Tag: featured

  • 2018: Bulldoze; 2019: Foundation

    Via Instagram

     

    2018 was my hardest year, the biggest year of change, the one where even my closest friends and family kept asking, “Are you OK? How are you handling all this?”

    But it was also an incredibly rewarding year with lots of love and laughter; that’s the part a lot of us forget when we describe what a garbage year it was, that there were still so many wonderful moments to be thankful for.

    I am thankful that after leaving a job of 21 years, the fears I had of not being able to support myself financially were unfounded. People came out of the woodwork to help me and to work with me and to open new doors for me and I worked hard to keep those doors open.

    I am thankful that my daughters are healthy and growing and becoming wonderful, talented people that I love spending time with. And I’m thankful that I’m loved even when I’m not feeling very lovable or worthy.

    There are a lot of things I’ll miss about my life before 2018, but this new path has been so unexpected and exciting, full of offers and new projects and love I could never have imagined for myself. I’m optimistic that will continue.

    My incredibly prescient word for 2018 was “Bulldoze.”

    For 2019, it’s “Foundation.” I hope that I can keep building a great life for myself and the people I love this year.

  • Recent writing: ebikes, dronegriculture and webcamgirls edition

    Dor Falu Korngold, MOD BIkes co-founder
    MOD Bikes co-founder Dor Falu Korngold. Photo by Nick Wagner for the Austin American-Statesman

     

    I am keeping busy! I’ve had several people ask me (online because I’m not out in public as much) “What are you working on?” or “what are you doing since you left the Statesman?” Still writing! Wrangling invoices! Pitching stuff! Going to the gym once in a while. Binge-watching Netflix shows!

    Of course, I worried a lot the month or two after I left my job of 21 years that the writing assignments would dry up and I’d be forgotten like a crunchy, fallen and browned Autumn leaf but it turns out I’m one of those perennial plants that just chugs along all year. I have to be very careful when I spell that word, “Perennial,” because I know that spelling it wrong turns it into something referring to penises, and that is NOT what I want prospective employers to see on this site, unless they are paying for that sort of advertising. It wouldn’t be ideal, but a man’s got to eat, hopefully not with funds made from penis-related ad money.

    THIS POST IS NOT GOING GREAT, SORRY.

    What this is supposed to be is an update on stuff I’ve been writing, so here goes that:

    In the Dec. 4 print edition of my old stomping grounds the Austin American-Statesman, they’re publishing an interview I did with Dor Falu Korngold, the founder of a new Austin shop called MOD Bikes. E-bikes are super interesting to me, and we talked a lot about how they fit into an Austin transportation scene dominated by electric scooters. You can read the story online here.

    "Cam" movie on Netflix
    Netflix

     

    I’ve been writing a lot of things for Book and Film Globe, including a review of the new Netflix movie “Cam.”

    A few weeks ago, I wrote an impassioned plea to comics artist/writer Chip Zdarsky to bring back “Kaptara,” a comic that only ran five issues and that I thought was hilarious and wonderful. Sadly, I don’t think it’ll be back anytime soon after its great 2015 run. He did respond on Twitter, and that was nice.

    I also did a review of a graphic novel about Hedy Lamarr, you can find that here.  Want to dig in more? Here’s all the stuff I’ve written for that site. I have something coming up soon about “Avatar,” so keep an eye out for that, please.

    This one’s different: a Q&A with a drone expert about how they can be used in agriculture! The subject of the interview was Neil Marek and the story was for “TNLA Green,” a magazine from the Texas Nursery and Landscape Magazine.

    Drone expert Neil Marek at Magonlia Gardens Nursery
    From TNLA Green magazine, photo by Phil Kline

     

    I’m still doing weekly radio segments for “Texas Standard!” You can find them all here including recent ones about Black Friday shopping and bad Microsoft Windows updates.

    Speaking of audio, I’ve got about 15 more audio segments up on Tech Minute Texas. There’ll be a total of 100 one-minute segments on there soon and it’s looking like I’ll be doing 100 more in 2019! Hooray!

    Thanks to my good friend Wendi Aarons, I had a pre-midterm elections co-byline on McSweeney’s, which was a huge bucket list item I was finally able to check off.

    And lastly, for 512tech/Statesman, I did a review of the Aquio smart speaker/water bottle. This was the last of four reviews I did for the Austin Central Library’s Tech Petting Zoo partnership, and while I’m sad to see that conclude, I’m so thrilled that these devices are still there at the library for people to try out. I just visited again last week and it’s all in place. If you live in Austin, please check it out, it’s on the fifth floor of the library. That’s it for now! I have some more stuff in the pipeline for December and January and hopefully some news about some other projects coming, so stay tuned for that.

    Thanks to everyone who has reached out to see how I’m doing or to offer freelance gigs, I’m truly grateful.

     

    Statesman print page

    At the Austin Central Library Technology Petting Zoo
    At the Austin Central Library Technology Petting Zoo

  • At ‘One Page Salon’

     

    This is a piece I read in front of an audience at last week’s “One Page Salon” at the North Door in Austin. Thanks so much to Owen Egerton for the invite.

     

    It’s going to be all right.

    I can tell from your face that you’re not so sure if that’s true, so this is supposed to be reassuring. It’s all right. You’re going to be OK.

    Unless something happens. Or things don’t work out. That’s definitely possible. Things go wrong for people all the time. They make a wrong turn, some barely-there decision, and suddenly they’re neck deep in manure. Not real manure, figurative manure. Do you know much manure you’re need for it to be up to your neck in literal manure? Even if you’re short? That sounds expensive. And trust me, you don’t have money to be spending on that right now.

    Hey, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean you can’t afford shit. I just meant you probably shouldn’t be spending money right now on THAT MUCH SHIT.

    We’re getting way off track here.

    So. Things seem a little weird. I get that. Maybe recapping will help.

    You got divorced. Pretty quickly. After being married a really long time. That has to be jarring. The not-being married part. And you bought a house. Buying a house is a huge, ridonk headache, but you did it and now you live in that house and it even has pretty plants and a beautiful patio. Well done.

    But then you stopped co-hosting a podcast you loved, one you’d been doing for five years and that stung a little. And, related: you stopped doing the podcast because you took a buyout and left a job you’d been at for 21 years. 21 years! That’s half your life! Wow! And now you’re freelancing, which is a very nice way of saying you’re an unemployed writer. Self-employed. Self-employed sounds better than unemployed or underemployed.

    That’s lot of stuff that happened. And see, I think the problem — not that there’s a problem, things will be fine! — is that most people deal with stuff like that over a period of a few years, but you went and did all that in like three months. Some people have a mid-life crisis, you had … like… a midlife Cuban Missile Crisis.

    But it’s going to be OK. Unless it’s not, but let’s not think about that.

    You’re worried about money, but that’s never been your problem. You hustle, you work hard, you’ll make do. You’re worried that you don’t know what to do next. But remember all those days you sat in an office wishing you weren’t sitting there and feeling like you were wasting your time? At least you can waste your time on your own couch now. That’s an improvement, right?

    You’re worried that you have stopped doing the thing that defined you, that everybody knew you for, the thing that gave you worth.

    But what if it’s going to be all right?

    And it’s just time for some new definitions?

  • The audacity

    This just happened. I’m getting an oil change at an auto dealership. Reading the newspaper. A woman also waiting comes by where I’m sitting with two small empty water bottles and says, “Please tell me you’re recycling these.” After a few seconds I realize she thinks I work here. Ok fine. Understandable mistake.

    20 minutes later, she walks back to me, without saying a word, and starts pawing through my stack of newspapers I BROUGHT FROM HOME as I stare at her. She walks off with two sections and sits down. She still has them. I was done with them, but WHAT THE HELL LADY?!

    When people ask me what I think the best future business model is for newspapers, I will answer, “monetizing the silent acquisition of newspapers at auto dealerships by bored, presumptuous recycling nuts.”

    You can read a whole thread about this here.

  • In Vermont

    Travel is a kind of transformational magic where the disorientation of being somewhere else can help you step out of your own skin. At least that’s been my experience.

    In Vermont I ran my first half marathon. I was dead last out of more than 200 runners but I finished under 3 hours (I am slow) after having only run a 5K before. You can see from the before and after pics how different in felt.

    Sometimes I take on more than I think I can handle and surprise myself by just making it through. This was one of those cases — around mile 6 or 7 I didn’t think finishing was possible but my coach wouldn’t let me give up. I walked a lot and I pushed through back spasms and foot pain and exhaustion. But I made it.

    There was also a tough but very rewarding hike up Camel’s Hump, a beautiful kayak run, so much cheese and maple syrup and Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and OMG the Alchemist beer. I’m not even a beer guy but Vermont has some beer magic happening.

    It was beautiful and magical and memorable. And the weather and changing leaves: incredible. I’d like to visit again.

  • Another goodbye: ‘I Love You So Much’

    Photo by our pal Megan Renart

    My life partner in podcast, Tolly Moseley, put up a beautiful post on Facebook about the end of our hosting gigs on the podcast we co-created with Addie Broyles and Alyssa Vidales, “I Love You So Much” (which, in a previous life, was the successor to “Statesman Shots.”

    Without her, there would never have been a “Statesman Shots” and I wouldn’t have wanted to take on either show without her laughter, her talent and her can-do spirit. Which is why it feels right that we’re saying goodbye to the show together. It has been the best kind of creative partnership and I hope we brought the best out of each other. We’ll be on a couple more episodes through ACL Fest with Addie but you can hear our goodbye bonus episode below or on your favorite podcast app.

    Thanks to all our guests, our newsroom heroes who said yes again and again when they could have easily said no and to all of you who listened, who shared and who helped make our little dream of a fun Austin podcast a reality.