Friday Inspiration 425



Friday Inspiration 425

After 45-ish seconds of this, I was kind of thinking, “Is this just a video of a guy running to my favorite The War on Drugs song?” and then at exactly the 1:44 mark, which I have been long convinced is the greatest “woo!” in the history of recorded music, I was like Yeah, this is a video of a guy running to my favorite The War on Drugs song, and that’s why it’s so great. It’s very simple, but captures the feeling of running in a city, and I think that’s why I like it so much. (video)

ANNOUNCEMENT: There’s a longer story about this on the DFTBA store page, but we are putting my “Periodic Table of the Elements of Adventure” on a LIMITED EDITION Nalgene bottle. You can order one from right now until midnight Mountain Time on April 5th (next Friday), and that’s it. Order now or live a life of regret. (Here’s a short video of the whole bottle so you can see the whole design)

If you own more than one mug, and you click on one thing in this list today, let it be this brilliant piece about the worst mug in your cupboard. I was going to include a quote from it, but I couldn’t decide on one. And for the record, my current favorite mug in our cupboard is actually Hilary’s, and the worst mug in the cupboard is probably one I brought to the relationship.

I love many things about this story, including but not limited to the fact that it’s about the guy who picks up dog poop on our local trail up Mt. Jumbo here in Missoula and leaves passive-aggressive (or maybe just aggressive?) notes for people calling them out, but also that it’s 6,000-plus words, which, given the average reader’s attention span nowadays, is really going for it when you’re writing a story about a guy who picks up dog poop on a trail in a town of 75,000 people. To be fair, there’s a lot there.

Payson High School, where Footloose was filmed in 1983, is scheduled to be demolished after the end of the 2023-3024 school year. Students wanted Kevin Bacon to come back to the high school for prom, and he told them he would, via a video call into a school assembly (that was broadcast on the Today Show).

Sure, this is a map of the internet in 1973, but how does it make you feel? Because I have feelings about it. Like nostalgia, but not?

This is a super-fun idea, and I think needed for a lot of people who enjoy creating things: A free (or pay what you want) zine, How to Keep Your Hobby From Becoming A Job.

This short blurb of a blog post is kind of all over the place, references a Slate article from 2014, and also the Emily Dickinson poem “That Love is all there is,” all to say: We’ve only been roasting vegetables since 1980? How is this invention younger than I am?
[RELATED: I have made this Brussels Sprouts Roasted with Kimchi and Scallions recipe at least 15 times since I found it in November 2022, and I can all but guarantee it help you win friends and influence people]

--

Semi-Rad

Writer, artist, filmmaker, columnist for Outside Magazine. My newsletter about creativity, adventure, and enthusiasm goes out to 15,000+ subscribers every week.

Read more from Semi-Rad
Thumbnail from Arthur C. Brooks- You Need to Be Bored. Here’s Why.

Friday Inspiration 501 I have enjoyed many of Arthur Brooks’ columns for The Atlantic over the years, so I wasn’t surprised that this video, “You Need to Be Bored. Here’s Why.” hit home for me as well. Sometimes I wonder if we’re all keeping ourselves so “busy” with everything that we don’t have time to feel anything anymore—boredom included, but also other things. (video) I don’t know who the market is for this app, or if the market actually exists, but I love that this person created it: A...

thumbnail from Fred again.. - Rooftop Live (Arun’s Roof, London)

Friday Inspiration 500 Well, today is the 500th edition of this Friday Inspiration newsletter. Aside from a couple of short breaks (one for some time off in 2021 and the other for the first few weeks of Jay’s life back in 2022), I’ve been doing this every week since November 20, 2015. Which is a long time. If you open this email every week or every once in a while, thanks for reading. If you are supporting this whole operation via Patreon or a paid subscription, thank you again for your...

mer de glace

I Hope You Like Mountains I’m walking my kid to the library in Chamonix, holding hands, or rather, he’s holding my middle finger in his hand. I get a tug on my finger every few steps, because he’s looking down as he jumps from seam to seam on the sidewalk, and I am looking up at the Aiguille du Dru, one of the six classic north faces of the Alps, 850 meters of steep granite, trying to remember the history of climbing routes on it. It’s almost a mile and a half straight up from where we’re...