iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Tomboyland by @mlfaliveno.bsky.social was so, so good. (I wound up buying myself a copy because I knew I would want to come back and spend more time with it... but library first.)

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

There are seven of them grazing in the brush. I don't want to disturb them by moving and making noise... but I really have to pee.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Hanging out with the deer in the back yard. Only one of us is drunk. (Not gonna say who.)

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Feeling a certain late-summer derangement tonight, so I'm gonna go with the stayed home toe, the had roast beef toe, and the had none toe 🤷‍♀️

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 12/08/2026

Thinking of doing the most luxurious thing imaginable: spending the rest of the month wrapping things up with all of my literal and metaphorical open tabs. Then I could celebrate with a Clean Slate September.

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Stephen Hardwick @nonfinality.com · 11/08/2026

My broken record issue: Serving as a poll worker is one of the best ways to make sure voters in your area are treated lawfully and professionally. This js a graphic from my BOE, but you can find info on how to sign up almost anywhere in the US here: www.eac.gov/help-america...

Graphic with flags on pieces of paper and these words:

Franklin County
BOARD OF ELECTIONS
VOTE
NATIONAL POLL WORKER
RECRUITMENT DAY
WE NEED 5,000 POLL WORKERS FOR THE GENERAL ELECTION ON
NOVEMBER 3, 2026
What you will do:
Apply to your local election office.
Complete your training.
***
VOTE
****
Help voters cast their ballot.
VOTE
Get paid for the time you serve your community!
More information:
614-525-5393
vote.franklincountyohio.gov

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Alexander Chee @alexanderchee.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

Mary Ruefle on The Odyssey.

Deconstruction
I think the sirens in the Odyssey sang the Odyssey, for there is nothing more seductive, more terrible, than the story of our own life, the one we do not want to hear and will do anything to listen to.

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G. Willow Wilson @gwillow.me · 03/08/2026

There is no version of yourself you could become that would satisfy the people who hate you. So you might as well be who you are.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

Thanks! So far I've mostly just been using it in improvised salad dressings. I'll have to give this a try soon.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

Favorite uses for Thai basil? I have a very nice plant growing, but I'm not in the habit of actually using it yet.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

All day it's felt like there's a bad storm about to roll in, but it's just Canadian wildfire smoke hanging low in the air, and the house shaking when the neighbors bring down a tree. A dislodged bird's nest. Small broken eggs on the patio table. Vaguely ominous day that's so far amounted to nothing.

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henry ✷ @strange.website · 19/06/2026

when i said 'let’s circle back to that' i more meant, like, in a different era, a different city, another life. let's circle back to it when we're old, or maybe when we're young again...we'll circle back in vienna, or in cairo, or in those slender black cat streets of paris, streetlamps and gossip

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Holy July, where did the time go? I need to make some changes. Right now I'm just running out the clock on my life.

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Gretchen McCulloch @gretchenmcculloch.com · 14/06/2026

I really wanted this to mean "it is solved by going for a little walk to think about it" because that's so often true for me Solvitur ambulando - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solvitu...

Solvitur ambulando on Wikipedia
Solvitur ambulando (Latin: [ˈsolwitur ambuˈlandoː]) is a Latin phrase which means "it is solved by walking", referring to an anecdotal, practical solution to a seemingly complex philosophical problem. It is often attributed to Saint Augustine in a refutation of Zeno's paradoxes of motion.[1]

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NE Ohio Regional Sewer District @neorsd.org · 09/06/2026

our pasts, the present, a future to be realized, all brewing in bubbles that ebb and flow under the watchful eye of unseen servants. the past is not forgotten. it is processed. the future is not unknown for we are treating it today. we have the present. and it is all we we will ever have.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 03/06/2026

Had a genuinely good experience being a poll worker in NJ's primary election yesterday. Definitely recommend doing it at least once if you have the ability and inclination.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Oh no. Local peaches are one of the best things about summer =(

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Rahawa Haile @rahawahaile.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

“…[at] the zine fest, I am perhaps looking for something that I think I may have recently lost track of, a couple decades into a peripatetic but also arguably successful career in publishing: the drive, freedom, and confidence to just make something. No promise of audience or sales… no regrets.”

talkscratch.com

I Don't Miss Twitter, I Miss Zines

Manjula goes to the Santa Rosa Zine Fest and finds more future than nostalgia.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 10/05/2026

I startle a little bit every time I walk past the pile of rubber snakes in our den. Even though I'm the one who put them there.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

Days later, I'm still thinking about "bodymind." What a great word.

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Ana Marie Cox @anamariecox.com · 28/04/2026

If your friends on Substack don't want to read any of the long essays and articles about The Substack Problem, send them this @anildash.com explainer video. (From his @pastduepodcast.com interview.) It's not just Nazis, it really isn't. www.youtube.com/watch?v=IWdS...

youtube.com

Anil Dash: Get Off Substack Before Someone Buys You | Past Due Podcast

YouTube video by Past Due with Ana Marie Cox and Open Mike Eagle

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

I was having a grumpy morning, but then I got to watch a fox sunbathe in our back yard for a few minutes. It brought me out of myself just enough.

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Katie Mack @astrokatie.com · 03/04/2026

More context on this #Artemis II image: * This is the night side, lit by moonlight. You can see city lights in Spain & Portugal, & a sliver of day at lower right * The Sun is entirely behind Earth, which makes it a kind of solar eclipse, but w/ Earth doing the eclipsing instead of the Moon: ☀️🌍🚀🌕

A full disc image of Earth, as seen from the Orion Crew Module. The planet is a pale blue, swirling with white clouds and glowing slightly lighter blue in place from reflected light. At lower left, a large brown landmass is Africa, with Spain and Portugal with twinkling lights where the planet curves. At top right, auroras glow in a thin green glow, just barely separated from the planet's surface. Earth is set against the black of space (pic: NASA/R.Wiseman)

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

It's a small detail, but for clarity, the gnarly traffic pattern you're describing is about 20 miles east of the gnarly intersection cited in the lawsuit. The 280/80/46/287/10 situation begins around exit 47 on 80. The 80/46 situation near the warehouse is exit 28, I believe.

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Surprised Eel Historian, PhD @greenleejw.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

Several years ago, on a whim, I started drawing a map of an eel's life travels as seen by the eel. I figured an eel thinks about its life as a linear journey, rather than a there-and-back again adventure. So I wanted to do a map to reflect this. This morning, on another whim, I finished the map!

A long, skinny map titled: "Life and Travels of the European Eel" with a subtitle reading: "From the Eel's Perspective." A label at the bottom of the map reads: "Begin Here." The map top half of the map is an mirror copy of the bottom half.

I will put the full text of the column in the alt text in an image in the next post in the thread.

The map goes from the bottom of the page up, starting in the Sargasso Sea. An set of arrows show the eels paths to shore, then up a river and into a marshland. The arrows continue up the page to show the eel leaving the marshland and heading back downstream, and out to sea. The land is green and verdant at the bottom of the map, because the eels migrate upstream in the spring. The land is brown and dry at the top of the map, because eels migrate downstream in the autumn.

A column of text on the side tells about the eels' journeys and changes. It is more text than I can relate in the space allowed here. Each paragraph has an arrow pointing up to the next one, and they are designed to be read from the bottom of the page going upwards.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

"You Had Time" is the sadness of going. Of maybe even loving and caring for someone who loves and cares for you too, but knowing (or worse, not knowing but sensing) that you need to leave the relationship anyway. I think that's the sadder sadness, for me. The more wrenching one.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

"Brick" is the sadness of staying. Of being alone within the context of a relationship, and accepting that loneliness.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Two good, sad songs today. Two skillful essays. Two contrasting sadnesses. Oof.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

In the erratic manner of a New Jersey spring it is, briefly, 4pm bitters and soda weather.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

"I won't find my stakes if I'm keeping secrets." 🖤

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

Also decided to start my month of joy and courage early. (Why wait?) Brought some essay drafts out to a microbrewery to enjoy a French pilsner while I read and make notes. The TV behind the bar is playing the eagle cam livestream from Duke Farms. Nest of weird little hatchings. This is perfect.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

After taking a walk and conferring with myself, I've decided to make April a month of joy and courage. Those are the things I need right now.

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Gretchen McCulloch @gretchenmcculloch.com · 22/03/2026

I don't normally subscribe to the "German has a word for it" thing because all languages can invent and borrow new words! That said, I can't stop thinking about "hobbyless" as an insult since I saw it a few days ago, so here you go It promotes a growth mindset!! www.tumblr.com/abbiistabbii...

user abbiistabbii:
The Germans really cooked making "Hobbyless behaviour" an insult. It is both devastating, applicable to a wide range of people and behaviours, and doesn't resort to swearing.

Man ranting on the internet about the Superbowl halftime show or complaining that something is "woke"? Hobbyless Behaviour. Girls mocking another girl for not looking right? Hobbyless Behaviour. Mindless vandalism? Hobbyless Behaviour.

It is more powerful than "get a life" or the English "You're Sad" because it gets to the central point of the matter, and that is wonderful. Danke, Deutsch.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

The past 14 months have been a string of one "there but for the grace" moment after another, with no end in sight. It's a particular kind of exhausting. And heartbreaking.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

Gonna let this one sit for a bit. I have time.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

@susannadonato.bsky.social and Ani: This song is the sadness of knowing you need to be the one to walk away.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

@jamcharlesworth.bsky.social and Collective Soul: This song is a lament for a society in which we have the material capacity to care for and connect with each other, yet we fall short anyway.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

"The World I Know" vs "You Had Time": a wrenching decision, having to choose between these two sadnesses.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

I'm voting @thejasonthayer.bsky.social and Bush because "Glycerine" absolutely hijacks my pulse and my respiration rate.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

"Glycerine" remains a viscerally sad song for me. The thrum of that guitar is enough to do it. The song is sad beyond its sometimes inscrutable lyrics, the way sadness itself isn't always clearly articulable. Some days you just live in it: the kind of sadness that's more than the sum of its parts.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

"Brick" is so straightforwardly, legibly a sad song. But it lets something else slip in: anxiety. What if I am someone else'e brick, and I don't know it? This song puts a lump in my throat, but in the end it's more dread than sadness. (YMMV.)

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

"Glycerine" vs "Brick": Two sad, pretty songs up against each other today. I've got to go with my gut on this one. And by "gut" I mean my autonomic nervous system.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

This song is viscerally sad to me. It has a muted pulse I must have internalized when I was 17, because listening now, 30 years later, I still recognize it as sadness itself beating in my chest. I have to vote Bush on this one.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

"Glycerine" is, indeed, "safer grunge for sad and angry kids like you."

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

And then there's @thejasonthayer.bsky.social on "Glycerine": "If Cobain’s caterwaul is a handful of jagged rocks chucked into a wood chipper, Gavin Rossdale’s moan is smooth pea gravel spread across the playground, crunching softly under the feet of kids at recess."

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

"Adam's Song" is a great song to be depressed to! But. I just can't hear it as a sad song.

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

These lines are among my favorites this month: "If I’m too messy to die, then I have to clean, and if I’ve got it in me to clean, I don’t want to die anymore. If I think about it for too long I start to feel like a Roomba who sometimes sits at the charging deck for an inappropriate amount of time."

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Jen Borkowski @jenmaicha.bsky.social · 20/03/2026

I enjoyed the humor in the opening paragraph of @emryal91.bsky.social's Blink-182 essay, and thought the tone was a good fit for the feel of the song.

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