are you aware of stuff lately?

See “the backlog” is an interesting aspect to this question to me bc if you take a moment to think about the scope and scale of that backlog it’s intimidating but if you think about it more it’s immensely freeing, the implausibility of even reading every book you’ve ever heard mentioned as a classic touchstone of Western Civilization means you can replace FOMO with COMO (certainty of missing out) and just vibe

Exactly. Embracing the fact that I'll only ever be a stone skipping across the surface.

Whereas “the firehose” of being aware of stuff that’s happening presently has a discursive style that affords you no such discretion, the merest glance in the direction of it subjects you simultaneously to all of it, making you aware of stuff, in my experience

I think re: silby re: COMO, there’s a degree of competition behind this feeling like we need to be aware of everything all the time. I have to say that being offline for months has made me appreciate the things that come to my attention in a way that does not include reading or watching a movie for the sake of having something to talk about or being able to say I have read/watched the thing. There is something precious about, just you know, pulling this out of thin air, not talking to my ex in half a year and suddenly remembering he was watching a show based off of a novel, being in a bookstore, and suddenly catching that novel out of the corner of my eye.

I’m a little too knowledgeable about stuff, which makes me anxious but not always pessimistic.

used to be pretty goddamn aware of stuff -- more or less kept up with nyer/nyrb/baffler/economist/foreign affairs (spare me the critiques, thx & lol). when bush was reelected in 2004 i shut down for a bit, but picked it up again in a year or so

when trump won, i shut down completely -- what, after all, was the point of learning facts about the world when facts meant nothing? but things haven't improved since his loss.

where trump once bloomed, a thousand gaetzs grow. and they refuse to stop fighting because like America, they're fighters and rapists and checkmate, libtards

i mean, i still vote in local primary elections ffs. honestly not sure where i was headed with this except to say that this country is unutterably stupid and depressing

you seem pretty aware to me, that seems pretty current

Wow y'all have a way of putting into words things I have thought about but never been really able to express. COMO! There was a point a few years ago where I started feeling COMO instead of FOMO in some of my hobbies and it really lifted a pressure

you seem pretty aware to me, that seems pretty current

even my incredible laziness cannot succor me in this age of trolldom

I've always kind of floated over everything. I'm a lot more aware than most people in my social milieu, but there still seems to be a thick clear glass wall between me and the rest of the world.

Vinnie, I’m sorry, but COMO is Columbia, Missouri

It’s just so much faster to say it that way, it’s too late

“The world” is soooooooooo shitty

No need to interact with it

posted this on 77, so here's my single ration for non-77 posting of it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJaE_BvLK6U

it's long, but if you watch it all, it will connect to this thread and you will be in antifa

trying to keep my focus on staying aware of medium/long-term important stuff i care about while minimizing my awareness of the daily/weekly media cycle of freaking out about stuff, not particularly successfully

Just realized I’m unaware of who won the super bowl this year, which I guess I’m usually not aware of this for very long or at all in any given year, but it’s nice to not be aware of it. I think maybe it was Tom Brady but it could’ve been not Tom Brady. Anyway he’s not a Patriot anymore he plays for like St Petersburg or something. Tampa? I don’t know.

I don’t know who won big at Oscar, or even what movies were nominated for Oscar.

I don't even have an Oscar.

I'm often not even aware of what friends and fam are up to let alone things in the world, because covid rendered me an agoraphobic hermit who has lost the ability to give a shit about anything going on anywhere.

I'll be one of those people found dead in my room 6 months after it happened because nobody noticed.

I live in Florida and I stopped paying attention to the news more or less when it became a certainty that COVID was sticking around and nobody in government gave a fuck.

Also my attention up until recently had been commanded by Instagram and my algorithm is so fucked that I was absorbed mostly with the cycle of reels that permeate my feed and not getting any actual updates from my friends. Even when I did it was like an obsession and totally non-nourishing for my brain so I’m taking a break. Memes were practically my only source of news.

I do feel like I’m uninformed and basically living under a rock but I think a lot of that has to do with comparing myself against others and how they seem to know a whole lot about everything. I also recently started taking adhd medication so maybe I’ve just been too scatterbrained to pay attention.

there's a lot of noise out there. people who seem like they know a whole lot about everything usually regurgitate a lot of the noise ime.

instagram is god-awful it's true

Don’t go on Twitter anymore and I’m aware of less stuff than ever, love it!

yeah ever since I quit it cold turkey i've been a lot happier. think the last five times I looked at it i was just looking at Miami Dolphins injury reports