It's a wrap
It's doomer season. Get in girls we're brooding.
It’s DECEMBER. Wintertime… Big puffy coats piled up at the bar. Drinking stiff Manhattans to make the walk home a bit less painful. This is what it’s all about people.
Wrapping
Who gives a shit about Spotify Wrapped? Me.
Do I care about your year in review? No.
Why would I? Means nothing to me.
I do selfishly love to rediscover the jewels of my year and congratulate myself on having such wonderful taste. I like stepping back into my own old headspace.
Here’s my official scorecard. Spotify is such an ugly and bad app. The music sounds terrible and everyone is getting ripped off. Artists, users, employees. Spotify has embedded a lot of passive listening features with daylists and recommended songs up next. Music is on a constant loop and I’m overfed with songs not of my choosing. Though I really enjoyed Royel Otis and Clairo this year, they’re undeserving of this ranking.
#4 should actually be Mannequin Pussy, #5 is probably Coco and Clair Clair.
Like a hopeless junkie, I’m not turning anywhere else for music. I don’t want to lose my playlists. I think Wrapped is so fun every year. I like my friends’ wraps and I do actually get a kick out of a number of random people's results. Apparently Apple Music is improving all these features and is making it easier to switch over, but that sounds like an exhausting project. Whatever.
Doomer Season
Another year is closing and ohhh I must be deep and reflect now. It’s gotten so, so cold and I’m sinking into my doomer tendencies. It’s all so gray.
I love summer and sunshine and swimming and grilling and flowers and trees and big group hangs and rooftops and being everywhere and saying yes all the time. I am a Leo hear me roar.
But boy, do I loooooove brooding. I love going on long walks alone, listening to songs that make me despair. I read books that torture me. I love staying in my apartment all weekend. I love when you cancel on me. I steal John Waters repeated line about his movie inclinations (minute 3:03 in the video with Ru). All I really want is a feel-bad French movie.
What better way to walk through a life of suffering and hardship than a visit to New York’s Tenement Museum? I’d been once before, only to the gift shop and was in heaven. It has an incredible selection of history books on immigrants, New York, Jacob Riis, race, class, and beyond. I bought one of my favorite books I read last year from the gift shop.
It’s a food history book called 97 Orchard: An Edible History of Five Immigrant Families in One New York Tenement. 97 Orchard Street is the current address of the museum. It describes how immigrant food from the Lower East Side in the 1800s largely informed a lot of American recipes today. It shares what the Germans, Irish, Russian Jews, Sicilians were making in the tiny, windowless apartments from what they bought with pennies from the Hester Street open market.
Last week I took an apartment tour that followed the life of an Irish couple. They were both considered “children of the famine” and both escaped Ireland by the 1860s. They arrived to a very hard life in the Lower East Side. Our guide was exceptional and the restoration of the tenement was really well done. They do other apartment tours and neighborhood walking tours. I urge anyone to check it out and I will be returning.
Season of giving
How was your Black Friday? Did you score something awesome? Did you get it shipped immediately? I hope you found what you were looking for.
I did buy some gifts on Black Friday online. It’s too easy. Instagram knows what I need to buy. I add to cart, my face is scanned, and my loved ones are taken care of. It’s all too immediate and certainly bad.
I did manage to buy one thing that felt good for once. This one’s for me though. On Tuesday night I went to a reception at Trinity Lower East Side Lutheran Parish to collect my newest prized possession.
An East Village pastor, middle school teacher, and a chef became friends at the Tompkins dog park during COVID and decided to make the East Village Community Cookbook. Proceeds from the book are going towards Trinity Lower East Side Services and Food for the Homeless. It includes recipes from East Village institutions like Cafe Mogador, Katz’s, and various long time residents. It has fun experts from Richard Hell and Alan Cumming. It is so wonderful.
Will Horowitz, the chef friend, wrote the forward that left me in a heap. The illustrations throughout the book are so precious. The recipes look great. The East Village is so scary, strange, absurd, brilliant, and amazing. It’s gone to shit and I’m an annoying transplant. That being said, it’s kept its special edge despite the horrible attempts trying to elbow their way in. I love this place.
This is a special rare thing that I’ve meaningfully collected, but this is not how I consume. I don’t really care who shops online. I do it all the time, but I wish I never did it. My mind is blown at these “underconsumption core” TikToks. Is this my next new thing?
There is a lot of suffering around us. Modernity is not serving us very well. It’s tempting to fill up a cart and feed your shopping impulses. I implore anyone who is open to it, to try to hold tight to the meaning of the holidays. Generosity, bringing people together, counting your blessings, giving what you can. Use this season to lend and extend and think about how you can weave this into your life the rest of the year. This is something I’m working on.
Friends and lovers
I did not ever watch the TV show Friends. I couldn’t get into it since they were always in that apartment. I like to watch people on the screen moving about in the world. What the hell were these people doing all day?
I was out of the house this week with some down time and I didn’t have a book on me so I scrolled through Spotify audiobooks and decided to dig into Matthew Perry’s memoir. Again, I didn’t watch the show, and I don’t know much about this guy, but I knew there was an addiction issue there that ultimately ended very tragically.
I’m not sure if this book was intended to help those who suffer from addiction, but I have some pause believing this could be a tool. I really recommend it, not that it was “good” or that you can really glean much from it. It’s just a very interesting point of view from a Hollywood-type who couldn’t think beyond himself. I think that’s what he truly suffered from.
Matthew Perry was 1 of 1 and suffered from addiction as an incredibly rich and famous person. There were a lot of illuminating Hollywood tales and a rollercoaster of a personal history. I think every famous person should consider the Witness Protection Program and liberate themselves.
Quick Thanksgiving recap:
Thanksgiving with friends was lovely. We were inside the entire day. Everything came together very well despite my late hour planning. I went with turkey legs and braised them for 4 hours in olive oil and pork fat. The fluffy pumpkin pie wasn’t as sturdy as I hoped and it needed to hang out in the freezer a bit before serving. It was delicious though.
The main plan for leftovers was to make turkey tortas. My boyfriend’s idea, not mine. Our nearby supermarket has a lot of good Latin American products and they keep very good fluffy torta loaves stocked. We got some of those.
Most compelling to me is the salsa. We made a quick roasted tomato and Chiltepin salsa. The Chiltepin peppercorns are a bit explosive when ground and cause us to sneeze like crazy every time. Well worth it though.
Top the torta with whatever you like. Tomatoes are pretty sad right now obviously so I skipped sliced tomato. They’re fine for the salsa though since they are vastly transformed in the process.
Toast the bread in a pan of olive oil or butter.
We spread a little mayo on the bottom of the bread.
Add avocado, mash and spread across.
Top with thinly sliced red onion.
Top with a bountiful bunch of cilantro.
Add salsa here if you like.
Add sliced turkey.
Top with more salsa.
Chow down and add more salsa at every bite too. Fin.
TGIF
I’m going to a 2012/Tumblr/Project X themed party tonight. Trying to think if I have any clothes with that vibe. Surely I do, just need to THINK. Just need to dress ugly with clashing colors, chokers. My hair will probably be side-parted. Eyeliner. This is the working thesis:
Muuuuuuusic
I don’t have a favorite song rn, but again, I’m going doomer mode. Here’s my December playlist if you wanna match my freak.
Please have a good weekend everyone and ttyl. Logging off.