more recs than an old school camera store

my fav joan didion essays + how to charge good $ for your work + recs + a photo of me with a truck that Lauren described as a "truck hottie"

Hello and honestly, given how close we are to the election, how are you?

We lost the baby monitor so I spent this morning rigging up a lil makeshift zoom-call-as-monitor setup with my phone and computer so I could still go to my office aka my mancave of peace where I stare into a computer and think about thinking.

I took my phone into EJ’s bedroom and placed it down and went back to the computer (still in the house during testing) to see if I could hear her.

I could not hear her.

Well, not through the computer, a fact I knew for certain because I could hear her screaming with my ears.

In trying to be sneaky, I’d woken her up.

There is a lesson here, a zen cone, I’m sure of it, but I’ve got neither the time nor money to figure it out.

Anyways, a warm 530am hello from my office where EJ currently sits playing with a box of tissues (they keep coming out? insane) while I write this missive to you.

Following my last, award winning post, a bookstore, joan didion, and me, more than one person (but less than three) asked me “Alex, oh Alex, where do I even start with this Joan Didion character!!”

And to that, I said and I say today, listen up and listen good. For I have compiled the first part in what can only be called a ‘multi-part’ series on JD and her work!! Am I an expert? Fuck no!

But I am a lover, and that’s just about all that’s required to fangirl as I shall now do about Joan Didion’s book of essays, The White Album (1979).

But wait, there’s more.

Don’t turn that dial just yet!! During last week’s award-winning YAMA/MAYA, I received two questions that were so scrumptuous, so divine, so out of this whirled, I decided to write up some longer answers to them.

Here are those questions:

• Whose work do you most admire, not for the money-making aspect of it but for the artistic merit?

• How do you navigate setting rates for your services, especially when dealing with friends or the temptation to provide free labor?

The recs!!

And if that wasn’t enough, I ALSO am including a list of very dope shit I’ve seen, read, or found interesting lately, all for your viewing pleasure and enjoyment (above board). If you’ve ever thought “man, I wish I had more to say at the culture parties.” Now you will. Now you will.

Why share all this cool shit?? Well, while answering that first question above, the one about whose work I admire, I realized that I have a very hard time doing that. Why?

Cuz I’m insecure!

But we know the message we send to ourselves when we’re insecure? Insect-u-are.

And I’m no insect!

Now here’s the rub. The catch. The fine print. All of this juicy, never before seen content is for paying subscribers only. And there’s a lot more where it came from.

So friends, if any of this interests you, come on down to paidBAT town and grab a drink, a seat, a cold one, and let’s dance.

INCLUDED IN THIS ISSUE:

1. Joan Didion - Where To Start: Pt 1

2. Ppl who inspire me, artistically.

3. Advice for how to charge money for your work especially when working with your dumb friends

4. The Cultural Recommendations That Will Make You People at the holiday party go, “wow, Josh has really stepped it up this year with his knowledge of cool stuff on the internet, let’s promote that son of a bitch right now Josh get over here!!” These cool recs include:

   1. The best book I’ve read in a long time

   2. An excerpt from Calvin & Hobbes creator Bill Watterson’s 1990 commencement speech

   3. A lil guide for how to send emails that don’t suck (useful)

   4. A writing tip that doesn’t make me want to hurl

   5. Several other cool things!

5. BONUS: photos from our recent trip to Milwaukee including but not limited to a photo of me near a truck with my mullet that Lauren said I looked like a “truck hottie”