In 2011, They Might Be Giants performed (as a trio, wearing suits) for a New York City benefit show that also included Sarah Vowell, Eugene Mirman and Mike Birbiglia.

At one point, Sarah offered her impersonation of John Flansburgh taking a nap. Check out my video for her explanation. Keep watching for a clip from TMBG's appearance in which Sarah yells at the band from offstage until John himself demonstrates the sleep pose.

It was all pretty funny, but the real payoff didn’t come until the following month when Andy Richter caught Flansy napping in the green room just prior to TMBG's first appearance on “Conan” 😂

Just the other day, I was in my neighborhood Starbucks, waiting for the post office to open. I was enjoying a chocolatey cafe mocha when it occurred to me that to drink a mocha is to gulp down the entire history of the New World. From the Spanish exportation of Aztec cacao, and the Dutch invention of the chemical process for making cocoa, on down to the capitalist empire of Hershey, PA, and the lifestyle marketing of Seattle's Starbucks, the modern mocha is a bittersweet concoction of imperialism, genocide, invention, and consumerism served with whipped cream on top. No wonder it costs so much.

-Sarah Vowell, author and journalist

No wonder it (coffee) costs so much

Just the other day, I was in my neighborhood Starbucks, waiting for the post office to open. I was enjoying a chocolatey cafe mocha when it occurred to me that to drink a mocha is to gulp down the entire history of the New World. From the Spanish exportation of Aztec cacao, and the Dutch invention of the chemical process for making cocoa, on down to the capitalist empire of Hershey, PA, and the lifestyle marketing of Seattle’s Starbucks, the modern mocha is a bittersweet concoction of imperialism, genocide, invention, and consumerism served with whipped cream on top. No wonder it costs so much.

— Sarah Vowell, from "The Nerd Voice" in The Partly Cloudy Patriot" (Simon & Schuster, September 2022)

PITCH:

Ms. Incredible & InvisiGirl

What is it — a spin-off series/reboot of The Incredibles (2004) with both Holly Hunter and Sarah Vowell reprising their roles as Helen and Violet.

PREMISE:

Gloomy, shy and socially withdrawn Violet Parr can't believe this. Due to her parents having to leave on business for an unspecified time, she's forced to stay with her Aunt Helen who she hasn't seen since she was little and Helen is now looking forward to spending time with her with her niece and get to know her better but unfortunately her niece has little to no interest in it. It's then that Violet begins having strange dreams/visions of a girl in a tight one-piece red suit with an orange "belt", black boots, gloves, and mask, a black crutch, and an insignia of a yellow "i" skulking around the shadows of the city, fighting crime and cleaning up the streets. It turns out to her complete and utter shock and horror that the girl.... is her. Discovering that the suit has given her invisibility and force field powers, Violet's "secret" that she didn't even know she had is almost instantly found out by Helen who goes full force in locking Violet down in order to protect her. However despite her intervention, everything takes yet another twist and turn on both their ends as Violet and Helen are dragged into a deadly plot to take out every remaining superhero there is by a sadistic femme fatale villainess while coming into deep conflict with the NSA as the two are now wanted for impersonating supers. Now the two have to don their suits and fight against the odds to survive as they both come into their own and have to decide whether or not they'd actually want to be heroes.

Notes/Trivia/Details:

• The series will be done in the exact same slick and noir look and aesthetic of the first film rather than the lackluster look of the second but in a way that feels like a proper updated way and version of it.

• There will be a few homages and call-backs here and there spread out to the first film with some more subtle and others more obvious like the famous ass scene as you see here.

• The reason why I changed Helen and Violet to aunt and niece is because it was a way to make their characters feel fresh and interesting again along with a new and distinctive dynamic.

• What won't be revealed until the last scene in the series finale is that Violet's parents (one of which is Helen's older sister) are actually NSA agents whose "business" they had to attend was a top secret mission in Russia that would play a part in the series.

• What will be throughout the series is that Helen and Violet will have their bumbling, screw-up, boobish moments to show that the two of them aren't perfect and top it off, to show that they're new at this.

• What will be exciting is the villain-later turned-antihero Miss Robin, a wicked and ruthless woman with shifting abilities that eventually turns over to help Violet and Helen. She will be heavily influenced by Eris from DreamWorks' Sinbad with the following actresses I'm considering for the role:

Michelle Pfeiffer, Stephanie Young, Nicole Sullivan, Idina Menzel, Eva Green, Sarah Michelle Gellar and maybe even Holly Hunter.

• There will be a couple of easter eggs and references that heavily imply a shared universe, this is for actual world-building. It's to show that there's much more to this world than what's going on with Violet, Helen and Robin.

• Other characters that will be in it are new and the following - two comic book store employees that turn out to be big help for our leads, Violet's snobby popular rival who is actually more intelligent than she looks and a police officer that develops abilities of his own.

• The show will be about three seasons with a total of 65 episodes.

THE INCREDIBLES 2004

You are Elastigirl! My God... Pull-yourself-together! "What will you do?" Is this a question? You will show him you remember that he is Mr. Incredible, and you will remind him who you are. Well, you know where he is. Go, confront the problem. Fight! Win! And call me when you get back, darling. I enjoy our visits.

My squirrel brain, I wonder sometimes. I love reading anything Sarah Vowell writes (I think because she has a similar squirrel brain, but she always circles back to the original point, something my brain does not always achieve…and she weaves current events, historical events and pop culture seamlessly, AND she’s so fucking funny). I’m in Hawaii, so of course, I’m reading her book “Unfamiliar Fishes” about Hawaii (seriously, read her books…”The Wordy Shipmates” and “Assassination Vacation” two of my absolute favorites). ~squirrel~

So anywho, she’s describing her research process and the portraits of 2 missionaries (Hawaiian history chalk full of the meddlers) painted by a man named Morse, yes, of Morse code fame. And aside from the very interesting story she goes on to tell that involves how Morse was inspired to invent Morse code, my little squirrel brain goes to Rhys Darby being a Morse coder in the NZ army, and I’m Hawaii thinking about how native Hawaiians are very connected to Māori people in NZ and Taika Waititi is Māori and now I should continue reading that OFMD S3 speculation fic I started last night but ~squirrel~ back to Hawaiian history.

Anyone else have this problem?

"Just the other day, I was in my neighborhood Starbucks, waiting for the post office to open. I was enjoying a chocolatey cafe mocha when it occurred to me that to drink a mocha is to gulp down the entire history of the New World. From the Spanish exportation of Aztec cacao, and the Dutch invention of the chemical process for making cocoa, on down to the capitalist empire of Hershey, PA, and the lifestyle marketing of Seattle's Starbucks, the modern mocha is a bittersweet concoction of imperialism, genocide, invention, and consumerism served with whipped cream on top. No wonder it costs so much."

Sarah Vowell, author and journalist (b. 27th December 1969)

Because I think the only reason seemingly every man, woman, and child in America goes to see his movies is not that he blinds us with beauty or talent or emotion. We can’t take our eyes off him because he makes us a little nervous. Not too nervous—that’s why we invented Dennis Hopper. Cruise makes us stealth nervous, just jittery enough to keep us awake. —Sarah Vowell/The Partly Cloudy Patriot(Tom Cruise Makes Me Nervous)

Sarah Vowell: Modern mocha

“Just the other day, I was in my neighborhood Starbucks, waiting for the post office to open. I was enjoying a chocolatey cafe mocha when it occurred to me that to drink a mocha is to gulp down the entire history of the New World. From the Spanish exportation of Aztec cacao, and the Dutch invention of the chemical process for making cocoa, on down to the capitalist empire of Hershey, PA, and the…

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The Book of Job Chapter 10

You made me to break me

Now, I don't want to be too self-referential in these posts. This is the Book of Job after all and it is one of the most misunderstood books in the world literature canon, so adding my own personal anecdotes makes things feel amateurish. The college professor who always marked me down for my papers on Horace's Odes because I always included personal stuff haunts me to this day. Especially when I agree with him to a certain extent. Or more accurately I agreed with him wholeheartedly when I tried to listen to a Sarah Vowell book about the pilgrims and learned absolutely nothing about the pilgrims but learned a great deal about Sarah Vowell, way more than i ever wanted to know about Sarah Vowell.

But the line from this second part of Job's response to his friend that is now a response to G-d that goes "Does it benefit you to defraud , to despise the toil of your hands, while smiling on the counsel of the wicked?" (verse 3) that gets to me this week because I was again in the crosshairs of the Facebook AI. Apparently Facebook has fired most of its standards people (including the one friend that I had who worked at Facebook) so my week long ban stuck.

And the weeklong ban was for a meme that gets shared all over Facebook, especially on the Ides of March - the one that goes "Whoever made September, October and November the 9th, 10th and 11th month should be stabbed." Because it promotes violence. Against Julius Fucking Caesar. And again, I'd be ok with that if this was a fucking sensible rule but it's not. How do I know it's not? Because I repeatedly make complaints against Nazis, conspiracy theorists, racists and transphobes on Facebook and then get the gaslighting "this isn't against Facebook standards"

Yes, G-d is arbitrary and shitty and lets the wicked prosper and the virtuous suffer. I expect better from Facebook standards. If other media companies can cancel Andrew Taint while G-d takes his only sweet time with that tumor, you'd think that Facebook would deal with the shitbags. But yeah, Facebook was complicit in the Myanmar genocide.

So what's the rest of this chapter. It's still pretty dark but it's also one of the ultimate "fuck you G-d" chapters where Job talks about being created and risen up just so he can get smashed. And he's actually asking why G-d would make this a thing. Job knows that he's innocent (and as a reader, we know that Job is innocent. Thank you, Satan). Yet, does Job's innocence help him? No.

And then we end with another "if only I was never born" verse. I just wonder if we would hear this verse a lot more if the anti-forced birth movement was full of religious fanatics and the forced birth assholes did not selectively quote the Bible.

Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell

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“Heaven, such as it is, is right here on earth. Behold: my revelation: I stand at the door in the morning, and lo, there is a newspaper, in sight like unto an emerald. And holy, holy, holy is the coffee, which was, and is, and is to come. And hark, I hear the voice of an angel round about the radio saying, "Since my baby left me I found a new place to dwell." And lo, after this I beheld a great multitude, which no man could number, of shoes. And after these things I will hasten unto a taxicab and to a theater, where a ticket will be given unto me, and lo, it will be a matinee, and a film that doeth great wonders. And when it is finished, the heavens will open, and out will cometh a rain fragrant as myrrh, and yea, I have an umbrella.” ― Sarah Vowell, Take the Cannoli

do you ever hear a take so rancid that you desperately hope that the person who said that has changed their mind entirely

I can't find it anywhere and it fucking sucks because it's actually pretty fucking cool and even interesting to see as it's the closest we'll get to any sort of celebrity's headcanon.

In an online discussion with fans of literature and media, Sarah Vowell - the voice of Violet Parr from The Incredibles aka the greatest superhero movie that's still ever been made - was chatting with several (it was basically an AMA) and she revealed a lot of fun stuff about herself.

Then someone (who I think I know who he is) said "I know that it's a DreamWorks movie but Megamind always feels like it's taking place in the Incredibles universe, at least in my opinion".

That led to a surprisingly fun discussion back-and-forth to where someone than asked Sarah herself what can YOU see taking place in or sharing the same universe as The Incredibles, to which she just replied with "I'll have to think about".

Next thing you know while everyone was joking about how Megamind would ever have to interact with Syndrome with the same type of Schaffrillas humor, Vowell comes back and gives a list on all the things that she can see taking place in or sharing the same universe as the greatest superhero movie ever made. Her Incredibles shared universe:

• The Incredibles (2004)

• Heat (1995)

• Urban Chaos: Riot Response (2006)

• The first season of Heroes (2006-07)

• Overlord (2018)

• Alan Wake (2010)

• Control (2019)

• Big Trouble In Little China (1986)

• Se7en (1995)

• Unbreakable (2000)

So yeah, that is her universe.

The Vowell-Verse as we should call it to anyone who reads and or sees this.

While we’re on the subject of names, is there an explanation for how traditional nicknames came about that are seemingly unrelated to, or have little in common with, the original name?

ie- John/Jack, Richard/Dick, Henry/Harry/Hank, Charles/Chuck, Margaret/Peggy/Daisy, Sarah/Sally, Mary/Molly, Anne/Nan, etc

I am actually over a week into researching a huge follow-up post (probably more than one if I’m being honest) about the history of nickname usage, so I will be going into this in much, much more detail at a hopefully not-so-later date - if I have not lost my mind. (Two days ago I spent three hours chasing down a source lead that turned out to be a typographical error from 1727 that was then quoted in source after source for the next 150 years.)

As a preview though, here’s some info about the names you mentioned:

The origins of a good portion of common English nicknames come down to the simple fact that people really, really like rhyming things. Will 🠞Bill, Rob🠞Bob, Rick🠞Dick, Meg🠞Peg.

It may seem like a weird reason, but how many of you have known an Anna/Hannah-Banana? I exclusively refer to my Mom’s cat as Toes even though her name is Moe (Moesie-Toesies 🠞 Toesies 🠞 Toes).

Jack likely evolved from the use of the Middle English diminutive suffix “-chen” - pronounced (and often spelled) “-kyn” or “kin”. The use of -chen as a diminutive suffix still endures in modern German - as in “liebchen” = sweetheart (lieb “love” + -chen).

John (Jan) 🠞 Jankin 🠞 Jackin 🠞 Jack.

Hank was also originally a nickname for John from the same source. I and J were not distinct letters in English until the 17th Century. “Iankin” would have been nearly indistinguishable in pronunciation from “Hankin” due to H-dropping. It’s believed to have switched over to being a nickname for Henry in early Colonial America due to the English being exposed to the Dutch nickname for Henrik - “Henk”.

Harry is thought to be a remnant of how Henry was pronounced up until the early modern era. The name was introduced to England during the Norman conquest as the French Henri (On-REE). The already muted nasal n was dropped in the English pronunciation. With a lack of standardized spelling, the two names were used interchangeably in records throughout the middle ages. So all the early English King Henrys would have written their name Henry and pronounced it Harry.

Sally and Molly likely developed simply because little kids can’t say R’s or L’s. Mary 🠞 Mawy 🠞 Molly. Sary 🠞 Sawy 🠞 Sally.

Daisy became a nickname for Margaret because in French garden daisies are called marguerites.

Nan for Anne is an example of a very cool linguistic process called rebracketing, where two words that are often said/written together transfer letters/morphemes over time. The English use of “an” instead of “a” before words beginning with vowels is a common cause of rebracketing. For example: the Middle English “an eute” became “a newt”, and “a napron” became “an apron”. In the case of nicknames the use of the archaic possessive “mine” is often the culprit. “Mine Anne” over time became “My Nan” as “mine” fell out of use. Ned and Nell have the same origin.

Oddly enough the word “nickname” is itself a result of rebracketing, from the Middle English “an eke (meaning additional) name”.

I realized earlier this week that my cat (Toe’s sister) also has a rebracketing nickname. Her name is Mina, but I call her Nom Nom - formed by me being very annoying and saying her name a bunch of time in a row - miNAMiNAMiNAM.

Chuck is a very modern (20th century) nickname which I’ll have to get back to you on as I started my research in the 16th century and am only up to the 1810s so far lol.

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