It’s been a slow week—just the way I like it. I finished up all my teaching responsibilities on Monday and decided to take a “reading vacation” for the rest of the week. What does that mean? I picked a single work task to do per day—basically sending a few emails every day—and then, once that was done, fucked off for the rest of the day to read with all the windows open.
I didn’t actually end up reading as much as I thought I would, but I did get through a huge stack of single issues I picked up last month. It’s always deeply satisfying to me, being able to read a back issue from the ‘80s, put it in a clean bag and board, and then file it away in a shortbox. The ritual is as nice as the reading of the comic.
But the comics were also good! I had a few early issues of Infinity, Inc. from the early ‘80s (featuring Earth-2 Wonder Woman’s daughter, Lyta Trevor, who is on my mind now for many reasons), a few issues of Justice League International (somehow I always forget how funnyyyyyy that book is), and of course the comics I picked up on Free Comic Book Day last Saturday.
I also had SO MANY Green Arrow back issues from Judd Winick’s ‘00s run. Which leads me to my FORMAL list of Things I Like for this week:
Kevin Smith’s Green Arrow run, which precedes Winick’s. DC just relaunched the Green Arrow title with a truly excellent #1, and it inspired me to go back to my Quiver and Sounds of Violence trades. I forgot how good that run is, just how good Comic Book Drama can be. More melodramatic reunions, please! Past and present!
I watched Queen Charlotte because fuck the monarchy, but I am a Bridgerton bitch. I like period romances! Sue me. The central romance, as always, is great, but I’m way more interested in the older women’s friendship. Anyway, the show itself has weird and complicated “real world” politics (again, it’s literally romanticizing the British monarchy), but there’s little I love more than deliberating on a romance’s responsibility to, like, deconstruct history. Or deliberating on my own complicity by engaging with historical romances of truly fucked figures in the first place. The Hamilton effect, I guess.
Uncomplicated romance: Emily Henry’s new novel Happy Place might be my new favorite Emily Henry book. Like it was designed specifically for me and my neuroses. She hasn’t missed yet.
I finally read American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang. I can’t say anything about it that hasn’t been said before, but it for sure for certain deserves every award, honor, and word of praise its ever received. Hoping I get the chance to teach a comics course again, and soon, just so I get to put this on the syllabus.
And I finally watched Loki! And actually really enjoyed it! Possibly because, between Tom Hiddleston’s British accent and all the time travel stuff, I kept forgetting I wasn’t watching Doctor Who. Which makes me think I should probably just commit to catching up with Doctor Who.
So fucking obsessed with these chili lime corn chips from Trader Joe’s. I could eat them forever.
I’m counting writing this newsletter as my “work task” for the day and returning to my so-called reading vacation. I’m still trucking through X-Men and I am SO CLOSE to finally dipping into the Claremont era.
I hope there are open windows and good books wherever you are, too.