Good day to you, reader. This is Vishal with another issue of Kat’s Kable. And this isn’t just any old issue… it’s issue three hundred! It feels nice to say that, and surreal to think about the fact that the newsletter is approaching seven years old. Anyhow, I’m here again on a Monday because the weekend was just packed and tiring. I’ve been feeling quite tired in a constant way for some time now, which I’m recognizing and trying to work around.
I’m about to start a new book, The Book of Disquiet by Fernando Pessoa, after a friend H recommended his work to me when they visited a few months ago. In fact, they also read a few pages of Night Train to Lisbon for me which I loved. I love being narrated to and also narrating to others. If I feel up to it, I might share a recording of myself reading something aloud in next week’s issue. Funnily enough, though, I don’t listen to podcasts. It’s not that I like or don’t like them, I just don’t care for them.
Anyhow, that’s all for now. I’ll spend a few moments tending to my ongoing ferments (roasted pumpkin miso, chilli garlic hot sauce, sauerkraut/curtido, and aam kaasundi , a green mango mustard) and then unwind post that. See you on the other side.
If you got this from a friend and want to subscribe, here’s the link. Also, if any of the links are paywalled and if you don’t want to pay for a subscription, try opening the link in incognito mode in your browser. This works if the website has a “soft” paywall. If that doesn’t work, you can access the website using a different browser on the same device, or use a different device altogether. Another, slightly involved, method is to try to disable JavaScript and reload the page. This works on some websites for me.
1. On Aging Alone (The Walrus):
Very touching and poignant personal essay written by Sharon Butala about aging by oneself. It’s an excerpt from her book This Strange Visible Air: Essays on Aging and the Writing Life which I now want to check out.
2. complementary (Mind Mud, a Substack newsletter):
An essay by Molly Mielke about femininity and “how do we use it?”. I found this thought-provoking, a little bit.
3. Elephants in the Room (Fifty Two):
Abhilash Pavuluri writes about human-elephant conflict in Karnataka’s Hassan district. He explores the issue from different angles, ranging from farmers’ exasperation to conservationists’ efforts.
4. Bye bye Kumble (Siddharth Vaidyanathan’s blog):
I recently stumbled upon this blog post from 2011 about the cricketer Anil Kumble’s retirement. I really liked it.
In the same way, a bowler needs to be able to take five wickets. He needs to know how many overs he can bowl per spell, how he can work each batsman out, how to bowl at various stages of a session, how to bowl in tandem with the bowler at the other end (depending on whether he’s a fast bowler or a medium-pacer or a spinner), how to bowl to an experienced batsmen and how to bowl to someone new to the crease. Once he gets five wickets, a bowler needs to be able to start afresh and want more. Much, much more.
5. Water Engineering and Wealth in the Age of Ponniyin Selvan (Mridula Ramesh’s blog):
I liked this brief introduction to water harvesting structures in ancient Tamil Nadu. She talks about tanks called eris and check dams called anais , primarily.
6. Nanotechnology’s spring (Works in Progress Magazine):
An evangelical post about how nanotechnology can solve all our problems and drastically improve our standard of living in a matter of a couple of decades. It’s a bit naive, honestly, and seems to belie a lack of scientific temperament. But it does cover the ground well.
7. Pune Cops Got On Bumble To Catch Woman Drugging And Robbing Her Dates (Decode Magazine):
Well, what more can I add to the title of this article.
8. The amazing true(ish) story of the ‘Honduran Maradona’ (The Guardian):
Brilliant! The author of this article played a “prank” of sorts by inflating the stats of Honruan footballer Alexander López and playing a role in him being transferred for a really large fee to a major US team, Houston Dynamo! The end of this article involves the author meeting López, which is really a fun thing to read about.
9. The Almost Great Bank Robbery (Texas Monthly):
A few months ago, someone on Reddit had posted a long list of good reporting of heists. I have been having fun reading about them. Here’s one.
10. America’s Busiest Bank Robber Was a Product of the Opioid Crisis (Bloomberg):
And here’s another. There’ll be a few more next week. Ha!