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“Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.” – Pablo Picasso Many people might think of Picasso as the man who looked at the world as if it were a kaleidoscope and thought, “Why not make it even more twisted?” But, he’s also the guy…
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“You know my method. It is founded on the observation of trifles.” – Sherlock Holmes in “The Boscombe Valley Mystery” Sherlock Holmes is perhaps the greatest fictional detective of all time and Arthur Conan Doyle’s most famous character. It’s probably not too surprising as I find myself quoting Holmes that I tend to analyze everyday…
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“Failure is always an option.” – Adam Savage of MythBusters Is it better to fail miserably and be forgotten, or to fail gloriously and make history? Would it be better to fail in obscurity and fade away into irrelevance? Or, should we seek to fail spectacularly in public view so that others may partake in…
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“You gain more by not being stupid than you do by being smart.” – Phil Birnbaum, baseball analyst, “An Important Life Lesson from Blackjack and Baseball” In an article published on Slate.com, baseball analyst Phil Birnbaum talked about focusing on minimizing bad decisions rather than trying too hard to make the right decisions. Birnbaum continued…
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Intellectualism is defined as “the exercise of the intellect at the expense of emotions.” In other words, it’s when you convince yourself you’re smart by ignoring your feelings. For the philosophers in the back, intellectualism is also a fancy cousin to rationalism, the belief that knowledge comes from pure reason, not from our muddled emotional…
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This is a response to a particularly thought-provoking newsletter from one of my favorite Substack writers. It’s part of her 28-day Writer’s Notebook challenge to find joy in writing again. This particular post from Collected Rejections gave me pause. Valorie Clark discusses the word “inevitability,” its roots, and the conclusion she comes to is that…
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In the world of Pokémon Red, Blue, and Yellow (Generation I), one type oozes through nearly every corner of the Kanto region: Poison. From the very first routes to the Elite Four, players are inundated with noxious creatures – purple sludge monsters, smog-spewing orbs, venomous plants, and Zubat swarms. It turns out almost 22% of…
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A Deep Dive into a Modern Pop Masterpiece Sabrina Carpenter’s latest single “Manchild” might just be one of the most brilliant pop songs of the 2020s. Beyond its catchy beat and sassy lyrics, the track doubles as sharp social commentary, and its music video unfolds as a pastiche of classic film moments that enrich the…
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When will people begin to value their time properly? Time is the most valuable resource of all. It’s the one unrenewable resource every single one of us has, and none of us can gain it back once it’s passed. On this earth, we each have twenty-four hours in a day, but how we choose to…
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Emily Dickinson is famous for her idiosyncratic grammar, liberal use of the hyphen, and seemingly random capitalization of words. Despite using typical poetic devices such as assonance, consonance, and alliteration in her works, her poems take unique forms with layouts often making them a bit cryptic. Are these idiosyncrasies in her poetry a sign of…
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Is Langston Hughes a Modernist poet? That question, once handed to me in a college classroom, now strikes me as too small for the man who so clearly saw poetry as a public force. Labels like “Modernist” tend to flatten voices into movements. But Hughes resists neat categorization. Yes, he wrote in free verse. Indeed,…
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There’s a dangerous myth that still lingers in how we teach, critique, and canonize writing, particularly with essays. It’s the idea that language is fixed, finalized, etched in stone. We’re taught in grammar school that the first draft must already point toward the final product. Then, revision is about perfection, not possibility. But the essay…
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“Being a queer girl isn’t something you decide. It’s something you survive, until you get old enough to claim it.”—Emily Pratt Slatin, Friendship Bracelets And Other Broken Promises This quote from my wife, Emily Pratt Slatin, is surgical. It names what so many queer femmes—especially lesbians and trans women—have lived: not a “choice” but a…
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In my teenage years, I came to realize that angels and demons are actually the same thing, but spiritually polar opposites. So, it’s then our place as mere mortal beasts cursed with divine reason to decide ultimately which side of the pendulum attracts us most. There was a moment in my own adolescence—especially for someone…
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There are days when everything feels like too much—like the very structure of reality is just slightly tilted, and you’re the only one noticing the slope. On those days, grand wisdom and motivational speeches just ricochet off your skin. But a small affirmation? That might make it through. Kate Cassidy recently said in her video…
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Ambitions, goals, and dreams are not necessarily the same thing; while related, ambitions are typically fueled by societal and social expectations. Ambition can look like purpose when it’s actually just a performance for others to convince ourselves of our own value. This means ambitions aren’t necessarily yours; often they can be borrowed beliefs driven by…
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Rather than continue to be herded like sheep in our often blissful, but more often self-defeating ignorance, let’s instead seek to become our own kings and queens. No more of this self-loathing anti-intellectual nonsense. Anti-intellectualism is self-sabotage dressed in false populist humility. It’s the kind of spiritual laziness that flatters itself into thinking that emotional…
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Today, let’s figure out just how a little symbol is now @ the top of the English dictionary. Yes, that curly little character that lives rent-free in your email address. Somehow, it managed to tango its way to the very beginning of the Merriam-Webster online dictionary. How does this happen, you ask? Once, the ‘@’…
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Stamp collecting, also more properly known as philately, is a hobby that has been enjoyed by many people for generations. Whether you are an avid collector or just getting started, there are a plethora of blogs and websites out there that cater to stamp collecting enthusiasts. Let’s explore some of the best philately blogs and…
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If you are an amateur coin collector, you might be interested in finding out which pennies are worth more than their face value. Some pennies can be worth thousands of dollars, depending on their rarity and condition. Here are some tips on how to identify and value the most valuable pennies to look for worth…