Leftovers #128

I landed in LA two nights ago and it’s perfect as always. I’ve just completed part one of my favourite ritual: a loop around Griffith Park, a stop off at Lazy Acres for a juice and a smile from the nicest security guard, How Long Gone episode in my ears. Now: shower, egg sando and matcha from Obet & Del’s, a walk to Barnsdall Art Park to lie on the grass and write, then a short walk to Kismet Rotisserie for a solo lunch (quarter plate + hibiscus lemonade, always). It’s so good to be back.

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Filipino food perfection, tuna frites, Hollywood martini

My first 24 hours in LA always hurts my bank account. It’s a city where you pay a lot for food but it’s always good, which is much more preferable than being a lot of money for food that is bad. We started off strong with dirty martinis at the iconic Musso & Frank – our bartender was 70+ and that’s what I’m looking for in a bar back. We ate fries, asparagus with hollandaise sauce, shrimp cocktail and oysters and finished off with more cocktails at Lily’s on Franklin. Yesterday we cruised Melrose Hill and shared a turkey sandwich at Ggiata as an appetiser then possibly the best bowl of food I’ve eaten this year: the Lucenachon at Kuya Lord. Salty pork, soft belly fat, crunchy crackling; java rice laced with garlic; sweet tomatoes and tart pickled cukes; and a spicy papaya salad. And a green goddess salad on the side which I must recreate: dill, chives, tarragon and kaffir lime leaves topped with shavings of soft ricotta salata. HOLY. Dinner looked like more oysters and shrimp cocktail and hushpuppies at Queen Street. The tuna frites was exceptional mainly because the sauce was literal crack (homemade ponzu + glossy butter), as was the chicory salad which was described as ‘the negroni of salads’ – three parts of bitter leaves, salty anchovies draped on top and a mellow, tangy dressing.

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Sally Rooney’s literary normalcy and something for the perennially online

Normal Novels, Becca Rothfield for The Point

If you are a writer in a Rooney novel, you are sure to be discovered without going to any great lengths to promote yourself. You are sure to write beautifully without agonizing over your work (or even editing it). And if you are a woman in a Rooney novel, you will only ever become disheveled in a glamorous way. You might be too thin or too aloof, but you will never be too emotional or, God forbid, overweight. Ultimately, there is no chance that literary institutions will fail to appreciate your gifts, no chance that the market will fail to reward your talents and no chance at all that you are not, deep down, very special.

The fantasy Rooney fosters in her interviews no less than in her fiction is that you can be the best without being better than any of your rivals—that normalcy, elevated to a high art, amounts to a kind of distinction. That even if they beat you, you are still the best.

This is from 2020 but I discovered this through a hilarious TikTok of someone doing impressions of every female character in a Sally Rooney novel (sensual but chaste; hair thick with bangs etc). I do actually enjoy Rooney’s novels and I think we place unfair pressure on female writers to exceed our expectations every time they write a new novel, but I did enjoy this quite sharp criticism from Rothfield.

The Desperation of The Instagram Photo Dump, Kyle Chayka for The New Yorker

Each one seemed to outdo the last in its ostentatious meaninglessness; they were the textual equivalent of a coy shrug, as if to say, “I don’t even know why I’m doing this, let alone why you’re looking at it.” The phrase “life lately” was a popular choice, as were “the last few days :)” and “~[insert month] vibes~.” The lowercase, perhaps paired with an emoji, emphasized that you were posting off the cuff. (Common additions were 🌞 and ✨, providing an air of seasonal effervescence.) A friend and fellow dump skeptic summarized the tone to me as “being-alive vibes.” But, if all social-media posting serves as a proof of life, do we really need the belabored reminders?

I fall under this category and I will admit, it does feel a little cringe. This is a textbook answer from someone defending their right to be cringe on social media, but, like, does it really matter? I’m more interested in these trends from a social point of view - why do we do them; what does it say about how we feel about ourselves or how we’re interacting with other people? Literally dump if you need to – it’s not that deep. I love Kyle Chayka’s fast-paced assessment of these trends, because he’s not trying to call you out (even if the clickbait title is – New Yorker’s editors have a job to do!). He’s observing why we might be moving towards this social trend (post-pandemic hangover meets Instagram’s engagement-hungry algorithm). As he says: “We follow platforms’ unwritten and ever-shifting rules, and we are rewarded with more attention; we attempt to counteract the overflow of content by putting out an overflow of our own. In the long term, the platform wins, and we’re left forcing new formats to fit our old goal of interacting with friends.”

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Is love blind?

I’m tempted to record a podcast episode about this with Ky seeing as we’re glued to the latest season of Love Is Blind. I’d never seen it before, and I am equally obsessed and frustrated by the concept. Why am I so invested in these couples even though I know this is all total bullshit? Love can definitely be blind, but it cannot exist in a vacuum. I find it fascinating, and it’s what I’ve always loved writing fiction about – the way the illusion of love can make you feel like sealing yourselves in your own little kingdom will keep you safe. Anyway, someone tell me if you’re watching it so I can discuss every inch of it with you!

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Thank you A24 for keeping a visual record of this

I genuinely loved this conversation. It’s very rare I’d watch one hour of two people talking into a microphone, but for Harris Dickinson…. They talk about navigating the industry, not giving too much of themselves to the public only to be cannibalised, and about the genuine importance of the arts in a disconnected society.

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Obviously Maggie but with a twist

I saw Maggie Rogers perform in Seattle a few days ago and it was truly perfect. I remember singing this song in the shower on repeat on my 30th birthday, my boyfriend at the time was truly baffled at my commitment to nailing this cover.