Extra Evil - How to Declutter a Bank Vault

Today’s Fortune: Tip your getaway driver.

Newsreel

Bailouts for me, bootstraps for thee.

Child labor might replace you before the machines.

A suicidal American drone shot itself in the Black Sea.

California flooding let a singing mermaid be part of our world.

The assault weapons ban faces—nevermind, it’s the same background checks.

Survival fundamentalists opposed deep-sea mining.

Today's Mood

War Journal

Bailouts make me feel young again.

When Anubis/St. Peter/Willy Wonka weighs your heart, he’ll ask a few questions:

1. What grade do you think your life deserves?

2. Did you ever write a Wall Street Journal op-ed?

3. What’s the worst thing you’ve done to someone?

After months of silent shame, I can face the third question.

I dated a single mother during lockdown. Her daily trial was rewatching Moana without tipping her television out the window. She did well, though I think Encanto’s probably broken her by now. She hated Dwayne Johnson more than Steve Austin did.

Knowing that, I thought playing “How Far I’ll Go” was the funniest thing in the world. Phones. Speakers. Karaoke booths. Solo vocals, if necessary. The entire world was our canoe. The Geneva Convention probably had opinions, but I laughed like George Carlin’s copy editor. It’s the only Lin-Manuel product I’ve willingly consumed.

Imagine a full year of Disney water torture. Is anything left in me human? I look forward to writing op-eds about cancel culture when my crimes go public. Until then, I’ll hide in the light with normal, soul-owning people.

It’s a miracle I’m alive. It’s natural I’m single.

A dick joke is traveling further than my entire fiction career. That fits: dick jokes reigned longed before screens colonized monkeys. If it’s good enough for Chaucer, it’s good enough for me.

I’m decent at staying productive, but I’m bad at deciding what boxes to put productive time in. It’s classic option paralysis. Competing ideas lead to me jumping between windows like a porn addict in a lecture hall.

I’ve considered saying some jokes out loud again. I lost my podcast co-host last year, and barred myself from stand-up until the manuscript was together (an easy pact to make during lockdown, but easy is my favorite word).

A loud internal voice tells me to let that field fallow. I haven’t been paid for it once, and I’ll never be half as good at it as the writing I’ve chased since we re-invaded Iraq. I could just triple down on my portfolio of fake posters.

But I like that microphones taught me to talk. I learned to speak at a human speed on stage, and in a way that made sense on the podcast. And based on the readings I’ve attended/survived, there’s an advantage to being able to address a crowd without melting.

We’ll see what happens. I could try TikTok, or eating nails.

The Present

Read an interview with, uh, me.

Learn the signs of a wytch.

What would fascist D&D look like? You don’t want to find out? Shit, sorry.

I’d prefer an invasion by the dead to the average “Why I’m Leaving New York” essay.

Read Everything Abridged to become water.

The Past

This short story gives me a tiny flash of pride.

The Future

All the cool kids want Everything Abridged in paperback.

Trying to fine-tune a prank idea. The perfect tone’s elusive.

One Sentence Reviews

Robocop: I’m late to every party. (4.5/5)

This is the Life: Really, really late. (4/5)

The Phantom of the Opera (Novel): Awesome/sucks/brilliant/idiotic. (I don’t even know/5)

Visigoth - The Revenant King: Not as good as their new stuff, which is a nice place for a band to be. (3/5)

Open Question

Signing off

Thanks for reading Extra Evil, the newsletter haunting your theater. Share to unmask it.

-DD