I subscribe to Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo because I started distrusting legacy/mainstream media outlets quite a long time ago, once they started chasing clicks and bending the knee to their corporate overlords. It is amazing to me, that people …
Why I work, for the kabillionth time
My husband just started a new job; I started a new job in January of this year. Both of these opportunities came after a period of not working for a year or more. During these hiatuses, we experienced some struggles …
Make culture, not war
I have always been a bit of a pop culture addict – I was a longtime reader and early subscriber of magazines like People, Entertainment Weekly, Premiere, Esquire, GQ, Us Weekly – no plane ride would be complete without me …
Communicating for power
I don’t understand why I get frustrated when people don’t seem to understand communications when I wouldn’t have a job if everyone understood communications. Like, my entire career has been in helping people say what they want to say on …
Message discipline, redux
[I know I reference my mom quite frequently in my writing here about communications, politics, and whatnot, and it’s because she’s such an interesting audience member to me – highly-educated, raised under certain cultural circumstances (wartime Korea), extremely proficient in …
My Five-People Rule for Processing the News
I have written a great deal about the narrative multiverse we’re in and even though we can still encounter compelling stories and moments of pure joy and inspiration (thank you, Minnesotans and Bad Bunny!), our daily lives are still peppered …
What to do about narrative rabbit holes
Three anecdotes: –One, I remember seeing a TikTok from Tressie McMillan Cottom, who I respect very much as a journalist and writer, the day after the November 2024 election. She talked about being at one of her favorite restaurants and …
Getting unstuck from the anger bog
I play a very soothing, dumb game all the time now, called Block Blast!, it’s very similar to Tetris except instead of having blocks fall continuously from above (which causes me anxiety, tbh), it gives you three blocks at a …
Learning, trying, and doing
One of the things I try to guard against, as I gather more experience and expertise with age, is coming off as a person who believes they’re always right. I have developed an acute allergy to people who are 100% …
Wanted: fun people doing great things
I launched this website in early 2018 because I left a full-time executive position at the end of 2017 and was about to launch a practice in communications consulting and writing. (I also wanted to do meeting design and facilitation …
