Pour Me A Story, Vol. 4
feat. Zainab Javed, a foolproof salmon recipe, a podcast recommendation and musings on silence
greetings pals — we made it to the end of another week, and what a difference a week can make. there was a lot of uncertainty in the world the last time I landed in your inbox, and while there are a lot of things still up in the air, it’s nice to feel that The One Thing We Were All Waiting To Hear has been set in stone.
for me, what’s been most pleasing about the past six days has been the relative silence. the current man in charge has been, for the most part, muted (as long as you don’t follow him on Twitter), while all messages from his soon-to-be-replacement have been measured, mature and almost calming in a way.
on Twitter this week I leaned on a heavy cliche by comparing it to how I felt in early 2017 after finally extricating myself from a toxic and manipulative relationship. I ended up in an apartment I could barely afford on my own, sitting on shitty furniture that I bought on credit, and the only entertainment my finances permitted was playing NBA 2K17. rather than playing the team game, I found it more satisfying in the practice gym quietly shooting free throws. my life was quiet again. I wrote at length about that here.
speaking of writing at length, I’m leaning towards extending the frequency of this newsletter to twice-weekly, probably on Tuesdays and hopefully starting next week. my logic there is that I guess I have more to say on a personal level than I previously anticipated, and I want to do so, but not in a way that takes the spotlight off of each week’s esteemed guest. and speaking of which…
Anyway, We Have Company
this week’s special guest is one of the myriad friends I’ve made via the barely definable subset known as Philly Twitter. this is a very, very good bunch of people and I’ve had the absolute pleasure of meeting several of them in real life, and hope to do more of the same after All Of This. Zainab Javed and I haven’t met IRL yet, but that hasn’t stopped us from becoming good pals.
AC: hey there friend! we’ve had ourselves quite a week. how are you holding up?
ZJ: Hello, sweet angel! Phewww. Hanging on by a thread! Currently going through a sugar crash after a month of adrenaline that ended with four straight days of 12oz Red Bull. Recovery’s slow and emotionally draining, but I’m on the way. How about you?
AC: my god, I can only imagine. now that the bulk of the anxiety has passed, I’m rediscovering the productivity that went out the window last Tuesday, which is great for my continued employment at least. for those reading at home who haven’t had the pleasure of your acquaintance, can you give us a general idea of what the last month or so has involved for you?
ZJ: Right?! A week straight of staring at Chris Cuomo, and John King has thrown my Is He Hot??? Meter off 🥴 I work in politics and still had zero productivity. So, I am the creative director at the Democratic Governors Association. The DGA is one of the national committees (like the DNC, DSCC, DCCC). We’re responsible for electing Dem Govs — and we do a damn good job of it. As part of the digital team, my job is to lead branding and design for our internal and external facing projects. From infographics on voting for our social media platforms to graphics for email fundraising, my existence revolved around re-electing Roy Cooper in North Carolina and other races, including Real Life Captain Planet Jay Inslee in Washington and Philly Eagles Fan John Carney in Delaware (Go Birds!). We had a record fundraising year online with grassroots donors. And now we have 38 races in 2021-2022, so we’re setting ourselves up for big success.
Just have to keep reminding people of why Democratic governors are so important.
AC: a record fundraising year is both astounding and unsurprising to me. on one hand we’ve got so many folks out of work or not knowing whether they’ll continue to be employed due to All Of This, but on the other hand there’s obviously a groundswell of activism and support for all kinds of Dem-centric causes. paint a picture for me: what was the moment like for you on Saturday when the news landed that Biden had crossed 270?
ZJ: Waiting for the networks to call it for Biden was like staying up half the night waiting for Santa to come, passing out, and waking up to presents. I woke up ten minutes after to see that Philly put him over the top! Ten minutes is a lot of lost time when it comes to getting the memes off, but luckily Nevada’s slow counts and Four Seasons Total Landscaping was the gift that kept on giving.
But honestly, the biggest thing: I remember being so shocked on election night 2016. We had just been hit with a Florida-Pennsylvania-Michigan-Wisconsin call in rapid succession. It was game seven, the ball bounced four times and went in, and there was nothing to do but stare into the emptiness. This time though? It was a moment of both relief and grieving. So once the sheer joy of Philly! Fucking Philly! being the ones to get Biden over the top wore off, I just started crying. I mourned all of the lives we’ve lost from Heather Heyer to every person who died alone and scared from COVID. But there was hope that we could pave a better future for people. I was ugly crying by the time Kamala Harris walked up to the podium wearing suffragette white, and Joe — just a good, decent man — promised that we were going to get through this together as a nation. I’m also crying right now so it’s taking forever to type hahaha.
AC: quit it, I’m choking up just reading it. I’m lucky to have a lot of good friends such as yourself thanks to Philly Twitter. tell me about what Philly represents to you.
ZJ: Philly and Philly Twitter are the happy accidents that saved my life. I was slipping into a dark, dark hole in 2017. The light that pulled me back was the glow of the TV playing Eagles games every Sunday at the bar next door to where I lived. It felt like a home and community that I needed. The team went on its Super Bowl run, and it was the happiest I remembered feeling in ages. I started following people like FanSince09 and Zo, but I was too intimidated so instead of interacting like a normal human, I’d just keep sharing their tweets with a friend. Eventually, I got fired a few days before Burnergate (lmao) and suddenly had a lot of time on my hands. Instead of falling apart, I asked Spike Eskin if I could help design for the [Rights to] Ricky [Sanchez podcast]. Got closer with everyone. It’s funny. I remember all the little things from when I first met y’all and they make me smile. For example, I’m pretty sure you and I became friends because I had jumped into a conversation about making you eat crab fries. I got to a part of everyone’s lives and it’s been the biggest blessing. Philly’s underdog attitude. I always get back on my feet now, even when things are bad.
AC: hahaha YES. It WAS crab fries. which I’ve still never had but one day when this is all over. and I love that as an origin story. some of the best friends I’ve made off of Twitter live in Philly and I’m so honored to be a Philly guy by proxy. you guys have helped keep me on my feet in tough times too, it’s what we gotta do. okay last one then I’ll quit bugging you: is there something important to you that you would like to plug? the floor is all yours!
ZJ: You’re the most wonderful person, and I am absolutely grateful that you asked me to be a part of this! Am I allowed to make a political ask here? (Editor’s note: Yes, yes you are.) If so, please support Fair Fight Action. It’s a project from Stacey Abrams (THE GOAT) to fight voter suppression in Georgia and make sure people’s voices are heard in the double runoffs.
AC: Thank you so much for giving me your precious downtime to talk about good stuff! You’re the best.
Bone Apple Teeth
while I don’t anticipate this will be a regular segment, and while so many folks who are better cooks than me have the recipes-in-newsletters market cornered, I figured I’d share this one.
this salad has been in my repertoire for like 15 years and it has never failed me. it’s very simple, but it comes across as though you’re a very worldly and talented gourmand.
stuff you need:
as many salmon fillets as people you’re feeding
crumbled feta
cherry tomatoes
one red onion
your favorite salad greens; I like arugula or a spring mix (containing arugula)
pine nuts
olive oil
stuff you do:
toast pine nuts over low heat in dry pan. be gentle! they’re expensive and they burn easily. set aside when done.
rub your salmon fillets with olive oil, season with salt and pepper; cook to temp in pan or air fryer.
while salmon is cooking, halve cherry tomatoes and thinly slice onion.
put salad greens in large mixing bowl, add toasted pine nuts, halved tomatoes and onion slices, then crumbled feta on top. don’t mix yet!
when salmon is done, remove skin. break fillets into flakes along grain with fork.
add salmon flakes on top of crumbled feta; allow heat from salmon to soften/melt feta a little.
NOW you can mix! if the feta is creamy enough, the heat will partially soften the feta into a light dressing.
dress further with olive oil and cracked pepper.
okay now you can eat it. or, like, just photograph it for Instagram or whatever. it’s your food, it’s totally up to you.
if you make this one, let me know in the comments or via twitter or something how you like it! if you don’t like it, well, taste is subjective I guess.
Worthy Consumables
as I mentioned back in the inaugural edition, becoming a parent has changed the cadence at which we’re able (and have the energy) to consume TV series. so it’s not like I’m ahead of the curve by saying that we just finished The Queen’s Gambit on Netflix, because so did everybody else like a week ago.
I gotta say man, I was really impressed. I don’t know the first thing about chess, and while at points it did feel like having a basic knowledge would’ve helped, it certainly wasn’t a prerequisite. the characters were engaging, the late-60s setting was executed well and — dare I say it — some of the chess matches were genuinely nerve-wracking stuff. you heard it here seventh.
moving to the world of auditory entertainment, I just got back on board with a podcast I had consumed voraciously over the summer when I started dragging my ass out of the house every afternoon for something resembling “exercise.”
10 Luck is a weekly production by Mike Nelson, Jerrod Roberts, Tanner Lichty and Byron Niles recorded right out of my neighborhood in Denver. These guys were regulars of mine at Capitol Hill Tavern in the Before Times, and now they’re putting their bar conversations on wax (so to speak). the pod is a great listen not only because I know the guys behind it, but because it feels local despite discussing topics of a nationwide interest.
10 Luck is available on SoundCloud and Spotify and Twitter, and I’m angling to have them in the newsletter sometime soon so stay tuned for that!
Parting Note
last Saturday I undertook the longest and farthest run of my life, a whole 8.75 miles. on my long runs I’ve been battling the habit of running the first mile much too quickly, leading me to wear myself out way too soon. so I decided to try some less upbeat music in my ears to try and keep my rhythm more gentle. that led me to Anthony Hamilton’s 2003 album Coming From Where I’m From. an old friend from another life once told me the whole album sounds like “baby-making music,” but you can be the judge.
anyway the tempo seemed to work on Saturday, so here’s one of my favorite tracks from that terrific record.
that’s all I got for you, friends. thanks for sharing your Friday morning with me once again. all things going to plan, I’ll be back in your inboxes on Tuesday.
keep fighting the good fight.
— adrian ✊🏻
Love our friend Zainab! pretty sure my large head makes a cameo in that photo.
Gonna make that salad this week!