Hi Darling Ones,

The unbearable heat and humidity in Minnesota has broken, which means we can have the windows open and not want to die of sweat-induced crankiness.

Thank to a cool breeze, open windows, and Liz Phair I got a momentary respite from the dread.

Frankly, I’m a little surprised I was awake to experience it. I don’t know about you, Darling Ones, but my reaction to having my bodily autonomy taken away by the USFB&GV government has been to sleep about it. My brain and body cannot take any more and so I’ve slept 20+ hours since Friday. I could probably sleep right now if I laid my head down (it’s 7:30 p.m. as I type).

My respite came later in the morning. The scent of my neighbors’ Japanese lilac trees was floating through the window, and I had just finished replanting Sonic, my aloe plant. I was feeling moderately productive and as a reward, I popped on Liz Phair’s “Whitechocolatespacegg” while enjoying this week’s #BarsOfSummer.*

It only lasted for about three minutes, but for those lilac-scented, peanut-buttery flavored minutes I was able to stop and say to myself, “well, if this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.”

Then the song ended, the bar was gone, and the crushing existential dread swept back in. But damn those three minutes were marvelous.

Sleepily yours,
Jodi

 
*This week’s #BarsOfSummer are called Boogie Woogie Bugle Bars and are, I believe, a Jodi Chromey original. I’m not gonna go too hard on being the inventor because as I have found, weirdly, people have a lot of opinions on bars, and what you call them. It’s weird. Without fail, every time I post about the bars someone will tell me I called them the wrong thing. As far as I can tell bar names are unique to families. Anyway, the BWBB are fucking delicious and if I am the inventor, this should be my culinary legacy. They’re peanut butter sauce (that’s what I’m calling the corn syrup, sugar, peanut butter concoction at the root of most bars), Bugles, caramel, and teeny tiny M&Ms.