This Is For The Hardcore Procrastinators Only

1. There were a lot of The Great Gatsby takes around for the centenary of its original publication, but none of them caught my interest as much as this one by Wesley Lowery. It posits the theory that the character of Jay Gatsby is subtly written as a Black or mixed race man working hard on "passing" as white so as to "outmanoeuvre the racial order of the era". I'm by no means an expert on Fitzgerald, but I found this analysis both interesting and persuasive.
2. Cal Newport on rediscovering joy on the internet by frequenting nice websites dedicated to things you are interested in rather than attempting to make sense of vast social media networks.

3. This twentieth anniversary performance of "Hips Don't Lie" by Shakira and Wyclef Jean was both baffling and life affirming. It prompted so many questions for me. Does Shakira keep laughing because she can't believe this is her most culturally lasting song (in the English-speaking world)? Why is Wyclef wearing a utility vest and an upside down flower as a hat like a Cicely Mary Barker flower fairy? And why is she dancing in a sandpit that has been constructed on a television soundstage?
4. Ed Simon makes a good case for why we should do close readings of bad poetry.
5. I love reading about the DIY projects of people with practical skills and the will to use them. This one by Andrew Childs is a great entry in this genre. Andrew's son has type 1 diabetes and having a smartwatch that displayed his CGM data would greatly simplify the task of managing his levels while at school. But giving a nine-year-old an Apple Watch seemed like a bad idea (and the Apple Watch is apparently not that good as a diabetes tool anyway). So Andrew designed and built a custom kid-with-diabetes smartwatch instead.
6. Would you like to play solitaire (or minesweeper or sudoku or 2048) at work inside a spreadsheet so it looks at a casual glance like you are diligently doing data entry? Well, now you can.

7. Reflections on the handwriting of various famous writers, including C.S. Lewis and Dorothy L. Sayers (see above), and what it could reveal about their moods. "One thing seems quite clear to me: the loose, flowing hand is associated not just with hurry but also with happiness."
8. This looks like an intriguing zine that combines a puzzle element with a commentary on art in the age of AI.
9. One of my (many!) unfulfilled project ideas is a hyperlocal newsletter just serving the few streets around my house. I will never actually do this but it's fun to think about the "fox spotting" column it would contain. I did really enjoy reading this profile of 88-year-old Lucy Lippard, though, who has been running a news-sheet for her village of 250 people in New Mexico since the 1990s.

10. Sometimes it's nice just to look at some pictures of owls in towels.
11. This is for the hardcore procrastinators only: the Dangerous writing app. If you stop typing for more than ten seconds (or the interval of your choice) it irrevocably deletes everything you have written. It's probably a good way to train yourself not to check your email or look at the news at the end of every sentence!
12. Is Anna Wintour anything like the Miranda Priestley character in The Devil Wears Prada? In some ways, yes, in others no, this former Vogue editor says. For one thing, she doesn't wear Prada:

You’d think somebody with Anna’s personality would have been attracted to the severe monochromatic blacks and navy favored by Miuccia Prada in the early 2000’s but, in fact, she preferred soft pastels and busy patterns of pink and pistachio. The first time I attended a party in her house, I was shocked by the cheerful yellow walls and drapes bursting with cabbage rose blooms. It all seemed so utterly un-Anna but, then again, as I learned from her, that’s what fashion is, a readily accessible tool that allows you to remake the actual self into a preferred version.

13. If I ever get to Tokyo (unlikely, for both financial and environmental reasons) I think I might like to stay in this hotel.