Weeknotes: July 20–24, 2026
Monday, July 20
Five years ago today, I moved to Ypsilanti, Michigan. I had already spent a couple days trying to get my apartment set up, but July 20 was the night I made it official. After a long day, I drove over to my friend Ashley's birthday party out near Ford Lake, knowing afterward I could just go home and crash in a place that was all my own. I've made so many friends here — these have been some of the happiest years of my adult life.
At seven o' clock, I walk up to Wax Bar and meet J & J for a celebratory cocktail. The Alan Parsons Project is playing on the radio — there are maybe seven or eight other patrons. I sip my mezcal negroni and gaze out across the alley, watching a woman stop and smile in front of the pet store. The shop cat must be lounging in the front window.
Walking back from the bar, I meet on our well-traveled street the family of my neighbor Matt, who announces as we pass "this is my family!" I reply just as vaguely, "Hello, I'm the neighbor, two or three houses down." Poking out of my mailbox is a signed copy of Robyn Hitchcock's second memoir, Stranded in the Future.
Weeknotes: August 12–16, 2024
Weeknotes went on vacation last week. Weeknotes thought about becoming Campnotes for a moment, but decided that being nothing was healthier. Now Weeknotes is Weeknotes again.
Monday, August 12
After four nights of camping, it's a luxury to wake in my own bed. The morning is cool with a slight blush of autumn. I love this time of year. It’s the start of harvest season, wildflowers are are at their peak, and as summer winds down, there's a bittersweet breath of change that never fails to electrify me. I'm most activated in the calendar's borderlands. Late August, November, April, early June, these are peak awareness periods for me. When the fullness of each season has yet to come, that's when the interesting stuff happens.
Weeknotes: July 22–26, 2024
Monday, July 22
I drive to the optometrist to pick up my new lenses. After two weeks of squinting and headaches, I ease back into a world of stunning clarity. I almost expect to hear a fanfare as I slide them onto my face. On the drive home I stop at Dairy Queen and eat a chocolate-vanilla twist cone in my car while listening to pundits discussing President Biden's decision to drop out of the race. For the first time in months, I feel some hope. The path to November had become a funeral procession. Can Harris can pull off what shouldn't have to seem like some kind of miracle?
It's an otherwise desultory day of self-admin and catching up at work. At night I walk into town to see a show at Ziggy's, less because I want to, but because I think going out would be good for me. It was right move. Sitting on the stage floor, Sara Tea plays a hypnonic set of ambient autoharp drones and other manipulated sounds while landscape videos are projected on to a small board to her left. Michael C. Sharp follows her with radiant synth and guitar shimmers, and finally my neighbor, Golden Feelings, kicks off his summer tour, sending out sweet lotic tones from a small Mexican blanket-covered podium. It’s a perfect Monday show. Soothing experimental music, no vocals. I catch up with friends and discuss DJ-ing skate jams, breaking down in the desert, banjo museums, and Ray Lynch's Deep Breakfast.