i hate this
Welcome to the optimist's newsletter!
Welcome (back), haters!
In a concentrated effort to avoid the sophomore slump, which everyone knows plagues culture-forward e-newsletters and professional athletes equally, I bring to you i hate this, vol ii.
Open concept floor plans
There is a special place in
hellKim Kardashian’s house for the shitty real estate agent that invented “open concept” floor plans. Bring me my nooks! Bring me my crannies! Bring me, hell, a cubicle! I’m pretty sure this has something to do with being a taurus but anything that doesn’t allow you to 1) feel cozy or 2) gossip falls under the umbrella of hostile architecture. Human beings are psychologically wired to prefer edges or perimeter boundaries to open space (Google it!), and open concepts are therefore the psychological enemy of human relaxation. And me, personally.
Look at how cozy they are. And how able to scheme!
P.T. Barnum
If you have fallen under the spell of Disney-adult-pre-covid-slop The Greatest Showman, let me disabuse you of the notion that Barnum is anything other than the Donald Trump of the 1800s. The man who probably didn’t say—but more importantly, seems like he said—“there’s a sucker born every minute” is not anywhere near as squeaky-clean as Hugh Jackman before he “did not” cheat on his wife with Sutton Foster. P.T. Barnum, who was a major donor to my alma mater (Tufts) and a state representative in my home state (Connecticut), was that sweet and rare combination of a cynic and a grifter. He kept Joice Heth, a woman of color, in slavery for “lease” via a legal loophole, voted to ban contraceptives in Connecticut (overturned in the landmark Griswold v. Connecticut Supreme Court Case. Remember when that thing worked?), and, in just-creepy news, had a second wife who was his friend's daughter and also 40 years his junior. Sanitized history, beware i hate this!
Dogs, everywhere.
They call me Chloë Sevigny the way I be hating on dogs. This is somehow grouped together with TikTok-induced lines, athleisure, and new construction in what I am calling the LA-ification of New York City (possibly a future topic). If you’re participating in “clean girl aesthetic”, and especially if you’re pronouncing it “ass-thetic”, you should have to pass some kind of exam to take up residence here. But I digress. The symptom that’s been irritating me the most lately is the preponderance of dogs running this town. Literally today, just today, I have seen non-service animals in:
Offices (including my office)
Coffee shops
Sit-down restaurants
What I’m pretty sure is a pre-school
The line for Mimi’s frozen yogurt, which is hard enough to get into as a human being
and that’s nothing—think of the sidewalks, parks (public and private), and other areas in which I begrudgingly give canines a pass. It’s not really the dogs’ fault per se, but the owners who assume everyone is as IN LOVE with their fur baby as they are. Here I am, clacking away on my laptop, while Bailey takes a shit on the carpet and Snoodles humps his toy in the adjacent conference room. The experts warned us that COVID isolation would damage our social skills, but it’s coming out in ways hairier (furrier) than I imagined.
Happy hating and I’ll see ya next week!