Hello, my fellow quarantaters!
I’ve already seen some of THOSE PEOPLE, you know who I mean, going about on social media pedentically saying “you’re not in QUARANTINE if you’re not sick, you’re in ISOLATION” and to them I say, quarantine is never over, stay in your house forever, and furthermore
Theoretically, we’re all supposed to be filled with peace and joy and brotherhood at this difficult time, but that doesn’t make the annoying people less annoying. Including the one who messaged me on twitter to correct a grammar error in my viral lizard story.
Viral Lizard Story?
Of course I’m not going to keep this from you if you haven’t seen it. We had a garden mystery to solve this week, and for some reason, the Internet was bored enough to become obsessed with it. It was, I must say, a tale to behold:
Sometimes you see a lizard and then Morgan Fairchild retweets you. Twitter is like that sometimes.
Stop Talking About Yourself And Give Us Good News
The good news is…well, relative. The good news unfortunately ISN’T that a miracle cure has been discovered and we can all return to normal. But there’s always good going on somewhere in the world, and I’ve scrounged up a bit for you.
First off, let’s acknowledge the fact that all the grimdark disaster films are wrong: pandemics are actually pretty funny. Not the horrors of the illness itself, of course, but the truth is that funny is a coping method, and when the going gets tough, the funny people make more jokes because that’s all they know how to do. THIS IS USEFUL. We can’t send Mike Birbiglia in to intubate someone (though that would doubtlessly become a great part of his next special) but we CAN enjoy his, and many other funny and creative peoples’, extra best efforts during this time. Because they’re bored and scared, and that works out well for us!
So here’s some funny things:
A Wild Wild West Side Story
Animals have been roaming the empty streets, and that is blessed for many reasons, but especially for this video:
Some Good News
John Krasinski, Hollywood’s most adorable adult son, has been running the delightful show Some Good News for a few weeks, and it’s really a delight. Probably better than this newsletter.
The Bahd
Finally, after the unfortunately absurd Senator Tom Cotton suggested that Shakespeare was American, I made the mistake of musing on Twitter that the Bard was, perhaps, Bostonian.
My followers did not let this opportunity pass lightly by. Try reading these aloud without laughing.
Bed And Breakfasts You Could Be
Ok, with a pandemic, you obviously wouldn’t be welcoming many guests to your bed and breakfast, but what a PERFECT time to take those lotto winnings and BUY one to renovate to your breakfasty heart’s content! Let’s take a look a who you could be if you owned:
You proudly peacock your sweet-butter colored inn on the main square, festooned with enough flags to make one suspicious of communism. You have a seething rivalry with the croissant baker directly across the square’s ornamental swan pond, who once overheard you calling his croissants “continental, not French.”
You run a small, discreet brothel in the basement rooms.
You have a tacit agreement with the lady ghost who haunts the blue room that you will not take down the wallpaper if she agrees to stay in it.
You have left the city to begin a pleasant, rustically nude new life.
You manner is no longer hunched and stressed. You are tall and straight-backed as a yeti and as proud of your swaying genitals. You have banished all scales. Your exercise program for guests is a three mile trot and a climb up the tallest redwood in the copse.
Your breakfast specialty is bourbon-barrel-aged granola. Your nightly fiddle receptions are full of gaiety. You feed the local deer, but do not touch or name them.
You have murdered literally hundreds of people and buried them beneath the southern pines.
Podcast Party
We’re continuing to churn out episodes of the Distant Socials podcast every week! This podcast is designed to be a Living Diary of Coronavirus, as I talk to people all over the country about their experiences in this troubled time. We’ve had some incredible guests lately, I’d love you to check out the latest batch!
The Future of This and Possibly All Newsletters
If you are (kindly!!!) still paying to receive the paid edition of this newsletter, I don’t know what to tell you. My information-processing brain has been broken for a few months now, and I’m finding that not only can I not write deep-dives into movies, I also can’t WATCH most movies. Something about this pandemic has turned my ability to concentrate into that of a sex-starved squirrel in May.
BUT, I am deeply uncomfortable taking your money for nothing. So I offer two choices about what kind of content you’d like to see that I could reasonably manage. Let me know in the comments whether you’d like either of these, or if you prefer to keep generously funding my lavish lifestyle of oatmeal and seven year old towels.
Jessica’s Titanic TV Bonanza:
Basically like the deep dives, but focusing on pilot episodes of series. An analytical look at the first episodes of shows both past and present, some where I’ve seen the series, some where I can merely guess at where it’s going.
Jessica’s Prose Party:
Believe it or not, while my screenwriting ability is on an extended vacation, I’ve begun writing two varieties of prose. One is a collection of fairy tale retellings I’ve been working on a few years, and the other is humorous short stories about my family, a la James Thurber (but with fewer dogs and less talent.) I could post weekly serials of these, in workshop version, for you to read and even comment on. This would be a bit more experimental, but fun if you’re short of amateur reading material.
If either of these sound good, let me know in the comments! If they both sound good, we can do a mix! I want to give you your $5 worth!
Stay safe and hug puppies.