Jessalyn Aaland

Winter Welcome (No. 7) Please Take a Look!—current events from Current Editions

Big News: my upcoming publication Girltalk is now available for pre-order! Find out all about it in the latest @currenteditions.bsky.social newsletter

but did you figure out if christ is real?!

Is America even prepared for this much art & academia visibility in electoral politics?!

We did it for you Dick Cheney

I’m concerned today’s level of internet fun may surpass the day Queen Elizabeth died

“Every parade has a right to exist in New York City”

“The Warriors are losing and we’re watching this?!??!?” @hernberferd.bsky.social’s 86-year-old mom weighs in on tonight’s game

“How can I play Wordle with the Pope?”

praying for a miracle you read this

A power line just exploded outside our window in Emeryville. RIP to the bird that caused it!!!

Does your cult have to be an anti internet/off grid cult in order to work successfully?

How are today’s sociopathic cult leaders getting their needs met?!

Ok serious question: what are cults in 2025?

It seems like now you’re just an influencer doing MLM. And since everyone is online and therefore you also have to be online, you a) can’t drop out and do drugs & b) can’t do the classic cult thing like get everyone to move to a compound and self-isolate

I KNOW just one of many crimes against us sign guys

A view of Orean's The Health Express orange sign with green and black text in serif and bubbly fonts. The bottom of the sign reads Total Vegetarian in a green serif font with white outline. The sign is a street view featuring the iconic a-frame building with red roof to the right, a lamp post in the left foreground and in the right background, and a view of Pasadena's Lake Street to the right.

Illuminated nighttime sign for Orean's vegetarian fast food restaurant reading "Total Vegetarian" with image of a plant-based burger, fries, and the brand's red train logo.

Sadly, in the 2010s, a series of rebrandings aimed at modernizing Orean’s led to less satisfying versions of the sign (the last photo is probably from our final visit in 2014, at least they kept the train!).

Bright yellow vintage sign for "Orean... The Health Express" featuring a cartoon faded red train carrying a veggies, advertising a vegetarian fast-food drive-thru in Pasadena, California.

The perpetually peeling yellow sign with its train hauling an assortment of veggies was also iconic.

Its A-frame building, across the street from a McDonald’s, stood as a classic SoCal food culture showdown (the first McDonald’s was founded just 30 minutes away). Global capitalism vs. “ethical consumption”: a hallmark early 00s debate!

As a vegan in Southern California in the early 2000s—when options were slim—Orean’s was a regular stop on drives to shows in LA from San Diego, or from my childhood home in the Inland Empire.

Now it appears to be an abandoned building, most recently home to a short-lived Tierra Mia Coffee.

Woman with long brown hair in a purple shirt making a peace sign, posing in front of an abandoned building with iconic green A-frame architecture, chain-link fence in foreground, sign reads "Tierra Mia Coffee"

While in Pasadena for the LA Art Book Fair with currenteditions.bsky.social, we naturally had to pay our respects to Orean’s Health Express on Lake Street (RIP!).

Founded by Orean Curtis Thomas in 1979, Orean’s was the first vegetarian fast food restaurant in the United States.

“architects and influencers”

“This is the caterpillar to end all caterpillars.” 🐛📲

Educators Union Rejects Anti-Defamation League, Cuts Ties The Anti-Defamation League has been a ubiquitous presence in U.S. schools for forty years, pushing curriculum, direct programming, and teacher training into K-12 schools and increasingly into universi...

The largest union in America, the three million member-strong National Educators Association, has voted to *cut all ties* with the Anti-Defamation League, citing the ADL’s opposition to Palestinian rights and antiracism.

@labornotes.bsky.social has the story: www.labornotes.org/blogs/2025/0...

YouTube video by Connie Converse - Topic I Have Considered the Lilies

youtu.be/Tmo7__7Y-gc?...

A work surface with a green cutting mat covered in collage clippings including two white and clear trays full of colorful miscellaneous objects, a clear tray of cut flowers. The mat is littered with clippings of flowers and textile objects like macrame. Also visible is a pair of orange handled scissors, a purple Xacto knife, a pencil, a metal ruler, an and sheet of colorful prismatic lotus symbol stickers. On the right side is a collage in progress: a wildflower bouquet in a tall thin colorful handmade vase on a brown paper background pressed to look like a wood tabletop, and a white background wall.

The show includes collages from 2017–2025: flowers, rocks, shells, stickers, and hand-cut shapes in spirals or quiet scenes. The title comes from a beautiful Connie Converse song I love. 🌼💗

Smiling woman in sunglasses, a floral print t-shirt, jeans, and off-white sneakers flashed a peace sign while kneeling. She is surrounded by boxes contained framed artworks in the bottom of a white brick stairwell in an industrial building.

Excited to share that my solo show Tell Me How to Be a Lily opens this Thursday, July 3, at Yorba Gallery in Sutter Creek, CA. Come by if you’re in the Sierra foothills this summer!

🎊 Reception July 19, 5–7pm.

That’s kind of what I was thinking?!

It’s not “bad,” but not my first choice

A hand holding a can of Sunshine La Croix against a white wall. The person holding the can has light skin and a light purple metal enamel bracelet.

@sahotchkiss.bsky.social in the spirit of a scientific investigation I am revisiting this beverage to give it a proper review. I would say the overall taste is like a smashed packet of Skittles with a slight skew towards lime and an unexpectedly weird undertaste of coconut

Yeah it’s like citrusy. I had no idea what to expect!