LOVE: The election workers. In a climate that has been defined by the ostentatious, they’ve been calm, steadfast, and enduring this week; a reminder that adhering to your principles (in this case, democracy) requires the most discipline in times of extreme pressure.
HATERADE: Information overload. As in, what the fuck am I supposed to do with all the information I’ve accumulated about Maricopa County when this is over?
If the year was supposed to teach us to learn how to sit with the discomfort of uncertainty, this week we’re getting our PhD. Everyone’s talking about patience, but I think it’s actually about making room for uncertainty and discomfort at the dinner table - who are we?, why are we?, and how will we? are not questions whose answers you find without an uncomfortable journey to somewhere familiar. And it’s been about that time for a while.
I can’t help but feeling like both political parties are in need of some really significant ethnographic user research - the kind that makes you do some overdue soul searching about what makes people get out of bed in the morning, their hopes and fears, and who we are to each other. And it’s been about that time for a while.
In a week of great internet, some gems:
When data shows that mail-in votes come in for Democrats by higher margins, I literally want to know everything about what drives that data point. Nate Silver has a theory, but I feel like the psychology rooted in why that happens might also carry the answer to the meaning of life and also who killed Jimmy Hoffa. 📊
Great thread on why Nebraska splits its electoral votes. ✊🏾
I could do Nevada memes for days (and I should get ready because we might have to) but this 90s R&B jam might be my fave? 🎤
Today in life imitating art: Nevada + stopping the vote count + continuing the vote count is apparently an episode of Veep? 👸🏻
Until next Thursday,
Nitya