GOOD LUCK WITH THAT
Look, if you've got the willpower to avoid the internet and legacy media for 24 hours, by all means power down your devices and spend today alone with your thoughts, but the fact that you're reading this right now does not bode well for your plans of thoughtful contemplation.
The good news is that, even if you fail in this endeavor, you have delicious consolation prizes waiting in the wings because today is also National Fruit Compote Day AND National Peanut Butter Lovers Day. Scrumdiddlyumptious!
While you're prepping said consoling confections, consider relaxing to the swinging sounds of Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Alice Coltrane, Sarah Vaughn, Nina Simone, Dinah Washington, Cassandra Wilson, and more — today is also National Black Women in Jazz and the Arts Day!
I doubt Queen Ella would put up with any internet idiocy were she still alive today.
GIF via Montreux Jazz Festival
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While you're waiting for your new Boredwalk gear to arrive you can also treat your earholes to the latest episode of the Boredwalk Podcast!
This week Meredith and Gabe discuss the heroes and trolls that alternately praise and vilify Boredwalk on the internet.
This leads to an interesting conversation about the cognitive dissonance between the forms of creative work that are deemed acceptable to monetize and those that are not (See: Taylor Swift's forthcoming album The Tortured Poets Department and Boredwalk's Grievance Journal) and how social media platforms pay for themselves in a broader sense (See: running ads for products like Boredwalk's Grievance Journal).
Our co-hosts move on to reacting to fan answers to the Question of the Day — pulled from the Delve Deck — "what is the most underwhelming tourist trap you've ever seen?"
Responses ranged from newer weird regional roadside attractions in the U.S. to critically and culturally revered classic artworks.
Then Gabe & Meredith chime in with their own thoughts on the worst tourist traps they've encountered.
They wrap things up by trading answers to the Delve Deck Venting and Joy Edition questions "what is a problem you never seem to be able to solve?" and "what's your favorite sound?"
Get in on the action and listen to the hilarity on the platform of your choice!
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Here are a few historical tidbits and famous birthdays to kick off your weekend:
• In 1692 Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne, and Tituba were brought before local magistrates in Salem Village, Massachusetts, kicking off the shameful episode known as the Salem witch trials. If anyone needed to go traipsing naked through the forests and fields of New England tripping on fungally "enhanced" rye bread, it was those uptight magistrates.
• In 1845 President John Tyler signed a bill authorizing the annexation of the Republic of Texas
• In 1867 Nebraska was admitted as the 37th U.S. state. Happy birthday, huskers!
• In 1872 Yellowstone National Park was established as the world's first national park
• In 1893 engineer and science icon Nikola Tesla gave the first public demonstration of radio in St. Louis, Missouri
• Birthday treats all around for: Polish pianist & composer Frédéric Chopin (1810), trombonist, composer, and bandleader Glenn Miller (1904), sportscaster & hotdog enthusiast Harry Caray (1914), novelist & literary critic Ralph Ellison (1914), singer & actress Dinah Shore (1917), singer-songwriter & actor Harry Belafonte (1927), English singer-songwriter Roger Daltrey of rock legends The Who (1944), Canadian-American actor and composer Alan Thicke of Growing Pains fame (1947), actress Catherine Bach of The Dukes of Hazzard fame (1954), actor & filmmaker Ron Howard of Happy Days and countless movies fame (1954), Spanish actor Javier Bardem of No Country For Old Men fame (1969), actor Jensen Ackles of Supernatural fame (1978), and singer-songwriter Kesha (1987)
• Pour one out for: Shoemaker & political activist Homer Plessy (d. 1925). Even though the U.S. Supreme Court shamefully ruled against him in Plessy v. Ferguson, his activism was rewarded posthumously in 1954 when Brown v. Board of Education and subsequent decisions finally began eroding the legal standing of Jim Crow laws.
Also dribble a tipple for actor Jackie Coogan, the original Uncle Fester (d. 1984), and famed comic book artist and editor Archie Goodwin, who co-created Luke Cage and Spider-Woman (d. 1998)
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OK, that's it for this week!
We'll be back here in your inbox on Monday with another email and maybe a fresh customer Q&A if any brave soul (perhaps you?) volunteers! If you'd like to be featured in an upcoming email, reply to this one and let us know!
Peace, love, and an idiot-free weekend,
Matt
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