AUGUST 2026 VOL. 2
a monthly digital coffee table book, curated by myself, to share my favorite recent musings with you.
MUSIC
Cathy dennis’ songwriting skills
When I was little, I was obsessed with Cathy Dennis's song "Too Many Walls." (I'm an '80s kid with an unapologetic love for adult contemporary music.) A few years ago, I looked her up and discovered she'd gone on to become an incredible songwriter for other artists.
Just a few of her writing credits: Britney Spears' "Toxic," Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out of My Head," Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl," and my personal favorite, s-Club 7's "Never Had a Dream Come True."
Thanks for the tunes Cathy - What a legend.
food
chicken tikka masala pizza
I was on tour in Denver last year, and one of my favorite takeout spots was a restaurant that served Indian-inspired pizzas. Their signature Chicken Tikka Masala Pizza was absolute crack.
I came up with a Trader Joe's hack: Buy their fresh pizza dough from the refrigerated section, a frozen box of chicken tikka masala, a bag of shredded mozzarella, and a handful of cilantro. Microwave the chicken tikka masala just enough to soften it, then spread it over the stretched pizza dough. Top with mozzarella and bake accordingly. Finish with a heaps of fresh cilantro. It's cheap and ridiculously good.
film
in her shoes
Side note: Older people are my favorite people on the planet. I could sit and talk with just about any one of them for hours.
back to the movie: Toni Collette's character kicks her ill-behaved sister (Cameron Diaz) out of her apartment, so Cameron moves in with her estranged grandmother (Shirley MacLaine) at a retirement community in Florida. What follows is an inspiring and touching story where Cameron learns HOW TO BE AN ADULT, toni learns to trust people again and Shirley gets a lost piece of her family back. it’s a top-five film for me.
performance
sutton lee seymour
in super ma’am
Being an artist is no easy task. I can barely serve dinner to people without apologizing for what I've cooked. Being a drag queen is even more exposing. You're a business of one: writer, performer, producer, booker, marketer, promoter, choreographer, costume designer, therapist, accountant... the list never ends.
One of my best friends in the world happens to be one of the best drag queens in the world: Sutton Lee Seymour. If you're ever in Puerto Vallarta or Provincetown, do yourself a favor and catch one of her original shows.
wellness
the infinite door tarot card deck
Rumor has it you're only supposed to receive tarot decks as gifts, never buy one for yourself. Well, I saw this deck about a year ago and wasn't about to wait for someone to magically read my mind, so I bought it anyway.
The artwork, the colors, even the box the cards come in all feel genuinely magical. SPELLBINDING, EVEN.
If you know someone who's tarot-curious, this makes a perfect gift. (And the best part… They won't have to break the "never-buy-your-own-deck" rule.)
travel
portland airport
I'm obsessed with airports. A therapist and I once realized that the Pittsburgh airport represented getting out of my hometown. It was a safety zone. An escape hatch from that city and town.
Portland's newly remodeled airport is, hands down, the most beautiful airport in America. Walking through it feels like you've stepped into a Pacific Northwest forest. The soaring wood ceilings, natural light, and abundance of real trees and plants. Even better, all of the food vendors are local and thanks to a local law, they charge the same prices they do outside the airport. (no airport markup!) A++++
art
AUTORRETRATO EN TARDE ROSA by Tomás Sánchez
I've been admiring Cuban artist Tomás Sánchez's work for years. He paints breathtaking landscapes, then quietly places a single person in meditation somewhere within the scene, often so subtly that you have to search for them. It's like a peaceful where’s waldo.
I RECENTLY BOUGHT a PRINT OF HIS 1994 PAINTING, AUTORRETRATO EN TARDE ROSA, (self-portrait on a pink afternoon) for my apartment. the elongated, tall vertical trees remind me of the late american illustrator, Eyvind Earle.
roller coaster
montu,
busch gardens,
tampa, fl
My first visit to Busch Gardens Tampa was in 1996, the debut year of its now world-famous inverted roller coaster, Montu.
Named after the ancient Egyptian god of war, the coaster dives, twists, and weaves through Egyptian ruins, skimming over trenches and plunging in and out of underground temple-like structures. When it first opened, one of the coolest moments was a quick drop out of the station over a live crocodile enclosure.
Thirty years later, it still holds up as one of the greatest inverted roller coasters ever built. happy birthday, montu!
coffee
Neiberhud coffee, 107 thompson st, new york, ny
there’s a stretch Thompson Street in SoHo, nyc i call "Espresso Alley." Between Prince and Spring alone, there are five or six coffee shops competing for your attention.
My favorite is Neiberhud Coffee.
They recently remodeled the space, and it's even better than before. There's indoor and outdoor seating, free Wi-Fi, an actual bathroom (a rare luxury in NYC), genuinely delicious coffee, and every drink comes with a free date. Yes, the fruit (yum). It's a tiny touch that somehow makes my day every time.
On Saturday afternoons each month, they even host a disco DJ set that turns the café into a neighborhood party.
literature
liberation by bess wohl
i read this script before I saw it onstage, so I knew exactly what was coming. It didn't matter. The words still hit me right in the heart.
It's a memory play about a woman who has recently lost her mother and returns to her small hometown in Ohio to better understand who she was. (SHE FORMED THE FIRST “CONSCIOUSNESS RAISING GROUP” IN TOWN.) The play builds to an emotional climax when an actress onstage embodies her mother's spirit, almost like Oda Mae Brown channeling Sam in Ghost, and delivers a line that completely leveled me:
"Don't get so caught up in the past, in ‘not becoming your mother,’ that you forget to become yourself."
little wonders
pounds = lbs.
Never in my life had I stopped to think about why we write "lbs." as the abbreviation for pounds until i was playing a round of Trivial Pursuit on a cruise ship years ago.
Well, after losing the game, I'm here to tell you why. It's short for the Latin phrase libra pondo, which means "weight by the pound." That's also where the zodiac sign Libra gets its name. It's represented by a set of balancing scales, just like the original Latin word. SO NEXT TIME YOU’RE WRITING YOUR WEIGHT, THINK OF IT IN LIBRAS INSTEAD. WE’RE ALL STARDUST, ANYWAY… RIGHT?
