Modest Pixie Dream Girl
Hi there. It’s snowing here. Big white fluffy flakes, like feathers. It feels a little fitting, since “Sundance” begins this week (virtually), and normally I’d be up in the mountains of Utah where, inevitably, it would be snowing. (There may be some tickets left, if you fancy having a virtual experience of your own.) I hope to be there next year.
In the meantime, though, I’m just here.
Joan Didion has a new essay collection out, and I wrote about it, and her. (I am in the final stretches of a book proposal about her, so my head is stuffed full of Didion knowledge, which I think shows in this essay.) Also, just for fun, this is Joan, in 1972, when she was about my age:
One of my favorite filmmakers has a new film on Netflix, The White Tiger, which I reviewed.
Our most recent Young Adult Movie Ministry pod is on A Walk to Remember! I think Sam outdid himself in picking the title for this episode.
My friend Rob Weinert-Kendt interviewed Heroes of the Fourth Turning playwright Will Arbery about what Rob described to me as “the recent unpleasantness” at the Capitol, which, of course, is an inspired interview.
You might enjoy watching the virtual New York Film Critics Circle awards, which are streaming on YouTube. Normally all of those movie stars would be at a big dinner party that the NYFCC (of which I am a member, as you’ll discover if you watch to the end and see me and Forky waving) throws at a fancy restaurant downtown. But we’re not there, clearly. So this is the next best thing.
After much deliberation, I have purchased an air fryer lid for my Instant Pot. There was absolutely no way I was buying yet another appliance, but this is more of an addition to an appliance I already have (and keep in a storage cubby above my washer and dryer, all of which — storage, washer, dryer — is considered a profound luxury in New York), so I allowed it. I will try it out tonight on some chicken and some broccoli. And if I remember, I will let you know how it goes.