New sheets — treat yourself nice because you’re nice

I bought new sheets last week. I bought a duvet cover (plus sham) the week before that and a down comforter before that. (tip: the “famous maker” on my blankie’s tag is Eddie Bauer!!)

I wish I could leave it there. If I thought my opinion on matters counted for much these days, I would write a product review on the site (THE LUXURY BEDDING I GOT FROM EZIBA IS FIT FOR A PHAROAH [GET IT? BECAUSE THEY ARE EGYPTIAN COTTON!]) or an incredibly detailed, picture-filled review on this blog to be one of those rando blog pages that gets lots of page views because it comes up when you  google for reviews of specific and obscure products. (If you found yourself here looking for a review of the West Elm Organic Cotton Pin-Tuck Duvet Cover: it looks like that. It does not feel like sandpaper. And I hate top sheets in principle, but get a nice one and the cover’s low thread-count is out of the equation. Get it. You’re going to be alright.) Or  maybe I could have produced a totally sincere haul video of me unboxing the bedding, washing it, putting it on my bed for the first time, then crawling into it naked, enjoying  800 threads of sateen finished Egyptian cotton on every square inch of my freshly showered nude body.

But mostly it’s a reminder that having nice things and taking care of those things can really be overlooked. Let’s be more mindful of the environments in our control. I’d prefer anyone other than me to talk about design and living, and neither am I advocating for materialism. I just think hand-me-down sheets are hard to get jazzed up about, and when a place where you spend anywhere from 6-10 hours in each day feels better in the most literal sense, it must effect your well-being.  I now find myself making the bed in the morning, which isn’t insignificant. Making the bed in the morning is a proven stress reducer. Another benefit: when you come home and your bed looks like the beds in the stores, I mean, don’t we all want to jump on or in the beds in the stores? Sleeping is awesome (I should do some of that now actually).

Sheets, socks, and underpants. Just because you’re not royalty doesn’t mean your intimates aren’t regal.

Small pleasures, ed. 1

I do not want to say YouTube or Digg or Facebook or Twitter or your Google Reader are wastes of time. Okay, maybe Digg is (except for this game that is up there now holy shit this is a dream come true). But I’m afraid I had forgotten how to waste time (in the office) without the internet.

Okay, I’m blogging, or maybe I could write an email to an old friend, but those are tasks. I also think YouTube or watching TV is a task: it’s research for conversation, after all. I want to know what you really do to waste time when there’s no computer or phone.

This is not the 21^st century equivalent of “you kids these days with your Sega Master Systems. In my day we played kick the can and spent days hoop trouling and we would put little Granduncle Zeke on the family dog and feed him rocks until Little Brown collapsed under the weight and then we would laugh and drink whiskey till Zeke threw up the pebbles. Yup, that was a good 6^th birthday party.”

What I’m saying is this: I just spent 4 minutes balancing my drinking glass on my teacup. This is not difficult. The curve of the teacup’s lip makes it easy for many reasons.

What is this good for? Like war: absolutely nothing. There is no way I could recall this task’s dexterity and sense of balance were I to be put in a Macguyver-like situation. That’s a waste of time as far as I can tell.

But such a pure waste of time is something to be treasured, and I have to believe such smaller, more aimless pleasures existed before we developed convenience-making technologies granting us access to so much of the world’s information and a million ways to be creative with no goal. Small pleasures like lickable stamps.

There is also something to be said for lickable stamps, but I don’t want to go there right now. The technology behind developing the adhesive for no-lick stamps at low cost, the calorie content…. But I have a 5:45 deadline I just missed. Dangit, K.Bo, my disappointments are endless.

The New Sincerity

I’d forgotten about this manifesto written a few years ago by one of my favorite podcasters/public radio show hosts espousing “The New Sincerity.” I really want to think (and really believe) that this manifesto just put a nicely summarizing label on things I’d always enjoyed. Makes me wonder: do you think behavior that strives for an imaginary ideal that isn’t completely internalized is reduced to being affectation, no matter how genuine the intent behind the behavior? That leads into (for me), “what’s the intent and what about it matters: the stated/motivating  intent or the impression of intent given?” and a bunch of other questions I have no answers for here and now. Maybe they can be found in a Philosophy 101 and/or self-help class (is self-help class an oxymoron?). Below, read half of Jesse Thorn’s Manifesto for the New Sincerity.

What is The New Sincerity? Think of it as irony and sincerity combined like Voltron, to form a new movement of astonishing power. Or think of it as the absence of irony and sincerity, where less is (obviously) more. If those strain the brain, just think of Evel Knievel.