My garden is growing, the seedlings look strong, and I’m finally on my way to being a self-reliant homesteader who only eats kohlrabi

“Hike up your skirt a little more and show your world to me” and it’s not close

Deja vu

'If you’ve ever thought snow doesn’t smell the same now as when you were a kid, you’re right.'

A new installment of Maggie Downs's column 'Been There, Smelled That.'
mcsweeneys.net/articles/clima…

If you think snow smells different than it used to, you’re right! Climate change has shifted our smellscape, affecting everything from snow to sandalwood.

I wrote about it in my latest Been There, Smelled That column

mcsweeneys.net/articles/clima…

So the eclipse is on Rex Manning Day?!

Say no more, mon amour

And if you wanted to find out where the party was that night, or just find people to hang with, you’d just go to the coffee shop and sit there with your Moleskine notebook, sketching or writing, until you saw one of your people

So the eclipse is on Rex Manning Day?!

Say no more, mon amour

I did a very intense meditation, hoping for some kind of deep insight or revelation. And at the end of the practice, my very first thought was: I like animals more than people

Today I remembered the time my friend created her first email address and didn’t realize how often she’d have to type it or give it out to other people

She soon regretted being Johnjacobjingleheimerschmidt @ hotmail

Did a cartoon villain write this

Alvin Taylor is the beat behind so many of the songs I love, and it was a joy to spend time with him and learn his origin story. It’s so wild and so very Palm Springs.

palmspringslife.com/how-drummer-al…

Bought a bagel for breakfast and the man said, “That’ll be $8. For a bagel. A BAGEL. That’s insane … but what do I know? I just work here.”

And I was like, yep, modern life is unsustainable and destroying us all. But at least this is an *everything* bagel

'The pursuit of a goal is what makes for memorable moments.' Maggie Downs Maggie Downs writes about her quest for sunrise in the LA Times.

With no travel on the horizon, I came up with a summer quest for my family: to find the very best sunrises in our own backyard, Joshua Tree National Park. What we found was nothing short of magic.

I wrote about it for the LA Times

latimes.com/travel/story/2…

An epic quest led us to the best sunrise views in Joshua Tree latimes.com/travel/story/2…

'So, what’s the Icelandic secret to living among fishy odors? Perhaps it’s because some residents have a unique superpower: They can’t smell fish.'

Our traveling writer/smeller, Maggie Downs, visits Iceland in this new edition of Been There, Done That.
mcsweeneys.net/articles/can-y…

When you stay at a vacation place with a kitchen, do you assume the dishes in the cupboard are