 world. For better or worse they have a new party leader who has promised new policies and commitments that no Republican would have espoused a decade ago. 2018 has shown how that may cost them future elected positions.
This week in Mormon News, a podcast recommendation and a bit of background reading from the incomparable C. Jane Kendrick. A link to the episode of This American Life in question can be found in her post. She sums up many of my feminist struggles with a patriarchal faith masterfully, “My problem is with the system…it is the power dynamics that I refuse. I refuse men in power and authority over women. I don’t care where it comes from. I refuse it… I believe you could put in a thousand checks to this system, you could go and sit with your child through every interview, you could teach your daughters to be the most feminist, but this system–designed to cultivate absolute obedience–will always seep in.”
This piece by The Cut feels like a good follow up to that. It’s hard, but necessary to read.
Also relevant, this piece by Monica Lewinsky for Vanity Fair. “If you want to know what power looks like, watch a man safely, even smugly, do interviews for decades, without ever worrying whether he will be asked the questions he doesn’t want to answer.”
This week in misogynistic nonsense…
Lady Washington is all, “Who the **** is Carol, George?!” But seriously, this thread is amazing.
Yeah…this feels correct…
It’s the Lester Holt/James Comey thing all over again. Nothing is new and neither is the lack of robust response.
A sad week for pop culture with two losses: Stan Lee and William Goldman.
Speaks for itself:
I love this. 😎😎😎 pic.twitter.com/0skaGQKPZC
— Jay Kuo (@nycjayjay) November 16, 2018
Small Dog Syndrome 
My sad little goal is to make in onto Jeopardy — to RE meet Trebek who in the 1970s was host of a Canadian teen quiz show called Reach For the Top; I was on it 2 years in a row and (imagine that) swore when I got an answer wrong. Ooops.
I think a lot about charm. On one hand, I hate and distrust it, having come from a VERY publicly charming (often privately nasty) family but I also really enjoy it and wish the world had more of it. I think — when not used in the service of manipulation — it’s a lovely quality and one I miss as well.