The Mixed Bag: May '25

reinvention in flannel? midlife crisis in Dolby? and other things worth binging.

The world is full of little portals. These are a few I fell through this month.

🐾 previously, on WAGO…

• Name Tags and Other Temporary Things

• A tour of WAGO’s new lay of the land

• When trust gets wobbly…

• In Profile: Seth Werkheiser

• On the podcast: An Invitation to Delight with Alex Lovell

🔗 other people’s brilliance

• “If you’ve been feeling distracted or scattered, overstimulated or a little hollow around the edges, try trading your screen for something slower. Something that brings you back to yourself.” — caitlyn in her piece “i want to get off the screen too.”

• “What’s the most courageous thing you’ve ever done? Write them all down in your Bravery Resume. I wrote at the top of my list, “I’m so brave that I…” — Regina Brett in “Bravery Takes Practice”

• “All of us encounter turning points in life […] In either case, you are often pushed to move too quickly. Life demands you keep going — to return the emails, make the appointments, plan the next thing. What gets lost is the chance to feel the transition. To sit with it and let it shape you.” — The Culturist’s “Why You Need to Slow Down”

• “To choose a different path and to actually do things differently, you have to unlearn nearly everything you’ve ever been taught. That’s a full-scale internal renovation. It’s disorienting and lonely and, honestly, a little brutal.” — Iwana Johannsen in “Unlearning Life”

• “So let me get this straight — AI is wonderful, except for the fact that it’s destroying media, education, the environment, music, the arts, public trust, thinking skills, and everybody’s job.” — Ted Gioia in “A Major Newspaper Publishes a Summer Reading List—but the Books Don't Exist”

• I’m a little lot behind on this, but Matthew Long has been doing a deep reading of Homer’s The Illiad since the beginning of the year. I’m just catching up on his wonderful series. If you want to deepen your knowledge of this epic poem, check Matthew’s series. You’ll find all of it, in chronological order, here.

📚 dog-eared

• Re-read Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and phew. When I first picked this up in the 90s, it felt like dystopian fiction. This time around, it felt eerily plausible. Turns out, context really is everything.

• Finally picked up Matt Haig’s The Midnight Library. A proper philosophy-in-a-denim-jacket book. Easy to read, quietly existential. Had me spiralling (in a good way) about all the lives I could’ve lived and the ones I still could — and want to!

📺 couch report

• Discovered Virgin River on Netflix and, well, send me some tea and emotional support. It’s small-town drama, scenic wilderness, and just enough reinvention angst to count as research. 😉 Everyone’s healing from something, falling in love with someone, or running from whatever happened in LA. It's like Grey’s Anatomy moved to the mountains, but with more flannel and less surgical trauma.

• No judgement, but I’m in the middle of a full Mission: Impossible rewatch, prepping for the (supposedly final?) Final Reckoning. The whole franchise feels like an empowerment binge for anyone north of 40. Tom’s still jumping off buildings, Ving Rhames is still the definition of chill, and somehow it all works. It’s either deeply inspiring or a midlife crisis in Dolby surround.

🍭 echo chamber

Okay, I promise I won’t always be talking about our shiny new Town Center… but today I am. Because a few lovely folks have already stopped by to say hello, and you should absolutely go meet them. Come wave back to Cathy, Paolo, Nicole, Nancy, Leo, Dawna, and so many more. Introduce yourself if you haven’t yet. We’re a good great crowd. Come see for yourself.

💬 last word

Not saying I used to dance around in my pajamas to this… but I’m also not not saying it. 🫢

Everything is fine,
Lou Blaser
(Vice Deputy of Whatever This Is)