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The Most Fabulous Garden Store in All of Dutchess County did have spaghetti squash seedlings. And also cucumber, watermelon, and basil seedlings. So I bought all four.
By the time I got back to the garden to plant them, though, it was a hideously humid 90°.
And even though I guzzled an entire liter of water, I could only stick it out long enough in the garden to plant the spaghetti squash seedling before I felt like I was going to pass out.
So, I scampered back to the casa to refortify myself by sipping Gatorade (foul fuckin’ stuff!) and reading up on the Jonah Hill Texting Scandal.
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Jonah Hill occupies a significant place in my heart on account of having been straight man to Russell Brand’s insane rock star in the Funniest Movie Ever Made, Get Him to the Greek.
In that movie, Jonah Hill plays a schlub.
In subsequent films like Moneyball, he also plays a schlub.
Jonah Hill played schlubs well because he was a schlub.
And I guess this was hard on his ego because subsequently, Jonah Hill went on an extreme diet where he only ate sushi for a year ( See? Reading The Daily Mail religiously does pay off!) He lost a lot of weight. He joined a gym! He dyed his hair a very peculiar shade of blonde and grew a beard.
Still. Once a schlub, always a schlub.
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Anyway.
One of Jonah Hill’s X-Girlfriends has decided to demonstrate once again that Hell hath no Fury by publishing a bunch of their private text exchanges on her Instagram:
Now I think it’s bad manners to publish anyone’s private texts, but whatevs, people do it all the time.
But more significantly, I don’t see anything wrong with this text.
Jonah Hill is not telling the X-Girlfriend she can’t surf with men, have boundaryless friendships with men, model, etc.
He is saying that if she wants to do these things, he can’t be in a relationship with her.
Which I think is an entirely reasonable thing to say. I mean, they're not things I would object to. But those are his boundaries.
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Of course, I had to follow the story down various rabbit holes, which included Reddit and LJ’s very own OHNOTHEYDIDNT.
Millennial online hangouts, for the most part.
The collective verdict was Narcissist! Abuser! Manipulative male controller! Entitled prick! Asshole!
Which really kinda astonished me since it seemed so clear to me that all Jonah Hill was trying to do was to protect himself against that predatory species known as star-fuckers.
To wit, some beautiful woman who might insinuate herself into his affections (quite easy to do because he is a schlub) and then leverage his connections and magnetism (because even though he is a schlub, he’s still a movie star and, therefore a celebrity) to her own promotional ends.
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Is it a generational thing? This collective inability to read subtext on Millennials’ part?
And what the hell is up with the invariable follow-up in these celebrity cyber-forums where the most vituperative of the venom-spewers must then trot out their PTSD self-diagnoses for group tongue baths: I am so sorry this happened to you! You are so brave! Etc, etc.
It is just fuckin’ weird.
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I don’t know whether it’s due to parenting failures, failures with the school systems, forever chemicals in the water supply, the IQ-flattening effects of Internet immersion, post-9/11 angst, or what, but Millennials are off in some essential way.
And I say that as the parent of two Millennials whom I love dearly.
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I’m inclined to attribute that off-ness to parenting failures.
Helicopter parenting was the big thing when I was raising my kids.
But meddling in every aspect of your kids’ lives (instead of giving them the freedom to have their own kid lives away from adults) produces timid, fragile adults who can’t organize their own lives.
And trying to fix the anxieties and fears that all kids have to some degree (admittedly, some more than others, and yes, there is a threshold with that one when fixing is called for) imprints the message that the best way to get attention is by being anxious and fearful.
And, of course, the Internet immersion inclines them toward lock-step conformity.
No one dares venture an opinion that deviates too far from the majority opinion lest they be piled upon in the cyber-forums that increasingly are a substitute for all collective interactions for members of this age group.
I wonder what Millennials will be like when they get old?
no subject
Date: 2023-07-14 06:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-07-15 12:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-07-15 01:18 pm (UTC)Zealots without a cause
Date: 2023-07-15 09:40 am (UTC)When I first got together with R, he told me his deal breakers and I told him mine. Don't like it, don't play with that person, it's not like the world is empty of potential partners. Can people not choose?
And yes,as you say, there is something strangely off about millennials; I think online existence and a serious feeling of impotence has led to them being at once powerhungry and also terrified of power. It feels like they need the comfort of group policing, happily unaware that the same rules they put in place for silencing others could be turned on them with frightening ease.
Re: Zealots without a cause
Date: 2023-07-15 12:08 pm (UTC)I wish I'd been sane enough to lay out the deal breakers for potential partners.
Millennials covet victim status. (Though, obviously, that's a generalization, and it's not true of all Millennials.) That's what I dislike about them en masse.
no subject
Date: 2023-07-15 03:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-07-15 03:13 pm (UTC)