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FAQ: The Running Edition

PSA: Please do not feel obligated to ask me about running. I really appreciate it, because I love talking about it, but I feel guilty because I suspect people who are just making polite inquiries end up getting an earful or five more than they signed up for. So if you are not at least sort of interested, don't feel like you have to ask. In an attempt to streamline conversation, I've compiled some frequently asked questions I get about running, and my answers. As anyone who has actually talked to me about this knows, I am more than happy to go into further detail, especially if it's to do with bodily functions. (Again, please don't feel like you have to ask.

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The Shits I Stopped Giving

Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to say farewell to all the things I stopped giving a shit about.

Blame It On the Girls

Cards on the table: I started watching Girls after I saw Star Wars: The Force Awakens and wanted to see more of Adam Driver's weird, sexy face and thick, sexy body. I quickly binged the first four seasons and watched the latter part of the fifth season as it aired (read: as it was released on HBO Go). Last night, I watched the final two (sadly Adam Driver-less) episodes of the both season six and the entire series. My spoiler-free review: Ugh. But really, are any of us surprised? Read on for a slightly more spoiler-y take.

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We Can Do Hard Things

It was but for the grace of pitying friends that I wasn't consistently picked last for teams in gym class. I was always short, slow and stumbling. I was a bad catch and a worse throw, always aiming for "not dead last.

Free Will Is For Suckers: Lessons From a Philosophy Degree

When I was in college and told inquiring Actual Adults™ that I was majoring in journalism and philosophy, the response, without fail, was, "Oh." A pause. Then: "What are you planning on doing with that?" I always suspected the first, less appropriate question that came to mind was something like, "So how much pot DO you smoke?" (Answer: Less than you might have expectd, but still more than my mom would want to believe.

White Girl Problems

She was standing in line at the local coffeeshop when the thought struck. She was one in a line of about four people spending their lunch hour waiting with varying degrees of patience for the baristas to make their drinks. The wait, she thought, is how you knew it wasn’t a Starbucks. That and the laminated, handwritten notices around the counter. There's no signage that's actually handwritten at Starbucks, only signage that's meant to look like it.

Requests For My Funeral

This year has been bookended by the deaths of two of my favorite icons, David Bowie and Carrie Fisher. 2016 also saw the death of my faith in democracy, common sense and humanity in general. Between all these great people dying and my suspicions that the End Times are surely near for all of us, I've had cause to really ponder my own mortality. I'm less concerned about what happens after we die in the spiritual/metaphysical sense and more concerned about what happens after we die in the sense of not wanting anyone to eulogize me using a trite phrase like, "She loved with her whole heart.

Am I Pulling Off This Pleather Crop Top? (And Other Sartorial Quandries)

Women's fashion is wild. I mean, back in Ye Olden Days an ankle was like, super slutty and now crop tops are A Thing. And I know no one wants to remember how we all thought gauchos were a good thing to put on our bodies back in the early 2000s, but those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

Getting Spooked

I love Halloween and all things spooky scary. But not scary-scary. I'm trying to sleep at night, people. Here are the things that my nightmares are made of.