The Weekly Digest is a weekly (no shit?) update that captures all the topics that aren’t worthy of their own post.
Man v. Shed II
Much like Rocky Balboa, it took me until the sequel to finally win1. The shed has yielded to my unquestionable and unimpeachable manliness. I’ve got all four walls built. The next steps are to build a base/foundation, transport the walls and assemble, add the roof and window panels, secure everything, and then drink into a comatose-adjacent state.
Mrs. Reads, concerned over the various grunts and curses emanating from our garage, reminded me not to take on too much. That is, of course, my specialty. It’s also why you haven’t received any updates or essays this week.
Book Bits
Substack Summer Reading List - It has begun! I’ve started reading Cubafruit by
as my first book of Substack Summer. I ordered a hardcopy of it as well, so I’ll have a shelf trophy. I know a few of the other books on this list are available as hardcopies, and I intend to pick up as many of them as my budget allows. If you’re one of the authors and have a hardcopy (not via Amazon, if possible) please let me know.Cubafruit rips so far. It reminds me of one of those political thriller movies where you slowly start to see all the disparate characters heading for a collision course but interspersed with backstory a la Godfather II. I don’t know why I went to movies for a comparison; I’m supposed to be a book snob…
Looking for Alaska by John Green - I started this at the tail-end of May and I’ve been mostly consuming it via audiobook (narrated by Wil Wheaton). I ended up tearing through the last 100-150 or so pages on Wednesday. I will lose all of my (minimal) street cred for saying this, but I teared up at the end. I feel like YA probably hits harder when there’s a sense of nostalgia attached to it, but what a lovely little book. It felt like part of my youth, as directed by John Hughes.
Recent Book Haul:
Salvage the Bones - Jesmyn Ward
Cannery Row - John Steinbeck
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
Replacing a tattered paperback with a faux leather version
Last Acts - Alexander Sammartino
Lanny - Max Porter
Grief Is the Thing with Wings - Max Porter
The Lathe of Heaven - Ursula K. Le Guin
The Moviegoer - Walker Percy
Writing
The Republic of Letters is doing Faith Week this week. They introduced the first essay with a “ecumenical” call for anyone who wanted to write about faithlessness. I spent a good amount of time on Tuesday writing about 1000 words about faithlessness and my burning distaste for organized religion — different from faith. Live and let live on that front — but I couldn’t square one final circle. I am a self-described apatheist; when it comes right down to it, the existence or non-existence of a deity or deities is not something I think matters. Or put more succinctly:
I wonder if others do a lot of writing like this. That is, what would be a snarky comment snowballs into an essay and that essay drains the desire to post from whatever drove it, and ultimately it just ends up in the recycle bin. If you’re like this, let me know in the comments.
I do plan on submitting to some of ROL’s contests for this/next month, and in a bit of serendipity I’ll be revising a previous shelved essay for one of them. My world takeover continues, stay tuned.
Miscellany
I donated blood on Wednesday. I donated platelets about a month ago. It was my first time doing that. It takes about two hours; they pump the blood out of you, run it through a machine to extract the platelets2, and then pump the blood back into your other arm. There is also an IV hook-up, but because room temperature is colder than body temperature, it feels like ice being injected into your veins. It’s a gnarly experience. At the end of two hours, they were wrapping up, baggin’ and taggin’, when I started to feel ill. I proceeded to projectile vomit and then pass out. I came to being reassured that I was alright, despite being held down by four visibly horrified older ladies. Normally, I’d be into that but since I was just returning to consciousness, all I could think was “sorry, I puked on your floor.” Apparently - as these things go - I did very well. Not only did I manage to puke in the only cardinal direction that minimized mess and clean-up, but I also didn’t bend the needles still embedded in my arms by panicking. Well, that’s good I thought and apologized again for the vomit. They gave me an extra T-shirt on account of the one I wore in being covered in leftovers.
So yeah, Wednesday was my first donation since then. It went fine.
That’ll do ya for this week. 🤙
— V
Spoiler for a movie older than I am.
This is a good time to note: I have no idea what platelets are.