The Half-Assed Activist, Chicago Storytelling Events (with 1 reschedule, hence the re-post), and other links.

~ JenniferP

Hi readers, I’ve started writing a series of posts about caring for mental health while engaging with the rocky political situation in the US over at my Patreon site. Financial support is always appreciated (and how we get to not look at ads when we hang out here), but this particular content is free for anyone to read and share.

Posts so far in the series:

I’m still messing about a bit with Patreon rewards that can be both maximally attractive to you and sustainably delivered by me. I will be reviving the Search Terms posts and the Friday Short Answers very very soon, but for now I’m also going with: MORE CONTENT, as I realized in December when all my attempts to answer reader questions started turning into book chapters (alas, not from any of the same books) or Twitter rants that a slight separation between “the advice blog that I dearly love writing” and “ALL OF JENNIFER’S THOUGHTS, EVER” might be wise, if only to keep *myself* a little more organized.

In other news, if you missed it, a bunch of people who write advice columns talked to each other about our processes over at BuzzFeed Content notes apply for mentions of abuse, animal harm, and something called “the jizzcliner.” Next time I’d love to hear from ¡Hola Papi!, Dearly Beloved, Asking Bear, Everyone Is Gay, for starters, the advice column form is rich and varied right now.

If you’re in Chicago, Mr. Awkward is telling a story at The Stoop’s Six Year Anniversary Show on January 31  postponed until Tuesday, Feb 5, same venue, same everything, different levels of cold! (I think it’s about how his dad founded a second franchise of the family), and I’m telling a story at You’re Being Ridiculous at Steppenwolf on February 1 –happening as planned, sold out as far as I know – My plan is to tell the story about the time I lived with a roommate ripped from the pages of The Gift of Fear, but I might write 6 more things between now and then, shhhhhhhh don’t tell the producers).

Here’s a song:

 

19 thoughts on “The Half-Assed Activist, Chicago Storytelling Events (with 1 reschedule, hence the re-post), and other links.”

  1. That Buzzfeed round table was amazing, and also made me want a sitcom where you all live together or work together in a shared working space and laugh about crazy letters you get and write advice. It would be funny AND deliver messages about how to interact with fellow humans properly (and clean things). It is the show we NEED right now. As a people. And especially me.

  2. So when are they going to start recording these story-tellings and put them up for Not-Chicagoans to see? 😀

    @Music: That would be a great anthology show! Would totally watch!

    1. The Stoop is working on a podcast, and I appreciate the sentiment, but I don’t like having my storytelling stuff recorded – I’m telling the story to that room, on that night, and you had to be there.

      1. Ok, very fair, soooo when are you putting on a world tour?

        Mostly kidding but would totally pay to see you if you ever came to Australia. 😁

  3. So true thing: last night I was praying about “ about nuclear war  global warming and the sheer stupidity of humans having to deal with Nazis again,” and the answer I got back from god (or maybe my caseworker; I can never tell for sure) was, essentially, “A little busy now—?” But if there’s one thing I’ve learned is that I will usually get a response, though it’s usually a day or two later, and often comes in a less than obvious form.

    True to form, I open up CA today, and see this post, and the Patreon links look to rather precisely adress my less than well articulated Wail into the Void.

    Thank you, Captain, for all you do!

  4. As someone who for professional reasons is supposed to maintain a “personal media platform” to support my artistic efforts, I can confirm that it’s super draining to try and run a blog, a twitter feed, an interactive website and ideally a few other platforms – for the purpose of promoting / raising the profile of some *third other product.* Personal branding is for the birds. I don’t want to make any assumptions, but I think there’d be a lot of potential for a Captain Awkward book (like Alison on Ask A Manager did) which sounds easier to me than trying to double your output on the web.

    1. I’m laughing because “easier for whom” and “easier compared to what” are my questions –

      I can obviously crank out enough content to fill many books, thanks to ADHD the sustained attention needed to crank out all the writing that goes in one single book over a sustained period has not been within reach (yet).

    2. Is anyone else thinking of that NXIVM cult when the phrase “personal branding” is mentioned?

      Of course, my sense of humor is very, very sick.

      1. I haven’t heard of them, but my mind has strayed in that same direction previously so you’re not the only one with a warped sense of humour. Here’s the link to a cartoon I drew on this a while back, titled “Brand awareness”: https://tinyurl.com/y927tu8c

        [commenting with my usual username but different email address and not-logged-in because of technical problems]

  5. I didn’t know Jolie was in that Buzzfeed round article! And it is kind of sad that I knew it was her from the phrase ‘jizzcliner’ lol

  7. Thank you for the content notes and for giving us these links and an update! I’m looking forward to short answer and search terms – the normal stuff is so good I don’t miss those between times, but when they show up it’s a fun change. Good luck to both of you with the stories!

  8. Thank you for all that you give us. Really! I’m thinking “ALL OF JENNIFER’S THOUGHTS, EVER” is only a problem on your side your “might be wise, if only to keep *myself* a little more organized” but for us reader I wanted to say I love all your thoughts so far that you’ve written and shared here!

  9. I can only speak for myself, of course, but when I support creators on Patreon I don’t necessarily want, or even appreciate, or even pay attention to really, bonus patrons-only stuff. I support creators because I like what they’ve been doing and I want them to be able to keep doing it.

    1. Thank you. I’m the same way (and this is reassuring to know!). I know that mos patrons are there to support *this* site vs. get special content/access, but I do want to be as transparent and make sure I’m not promising things I can’t deliver.

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