I can’t deny JB’s talent, but I’m thinking about how interesting it is that when a woman shows up nude, it’s shocking or perhaps attention seeking. But when a man does it, it’s art. Or in Justin’s case, a clever business decision, if we go by the NYT commentary of his performance: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/01/style/justin-bieber-boxers-grammys.html

The only thing they said about Chappell Roan's naked dress (for example) was essentially just that she was more naked than anyone else: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/01/style/grammys-chappell-roan-naked-dress.html

noted!!! the different ways men and women are evaluated at these events is crazy. --- it's funny, audiences are so different. i didn't see much praising jb but i don't read nyt. i didn't see any dragging chappell roan but... ditto.

new "book report": https://sorbier.neocities.org/blog/details

brb, gotta go calculate my adverb usage

i'm fairly certain it was stephen king who started all the adverb hate, in his book "on writing". haven't read it but i've heard people repeat his advice from it to avoid adverbs at any cost many times

i love adverbs. honestly my favourite part of speech. they just add so much personality

there's such a beautiful rhythm to Ishmael "deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off"

Adverbs can be overused and poorly used, but at this point in life I am so over prescriptivism about writing. I would not be surprised if Strunk & White had a hand in this, too. We don't always need to strip writing down to its most basic meaning. That misses the point so often.

i'm writing my response, writerly

@suboptimalism by jove you are right, how did i miss that? i wonder if my coauthor got it from directly or through the zeitgeist. he is not a native speaker and i dont know how much king he might have read

@balckwell + emily, so true to both of you, though i will say that i dont write documents that value lyricism, especially from a beginner lyricist. there are some in the profession who manage to write in a compelling way, but they are writing poetry on hard mode as for the rest of us the main goal is to convey information as clearly + unambiguously as possible