The New Year, or tumbleweeds for brains

My idea for this week’s essay is moving to next week because I simply do not have the energy or mental fortitude to expand on why Orange Juice’s “Rip It Up” is the quintessential New Year’s song. But you will have a full-throated defense of this thesis waiting for you in your inbox by the time you wake up next Sunday morning, scout’s honor. In all seriousness, establishing a delivery schedule for Not Quite Punk to appear like clockwork every Sunday morning is lofty, but when I remind myself of why I’m even doing this — which is to produce the kind of cultural musing, alt-weekly-esque pieces that I would want to read — I’d want that newsletter on a weekend morning to consume alongside my first cup of coffee. I’m telling you right now (for accountability purposes) that beginning next week, I’ll have completed everything for this weekly dispatch — from topic selection, to header image w/caption — by EOD each Saturday and scheduled the send for 8am the next day. This is all totally fine,  and doable, and absolutely not certain to blow up in my face at any point when life starts lifin’ and my brain gets all cached up again. Right, right… right??

I don’t have much else to add today, it’s my first full day off since, I dunno, mid-November? Early December? It’s been difficult to keep track. And I’m currently staring down 2026 with an open (yet completely untouched) budget spreadsheet, a fully filled in, all-encompassing media consumption tracker (in which I plan to log everything I watch, read ,and listen to this year), and the looming probability that a lifetime of total self-employment and gig work (business plans! accounting!) lies ahead. It’s daunting and I’m nervous. There is so much to be nervous about right now (understatement). More on all of the above soon, especially the media log. Three days into the new year and I have to face a Podcasts tab that has 12 entries in a single day feels. It doesn’t feel amazing. However, in my defense, a lot of them were half an hour or less and I listened to most of them as I walked for 7.3 miles and climbed 44 flights of stairs. 

I’m rambling at this point, and though rambling is something I’m genetically prone to, I try my best to avoid. I’ll leave you with a recommendation because even though this entry is very much a place holder and the actual commitment to this overarching project begins next week, the first real week of the new year, I can’t have written this much without sharing something actionable. If you have access to Hulu and haven’t started The Lowdown yet, do it. This series is everything I was hoping it would be and so much more. The influences are apparent — Twin Peaks, Elmore Leonard, Larry McMurtry, etc. — but they are so finely woven into a wholly original story that it makes what show runner Sterlin Harjo is doing all the more impressive. Everything about this series is profoundly lived-in, the central conspiracy grows increasingly thorny from episode to episode, and Ethan Hawke’s Lee Raybon remains shockingly reckless as his investigation deepens. Between this and Blue Moon both happening in 2025, I’m officially ready to claim Hawke as my favorite actor. And I haven’t even seen some of his most definitive work (including the entirety of the Before trilogy(??) — I know, I know, I know, I know, I know… I’ve been saving it). And… it looks like I just gave myself another media intake project for 2026, huh? Cool, cool, cool. Back to The Lowdown, this is the kind of art that demands to be savored. I’m on track to watch the finale tomorrow night and I’m already feeling its absence. 

Anyway, Happy New Year from my supremely disorganized mind, tumbleweed infested mind. I hope yours is faring a whole lot better. And if it's not, here's to commiseration.