Friday Favorites 13

Fri, 15 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Cue the music, brew that pot. A wood thrush (rare!) can to our yard yesterday — and if you’ve ever heard their ethereal, flute-like song, you have some idea of how excited I was.

Here are 10 interesting things worth sharing this week:

I spend a lot of time reading book recommendations instead of just reading books. So maybe reading Emma Reads Too Much’s list of books about books will entice me to finish a few more?
Plug-in solar laws are being passed in different states, my social feeds are full of gardening and DIY, and I think the time is ripe for solarpunk optimism. I love this solarpunk animation from years back (yes, it’s a Chobani commercial; the irony is not lost on me) and think we could all benefit from imagining better futures we can build rather than doomscrolling.
“And what a pleasure that is; to be, on the page, less of a dope than usual.” Really enjoyed George Saunders writing about his creative process, especially the small incremental changes he makes that end up making his writing more compassionate.
Oh to be gifted a well-serviced typewriter from the patron saint of typewriters himself, Tom Hanks.
“Somehow, before personal computers and email, they managed to collaborate on an entire book—drafts of pages written on typewriters were placed in yellow envelopes and mailed across continents and ocean.” There’s a lot to love in this creative advice from Anna Brones’ mom, but I am fascinated people used to write books without computers.
I have way more ideas for creative projects than finished products — so I really enjoyed this video about how you can get stuck in it. Time to make a few zines and short stories!
It’s the season of commencement speeches: I prefer Harrison Ford’s to the viral AI one going around. But DFW’s “This Is Water” speech and Baz Luhrmann’s sunscreen speech are my two all-time favs.
We’re on the Zara Larson hype train in our household, and the viral clip of her being very tired (and relatable) doing a 5 a.m. sound check for The Today Show is how I feel being on a video call before 10:30 or so.
Western AF introduces me to a lot of great music, but I’ve come back to “Wishing Bone Blues” by Cristina Vane so many times over the years, I think I’m responsible for 1/10th of the views. Such a good guitar solo.
I wrote about the four reference books I keep on my writing desk and had a great time paging through my usage history again — another encouragement from DFW!

See you on down the dusty trail,

Cristinavane on Isak's Blog

Friday Favorites 13