Steeves

Yesterday morning kids were sent running from their bus stop in panic because ICE showed up. This guy at today’s ICE Out of Lindenwold protest is a must watch 😭. @maddow.bsky.social

Would love a set for Lit Circles. Not sure how many constitutes a box.

Bleh. Authorial intent. Many of the authors I met in grad school, if you asked them about theme in their books, their response was usually, "Sure! Why not? That sounds good, let's say I meant that. Makes me seem smart, and not like a little kid playing with action figures."

This is the fault of English teachers. The way we engage in lit is to search for meaning, or theme, and we always talk about authority intent. But if you actually talk to authors, their intent is not usually thematic, but more like "this seemed like it would be interesting/fun to write."

I don't think these two things are mutually exclusive. For literary analysis, its hard not to read the text as "morally problematic" or whatever, but its also undeniably well-crafted. I keep a copy of it in my classroom explicitly to argue with my students about it, and it's always fun to do so.

please remember that no matter how many “ICE is losing in MN” articles you read today, there is still a very real, urgent, ongoing crisis in Minnesota.

people need food and they need rent money. that has not changed.

Donate to Rent Support for Bancroft Families, organized by Emily Butler As neighbors, friends, caregivers, and community, we cannot sit by and watch neighbors… Emily Butler needs your support for Rent Support for Bancroft Families

Anyone looking to support Minnesotan families from out of state, here's a worthy place for your dollars.

Many families can't work due to the ongoing federal occupation, this is to help them make rent.

via: www.startribune.com/chris-madel-...

(reminder to not share unsourced screenshots!)

Statement from Michael and Susan Pretti Parents of Alex Jeffrey Pretti “We are heartbroken but also very angry. Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital. Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately, he will not be with us to see his impact. I do not throw around the ‘hero’ term lightly. However, his last thought and act was to protect a woman. The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He had his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down, all while being pepper sprayed. Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man. Thank you.

Kare 11 local news just read, in full, this statement from Michael and Susan Pretti, the parents of Alex Pretti.

"Please get the truth out about our son."

Well worth a watch.

Another case of normie radicalization. This guy is the former president of a local HOA, a web developer for real estate companies and a self proclaimed "member of the square community" and he's out in the streets.

Np, thanks for spreading the word. Fuck ICE.

How To Help if You are Outside Minnesota Last edited January 22, 2026 I’m going to assume that if you’re reading this, you more or less understand the situation in Minnesota and I don’t have to explain it to you! That sa…

I've found this resource helpful.

naomikritzer.com/2026/01/21/h...

Once again, immigration is not even a problem. Immigrants are not more criminal, they don't cost jobs, they don't harm the economy. There is no reason for any of this. It is hurting ourselves to hurt them.

The true secret to my long career: As a midlist writer hanging on to my career one book at a time, I can only control the work I do, not outcomes.
So I work: Drafting Novel W while waiting for edit notes on Novel F. When edits & draft are done, I'll return to the half finished & overdue Novel L.

🇺🇸 MINNEAPOLIS VETERAN: "They are terrorizing the population, in Afghanistan we never wore masks.” (From @statuscoupnews.bsky.social )

One of the great magic tricks of that comic (which is chalk full of them) is how the parents are simultaneously antagonists for the young readers and INCREDIBLY RELATABLE for the older readers.

Gonna be even more earnest than usual on main, but I wanted to share. Because I have a bunch of pain stuff I was in my thoughts about it, and I said to myself, “I have to show love to my body. My body is doing the best it can.” so if anybody needs this, it made me feel good to say that

I once asked a bookseller at a large indie store how many people would have to buy a book for it to get the attention of the store buyer and cause an additional order and they said: Three.

A toppled tree with a sign screwed on to it.

The sign reads, "The raft of memory floats directionless on the ocean of mind." Attrubuted to H.G.

Went to a old childhood park. A golf course that had been there is now a nature preserve, which was pretty cool. The bridge I used to cross to get to my GF'S house in high school has been torn down. Also, I found this neat thing. Places age along with people, it turns out.

Joyce Carol Oates @Joyce... 17h O So curious that such a wealthy man never posts anything that indicates that he enjoys or is even aware of what virtually everyone appreciates— scenes from nature, pet dog or cat, praise for a movie, music, a book (but doubt that he reads); pride in a friend's or relative's accomplishment; condolences for someone who has died; pleasure in sports, acclaim for a favorite team; references to history. In fact he seems totally uneducated, uncultured. The poorest persons on Twitter may have access to more beauty & meaning in life than the "most wealthy person in the world."

Elon Musk ' @elonmusk X.com Oates is a liar and delights in being mean. Not a good human.

lol she got his ass and he knows it

I feel like I say this every year but I really need people to hear it. Halloween is the best American holiday. Just kids outside welcomed into their world, marching around together, showing off their costumes to the elderly, parents meeting parents, neighbors catching up with neighbors.

this is, hands down, the best video I've seen on men's influencer content and it's not close either

Deskilling is real.

This is the world generative AI peddlers long for, one where people are incompetent without their service.

Don't outsource your brain to this shit. You'll regret it.

What’s a technology that you think is overhyped? I’m going to give a sideways answer to this, which is that the venture capital business model needs to be understood as requiring hype. You can go back to the Netscape IPO, and that was the proof point that made venture capital the financial lifeblood of the tech industry. Venture capital looks at valuations and growth, not necessarily at profit or revenue. So you don’t actually have to invest in technology that works, or that even makes a profit, you simply have to have a narrative that is compelling enough to float those valuations. So you see this repetitive and exhausting hype cycle as a feature in this industry. A couple of years ago, you would have been asking me about the metaverse, then last year, you would have asked me about Web3 and crypto, and for each of these inflection points there’s an Andreessen Horowitz manifesto. It’s not simply that one piece of technology is overhyped, it’s that hype is a necessary ingredient of the current business ecosystem of the tech industry. We should examine how often the financial incentive for hype is rewarded without any real social returns, without any meaningful progress in technology, without these tools and services and worlds ever actually manifesting. That’s key to understanding the growing chasm between the narrative of techno-optimists and the reality of our tech-encumbered world.

Stand by this: www.politico.com/newsletters/...

I think that if you're a writer and you don't invent a word every now and then you're missing out on a solid chunk of the fun.

But God damn it. It was really nice. And I think that I do probably feel like that more often than I think I do. The big bad things are big and bad, and should be resisted and oh god now I'm talking about the NOW...

Point is, joy sneaks in. Don't ignore it when it does. Enjoy stupid little joy.

2. It's INCREDIBLY stupid. Every part of that story was dumb as rocks, but especially the surge of pleasure my brain treated me to by being unexectedly mildly competent. What has become of me? Is this all it takes, brain? Any port in a storm?

Two important things about this story.

1: It's a little thing, and we have a lot more of those happen to us than the big things. And big things are fine! Nothing against them. But if someone gives me the choice to pet a horse or a MINIATURE horse, I'm going with the little guy.

So I grabbed the lids, got a mint and a chamomile, and brought it upstairs to drink with my wife! I felt incredible, finding those lids! Like goddam Macguyver. If he just... looked a little and found the stuff he needed instead of inventing it.