using purell 'til my hands bleed and swell (week notes 18)

Doing

Unfortunately I haven’t been able to exercise much; partly, this is because I haven’t been making the time for it, but I also tweaked my right shoulder somehow and it’s been quite painful to use in every day tasks. Ring Fit is therefore off the table. The trouble is that I genuinely don’t know what I did to it! This week is my last before our holiday break, and I’m hoping to get back on the horse over the course of my 16 (!!) days off.

I briefly contemplated spending far too much money on a print of Martha Rich’s “Stop Talking,” but I’m far too poor and cheap, even though it expertly captures how I feel lately after work (or interacting with anyone).

I’ve been in a strange headspace since turning 30. I feel as though I know myself and the world so much better now, like it’s time to stop wasting all my time on the bullshit and focus instead on what’s really important to me. I have been reflecting on myself a lot lately, but in a present- and future-oriented way: what is it I want to be doing? What really fucking matters? These questions sound quite existential and they are, but they’re also oddly liberating — and it’s driving me to read more and (hopefully) write again. It all feels like coming back home after a long trip, taking comfort and finding peace and joy in the known and loved familiar.¹

Reading

I’m still (re-)reading Pride & Prejudice and I’m just as in love with it as ever. I’m sure it’s revisionist history on my part, but I feel I understand the humor, the plot, the politic far more this time around — but then, I’m always looking back at the past and thinking I’ve grown far older and wiser since when perhaps only the former is true.

Watching

Joe and I finished the Emma mini-series that we started last week; I’d seen it before and found it similarly delightful this time around, though I’m beginning to doubt my prior assertions that Emma is Austen’s work (albeit not my personal favorite). Perhaps a re-read is in order…

I’m also continuing on with Girls; I’m actually enjoying it now (still in season one). There’s some really funny shit in it, but most of the dramatic beats fall short for me. I find Hannah generally insufferable, Adam I’m up and down on, I love what little Shoshanna there is, I’m tepid on Jessa, and I like Marnie.

Listening

• “2468” by Horsegirl. A random find while stumbling around Bandcamp, but I’m in love.
• On the Intricate Inner Workings of the System, The Bug Club. Pleasant listening but a bit humdrum; few standouts for me as there have been on their other albums.
• Alopecia, WHY? I’ve been listening to “Good Friday,” mainly, and sampling other tracks here and there for years. For some reason I had a line from “These Few Presidents” in my head this week — “even though I haven’t seen you for years, yours is a funeral I’d run to from anywhere” — and it prompted me to at last listen to the album all the way through. I have since been (figuratively) spinning and shuffling it through the week. I’ve not listened to any others of WHY?’s albums — I get the impression they’re variable in quality — but I may give them a shot.