Everything about hosting

Rounding up IndieWeb Carnival December

When I introduced this month’s IndieWeb Carnival theme belief, I was terribly excited to take a quiet Saturday morning and really put together a beautiful piece on how I relate to the theme. We make plans, and God laughs. In late October, God laughed when I triple-fractured my ankle. My original recovery timeline, which included surgery under general anesthesia, had me use first a cast and then an air cast until December 25. (Continue)

IndieWeb Carnival December 2024: Belief

As we approach the end of 2024 (wow, already?!) I’m pleased to do something I have been anticipating for months: host the December 2024 edition of the IndieWeb Carnival ( What is that?). The theme is belief It’s an open theme, one that I hope will inspire you to share whatever pops into your head when you think about it. A few prompts to merely inspire you: What is something you can’t know, but that you believe? (Continue)

I had the pleasure of being the +1 at The Black Archives Bijlmer Book Club, where we read Travis Alabanza’s None of the Above. Meredith and Wally were excellent hosts, and I loved meeting new people with similar interests.

I had strong feelings about Alabanza’s insistence that this work “feels like theory”, in response to it being marketed as a memoir. Calling Get Out a comedy diminishes the value of Black storytelling in horror narratives. But calling it a documentary is just as ineffective. “Feels like theory” very much sits in that spectrum, for me.

I enjoyed the lively conversation my strong feelings sparked about respectability and Black works, and was surprised the lyrical essay appears to be such an unknown genre when I offered it.

A Black non-binary person with a black shirt and jeans and a white headwrap sits in a chair in between two bookcases while holding a book titled “None of the Above” Three Black people, smile at the camera while pointing at an events poster displayed in the window of The Black Archives Bijlmer Seven people stand in front of a colorful street art wall while holding a book titled “None of the Above”

The first and last photos were taken by Wouter Pocornie.

Eating with hands

They open their roti takeout, unfold their pancake, and start eating. Strike a pose, there’s nothing to it. I ask them if it’s okay that I watch them eat before I start, so I can see how in the world I’m supposed to eat sauce without cutlery. (Continue)