recently

a blurry and poorly lit photo of a group of strangers walking on a sidewalk in los angeles at night taken by ash in july 2010

Hello and happy September! Though I have a newfound appreciation for spring and summer after moving to Minnesota (especially spring, god! California is the most beautiful place I’ve ever been of course, but because it’s so temperate spring isn’t really a thing in the way it is with places that have seasons and my god does Minnesota know how to have a spring!) I am, as always, deeply ready for it to be fall. I try not to wish for time to go faster — I’m getting old and I’m not really ready to rush into more of that — but good god is it an effort. I really love how much people love summer here and I love doing our loop of the lakes and seeing everyone out enjoying it, but I am desperate for cooler temps and humidity that makes rain instead of me-want-to-kill-myself.

I have been listening to my own September playlist a lot and this compilation playlist I threw together of all the September playlists I’ve made because so much of it works so well together that shuffle is kind of perfect. But I have also been listening to this incredibleeeeeeeeeee playlist of techno/house/dance music from the 90s/00s SO MUCH and it has brought so many childhood jams back to me I can hardly bear it. Like obviously “Everytime We Touch,” is a banger, but Cascada gave us so many more jamz than that. It also introduced me to “I Do Both Jay and Jane” by La Rissa which whips.

I finally, after many years of exposure and pressure and being alive, watched both Dirty Dancing and Fried Green Tomatoes which I enjoyed immensely. Not to restate things that people have been saying for literally forever, but movies kind of suck now! Everything is a remake or a reboot or a sequel or some CGI horseshit and sure there are other things being made but they’re fewer and farther between every day, harder to find, and left to flounder. Every time I watch a new to me movie that came out before like, 2010, I can’t believe how much better it is than anything recent I’ve watched and that isn’t just nostalgia or being old; the quality of everything is worse now and movies are right there with the clothes and the food and the technology. TV might still be okay, but I wouldn’t know because I don’t have subscribe-to-fifteen-streaming-services money.

Alright! I don’t think I’ve got anything else to share. We finally bought a new couch because our old couch sucks and is also not designed for two fat people in their forties and instead of just exchanging one for one, we decided to swap our living room and our studio, so my life has been consumed by moving heavy furniture from room to room and to add insult to injury, most of that furniture was in that room six months ago because we already made this same room swap before, despite having lived in this house for less than a year. I love to be capricious and flexible! I do not love moving furniture!

This month we donated to help families in Sudan and to Drop Deadlift Gorgeous for team Homo Zoo (Sam Schedler’s funny! And charming! You should follow him on Instagram!), and to the Starbucks Union Strike Fun because Crystal bought a couple drinks out of desperation and we donated double to make up for spending money there when they still don’t have a contract.

As always let me know if you have somewhere you think I should donate or if you want to recommend me some pop culture or if you just have something you really need to say! ashrocketship [at] gmail. Love you!