iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

During the pandemic, I loved listening to the Youtube channel "Mikey and his Uke," where Mikey Hawdon and his famous friends did fun punk covers of popular tunes. Then it went dark. But today there was a new video. Music is joy. Music is brain. Listen to more music.

youtube.com

DANDY WARHOLS 'BOHEMIAN LIKE YOU' COVER - FEAT: CHEAP TRICK, RUNAWAYS, BANGLES, POISON, REDD KROSS

YouTube video by Mikey And His Uke

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 14/01/2026

Sorry! There is nowhere in LA that a cyclist is safe. Not even on the beach. 😔

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 18/12/2025

An excellent episode. Peter slays with the line, "Just go make sure my fking packages are on time, ok?" (paraphrased!) Just absolutely the truest thing ever.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 10/12/2025

Thank you for the explanation, Lexis-Olivier. We appreciate you breaking it down for us.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 06/12/2025

This is like if Joan Didion had a baby with Francine Pascal. 🤢

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 06/12/2025

This hits hard. I do remember several LJ friends and hope they are well. ❤️ Miss ficcing with all of them. Great poem 🥹

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

Music: Mono Neon plays for Jam in the Van, Los Angeles. Fun, funky-jazz sound -- and I would love to sit down and quiz him about who crochets his balaclavas. It must be him, right? Where does he get the yarn? Anyway. They are fabulous.

youtube.com

MonoNeon | Jam in the Van | Avant-Funk Music (Full Set 2025)

YouTube video by Jam In The Van

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 15/11/2025

Article: "Living with Muscular Dystrophy at 50 Makes Death My Shadow Partner." "Being disabled in a nondisabled world is precarious, one of constant adaptation. I remade myself into a new cyborg form that still has a voice, a breath, and a will to live."

time.com

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 15/11/2025

Alice Wong: disability advocate, MacArthur Genius, and wonderful writer -- has died. This post is dedicated to her. Please read any of her books: "Disability Visibility," "Disability Intimacy," or her biographical memoir, "Year of the Tiger."

penguinrandomhouse.com

Year of the Tiger by Alice Wong: 9780593315392 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • ONE OF USA TODAY'S MUST-READ BOOKS • This groundbreaking memoir offers a glimpse into an activist's journey to finding and cultivating community and the continued fight...

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 09/11/2025

I second Vania to say, you must listen to the Messing ep of "A Bit Fruity."

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 27/10/2025

Video: Little Simz with Obongjayar, "Lion," live on GN Show. Her new album "Lotus" is fire. And she looks so good here!! "We don't care for what they say, that's our superpower."

youtube.com

Little Simz feat. Obongjayar - Lion (Live on The Graham Norton Show)

YouTube video by Little Simz

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 18/10/2025

Youtube: Playing for Change. They always do such great videos featuring incredible world talent. This older one, though it is mostly USA-centric, got me in the feels cuz of all the musical kids. Just look at 'em being so hopeful. Could I be hopeful too? (Unlikely)

youtube.com

Love Train feat. Jason Mraz, Chad Smith, Yo-Yo Ma | Turnaround Arts | Playing For Change

YouTube video by Playing For Change

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 10/10/2025

"One day this will end. [...] The same people who did the killing and financed the killing and justified the killing and turned away from the killing will congratulate themselves on doing the right thing. It is very important to do the right thing, eventually." - Omar El Akkad

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 10/10/2025

Book: "One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This," by Omar El Akkad. It finally helped me understand why just "being a liberal because it's better than the alternative" doesn't morally work and isn't convincing anymore. Watch an interview with the author here:

youtube.com

“One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This”: Omar El Akkad on Gaza & Western Complicity

YouTube video by Democracy Now!

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 03/10/2025

Incorrect; all of your sh*t is still funny.

A pink snek character with a lavender top hat saying, "Get a loada this guy!"

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 14/09/2025

Julio, you deserve better than this.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 12/09/2025

Prose so dense it actually has an event horizon

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 03/09/2025

When you finally cut a relative off, it often comes after years and years of putting up with them, hoping they will moderate the abuse, hoping to have a polite conversation this time, etc. In my case it was 30 years. But the person only "noticed" after I stopped speaking to them entirely.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 20/08/2025

Oh, so that's why beef is $254.95 😏

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 14/08/2025

Music: The B-52's, "Tell It Like It T-I-Is (MK Underground Remix)" from 1992. I'm pretty sure that MK is Mark Kinchen. Great remix, light on the lyric and heavy on the beat.

youtube.com

THE B-52's - Tell It Like It T-I-Is (MK Underground Mix) 1992

YouTube video by MURKBOY72

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 12/08/2025

Book: "Ben and Beatriz" by Katalina Gamarra. Enemies to lovers romance? ✔️ Slick banter? ✔️ Shakespeare in the mix? ✔️️ Video: Laura Jane Grace shows off her Rickenbacker collection. She's extremely cute. Song: "Black Me Out," by Against Me!, featuring my favorite fellow Laura. 11 years old this year.

youtube.com

Against Me!'s Laura Jane Grace and Her Rickenbacker Guitar Collection | Interview

YouTube video by Reverb

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 09/08/2025

Appreciate this along with your very insightful episode of A Bit Fruity this week.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

😂😂😂 Country Club Vampires of Sweet Valley

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 15/07/2025

Music: Black Sky Over the Projects, Public Enemy. I LOVE a cranky old rapper. "What the fk is a sexagenarian, Chuck?" Site: Unofficial Hugo Book Club Blog's list of SF-depicted unions. Infotainment. docs.google.com/spreadsheets...

youtu.be

Public Enemy - "SEXEGENARIAN VAPE" Official Music Video

YouTube video by Channel ZERO

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 12/07/2025

One more way to coerce women into doing literally everything.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 12/07/2025

I remember watching, in elementary school, the Nat Geo documentary on the undersea robot that went down and got contemporary footage of the Titanic.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Music: First Aid Kit with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra. As I was listening, I swear I felt my heart stand on end. As if there was too much music for my body to handle (not a feeling I feel, like, ever).

berwaldhallen.se

First Aid Kit möter Sveriges Radios Symfoniorkester - Berwaldhallen

Återupplev konserten First Aid Kit möter Sveriges Radios Symfoniorkester, inspelad live i Berwaldhallen Stockholm januari 2025.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 04/07/2025

"Whether we turn to the declarations of the past, or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future." -- Frederick Douglass

teachingamericanhistory.org

What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?

The speech shows the moral outrage that powered the abolition movement and made it so threatening to Southern slave holders, but also to anyone willing to tolerate or ignore slavery.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 05/06/2025

And by the way, here is the start of "Kids Who Die," by Langston Hughes. I'd post the whole thing, but .... This is for the kids who die, Black and white, For kids will die certainly. The old and rich will live on awhile, As always, Eating blood and gold, Letting kids die.

allpoetry.com

Kids Who Die by Langston Hughes at Allpoetry

Comments & analysis: This is for the kids who die, / Black and white, / For kids will die certainly. / The old

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 05/06/2025

In Langston Hughes's poem called "Kids Who Die," I noticed a mention of Angelo Herndon, who I hadn't heard of. When I looked him up, turns out he was a Black labor organizer in the South. He wrote a beautiful account of his efforts called "You Cannot Kill the Working Class." Read it here:

historyisaweapon.com

"You Cannot Kill the Working Class" | Angelo Herndon (1937)

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 02/06/2025

Seems appropriate, since she is an actual ghoul.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 07/05/2025

Song: "Self Esteem," by the Offspring -- look, this song still has one of the best opening lines ever. And the bass slaps. "I wrote her off for the tenth time today...." Video: Nicole Scherzinger and Tom Francis doing Sunset Blvd. revival on Tiny Desk. WATCH IT WATCH IT NOW

youtube.com

SUNSET BLVD.: Tiny Desk Concert

YouTube video by NPR Music

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 26/04/2025

Music: "Me, Myself, and I," De La Soul - I'm seriously obsessed with De La Soul (almost 40 years later). Podcast: "One Song," - takes apart songs and traces their influences. <3 Website: Bookshop.org - it's bookstore day! And Amazon sucks, and Bookshop has free shipping today and tomorrow.

bookshop.org

Bookshop: Buy books online. Support local bookstores.

An online bookstore that financially supports local independent bookstores and gives back to the book community.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 10/04/2025

I am not sure at ALL about Skarsgard, but I did think I saw John Cho in The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon!! And that would be awesome.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 27/02/2025

For contemporaries, I would recommend the Riggs Brothers series by Julie Kriss. Esp book 2, "Take Me Down." Jace Riggs just got out of prison and he now needs to go to counseling as a condition of parole. He is unluckily (luckily?!) very attracted to his counselor.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 27/02/2025

This is one of your best to date. I want to read every single book !! Let me recommend Rose Lerner for historicals - she has stories about maids, valets, con men, and confectioners. Her books are fantastic.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 26/02/2025

Costco people are the nicest people! Also, your hair really does look fab.

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 24/02/2025

Book (Graphic novel): "Bingo Love," by Tee Franklin Music: "Time Travelin' (A Tribute to Fela)," by Common, feat. Vinia Mojica, Roy Hargrove, and Fema Kuti

imagecomics.com

Bingo Love OGN

From TEE FRANKLIN (NAILBITER’s

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 22/02/2025

Nina Simone was born on this day, 92 years ago. My favorite song of hers is "Little Girl Blue," because she always takes the opportunity to go full classical. Eat your heart out, Curtis Institute. #younggiftedandblack

youtube.com

Nina Simone - Live At Montreux 1976 Little Girl Blue

YouTube video by GUI OLIVEIRA

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 21/02/2025

Made in 1945, includes no women with a speaking part, but (un?)surprisingly still apropos today, if you still have a 23 minute attention span. "We must guard everyone's liberty, or we can lose our own." #thismachinekillsfascists

youtube.com

Don't Be a Sucker

YouTube video by US National Archives

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Laura Sorensen @this-be-the-verse.bsky.social · 19/02/2025

Let me 100% recommend "Clean Slate" on Amazon Prime, which stars the fabulous Laverne Cox and a slew of really funny actors including George Wallace, Telma Hopkins, and DK Ozoukwu. I seriously belly-laughed when I watched it (which I almost never do. A "ha" is pretty good from me).

youtube.com

Clean Slate - Official Trailer | Prime Video

YouTube video by Prime Video

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