everything's awful! let's do a silly one

Behold! I have had a thought.

Hello!

Hi! So a few weeks ago I went to the AGM of the Elderly Hacks Pub-Attending Society, by which I mean: I went to the pub with a group of friends I met between the years 2013 and 2015, back when we were all baby journalists, and I guess a bunch of us lost touch a bit over the years but now we’re trying to make the most of it, and see each other as a group roughly once a quarter. It’s pretty nice.

My main memory of that group is of the time a number of us covered the 2015 general election, slept for an amount of time that ranged from zero minutes to maybe 120 minutes, and then we all met up at something like 1pm in a Wetherspoons and ordered a pitcher of cocktail each, as a way to try and process what’d just happened.

Well, I also have a bunch of other memories from those years but not everything needs to be online, you know. I think everyone should be allowed to be in their early twenties in the privacy of their own friendship groups.

Anyway! I attended the EHPAS AGM the other week and somehow we got onto the topic of “what would be the worst foods to eat while sitting in a hot tub with people?”. I can’t actually remember what prompted that particular question, though I do vaguely recall discussing the Jacuzzi Conundrum, namely that everyone would like to have friends with a hot tub but no-one can be “the couple/person with the hot tub” because the vibes of that are just rancid. I guess we moved on to the food thing pretty quickly after that.

Without further ado, here are the minutes from our discussion, written up like a fortnight later so I definitely forgot a bunch of them, and also I’m adding some new entries because it’s my newsletter and I can do what I want.

The Top 5 Worst Foods To Eat In A Hot Tub (In No Particular Order)

1. Fondue

I mean this came up basically immediately. Horrid horrid horrid. Can you imagine trying to navigate all that gooey cheese while sitting in bubbling water? What if a piece of soggy, cheese-laden bread were to fall onto your lap? What if someone knocked the whole fondue machine into the water, scalding everyone in the process and also kind of covering them in rapidly curdling cheese? A fondue in a hot tub would be a nightmare.

2. Sushi

Not sure who suggested this first but I have a very clear memory of the full body shiver it caused. I’m so violently repulsed by the idea of eating sushi in a jacuzzi. I’m not even sure why. I think it’s got something to do with the raw coldness of the fish, mixed with the inherent warm, humidity of human bodies in hot bubbling water? I just hate it so much. Lil’ piece of ‘shimi in the jacuzz’. Vile. Unspeakable. Interestingly, though: not everyone agreed. Some people were fine with the idea. What a way to find out your friends are, I now assume, child murderers.

3. Lasagne

I would say this wasn’t as much of a slam dunk as the others but it was my suggestion and I stand my ground. I’m particularly thinking of one of those overly sloppy lasagne, maybe one where - this is making me feel so ill - the chef went heavy on the bechamel. You really do want a full table, plate, knife and fork situation when you’re attacking a lasagne, and I just don’t see how you could feasibly do it in a hot tub. I think the layers would disintegrate really quickly and it would be chaos. No-one would be enjoying themselves.

4. 99 flake

I thought of this one afterwards and honestly it’s one of the worst ones, for me. I’ve not always had the easiest life, despite appearances, and the thing I found out thanks to that is that I’m actually capable of being remarkably calm when under pressure, and I can keep my cool when things are bad and getting worse, and I think of it as one of my greatest strengths. Not many people know about it but I think that’s nice, in a way; it means they’ve never had to see me in awful situations. Now the problem with this is that there is a flipside to it, and it is that sometimes I can just lose my entire shit over tiny little things, for reasons even I can’t really explain. The other week I was in the countryside and I realised I wanted to drink a Diet Coke but I don’t know how to drive and no-one who could drive was awake and the nearest place to buy a Diet Coke was maybe a 45-minute walk away and I: lost it. My internal monologue just became IwantadietcokeIwantadietcokeIwantadietcoke and it made me feel so sad and overwhelmed and it was very undignified. I reckon this is absolutely, basically word-for-word what would happen to me if I were to try and eat a 99 cone in a hot tub. The ice cream would start melting pretty much straight away and I’d try to lick all the sides somehow at once and I’d fail and it’d start melting onto my fingers and there’s nothing I hate more than the sensation of melting ice cream on my fingers and I would lose it. I would lose my entire shit. There’s a non-zero chance I would simply scream and throw the cone into the water then scream some more then run away, and maybe never see my jacuzzi friends again.

5. Ortolan

Another friend’s suggestion. Wouldn’t god be even more against the eating of little birds whole if He knew you were doing it while your crotch was bathing in warm, fizzy, chlorinated water? I reckon God would hate it sooooo much.

And that is all. Thank you. I would recommend playing a hearty round of “what are the worst foods to eat in a hot tub?” with your loved ones. We had a tremendous time doing it and I hope you will also.

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Quite a preposterous segue to make, really, but since I have you - would you, if you aren’t doing it already, consider taking out a paid subscription to this newsletter? Truly I hate self-promotion with all my life - I just love to post, which is a very different beast - but also to be entirely honest with you, I could do with a few more paid subscriptions right now.

I totally understand if you can’t afford it or if you don’t want it but, I guess, if you’d been waiting for a nudge or a reminder that actually I do publish on average over 2,500 words a week every single week on here and would quite like to be paid fairly for those words, then this can be it. Obviously I could have waited for an issue that didn’t talk about spilling melted cheese onto your lap while sitting in a hot tub to ask but I’m afraid this is where we’re at. Let us not mention this again for a little while. Farewell.

A column

Actually that’s a lie! It’s not a column at all. It’s a very serious discussion I had with a pal on the topic of literary readings. Well, a medium serious discussion. I know that readings became unbelievably trendy at some point last year or the year before that, in New York at first then in London, and I just didn’t understand why. I love reading books so much and I love going out but I see no point in mixing the two. I love suncream and gorgonzola and I wouldn’t want them to mix either.

Because I believe it’s important to remain as full of wonder for the big wild world as humanly possible, I decided to ask Rory, an associate who likes readings, to explain to me what’s so good about them.

Admittedly I could have gone to one myself but you must realise I really really really did not want to do that, because I assumed I would have just got amazingly, incredibly bored. This was as full of wonder as I could stand to be. Here is what we discussed:

Please could you tell me a bit about your background, so I guess specifically about why you’d be the sort of person going to literary readings

Ha

Hm

I’m a copywriter, and I’ve had bits of fiction published here and there, but mainly I go because I’m very into contemporary literature and, if these nights are well-curated, this is a good way to enjoy/find out about some of that.

They’re also fun nights out in London, with a bar, that have a very different vibe from your usual author-reading-their-work-at-a-bookshop event.

I tend to bump into people I’ve already met around these circles fairly often at these events so it’s a good way to get my share of socialising in London w/ likeminded sorts

So bookish, enjoys good readers, likes bookish sorts?

Thank you! Do you remember why you decided to go to your first reading of that kind, by any chance?

Hmm

First one I went to was Deleted Scenes, and honestly, that was because my girlfriend was working with/good pals with Paul Jonathan, who runs those nights. It was good fun anyhow.

Fair enough!

Now, for the meat of the argument

Please try to explain to me why listening to someone reading out something they read doesn’t suck ass, especially as opposed to just reading something yourself, with the eyes god gave you

It’s a good question

But I suppose it all depends

There’s plenty of fiction that’s _good_ but which wouldn’t work in that sort of context. I feel like this novel scene of these kind of readings have made it apparent what kind of fiction does work in front of a crowd. Someone genuinely funny like David Sedaris or Patricia Lockwood are brilliant at reading their own work to a crowd (and Geoff Dyer’s maybe the best they’ve had at the Soho Reading Nights), while a drier writer like Elizabeth Strout, who I love, wouldn’t really make sense there

So at these readings in London I’ve hugely enjoyed Roísín Lanigan and Aea Varfis-van Warmelo because they’re charismatic/funny/intelligent and can really play to a crowd in a new sort of way that’s emerged w/ this scene (not that it should all just be some highbrow form of standup, but also it sort of is that in part). And also because they’re very good writers on the page anyway.

But yes, certainly you’ll encounter dry/awkward readers and the experience will suck ass, and the whole thing does demand a certain kind of attention that’s unusual for a night out (though maybe that’s good? Not that everything has to be some sort of mindfulness therapy nowadays).

Interesting interesting

So should I basically be seeing this as closer in vibe to, say, stand up, than reading a book

Is that where I’m going wrong do we think

I basically assume it was all quite....solemn

Ahh! Yes, although maybe it’s sort of unintentionally become that way just via reiterating what works? Or in terms of what people choose to read in front of a crowd, and really that’s what works best in front of a crowd — being funny. The hosts tend to be funny, the vibe does tend to be more light/fun/edgy (for better or worse)

I remember Geoff saying at the Soho Reading one that it was “the most rock n’ roll” event he’d ever read at. That’s definitely key here.

Okay this genuinely feels like I’ve unlocked part of this here

As I was genuinely picturing people essentially reading out quite pretentious lit fic while everyone stood or sat there in silence

And that basically made me angry as a premise

As it feels so unfun

But if the readings are funny!

Are they usually specifically written for the events or extracts from books?

Yeah, if these nights were made exclusively of that it’d have a v different vibe

Although there is p much always that literary quality (however the hell that’s defined) woven in, it’s not just a barrage of one-liners. There’s dramatic/emotive stuff.

The vast majority of what’s read would be stuff people have about anyway, whether it’s from published books (which they’re promoting) or works in progress or short stories they had to hand

Hmmm

I think I would find that frustrating

Also I guess what I find interesting here, as someone who both writes and does public speaking, is that I write differently in both cases

And I sort of can’t imagine a book extract ever being truly entertaining and not a bit clunky while read out loud

But I’m willing to accept this is a Marie problem

Mmm, that’s interesting

It then yeah, it goes back round to the sort of extracts, and what gets chosen and works well at these events

You can read a funny/entertaining page of Geoff Dyer or Patricia Lockwood out loud to someone and (if they’re that sort that enjoys those writers) they’d find it funny/entertaining. I read some David Sedaris out loud to my gf the other day and we were in hysterics. But they’re just written in a particularly light/breezy/chatty sorta way.

Me and my gf came in late in Aea’s event the other day and thought she was answering a question/chatting to the cohost when it turned out she was actually reading from her book — it’s first-person and the book/her performance was just very conversational anyway, it’s engaging in that way

Ooooh!

Okay this is annoying I can feel myself getting convinced

Have you ever been to readings that sucked

For balance

Oh definitely

Or there have been particular readings on particular nights that sucked

Those ones tend to be more self-involved/detaily/not orientated to a crowd. Or the performers have been either too awkward or just sort of charmless, unable to really perform. Or they’re trying to be funny but they’re tragically _just not that funny_. Or at least not to me.

So finally

Am I being unreasonable/a bitch if I assume those events are quite pretentious

(I will note here that being pretentious isn’t necessarily bad - I, too, like some pretentious things - but you know)

They are surprisingly _unpretentious_ (or at least in a literary sense — it’s not like “oh you haven’t read Henry James, you haven’t read Moby-Dick, what’s the point of you”, they don’t oscillate around intellectual intimidation, any idiot could feel comfortable there)

But there’s a sort of edginess that’s to do with a high cultural cachet literary fiction (or particularly edgy cool contemporary literary fiction) has that tends to define the tone of the scene and of these nights

So if its it’s pretentious, it’s pretentious in a _hipster_ way, rather than a 17 year old who brags about having read Finnegans Wake way

Very east London

Hahaha, that’s probably why I find them a bit off-putting

Very not my scene! But bless them

Okay I think you have been successful in at least making me feel curious about them

When I previously felt entirely uninterested in them

Great, glad I could help!

And scene.