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​Friday Inspiration 475​
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I have said something very similar to this before in this newsletter, but: I could watch Action Bronson going around to restaurants and eating their food all day. I love to eat food, he loves to eat food, and I love to watch him eat food and talk about it while connecting with the people who made the food. (video)

I was trying to find a word to describe the images Eric Kogan captures in his photography around New York, and I think “playful” is close, but I assume he puts some legwork into at least some of these photos. Like he doesn’t just get lucky and clouds happen to fall right where he needs them to be, or reflections of trees or windows appear where he’s walking.

David Epstein’s book Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World is one of my favorite reads of the past five years, maybe because it validates my tendency to try lots of things instead of just one, or maybe because it encourages us to go ahead and be real human beings with multiple interests—like he does in this recent piece, “Why Hobbies Are An Advantage, Not a Distraction.”​

I was pretty sure I spent all last week recovering from my race all wrong: I crushed an entire pizza after my race (OK, after I took down a veggie burger and fries at the finish line), and the next day ate croissants at a wonderful patisserie in the next town over, and then continued to eat a bunch of carbs all week as I exercised too much (I don’t know when I’ll be back next, it’s beautiful, there’s so much cool stuff too see, blah blah blah). Anyway, I assumed I’d be able to find an article from newsletter sponsor Precision Fuel and Hydration that would confirm my fears, but the first thing I clicked on was this one, Are carbohydrates more important than protein for recovery? and it certainly seems that I’m not doing as badly as I thought. (reminder: clicking the above link will give you 15% off of your first purchase at PFH)

Perhaps you’ve heard of David Goggins and his mantra to “stay hard” as it pertains to endurance sports and other things that require mental toughness? I loved this piece by Colleen Miracle, “Stay Soft”: A Complementary Mindset to “Stay Hard”​

I loved this Substack piece by Amie McNee, “We Need Men’s Art.” She opens the essay by saying she was scared to write it, and I kind of get what she means, but I think anyone who reads a few paragraphs of it will get where she’s going with it—not that we “need” art by men more than other demographic groups, but that men shouldn’t feel like they can’t be creative TOO, and share it.

Over the past week, I have been working on an illustration for Janji, a sponsor of this week’s newsletter—Janji co-founder Mike Burnstein sent me a long list of possible topics for illustrations and I immediately latched on to the one that said “pockets” because I love running shorts with pockets. Not like one little pocket that you can maybe fit a car key and an ID in, like multiple pockets. They make several pairs of shorts with seven pockets in them—I’ve been wearing the Men's 7" Multi Short 2-in-1 lately and digging them because I can fit my ID, car key, phone, and some calories in the pockets (and probably some other stuff but I haven’t gotten THAT adventurous with them yet). They don’t make the exact same short in women’s, but the Women’s 5” Multi Short also has seven pockets.

Have you ever been insulted by the way a pair of pants fit your body when you tried them on? Then this piece of satire is for you. (I mean, of course you have)

I don’t remember how I heard about Dave Eggers’ book A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, but I remember devouring it while smoking cigarettes on the front stoop of my first post-college house between bartending shifts during the fall of 2001, and I remember loving it at the time. I’m sure it influenced many writers, and I’m not sure if it’s cool to say that it influenced you, or what Dave Eggers thinks about the book 25 years later, but in reading this Slate piece about the book, I realized that I picked up at least one (bad?) habit from Eggers’ memoir writing: Thinking about what every possible critic might say about your work while you are creating that work and trying to beat them to the criticism. Anyway, if you read the book back then (apparently it doesn’t sell that well anymore), you might be interested in this Slate article that dives into the book’s legacy.

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