I meant to post this on Monday, in honor of what experts deem the crappiest day of the year, but apparently I was so busy being bummed or something that I just never got around to it.

From The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression:

I find the fact of the past, the reality of time’s passage, incredibly difficult. My house is full of books I can’t read and records to which I can’t listen and photos at which I can’t look because they are too strongly associated with the past. When I see friends from college, I try not to talk about college too much because I was so happy then — not necessarily happier than I am now, but with a happiness that was particular and specific in its moods and that will never come again. Those days of young splendor eat at me.

[…]Don’t make me remember, I say to the detritus of past pleasures. Depression can as easily be the consequence of too much that was joyful as of too much that was horrible. There is such a thing as post-joy stress too. The worst of depression lies in a present moment that cannot escape the past it idealizes or deplores.

I can’t really get over how beautifully this book is written. You know when you were younger, and you had your list of authors that you idolized — adults with whom you desperately wanted to be around some day, just so some of their wisdom and well-placed words could fall upon your ears, calling into attention lovely things, unusual things, putting-things-into-perspective things? Just their presence could be a comfort to you, knowing they were thinking their usual thoughts.

I haven’t felt that way about an author in a very long time.

A few months ago, one of Jurvis’ friends sent us a link to the music video of Francis and The Lights’ “The Top”, directed by Jake Schreier. I loved it the first time I saw it. The second time I saw it I loved it some more. Now it’s in my bookmarks bar at the top of my browser, and any time I click on it — about once a week — I watch it at least three times in a row, sometimes more.

In short, this video has kind of driven me insane. I keep trying to share it with other people the way it was shared with me — I explain beforehand that it was filmed on 35mm, with him singing live, and it was just one take — but nobody else seems to really dig it. “Meh,” they say. “Is this guy serious?” they ask. “I don’t really like how he’s not Prince,” they add.

The more I watch, the more difficult I find it to believe that you haven’t fallen in love with this. Seriously? Anyone? (Download the full-screenable mp4 here).

Thank God Almighty, color management in Firefox at last. One little preferences tweak, and the world is a greener, more saturated place. Doooooo it.