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One of my favorite moments in the Hitchcock movie Rope is when a rich, daffy old British lady arrives at the party, babbling semi-coherently about society nonsense as she pulls off her fancy-person gloves. When the kindly American housekeeper responds to the prattle with a bit of smalltalk, the rich lady reacts with a momentary […]

Every time I walk out onto my balcony, I wonder, how did all these centipedes get up here? I live in an apartment that’s several stories up off the ground, though not high enough that my view is anything other than the vinyl siding of my neighbor. I’ve planted a couple of plants in containers […]

I used to work at a camera store with a young woman who would occasionally tell stories about a ghost she was having sex with. As she described the encounters, it became clear to all of us who worked in the store that the “ghost” in the stories matched the exact physical description of her […]

I hope you’re ready for a hot take about Austin Powers, a movie franchise that is nearly as old today as the time period that it references. I recently attempted a rewatch of the films, because they feature briefly in the new Space Jam movie and I was wondering how well they hold up. The […]

The last year has given many of us a sort of social jetlag, a disorientation around the people we choose to spend time with and what we choose to do with that time. It’s a perfect opportunity to reconfirm your social circle, or remake it, starting with the friends you’re relieved to see and the […]

Were you one of those weird kids who had obsession-media? You know, that thing where a child has a limited selection of entertainment to choose from, and so they’ll just listen to the same songs, or watch the same movie, or read the same book over and over and over and over? One of the […]

Look, I just really like shrimp, okay? So when I got one of those $10 shrimp trays from QFC, I thought I was going to enjoy a nice little treat, with a wedge of lemon and that little cup of red sauce. Instead, within a few hours, I thought I might actually be dying; symptoms […]

I used to work at a summer camp where one of the kids had a VHS copy of Fight Club and another had one of those fancy TV/VCR combo machines, and by their powers combined they were the most popular teenagers for miles around. I don’t think any of the campers who gathered around the […]

I have decided to support the underdog. Right outside my apartment building, there’s a dirty patch in the sidewalk with a lone bedraggled tree in the middle, and nothing has ever grown there until a few weeks ago when I noticed a few optimistic tiny leaves poking through for the first time. I love an […]