Inspo

a slangy vocab word that’s here to mollify you today whilst I concoct a more complicated post for next week

Intro: INSPO

So for today, I drafted and otherwise organized ideas for an in-depth essay that came from one of my favorite vocab words. But once I got halfway through it, and engaged in a whole discussion about the concepts I started with my very big-brained partner, I realized I needed some more time to work on that one, to get it to where I want it and to where the topics involved deserve it to be. So I’m hereby giving myself more time through next week to tinker with it. 

But what to do for today? Well I’ve noticed that several of the Substacks I follow do a sort of roundup sesh at the end of the week pretty frequently. Most of us here are writers, after all, so it is a good thing to peruse the museums of input that all of us are taking in regularly—it adds to my understanding and appreciation of a writer’s output, if I can see a bit of what they’re in-putting, too. It’s like a sort of non-academic literature review. Or a cabinet of curiosities tour. 

Besides, I think sorting all my things like this is fun: it’s a way to defrag the brain and share some of the awesome stuff that’s out there that isn’t made by me. And if you like my Musings, it might be nice to see the sorts of things I myself absorb and consume, only to digest them and produce my Musings from out of that process (yipes this metaphor went to a gross place sorry ‘bout that)... On a nerdy note: “inspo” is based on “inspiration,” which also has a meaning akin to “breathing in.” Yanno, inspire = breathe in; expire = breathe out? So this is INSPO which is what I’m taking IN. Cool, huh? Just me?

So what’s inspo? Besides a luxury brand name? Here’s the definition (from Merriam-Webster), and yes yes I know it’s a faux pas to use dictionary definitions in essays, but M-W is so enthusiastic about it—they’re so cute about this little slang term, look: 

…inspo is a clipped and modified form of the word "inspiration." It follows in the footsteps of such esteemed lexical units as convo and rando (for conversation and random, respectively. 

Esteemed lexical units. Ahhhh I love it.

Anyway, hereby follows a list of the stuff I’m intaking (as opposed to the Musings I’m outputting). I use the categories in Kathryn Vercillo’s rundown I stumbled across on Notes the other day. 

Reading 

• First, these several Substacks (I subscribe to more newsletters than I regularly read): 

  • The Recovering Academic

  • The Deleted Scenes

  • Dirtbags Through the Ages

  • Molly White

  • The Status Kuo

  • Personal Canon Formation

As I said, I do follow several more, but these are the ones I make sure I read everything they publish as soon as they come out.

• The John LeCarrè George Smiley spy series: right now I’m on book 4 (Looking Glass War).

• Every night I read Sherlock Holmes canon stories in bed to calm my brain. What. Victorian murder calms me down. That’s not weird.

  • These days it’s a rotation of some of the later stories: The Valley of Fear, “The Devil’s Foot,” “The Lion’s Mane,” and “Black Peter,” mainly.

The Lieutenant and The Detective. Batman used to be a thing I would intake quite a bit of, back when I was a gamer and the wonderful Arkham games were out. This image is by Gabriel Hardman, and I yoinked it awhile back from blogger Lieutenant Columbo’s Facebook page. Don’t you wish this was a whole comic?

Watching 

I don’t tend to follow series, because I can’t commit. When I do watch things, it tends to be:

• Columbo (for comfort)

• Watch it For Days, who deconstructs Columbo eps and finds the most obscure uncredited actors and LA locations and it’s just delightful

• silly paranormal ‘researchers’ series Hellier (I actually just finished this)

• Andre Mack the sommelier, who reviews wines of all kinds or pairs them with crazy things or compares vintages

• Milo (the miniminuteman) who debunks archaeological conspiracy theories and makes me think The Kids Are All Right

• A few TikTok creators I follow regularly are good for the brain soothings and high level / lowbrow entertainment, like:

  •  the Gen-Z Bible translator (also the actor that does Shakespearean monologues in Gen Z-speak)

  • Sandwiches of History 

  • Roll For Sandwich

  • The Makeshift Tavern

  • I do follow the lovely ASMR of several collage artists that do junk journals

• just saw the movie Renfield and adored it

In a world of poisonous interwebz and online hate, Roll For Sandwich is a beacon of wholesome (though not always tasty) happiness and light.

Listening to (1/2)

• My partner is a musician and music nerd. He’s ones of those that can pick up pretty much any instrument and follow nearly anything he’s listening to on it. As such, music-wise, I listen to him play and also his playlists. It’s a rich musical world.

  • He’s in particular a Metal and Outlaw Country enthusiast, and so I’ve been loving the exploration into those fierce and passionate subgenres. Other frequent genres I hear often in the home are: hardcore, hiphop, and jazz—oops I mean genius—guitar.

Listening to (2/2)

I am a podcast listener, have been since my long public transportation commute days. I still listen to a few during my work day (akin to my Substack intake, I subscribe to a few more than I actually listen to). These are the ones I tend to actually actively follow the most regularly:

• Trifles

• Betwixt the Sheets

• Moon Under Water

• The Columbo Podcast (who are doing Poker Face right now actually)

• 2 Psychologists 4 Beers

• Ding Dong Darkness Time

• Fresh Hell

• Trenchcoat, Cigar, Peugeot

(I won’t link to all of these—you can look them up in your own podcatcher if they sound interesting. Also, I am co-host on a literature and writing themed podcast called The Outrider, but that’s output, not intake, so. Nevermind.)

Tasting 

We’ve been lately addicted to Stanley Tucci’s incredible Italy travel/foodie series from last year and so we’ve been doing the burrata and the fresh pasta and the arugula with shaved Parmesan and all that lovely and delicious nonsense. I’m a cheese monster, too, and so I do like a lunch of a very sharp type with a couple of crackers or on a sandwich.

Smelling

• The younger stepgoblin is obsessed with pumpkin spice right now (no, he’s not a white woman, but) so there’s that-scented candles and the like around my world these days.

• My home always smells like coffee. Which pleases me.

• I always make sure we’re well stocked with that pricey fancy Japanese incense, of which flavors burned in the home are usually: lavender, sage, frankincense, myrrh, fig, and cedarwood. We burn incense nearly daily, even though we’re not allowed to in our apartment complex. Ssh, don’t tell anyone…

And I wanted to add one more category that pertains to me and the varying arts and things I regularly consume:

Teaching

This counts as intake as well as output, because teaching a (-n especially online only) class means I am reading lots of student produced material as well as refreshing myself on the course materials. This quarter, I’m teaching a course for the Bachelor of Arts Continuation program at DU—it’s a Communication Arts course and it’s all online. It’s called: Visual and Physical Communication. In it, we read a bunch of articles and look at videos and studies, but the two books we use most are Amy Cuddy’s Presence, and Paul Ekman’s Emotions Revealed. Which is great, because I’m mildly obsessed with the Tim Roth vehicle from back in the early 20teens called Lie To Me. Am I making my students watch this show? Not technically.

Here’s the course description:

How does body language reveal or conceal true intent? Humans appear to be "hard-wired" to assess, examine, and respond to the physical language of others. Although this process is often automatic or unconscious, people can learn to identify visual signs and employ the elements of physical rhetoric (posture, stance, bearing, expression, and gait) in conscious ways to persuade others. This course will explore the body’s physical response to certain triggers like anxiety, anger, and stress and how those triggers manifest outwardly. Students will examine strategies for reading physical signs in others and for managing their own physical and visual language. Students will learn techniques for performing nonverbal language, gaining tools for communicating leadership, power, acceptance, openness, and other nonverbal behaviors that impact communication in professional settings.

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Thanks to these two for inspira—I mean, for the inspo:

Kathryn Vercillo: Create me Free

John Halbrooks: Personal Canon Formation