Obscure Curiosities

Seeking New Vibrations – May 2026

Perhaps the best affirmation I’ve come across this month is this: “I start every morning with positive intentions.” It’s amazing how much just having a single positive intention to build your day around can lead you to making better decisions about how you should choose to spend your time and energy. Soon as I started using this as my mantra the last week of May, I came up with a new workflow that splits my intentions across tasks, spreading them out in half-hour segments across both the morning and afternoon, ensuring I’m always making progress on some aspect of my creative output. The rest of the time can be purely used for spontaneous creativity and rest. Lately, I’ve needed a lot of rest, far more than I’m used to in spring.

I intended to start these monthly compilations of what I’ve published, been reading, watching, and listening to, with some artsy-fartsy stream of consciousness based on whatever lyric I happen to have stuck in my head as the month turns over. But I’m not really one to lean into gimmicks, so if I do these lyrical riffs, they will be independent of these monthly recaps. I create these more to prove to myself what I’ve accomplished and to share what interests me in a sort of public permanent record. But if I do write those, I will link them in these blurbs.

I’ve also greatly reduced my video game participation this month, with MLB the Show Mobile being my only real game that I play now. So, there will likely be some posts about that on Obscure Curiosites reflecting on my experiences with that experience versus the PS5 version going forward.

Without further ado, let’s recap this month. It wasn’t my greatest in terms of creative output, a lot of archive work going on behind the scenes and revising a lot of old stuff to get both of my sites active again. I did watch a bunch of great stuff, although until now, the links have been scattered across so many journal entries, which is being rectified going forward.

What I’m Reading

I was in a bit of a reading slump this entire month, and tried to make up for it by compiling my old reading notes. My notes on things I actually read this month are what follows, and are being published at the links below.

I also plan on linking to articles I’ve read, which is actually quite a few, but this month I simply didn’t have the energy to go back and compile these. I plan to do better on this front in the future. I will just say subscribe to Henrik Karlsson and his Escaping Flatland substack, and check out 3 Quarks Daily and Arts and Letters Daily, because that’s where I get most of my online reading material these days.

What I’m Watching

Special shoutout to Affirmations by Fern ASMR. Her affirmations have been truly transformative for my mindset recently. I also watch The Rest is Science every Monday night (except when it’s on Sunday night) and Wednesday night, because Hannah Fry and Michael Stevens (aka VSauce) are just the greatest podcast hosts ever. (And theirs isn’t even my favorite podcast; that’s Anna of Wild Geese! Her videos are roughly biweekly, though, so they are a real treat.) 

I’ve been trying to limit my YouTube considerably over the past month. I’m certainly being far more picky about how I spend my screen time. But when you suffer from extreme bouts of chronic fatigue, YouTube is unfortunately often my only option to keep me from sleeping away entire days.

[I have so many more videos to list that likely just won’t make it here… I’m playing catch up!]

Below is a curated list of YouTube videos I’ve watched this month. When notes are available on Obscure Curiosites, it will be denoted as (Notes):

What I’m Listening To…

This section will be a lot better in future months. But I did watch the Foo Fighters: Tiny Desk Concert. Good to see them still going strong! My listening habits are very odd these days, and I need to get back to discovery.

However, I DO have to share this: “Bravado” Lorde cover by Sarah And Sabrina Carpenter (2013) – yes, that really is THE Sabrina Carpenter and her sister Sarah, and this cover is incredible. 

And this one for good measure from around the same time: Sabrina Carpenter – ‘Shake It Off’, Taylor Swift (cover) – notably also with Sarah.

Also, hi Amy Lee! – Evanescence – Who Will You Follow (Official Music Video)

Read, watched, or heard something life-altering? Let me know in the comments. Anything that offers new vibrations, positive ones preferred, I want to know about it!

Amelia Desertsong