Extra Evil - Everything Abridged Sure is a Nice Book

Today’s Fortune: Find a good tinfoil hat.

Newsreel

The scorpion announced stinging the frog.

Elon checked on his fallback mine.

NYC announced plans to try something, a little, maybe, for the homeless.

NASA launched no one to the moon to show off.

Football fans and alcoholics prepared for the World Cup.

Today's Mood

War Journal

I'll hit this in "The Present" as well, but that video I've been talking about forever finally exists. It's a mini-doc with Talia Light Rake and Leo Gallagher, two fantastic filmmakers that reached out for reasons that remain beyond me. It's reaching more people than I expected, which makes me smile.

Some confide in a friend or therapist. Others confide in no one. I do all my dumping in stand-up notebooks.

I haven't been on stage in two years (first the plague, then a self-embargo until I finish the current manuscript), but I keep the format. The notebooks have become diaries with a fixation on the rule of three. Leading to all the hack jokes about Hinge and my father that you'd imagine.

Hopefully it's good discipline. Or at least something to pillage after my spark dies.

I feel a disturbance. Maybe that cultural well is tapped, but it still resonates with me. While I don’t have to worry about my planet exploding (just melting), the aura of the moment is off.

I’m responding my usual way: writing on the semi-frozen streets at 3 AM.  This newsletter keeps me honest one night a week, preventing me from dissecting madness from the wrong side of the internet. I think, in some twisted way, they feel like my people. But that’s a topic for another, more focused piece.

If anything goes wrong, I hope it’s personal. My fortunes and the nation’s are generally reversed. 2020 was the best year of my professional life. In 2016, I found my voice. I got my first game console on my tenth birthday, despite all the fuss about planes downtown.

I’m willing to take this one for the team. As long as there’s a parade afterwards. And Star Wars jokes come back in style.

Good news for everyone tired of physical therapy one-liners: I've graduated. I can do handsprings and aerials again, and only injure myself the normal way. It's a banner week.

The Present

The mini-doc finally lives.

Master the way of the shadow warriors in my 1-900-HOTDOG column.

Tell the mayor he's in The New Yorker, he loves attention.

Did you vote? Or did you die?

Everything Abridged can distract you from Thanksgiving.

The Past

There should have been much more satire about this incident.

The Future

Peace.

Nah, no way. But I am still plugging away at book and column stuff.

I haven't forgotten the comic photoshop return. I'm just in a new dimension of backlog.

One Sentence Reviews

Freestyle Book: Part 1 by Guenter Mokulys - Much more useful than it has any right to be. (3.5/5)

In The Loop: I like this much more than someone I respect, and now I wonder if I've lost the script. (4.5/5)

Knockemstiff: Heavy on the shock value, but I'm shock value friendly. (3.5/5)

Open Question

Signing off

Thanks for reading Extra Evil, the newsletter gazing into the abyss. Share it to gaze back.

-DD