I almost told someone that they looked tired, then I remembered how hurt someone looked the last time I made that comment, 20 years ago at least, and so I asked them how they were doing instead. The person in line behind me at the grocery store had only three items, so I let them… [Read More]
Blog
Bolivia: A Young Man’s Guide to Late Capitalism
I first learned about Bolivia in second grade. One of the priests at my parish had served as a Maryknoll missionary in Bolivia, and he visited our classroom to tell us about it. Bolivia had two capitals, La Paz and Sucre, and the women wore bowler hats. To second graders, these were things that made… [Read More]
My New Substack: The Whatever Years
My new venture, The Whatever Years, is a newsletter for life on the bleeding edge of Generation X. It will cover money, work, caregiving, and live in general. I’d love it if you’d sign up! The first 500 subscriptions are free. After that, I will charge for a full subscription so that I can expand… [Read More]
Spain: An Englishman in Madrid
I suppose my ongoing Velvet recaps could count as reviewing culture from Spain, but I went with a book in the spirit of reading around the world. And that brings me to An Englishman in Madrid, a spy novel set in pre-Franco Spain. The protagonist, Anthony Whitelands, is an English art historian. In 1936, he… [Read More]
Recapping Velvet: Season 1, Episode 10, “The Big Day”
Warning: there are many, many spoilers about the Spanish drama Velvet ahead. I think I’m in denial about how much I liked this show, because I have pages of notes but it takes me forever to write them up. And when I write them up, I just get annoyed by how these characters behave. This episode… [Read More]
