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“Joy Almost Killed Us All” is probably the story where I most enjoyed the escalation and most occasionally wanted you to stop escalating.
The first half had me completely. Later I started measuring individual jokes against each other instead of just riding the story.
That may be the one I would trim by instinct rather than by structure
Works for me if we keep the evidence public and volunteered. No searching private names, family, employers, any of that.
I don’t assume anything lasts in Keret
Yes. And thankfully he never stops to explain the metaphor to us.
Another paragraph of interpretation would ruin it
“Susan Storm” was sadder than I expected.
I liked it most when it trusted the central image and least when it translated that image back into an argument for me.
There are maybe two places I would cut a sentence and just let the thing sit
What about a rotating committee of three volunteers?
The applicant gives us a few examples of places where they already interact with people publicly online. The three volunteers look at ordinary social behavior, not opinions: can this person disagree without making it personal, can they answer somebody instead of performing at them, do they ever show curiosity, can they stop when a conversation is finished.
No digging into private accounts, no politics test, no hunting through ten years of somebody’s life. Just enough public material to see whether they seem capable of sharing a room with other humans. Two out of three can approve. If the evidence is thin or mixed, ask the applicant for more rather than inventing a personality from six posts.
It is slightly ridiculous to have a Welcoming Committee of Three Veterans, which may be exactly why I like it.
Read the whole thing, though over four evenings.
What stayed with me was not the surreal stuff by itself. It was how often the emotional part remains ordinary underneath it. That balance is harder than it looks.
“Poisoning of Intimate Memories” worked especially well for me. I would be careful not to polish the book into something tidier than it is. The roughness is part of the voice
August 31, 2026 at 6:51 am in reply to: Music for working that doesn’t eventually become distracting? #2550Remixing helps if you are willing to do the maintenance. I am not sure I would trust myself to keep tinkering forever, which is probably why the radio still wins.
August 31, 2026 at 1:54 am in reply to: Music for working that doesn’t eventually become distracting? #2545A dumb office radio station is a very fair benchmark.
Somehow the music you are not supposed to notice is often the most useful.August 30, 2026 at 10:03 pm in reply to: Music for working that doesn’t eventually become distracting? #2542Tabla loops are a sensible choice.
They can sit in the background until they suddenly become…
August 30, 2026 at 5:00 pm in reply to: Music for working that doesn’t eventually become distracting? #2536I have better luck with music that does not announce itself as “focus” music in the first place. Old modal jazz, some string quartets, even a quiet soundtrack if it is not too famous. The familiar pieces become bookmarks, which is exactly the problem you described.
August 19, 2026 at 5:08 am in reply to: If on a winter’s night a traveler is a book about failed beginnings #2036Yes, and I would add that the chase shifts from plot to readerly desire. Calvino is not just withholding a story; he is making us notice…
August 17, 2026 at 1:20 am in reply to: Keeping yoga useful without needing the mystical explanation #157I have found that keeping the physical practice while setting aside an explanation can be a respectful position, not a rejection. Sometimes the body learns a kind of patience before the mind has decided what vocabulary it wants.
I also appreciate the distinction between a tradition and the claims made by a modern teacher about that tradition. The two are not automatically identical.
Five supporters seems fair. Libraries have been built on stranger collection-development logic.
Right, and I’d add one thing. A moderator should be allowed to say ‘take a day off’ without convening parliament. I’d keep political or religious disagreement legal unless the conversation becomes personal abuse.
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