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I’m writing this on Thursday afternoon, and by the time you read it, the Chicago White Sox may have broken the record for most games ever lost in a Major League Baseball season. I’ve been a little interested in this for a few weeks now, not out of schadenfreude, but because people are writing about “losing” in really thoughtful ways, like in this piece. (gift link)
I don’t know if this is inspiring, but it’s really interesting if you are a little bit of a geography nerd: Mount Rainier’s highest point isn’t the highest point anymore, according to new GPS evidence.
I follow the Photoshop Request subreddit, and it seems to be mostly people earnestly asking for help: Please remove this person from the background of the last photo we have of my dad, so we can use it at his funeral, Please edit this photo of me so I can use it for a LinkedIn profile photo, stuff like that. But every once in a while, someone asks for something like this, and I really appreciate the title for this particular one: Please put my son in a terribly dangerous situation
The Pudding put together a web page of every one of the 59,705 outdoor basketball court in the United States, and I’m not saying you’re going to spend an hour on this, but if you spend a few minutes on it, you can at least marvel a little bit at how big of a deal it is.
I’m sure every parent has warned a child about sticking things up their nose, and I don’t know if this is a worst-case scenario or a best-case scenario, but here’s the headline: “LEGO piece found in 32-year-old’s nose after decades”
I love Seth Werkheiser’s whole approach to telling us we can make art instead of making stuff for social media, but this newest story on his Social Media Escape Club Substack really hits home—it’s about his dad, and his dad’s music, and a neighbor who maybe wouldn’t have called himself a “fan,” but … anyway, it’s worth your time.
We are almost 75 percent through 2024, and it reminds me that I should mention this: If you’re on Strava and you like to go uphill, I created a club called 100 Grand. I made it in 2023 to give people a fun incentive that wasn’t based on how fast you can go or how many miles you cover—basically, if you climb 100,000 vertical feet this year, I’ll send you a sticker at the end of 2024 (and if you climb 300,000 vertical feet, you get 3 stickers, and so on). There’s no sponsor or anything, I just thought it would be fun. Anyway, we all have about three months left to clock some more vert.
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Writer, artist, filmmaker, columnist for Outside Magazine. My newsletter about creativity, adventure, and enthusiasm goes out to 15,000+ subscribers every week.
Friday Inspiration 546 I love these Track Star interviews, and it’s a real challenge to not put one in this newsletter every week. But the story Jack Johnson tells about meeting the drummer from Wilco in an elevator (starting at about 3:54) made me laugh out loud. (video) Do you want to read an essay about a guy who was an editor at The Atlantic and quit his day job because he became obsessed with rebuilding stone walls in New England? Yes you do. [GIFT LINK] I am a big fan of Craig Mod, and...
Why We Put In The Miles I would like to present this with more fanfare, but I don't want to write more words about the thing than are in the actual thing, so: This is a sort of visual poem about running, but more about repetition, and believing in a thing that we do. I've had the idea for this film for at least two and a half years, and when it finally came together over this past weekend, the finished product ended up being two minutes. Or 2:19, to be exact. It's called "Why We Put In The...
Friday Inspiration 545 I don’t know how to describe this 8-minute video of the Artemis II launch, but it was unexpectedly moving (I know Katy Perry/lots of ultra-rich people have now gone to space but why is this so much more exciting?)(video) This is a story about the minor-league Staten Island FerryHawks being the worst team in professional baseball this season, but the best part to me was Lauren Theisen’s description of what it was like to watch a night game in a stadium designed to hold...