Do you know how I know I should probably strive to get out of the house more often? The level of amusement I get out of trying to find the most ridiculous still in each week’s video.
Clearly I need to take up another hobby.
So it turns out that I’m not the only one suffering from the funks right now. The uproariously witty Jen Mann wrote an unusually vulnerable post last week which makes me wonder if I’m going to have to admit maybe I have more than just the winter grays.
Midlife is some serious bullshit. Every time I get my period I’m stunned to see swirls or red in the toilet bowl rather than tiny piles of ash floating on the water’s surface. I’m simultaneously both disappointed and relieved. Much like when I watch the Grammys and see the Red Hot Chilli Peppers still performing.
WAS THAT SERIOUSLY LESS THAN A WEEK AGO? I thought time was supposed to move faster as you got older. But I looked up a McSweeney’s I wrote for last year’s Valentine’s Day and it’s full of jokes about impending nuclear war with North Korea. CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT ALL OF THAT LITTLE ROCKET MAN BULLSHIT WAS ONLY A YEAR AGO? I swear I’ve aged ten years since then.
So that means that this middle age slump thing, which all research says should last about a decade, is going to feel like it lasts a century.
Thank heavens for deeply-discounted chocolate and all the witty people on the internet that infuse our feeds with joy. Like I can not possibly get enough R. Eric Thomas. If you aren’t subscribed to his newsletters you will never survive the winter. Because he says things like this about one particular dog at the Westminster show:
The agility course, a series of ramps, hurdles, and tunnels, is meant to be taken at top speed and with a gymnast’s precision. Winky looked at the course and was like, “Okay, see what I’m not going to do is break a sweat, though,” and set off on a leisurely trot through some but not all of the obstacles, pausing frequently for applause breaks and to just soak it in. Winky is out here manifesting that Lauryn Hill concert energy and it’s magnificent.
from Winky, the Westminster Dog Show’s Unbothered Bichon Frise, Is My New Life Coach
And oh! Here’s one more thing that tickled my face off this week. From the Weekly Humorist:
In this season of giving, please find it within yourself to keep pleasant and witty anecdotes like this coming in the years ahead. Whether that’s a one-time pledge for some light tongue action, a commitment for just three “you up?” texts over five weeks, or a year-long sexual dalliance at either the casual or exclusive level, your support is the difference between being able to find a man who can effortlessly quote F. Scott Fitzgerald and is fluent in multiple foreign languages, or seeing his humorous anecdotes disappear from modern dating life.
from Transcript: On a Date with an NPR Host
Ok. Now here’s one last thing to hopefully bring you some giggles as we role into this long weekend. UKULELE!! Nothing like churning out a video with only ten minutes of practice, no? It’s a metaphor. Probably.