Shouts & Murmurs
Every Newspaper Obituary’s First Paragraph
Alfred T. Alfred, whose invention of the plastic fastener that affixes tags to clothing upended the tag industry, died on Saturday.
A Guide to Brat Summer
What is Brat? It’s the Cynthia doll from “Rugrats.” It’s praying to Janeane Garofalo to keep you free from harm.
My Life’s Work
Every day for the past forty years, I’ve got up in the morning and tried to figure out how to get tiny shards of plastic into human testicles.
“Me, Lania”: A First Lady’s Memoir
So I gave Donald my number and the next thing I knew I was living in a penthouse at Trump Tower and asking Alan Dershowitz to stop eating on the couch.
Writing Prompts for New Parents
Write a story about an underground tunnel that leads someplace unexpected while you sit between a radiator and a diaper pail.
Bot Therapy
He was a widower who had lost his wife to cancer and his only son in a hideous boating accident. He worked in a bunker in Paris. I took the bait.
Parents in a Chain
The great zucchini-bread disaster of 2024 and other mishaps, on a group text of moms and dads after the library bake sale.
Middle-Age Fantasies
Which is hotter? Talking geopolitics with the sexy nurse, or finding that the alluring young babysitter likes your unpublished novel?
What Are You Fond of, Samuel Alito?
My wife is fond of expensive men’s watches, Norwegian death metal, and private jets. I am not.