SUMMER FRIDAYS DEP'T.: Take back your Friday, then take back your country
Indignity Vol. 5, No. 107
DID WE MENTION how everything is coming apart at once? Right, yes, over and over. And it's still getting worse. But before we go out on Saturday and see how many other people are fed up with it all, Indignity is taking rest and refuge in the still-stable tradition of SUMMER FRIDAYS, in which we deliver a brief digest of the week with a few extra light items, then get out into the sunshine. From now through Labor Day, we encourage anyone else who is self-employed or lightly supervised to likewise take a moment of leisure while you can. Thank you for your continued reading and support of Indignity!
A week of INDIGNITY!
ASK THE SOPHIST
Tom Scocca
Does parking etiquette in difficult-to-park places like New York City require no bumping of cars? I was trying to squeeze into a tight spot the other day and doing my best to ensure, if my car touched either the car in front or the car in back, that it was at the slowest speed I could manage, and a couple of guys on the block came running and shouting as if I was ramming the cars (which weren’t theirs, btw fwiw) demolition-derby style.
THE WORST THING WE READ™ [PLEASE SUBSCRIBE]
Tom Scocca
Unfortunately, this was not just a dispute about professional standards and textual interpretation. While editors and pundits, under the banners of true liberalism and/or free thought, were building a consensus among their own class about reversing the events of 2020, Donald Trump and his supporters were dreaming up their version of the same goal. And in the Trump version, the error of 2020 wasn't that executives had been cowed by insubordinate underlings into making ritual offerings to social justice. It was that his government hadn't sent troops to shoot the protesters.
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT DEP'T.
Tom Scocca
I closed the computer and went outside to stop seeing the bad news accumulate, and in the foot traffic on Broadway I saw two different people carrying blank sheets of posterboard or foamcore. One of them had dowel rods. The tanks are due to roll on Saturday, but also on Saturday people are planning on heading out to demonstrate against it all, more or less everywhere, if you're looking for somewhere to go.
MR WRONG
JOE MACLEOD
Saturday, June 14, we have this sort of unprecedented Military parade in Our Nation’s Capital, where they are gonna fucking roll tanks on this guy’s request, which, again, is shit they do in Russia and North Korea, and there is a large reaction to this event, which, again, seems like a super Tinpot Dictator/Commie Totalitarian/King kind of event, because of the way our current POTUS is behaving, a guy who has been quoted as saying a lot of shitty things about people who have served and paid the Ultimate Price.
New York City, June 12, 2025
★★ The gauge said the soil on the balcony's potted plants was on its way to drying out. Insects and floaters darted around as the eyes turned to the blank hazy blue overhead. People went out to do things and came home sweating. A black helicopter crawled along below a cloud that was throwing off glory rays. In the woods off the path in the Park, a man had gathered some thick sections of cut branches or tree trunks and was sitting on a shabby red upholstered chair, chiseling them into sculptures. Pale finished works—animals, faces, giant utensils—were lined up in front of him, and a chirping ring carried as he hammered. A cloud provided a brief deceptive interlude of temperance, and then the full sun came slashing down in the open. Ten or so minutes in heavy institutional air conditioning provided another illusion of relief, this one lasting about three paces outside the door. On the trip back across the Park, the paths looked at first like treacherously wandering alternatives to a straight route across the fields, then like a shaded refuge from the harsh direct route. A red-tailed hawk circled, not too high, showing a gap in its primary feathers.
EASY LISTENING DEP'T.
HERE IS THE Indignity Morning Podcast archive!
TOM SCOCCA
THOUGHT DEP'T.
Got a thought? Send it to indignity@indignity.net.
ADVICE DEP'T.
HEY! DO YOU like advice columns? They don't happen unless you send in some letters! Surely you have something you want to justify to yourself, or to the world at large. Now is the perfect time to share it with everyone else through The Sophist, the columnist who is not here to correct you, but to tell you why you're right. Direct your questions to The Sophist, at indignity@indignity.net, and get the answers you want.
SANDWICH RECIPES DEP'T.
WE PRESENT INSTRUCTIONS in aid of the assembly of sandwiches selected from The new Annie Dennis Cook Book , by Annie E. Dennis, published in 1921, and now available at archive.org for the delectation of all.
Tomato Sandwich
Cut thin slices of white bread round, just a bit larger than the tomatoes. After spreading the bread with mayonnaise, place a slice of peeled tomato between the slices.
Cheese Dreams
Spread a thin layer of American cheese or Swiss cheese between thin slices of white bread cut round. Fry in hot butter a light brown. Serve hot.
If you decide to prepare and attempt to enjoy a sandwich inspired by this offering, be sure to send a picture to indignity@indignity.net .
SELF-SERVING SELF-PROMOTION DEP'T.
Indignity is presented on Ghost. Indignity recommends Ghost for your Modern Publishing needs. Indignity gets a slice if you do this successfully!
