I tend to read, watch, and listen to an awful lot of Oldster-adjacent content. Now and then I’ll pass some of it along to you in a link roundup like this one.
(I usually only post link roundups every other week, but this week there were too many good ones not to share, so consider this one a bonus round…)
RIP Teresa Tylor, 60-year-old Butthole Surfers drummer and actor in Richard Linklater’s Slacker. - at Pitchfork, Rob Arcand reports.
“Madonna once sent him a note telling him his writing was brilliant, but depressing — it was one of the documents, along with his vaccine card, that Plunket grabbed when he fled his trailer during Hurricane Ian last year, he said.” - In The New York Times, Alexandra Alter profiles 78-year-old author Robert Plunket, whose comedic 1983 novel, My Search for Warren Harding, was recently re-released by New Directions.
“I’ve been dipping a lot into Michael A. Gonzales’s writing in recent months, particularly his stories about growing up, discovering the music that would carry him through to adulthood, working at record stores, book stores, and coffee shops (working environments I’m all too familiar with).” - at RockCritics.com, an interview with Oldster contributor
.Choire Sicha’s interview with 54-year-old Parker Posey in Vulture/NYMag is kind of bananas and I am here for it. I love her description of menopause:
“It is refreshing to know that there is a future for healthy conversations around “soft” masculinity on television—and that there is space for us to celebrate the impact that these values can have on the men that choose to embrace them.” - In Ms. Magazine, Aastha Jani writes about Ted Lasso, and how it’s changed how we view masculinity on TV.
“I thought that in these interviews I would hear more about pain and regret. Instead, I heard more celebration and excitement. There was less a sense of escaping from closets and more of emerging from cocoons.” - In The New York Times, opinion columnist Charles Blow interviews LBGTQ folks who came out later in life—and counts himself among them.
“‘Rapper’s Delight’ by the Sugarhill Gang was the first rap song I remember hearing. It was 1979, and I was 9 years old.” - more from Charles Blow in the Times, this time an appreciation of the Sugar Hill Gang’s iconic “Rapper’s Delight.”
“We really would just drive to someone’s house and see what they were doing. You and a couple people would be in the car and you’d be like, ‘Let’s go by Brian and Mike’s.’” - the internet was abuzz this week over this Dan Kois post on Slate, entitled: “Young People Have No Idea What We Used to Do After Work. Let Me Regale You.”
Ten years after his passing, actor James Gandolfini is fondly remembered by actors and others who worked with him. - in Vanity Fair, Jason Bailey reports.
- is fucking hilarious. - Via . (Happy belated 53rd to this early Oldster Questionnaire-taker.)
Bethanne Patrick, (another Oldster Questionnaire-taker) on the Book Cougars podcast.
In the Virginia Quarterly Review (VQR), Diane Mehta on learning to swim later in life.
He interviewed his daughter on her birthday for 17 years. This is what he learned. - via NPR.
Now that Aidan is back in Carrie Bradshaw’s life, Brian says he just might watch season 2 of And Just Like That with me. (He identifies as an Aidan. 😂) Related: I enjoyed Alexis Soloski’s New York Times interview with John Corbett, who plays Aidan
And speaking of And Just Like That, in season 1, episode 4, the updated edition of my anthology Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving & Leaving NY makes a cameo. In Vogue, Scarlett Harris reports on how the books get chosen for the show.
A year ago today, the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. In the New York Times, David S. Cohen, Greer Donley and Rachel Rebouché suggest we get to work trying to overturn the devastating Dobbs decision.
Have you checked out “Ask a Sober Oldster,” our new monthly collaboration with The Small Bow newsletter? Don’t miss our Q&A with our first respondent, author and Woodstock Bookfest director Martha Frankel.
That’s a lot of links for a bonus round! Would you believe I have even more links saved? I’ll share them next time. Have a great rest of your weekend.
-Sari
So much goodness.
Thanks Sari.