Hey, so I don’t have a monologue for you this Friday; we are preparing for the arrival of the National Guard in Chicago, a headache we are ready to face head-on. (Simply put: Wrong city, jagoffs.)
With the invasion rumored to begin as soon as tonight, it’s a little…funny how silent the second-amendment crowd is right now, no? If you’re a Chicago homie and have the means and time, there are a couple of protests planned this weekend:
Potentially Saturday at 5pm downtown, though I would confirm the details and vet the organizers
It also happens to a very busy week of celebration: our annual block party — a raucous affair — and my birthday week — theoretically a laidback affair — despite including an activity almost every night. (Joy is resistance, and all that.)
And now here are some links!
away we go.
Chicago gears up as Trump troop deployment looms: ‘We aren’t helpless’
By Maia McDonald for The Guardian
Best line: “We can’t be effective if we don’t act together, and I think we draw our strength from each other. I think that is the strength of Chicago, and that’s what’s going to get us through this, and, you know, I think that’s the strength of a lot of places in this country,” Poloyac said. “I think that’s what Trump’s administration doesn’t understand, that we are in a community.”
I'm Post-Hope (and it's the Richest Place I've Ever Been) by Eden Connelly for New Money Social Club
Best line: Before we tailspin here, I invite us to consider a longer, deeper, truer timeline. Humans have been human-ing on earth for like 300,000 years, right? ✓
Up until the last couple hundred years (a mere blip on our DNA), the vast majority of our collective ancestors lived in far more earthbound cultures. They were at the whim of sunlight and candlelight… Their food came from the earth… Human progress moved at the speed of human bodies—far slower, more humble, more focused… Hard, physical labor was a part of daily living.
Here's what I'm getting at: for the vast majority of human history, for most people around the world, "success" was more about surviving than it was material acquisition.
I Drank Every Cocktail by Adam Aaronson
Best line: The IBA official cocktail list has existed for over 60 years. It was first proposed in Paris in 1960 by bartender and IBA founding member Angelo Zola, who felt the need to standardize the mess of cocktail recipes that differed depending on which bartender you asked. Zola assembled a committee within the IBA, and together, they decided on a set of cocktails that best represented the most important recipes served around the world.
As of July 12, 2025, I’ve had every one of them. The journey has taken me to some interesting places, and now that it’s done, I have a little story to tell for each cocktail. Drinking all 102 cocktails turned out to be unexpectedly tricky, and for reasons you’ll soon understand, I might be one of the first people in the world to do it.
Erie in the dark: Michigan teens swim all the Great Lakes in one day by Neil Blake for Mlive
Best line: They aren’t the first group to do the feat, nor will they be the last, but it’s an exclusive club of people that can say they’ve dipped their toes in each Great Lakes in 24 hours. Club coach Anne Petruzzi accomplished the task last year, inspired by fellow swimmer “Marathon Don” Kern, and thought the team would appreciate the challenge and the road trip. Kern has led a group from Grand Rapids the last several years and pioneered the route that Petruzzi led the club on.
A Moody, Gothic Writer’s Home on Long Island
By Alexa Brazilian for T: The New York Times Style Magazine
Best line: Coastal style hasn’t always been synonymous with whitewashed, sun-soaked spaces. In fact — as Stephen Alesch and Robin Standefer, the husband-and-wife design team known as Roman and Williams, learned a decade ago while working on Nantucket’s circa 1850s Greydon House hotel — shadowy interiors were the norm along America’s Northeastern shore until the mid-20th century. “It wasn’t like, ‘How can there be more glass?’” says Alesch. “You wanted to protect the interiors and the fabrics.”
Seth Putnam is an editor and writer in Chicago. He lives with his wife, son, and daughter in a 1920s home that is the epitome of a work in progress.
"Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it." —Mary Oliver