Adam beams in from a room near the lobby of a Grand Cayman hotel room to discuss what we’ve been jotting in our notebooks, app boredom, school dropoff chaos, and book recommendations. And in a new feature, Radio Take Note, we offer up two songs that are worth sharing. 

Book recommendations

A Gentleman in Moscow

Belcanto

My Brilliant Friend

Lonesome Dove

The Adult

All the Light We Cannot See

Angie McMahon

Sprints

Field Notes "The Chicago Look" Edition

Colt Bowden Sign Painting Books

Penchetta Pen and Knife Store

Profolio Oasis Notebook

Ted steps in it when comparing a local celebration to Mardi Gras, plus some impromptu haiku, real rodeo cowboy names, and notes from the baseball tournament. And a leading question: what pen is most like a pencil? 

Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo

Uni Jetstream Edge

Pentel sign pen

Project 3.18’s Spring Training Story

Adam's Notebooks

Just Tell Me Who It Was by John Cheever

Vineland by Thomas Pynchon

Jamelle Bouie favorite film genres

Annhiliation by Jeff VanderMeer

The Acid House by Irvine Welsh

Pablo Delcan

The Imperfectionist (Oliver Burkeman)

The Secret Pentagon War Game…

It’s baseball season! To commemorate this happy time of year, Ted made an audio recording of an essay that he wrote in 2014 for a collection called “The Who, the What, and the When” put together by Julia Rothman, Jenny Volvovski, and Matt LaMothe on the theme of historical sidekicks. Adam also contributed, as did Dan Kugler (underground legend for his work co-hosing the Slackers episode) and lots of other cool folks.

In Ted’s essay, he shares a vignette about Hiroshi Arakawa, the hitting coach of Japanese baseball legend Sadaharu Oh. Every short essay is accompanied by a staggeringly beautiful illustration. The mind-blowing illustration accompanying his essay is by the awesome Paul Windle.

Notes from between 1606 and 1607, the beauty of alternate takes, using notebooks to refine ideas, and why the pencil is a Zen object. 

Caravaggio essay, NYRB

Wilco, A Ghost is Born box set

Kafka’s Diaries

zen

DDC x FN Turquoise Tribute

At the Existensialist Cafe by Sarah Bakewell

Inside the Fight Against a Los Angeles Inferno

Jokermen

Turkey and the Wolf

Casamento's

Midori Grain Memo Pad

The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper 

Ryan joins us as we prep for the big game with our talk of oyster restaurants, middle school recitals, and Adam’s approach to a “logbook” to track movies watched, stories read, etc.

Oysters in the New York Times

Bakewell’s book on existentialism

MJ Lenderman

You Must Remember This podcast

Patreon page (thanks for your support!)

In this episode we share notes from a Texas snowstorm, journals from the olden days spark creative, a dream journaling update, a new segment, and discuss the new work from John McPhee in the New Yorker. We also announce the new book we’ll read together and discuss. Please enjoy!

Stationerdy notebook from Dapper Notes

Ohto sharp pencil

Tabula Rasa Volume Five by John McPhee

Take Note book club, The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper

The Theme

Northwestern University Media Library

Today's Number Is…

Peggy Guggenheim Museum Shop

Easy Everything Internet Cafe

Rushmore

A Complete Unknown

Joan Baez Tax Debt