Can’t believe we gave up “singsongcraft” for “music,” the Roman Empire has a lot to answer for.

Glig and mirigness are the ancestors of glee and merriment. Swegelrad means “heavenly journey”! All of these words are just beautiful.

If I read a fantasy series where a culture called music “dream craft,” I’d consider that A+ world building.

Old English words for music: dreámcræft, gleow, glig, hwistlung, mirigness, sangcræft, sóncræft, swegelrád, swinsungcræft

I’m going to become a RETVRN guy, but only for using the Old English words for “music” before the Greco-Latin references to the Muses crept into our language.

If you love mayo so much, why don’t you marry it

New philosophical paradox where a millennial with a broken laptop is stuck in a loop where they can’t buy a new one, because that’s a major purchase that would require a laptop.

PELL

Don DeLillo’s Ribald Hockey Romp Will Return to Stores

Pynchon adaptations are winning Oscars, DeLillo is being credited with inventing the hockey romance genre, love to see our postmodernists taking a victory lap in 2026. www.nytimes.com/2026/03/20/b...

The Trump administration is removing a popular DC bike lane Feds say the 15th Street protected bike lane will cause more traffic during cherry blossom season, but bike advocates say it makes everyone safer.

A reminder that national parks are great, but the *National Park Service* has been an awful steward of them, generally committed to nothing but getting as many cars inside parks as possible. This has been the case long before Trump. 51st.news/trump-admini...

Chris’ favorite movies of 2025

Still getting used to this thing where my favorite movie of the year also wins Best Picture (in fairness, the Academy completely ignored my 2nd through 15th favorite movies)

I'm an academic librarian and I remember this happening 10 years ago with MOOCs. A lot of people who should have known better were convinced that MOOCs were definitely the future of the academy, and anyone who didn't get on board was missing out.

You don't hear much about MOOCs anymore

I want my search engines to retrieve specific pieces of data, not craft qualitative statements!

Google AI summaries when searching quotes include literary analysis from Reddit

Sometimes I Google a portion of a quote, and I’m so glad that now Google gives me questionable literary analysis from Reddit in bold highlighted font, front and center, instead of, you know, just the complete quote or the source.

Watched the Kenneth Branagh Hamlet, and for a 30 year old unabridged adaptation of a 400 year old play, its humor and pacing somehow seems perfect for social media memes in 2026?

You basically ran a library in fifth grade, lending Goosebumps books to the entire class!

I think a lot about how there were so many things to read (newspapers, magazines, paperback books) just lying around everywhere when I was growing up. I became a fan of a lot of things because it was so easy just to pick something up and see what it was about.

The paper has been a shell of its former self for a long time, but now that even that shell is being carved up for parts. It's infuriating.

Bezos carries a lot of the blame, but also the Graham family fell for his benevolent billionaire bullshit when they made the sale, and he's been boosted for years by an army of toadies who have written unsourced articles about how Bezos "really cares about the paper."

The Post was one of the success stories of the Trump 1.0 era, and somehow its leadership managed to completely squander the good will and massive subscription influx they earned, chasing weird AI curios and clickbait op-ed writers instead.

We probably learned it at the exact same time then!

(Actually I think I learned CATAMITE from my high school’s production of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which is kind of messed up)

English words I learned reading fantasy novels that I’m annoyed are not accepted by the NYTimes Spelling Bee:

ABATTOIR
ATTAINT
CATAMITE

I am sure this will be a list in progress.

Fair! And JustWatch is often unreliable at the beginning of any given month, when rights change or expire.

Stuff like this makes me miss when Netflix rented physical discs and just had everything.

JustWatch is the site to use. The streaming services are not necessarily trying to trick you; lots of services have the rights to movies in one country but not another

Other formats have their place but no one should read a book called "The Dragon Reborn" at the beach during summer vacation in hardback, get over yourselves.

I grew up reading Robert Jordan and George R.R. Martin mass market paperbacks. They cost like $5 and were all 1500 pages and fell apart under their own weight the minute you opened them. It remains the best format for a book.

Last Call for Mass Market Paperbacks After years of steady sales declines, the format will largely disappear next year.

What the fuck, no one asked me about this www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

Wikipedia: Encyclopedias should practice editorial neutrality!

Century-old subject encyclopedias: Your favorite composer was, let's say, "melodically insignificant."