Is the club ever jumpin’ at 11:30, like Beyonce says? In Jumpin’, Jumpin’, by Destiny’s Child. 

When we were coming back from brunch, I was playing my “Upbeat Brunch Mix” on Spotify (should I stop using Spotify?) and Jumpin’ Jumpin’ by Destiny’s Child came on. 

I thought maybe the clubs were jumpin’ at an earlier time back in 1999, but my boyfriend thought it was because “eleven-thirty” had more syllables and sounded better in a lyrical context as opposed to “one-thirty.”

According to a Genius Lyrics contributor, it’s because “Many clubs maintain a ‘ladies fre;” rule before a certain time, often ten, eleven, or in this song’s context, eleven thirty. Before the given time, discounted drinks and waived covers are offered to women entering. This common practice has become more controversial over time, with some critics seeing the practice a form of commodifying women.” 

Then there’s a hyperlink that points to thetylt.com/culture/ladies-nights-sexist, to an article titled “Is it sexist to let women into bars for free?”

I don’t know what the hell Tylt is, but Google gave me one of those warnings about the website “appearing unsafe” because it’s missing an https protocol. The piece was written by Jessie Blaeser. After briefly LinkedIn stalking her, I found out she got a Master’s in Journalism from Columbia, which is something I want to get. A Master’s in Journalism in general.

My parasocial understanding of people is due both in part to social media and the great ease with which people make it to find them on the internet and due to, like, having to research a lot for work. And due to reading their books and stuff, I guess.

I’m currently reading Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino and I’m liking it kind of; it reminds me of the type of writing I was reading (and writing) for my undergrad thesis on hyperpop, but at a far superior level, and some other books I also read. 

Particularly the part  about identity performance online, which I think is something I read about in How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell, which I read in 2021, I think.

I also read Weather by Jenny Offill earlier this year, maybe a month or two ago when I first started my new job, and it contains a lot of that same post-2016 apocalyptic everything-is-falling-apart energy, which also reminds me of my undergrad thesis. Weather was published in 2020, Trick Mirror was published in 2019. How to do Nothing was also published in 2019. One is fiction, two are not.

In my limited cerebral cache of books (I read far less than I think I should, but doesn’t everybody?), these all cling to each other, drawn together like magnets or bubbles on the surface of a glass of sparkling water.

I recently started growing plants in my backyard. Corn, and squash, and some cucumbers that have just sprouted.

Apathy. I think most people are generally apathetic, or maybe it’s just me. Jia Tolentino’s book is giving me a lot of validation in terms of what I think about virtue signalling or online posturing and why it rubs me a weird way.

I guess the things that really matter are the persistent, personal ones. The ones in the smallest molecules of person-to-person communication. The smallest parts that make up bigger parts.

I strung up happy birthday balloons, but out of order, to say “apathy” for a sculpture class, where our task was to make an “outside sculpture,” back when all our classes were online. The campus police took it down pretty much immediately, but I snapped photos to submit for the assignment.

I’ve come back to add that Jia Tolentino actually quotes Jenny Odell’s How to Do Nothing at the end of the first chapter.