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abby

@mlejnas.bsky.social
414 followers 270 following 219 posts

Good at books, terrible at the world.

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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
Paradise of the Blind, a beautifully written novel about postwar Vietnam.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 07/10/2026
My dark-horse Nobel for literature candidate: Duong Thu Huong.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
If we don’t shut it down, he will tear it all down.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 16/08/2026
Sartre got it wrong. Hell is not other people, but endless customer service calls staffed by bots.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
I don’t really need to lose weight, but out-of-pocket Ozempic is now more affordable than groceries, so…
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
Tyler Austin Harper isn’t critiquing DEI/wokeness, but the cynical, silly ways wokeness is used to deny institutional and earning power to faculty & staff. The chief work of higher ed is growing endowments, not teaching and research. It is part of the neoliberal order.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
It makes me tear up every time Mamdani puts out a video telling New Yorkers how to stay safe in a weather event, and what city services are there to help us. Americans have gotten so used to an uncaring government that tells us we’re on our own.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 29/04/2026
Yeesh. Glad mine doesn’t expire until 2031, and you’ll receive yours before this hideousness can take effect.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 09/04/2026
Remember the clamoring and pressure for Biden to drop out after a poor showing in a debate? What’s it going to take to stop this madness? We all need to apply the thumbscrews and keep turning.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Prior to this, the stupidest reason for making war was to steal back a beautiful woman.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 08/03/2026
NJ commuter train. Makes it easier to get to Newark airport than to JFK.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
Noted! Will be flying out of Newark to Cairo via NJ Transit, so will get reacquainted.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
No, I don’t know that one. Have read some of his poems in translation, and a dandy book of his film pieces. Should try his novels some day!
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 07/03/2026
What Egyptologist Barry Crump said about Akhenaten is still relevant: “The danger of being an absolute ruler is that no one dares tell you that what you have just decreed is not a good idea.”
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 05/03/2026
Eloquent essay—love both Fuller and Cendrars!
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 03/03/2026
😂
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 02/03/2026
As a New Yorker, I have a deep respect for rats. Rats would never get behind an old, diseased, obese rat who had preyed upon females before they were sexually mature and repeatedly starts shit with other rat colonies for personal gain. That rat would have been banished long ago.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 22/02/2026
Yes, thank you! Had not seen this. It's bad enough Johnson & Johnson is headquartered there. A friend used to teach an urban politics course at Rutgers and lead his students to the antiseptic and creepily empty "corporate park" across the street, where security guards chased them away.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 14/02/2026
Kristi, Tulsi, and Bondi are Donald's Demons, with JD Vance as Beelzebub Bosley.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 14/02/2026
As bad as that terrible century was, this one may be worse.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
Pam Bondi acts like she’s part of a 1000-year Reich when she’ll be lucky to last the rest of the year.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
I think she’s also the British novelist Elizabeth Jane Howard, of The Cazelet Chronicles fame. Haven read it!
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 12/02/2026
Elizabeth Howard is the interviewer, as I recall.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 11/02/2026
Refusing to appreciate the best from other cultures while praising the worst from your own culture will not garner you the respect you so obviously crave.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 11/02/2026
Yes! I would’ve needed subtitles—wonderful contrast to Elizabeth Howard—except for my familiarity with the coastal Alabama drawl, about as mushmouthed as it gets.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 09/02/2026
Thank you, what a beautiful smile and grace! She manages to be both cute and elegant.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 31/01/2026
I suppose we should be thankful that Brett Ratner is no Leni Riefenstahl.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 27/01/2026
Wondering what kind of monster fills out a brief survey about their coat check experience.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 26/01/2026
So killing an RN who saves lives gets you the full protection of the federal government, whereas killing a CEO who prevents life-saving care gets you charged by the feds with a capital crime.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
In conversation, a Republican friend imagined and sympathized with Jonathan Ross’s “fear”while failing to ascribe any feelings to Renee Good while he shot her three times in anger and she bled to death. This is how dehumanization works.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 22/01/2026
When I was younger, I wished I’d married rich. Now I just regret not having married a Canadian.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 21/01/2026
The barbarians were inside the country.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 20/01/2026
:) Yeah, I’m at the point where I hope someone, anyone, takes him away. Satan, for example.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 19/01/2026
Have you taken a look at Richard Kopley’s 2025 Poe bio? I haven’t but took note of very positive reviews.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 19/01/2026
Yes! I mainly follow Georgia, but they pulled off a fake punt against Ole Miss in their playoff game.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 19/01/2026
Georgia blocked a punt against Alabama in this year’s SEC championship game.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 11/01/2026
It’s a good time to remember John Mueller’s finding that internecine conflicts are driven, not by ethnic and religious hatreds, but by a government’s use of paramilitary thugs.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 11/01/2026
Major media outlets presenting video of the murder of Renee Good like it’s the fucking dress.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 06/01/2026
It’s bad that US foreign policy hasn’t progressed since the Vietnam War.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 06/01/2026
Perfect metaphor, yes. Hate to see it again. Will Americans never learn to stop voting for Republicans?
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 06/01/2026
Apparently the US is as susceptible to a corrupt strongman seizing power as any other country in the Americas.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 03/01/2026
What a craven lot. A pox on them all.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 03/01/2026
That’s CNN for you, the network made by the US wars in Iraq. I hope the French press is more critical.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 03/01/2026
I despise Trump with every fiber of my being, but I’d be alarmed and enraged if another country’s military bombed Washington, DC, and kidnapped him.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 03/01/2026
“The United States appears destined by Providence to plague America with miseries in the name of Freedom.” —Simón Bolívar, 1829
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 21/12/2025
Thank you! Two geniuses.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 02/12/2025
Thanks to Ozempic, my fridge is full of neighbors’ pumpkin and pecan pies with tiny wedges carved out.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 25/11/2025
I think that place is gone, but there’s an empanada spot on 7th and A, as well as Empanada Mama, one of very few remaining 24-hr spots. Have not had mofongo—will have to ask our wonderful Puerto Rican doorman about it!
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 25/11/2025
Very sorry to hear that. We just lost the one good bakery in my neighborhood, and I refuse to eat mediocre bread so do without.
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abby @mlejnas.bsky.social · 24/11/2025
All those places are still there! You will have to come back, at least for a visit. Will have to give up your boulangerie, as the bakeries here are inferior.
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