JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

You’ve always wanted to write, but you don’t know how to get started.

You used to write, but you haven’t done it in a while and you feel rusty.

You’re sort of interested in writing, but you’re afraid to even admit it.

You’ve started many stories, but you ran out of steam.

You think you can write, but you need a second opinion.

You have a writing project that you’ve been putting off, and you just looked at the calendar and it’s almost 2018.

You want to learn the basics of storytelling.

(Or you have a friend who is any/all of the above and you want to give them a little push.)

Join our Writing Boot Camp! The objective is simple: to start and finish a piece of writing (a short story, a personal essay, or a piece of fanfiction) in two weekends.

Dates: July 22 and 29, 2017, from 1-5pm.
Venue: WSI Corporate Center, Metropolitan Avenue, Makati (near the Makati fire station at the end of Ayala Avenue)
Cost: Php6,000, but if you pay on or before June 30, 2017, you only pay Php5,000.

No pressure, no tears, no time like the present.

For inquiries and to book a place, email saffron.safin@gmail.com.
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An escalating divorce rate shows the depth of gender inequality in Chinese society. Illustration by Malika Favre

China’s Mistress-Dispellers
How the economic boom and deep gender inequality have created a new industry by Jiayang Fan

Yu, a gentle-looking man in his early forties, with the placid demeanor of a yoga instructor, works as a mistress dispeller, a job that barely existed a decade ago but is becoming common in major Chinese cities. His clients are women who hope to preserve their marriages by fending off what is known in Chinese as a xiao san, or “Little Third”—a term that encompasses everything from a partner in a casual affair to a long-term “kept woman.” Mistress dispellers use a variety of methods. Some Little Thirds can be paid off or discouraged by hearing unwelcome details of their lovers’ lives—debts, say, or responsibility for an elderly parent—or shamed with notes sent to friends and family. If the dispeller or the client is well connected, a Little Third may suddenly find that her job requires her to move to another city. A female dispeller sometimes seeks to become a confidante, in order to advise the targeted woman that the liaison will inevitably crumble. In certain cases, a male mistress dispeller may even seduce the woman. Like all the mistress dispellers I spoke to, Yu said that he never resorts to this tactic, but he acknowledged that there are those who do.

Read it in The New Yorker.

Reminds me of that Romain Duris movie, Heartbreaker, in which he plays a professional hired by a businessman to break up his daughter’s engagement. So the heartbreaker woos the woman by, among other things, learning the big dance in Dirty Dancing. Mmmmm, Romain Duris.

In a long life I have devoted all my faculties to reach a somewhat deeper insight into the structure of physical reality. Never have I made any systematic effort to ameliorate the lot of men, to fight injustice and suppression, and to improve the traditional forms of human relations. The only thing I did was this: in long intervals I have expressed an opinion on public issues whenever they appeared to me so bad and unfortunate that silence would have made me feel guilty of complicity.

Read about Einstein and the duties of the individual in Brain Pickings.

Saffron Sassafras Saoirse Schmitz Zafra Safin-Sprungli

Happy Birthday, Saffy! Saffy is our very clever cat who specializes in the planning and execution of revenge plots. She is cranky, possessive, and the master of the side-eye. Her favorite activities are sitting on my notebook as I’m writing, sitting on the keyboard as I’m typing, and sharpening her claws on the book I am reading. She is the reigning staring contest champion. While she is a picky (but voracious) eater, Saffy loves all fried chicken so we’re having that for her birthday lunch.

Today and tomorrow you can ask Saffy any and all questions about your personal lives and destinies and she will answer them!

Saffy Strange, Mistress of the Mystic Arts

* * * * *

Dear Saffy,

May you have many, many more happy years to come.

I am usually a jovial person, but lately I have been feeling glum and anxious, especially when I read the news or see people quarreling in my social media accounts. There have been no changes in my living situation or my work, so it must be me. Sometimes I cannot bring myself to get out of bed, other times I cannot sleep. Help?

Gray Clouds

Dear Gray Clouds,
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Drogon Targaryen-Targaryen explains the ways of the household to the new cat, Jacob Totoro Howlett.

Take the Lonely Pets Quiz.

Additional question:

When you’re at the computer:

– The cat sits on the keyboard, preventing you from typing.

– The cat immediately goes to her favorite websites.

– The cat ignores you to play with his imaginary friends.

Any week that we find two new David Sedaris essays is a good week. The funniest memoirs deal with old pain.

The author (rear) with his sister Lisa and their mother, Sharon Sedaris.

Sober, she was cheerful and charismatic, the kind of person who could—and would—talk to anyone. Unlike our father, who makes jokes no one understands and leaves his listeners baffled and anxious to get away, it was fun to hear what our mom might come out with. “I got them laughing” was a popular line in the stories she’d tell at the end of the day. The men who pumped her gas, the bank tellers, the receptionists at the dentist’s office. “I got them laughing.” Her specialty was the real-life story, perfected and condensed. These take work, and she’d go through half a dozen verbal drafts before getting one where she wanted it. In the course of the day, the line she wished she’d delivered in response to some question or comment—the zinger—would become the line she had delivered. “So I said to him, ‘Buddy, that’s why they invented the airplane.’ ”

Read Why aren’t you laughing? in the New Yorker.