10 Things: Piano, Pizzas, Paper
My recommendations of what to read, watch, listen to, do, make, and more this week.
This is the wrong day to receive ten recommendations, and I think it’s, um, four (?!) weeks late. But here they come anyway. Thank you for your patience. The first three are always free, and paid subscribers get seven more — this time they include a recipe, an activity to do with a friend, and a link to a near-perfect TikTok.
Kong didn’t know it yet, but on the morning of May 15, as she sat demurely on the damp back lawn of a home in North Austin’s Wooten neighborhood, true love was on the way. Her orblike body was pocked with teeth marks, her yellow felt stained with slobber. Her expression was as implacable as the Mona Lisa’s. It wouldn’t be long now before she was scooped up and tossed unceremoniously in the trash, depleted and forgotten and cruelly unloved. Kong was mulling this over when she saw a flash of iridescent purple and black in the maple tree above her, followed by a shrieking “readle-eak” that could only mean “I’m here, my love. I’m here for you at last.”
Yes, this is the show [Kat and Brendan] already told you about — but if they didn’t get to you yet, and neither did your favorite podcast or The New York Times, I’m excited to confirm that this “reality series” (?) is absolutely the delight that everyone says that it is, and that it is deeply gentle and funny in the kind of universal way that makes you go, “Well that’s a relief.” I am very sad that I have already watched all of the episodes of this show two times. I put it on the background while shipping things, which means that I have had a lot of things to ship since hearing about it while walking to my car after seeing Hadestown (which was also good, but not as good).
LISTEN: Joanna Sternberg’s I’ve Got Me
I already had this generous album on this list before
’s Tove Danovich emailed me recommending it, which felt like exactly the synchronicity I needed to push it up to my top three. Luke was obsessed with her 2019 album Then I Try Some More, declaring “This Is Not Who I Want To Be” “the saddest song that has ever been written, probably.” Sternberg’s piano is is cozy, bright, and perfect for the season. And Tove blessed it. (By the way, even if you aren’t a chicken person [why?!?!?!], you should check out Tove’s Substack, which is linked above. Tove also gardens and thinks about being outside and writes beautifully about what it means to be a human animal.)Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
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