Memory Palace
The first poem I memorized was 'Pinkle Purr' by A.A. Milne. I was around seven years old when I encountered it and was immediately enchanted. It's a children's poem, four stanzas, all with the same hypnotic AA/BB/AA rhyme scheme. It's a poem about a kitten, Pinkle Purr, and his mother, Tattoo, and their changing relationship as Pinkle Purr grows up, a sort of 'Cat's in the Cradle' for kids, but less sad.
I don't remember making any effort to memorize it; I just read the poem so many times that it worked its way into me, such that I knew it as well as I knew the theme songs to my favorite TV shows. I'd walk around muttering to myself, trying out different voices and syllable stresses: 'Tattoo was the mother of Pinkle Purr/A little black nothing of feet and fur;/And by-and-by, when his eyes came through,/He saw his mother, the big Tattoo.' It was meditative, comforting, an internal metronome that I naturally returned to when I returned to myself.
Perhaps because I started memorizing poems early, before I was forced to do so in school, I never perceived the process as onerous, but rather as a fun challenge, a way to take something I loved and make it a part of me. As a graduate student, I memorized Galway Kinnell's 'Little Sleep's-Head Sprouting Hair in the Moonlight,' lines from which still regularly surface in my brain unbidden — 'Kiss the mouth / that tells you, here, / here is the world' — even though I can't recall the whole thing anymore. I love that, amid the practical information and persistent worries and memories good and bad, my mind's archive contains these bits of beauty, lyrics that float up into consciousness, lovely echoes.
This past week, The Times Book Review ran a weeklong challenge to help readers memorize Edna St. Vincent Millay's 'Recuerdo,' replete with games and videos. (Ethan Hawke's recitation of 'We were very tired, we were very merry, / We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry' is delightful and dramatic; I'd like to hear him do 'Pinkle Purr.') I'm obviously the exact audience for this type of thing, but even if you're the sort who thinks of memorizing verse as homework, I think this challenge will make you reconsider. The poem is dazzling, and the challenge's structure makes it almost effortless to absorb it. I love what A.O. Scott and Aliza Aufrichtig write in their introduction: 'At a time when we are flooded with texts, rants and A.I. slop, a poem occupies a quieter, less commodified corner of your consciousness. It's a flower in the windowbox of your mind.'
The flower in my mind's windowbox that blooms most satisfyingly is 'Spelt From Sibyl's Leaves,' by the late-19th century English poet and Jesuit priest Gerard Manley Hopkins. I memorized it for the first time maybe 20 years ago, and I have made a point of re-memorizing it at regular intervals, whenever I go to recite it and find I can't do it perfectly without hesitation. It's a strange, propulsive poem whose rhythm, language and imagery I love so deeply — 'Earnest, earthless, equal, attuneable, ' vaulty, voluminous, … stupendous / Evening strains to be time's vást, ' womb-of-all, home-of-all, hearse-of-all night' — that reciting it is a sort of ecstasy.
I found out only recently that Hopkins insisted that the poem should not just be read with the eye, but loudly performed, 'almost sung.' In the shower. While driving to work or making dinner. On those insomniac nights when you can't stop fretting and wish you had something, anything else to think about. This is when memorized poems are most valuable. You can run over the lines in your head, or you can open your mouth, call the verse up from the recesses of your memory, and sing.
🎬 'Friendship' (Friday): It can be hard to make friends as an adult. It's that much harder when you are as terminally awkward as Craig (Tim Robinson), a gormless digital strategist slogging through middle age in a grim suburb. On shows like 'I Think You Should Leave' and 'Detroiters,' Robinson has made a study of unhinged Everymen. Craig is one more. At the urging of his wife Tami (Kate Mara), a florist and cancer survivor, he makes overtures to an affable new neighbor (Paul Rudd). In Andrew DeYoung's directorial debut, which has its dial set to maximum cringe, intimacy quickly cedes to light stalking and gun play.
Asparagus Ricotta Pasta
It's asparagus season in much of the country, and Christian Reynoso's lemon-scented asparagus ricotta pasta is a perfect showcase for those grass-green stalks. The sauce is a snap to make: just a dollop of ricotta, thinned out with a little pasta cooking water, which gets tossed with the pasta and crisp-tender asparagus spears. Then a topping of garlicky toasted almonds is sprinkled on top, adding crunch, while a few dashes of hot sauce zips up everything.
The Hunt: A couple left Queens for Manhattan with $600,000 and a short wish list. Which home did they choose? Play our game.
What you get for $625,000: An American Foursquare house in Newburgh, N.Y.; an 1810 Saltbox in Sandwich, Mass.; or a 1908 Craftsman bungalow in Portland, Ore.
Listed: The longtime Upper East Side home of Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul and Mary is up for sale. See inside.
I published a story this week about the collision between a 25-year-old TikTok influencer and a Reddit community that took aggressive measures to paint her as a fraud. In a voluminous collection of videos, the influencer, Sydney Towle, discussed her efforts to live a full life while she received treatments for a rare cancer. Her critics accused her of faking the illness.
SydTowleSnark was one of innumerable Reddit 'snark pages' or 'snark subreddits,' forums where people congregate under the veil of anonymity to critique and mock influencers and celebrities.
My article attracted hundreds of comments on The Times's site, many about the perils of sharing one's private life on the internet. 'Social media is poison,' as one reader put it.
Dozens of readers reflected on their own experiences with cancer and said that, like Towle, they did not always 'look' sick.
The comments also included gems like this piece of advice, which I plan to (try to) live by: 'Don't accept criticism from someone that you wouldn't accept advice from.'
Over on Reddit, the article kicked up a lot of dust. One moderator spilled 1,100 words in a takedown that criticized all the perceived problems with what I wrote, meaning that my article, fittingly, got the full snark page treatment.
Find a great Mother's Day gift
Nearly every Wirecutter mom with small children had the same answer for the best gift they have ever received: a few hours to themselves. Whether you're shopping for a mother of toddlers or grown-ups, our gift experts say you can never go wrong with a bouquet of pretty flowers or a box of excellent chocolates. We have plenty of other more surprising and offbeat ideas, too, as well as some lovely options under $50. And don't overlook the gift of something sentimental. 'So often the labor of memory-keeping falls to moms,' our gifts editor, Hannah Morrill, says. Consider taking that off their plate with something meaningful — perhaps a piece of their kids' art encased in a beautiful frame. — Haley Jo Lewis
The 151st Kentucky Derby: A horse named Journalism is the favorite in today's race, with 3-to-1 odds. How on earth does a horse get a name like Journalism? Its co-owner, Aron Wellman, told LAist the name is partly a reflection of the horse's lineage — its mother was named Mopotism — and partly his own, as a former sports editor of his high school newspaper.
This isn't the first newspaper-inspired horse name in the Derby, as Jason Frakes noted in the Louisville Courier Journal:
Third place isn't bad. But, if you'll allow us a little media bias, it would be nice to see Journalism get a win.
Derby coverage begins at 2:30 p.m. Eastern on NBC; post time is 6:57 p.m.
Here is today's Spelling Bee. Yesterday's pangram was virology.
Take the news quiz to see how well you followed this week's headlines.
And here are today's Mini Crossword, Wordle, Sudoku, Connections and Strands.
Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times. — Melissa
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Entrepreneur
27-05-2025
- Entrepreneur
How &pizza's CEO Is Staging a Comeback for the Brand
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. When Mike Burns became CEO of &pizza, he arrived on his first day ready to get to work. There was just one problem: No one told him there wasn't an office. "I show up in D.C. and I'm like, Where do I go?" he recalls. "They send me to an address. It's just a restaurant." But Burns wouldn't want it any other way. "Kind of the beauty of &pizza [is] it's all about the restaurant," he says. "The people. The vibe. You can't get that in an office." But what he walked into wasn't a thriving brand in need of just a few tweaks. Operations were inconsistent, culture had slipped and a once-passionate customer base had drifted. So he did what any rational new CEO would do. He got a tattoo. Years earlier, &pizza had launched a promotion offering free pizza for a year to the first 100 people willing to tattoo the brand's signature ampersand on their body. What once seemed like a one-off publicity stunt became something else when Burns brought it back. The first day, 2,700 people signed up. "And that's when I knew," he says. "The brand still had it. People weren't just customers. They were believers." Burns rolled up his sleeve and got the tattoo himself on his forearm, which is hard to miss. The loyalty went beyond ink. Some fans had even tied the knot at &pizza shops — literally. On Pi Day (March 14), the brand hosted weddings where couples tied dough knots and enjoyed pizza. "People have met at &pizza, gotten engaged at &pizza and gotten married at &pizza," Burns says. "It's more than food. It's a culture." Related: This Chef Lost His Restaurant the Week Michelin Called. Now He's Made a Comeback By Perfecting One Recipe. Rebuilding from the inside Of course, no number of tattoos or weddings could fix slow ticket times or a fading sense of purpose. Burns focused on two things: culture and performance. The first step? Clearing out much of the upper management and promoting from within. "I don't care about resumes," he says. "I care if you know how to run a line at midnight." He hired a VP of operations with sleeve tattoos to match the brand's vibe and elevated district managers who had started as pizza-makers. Suddenly, the leadership wasn't observing the frontline; it was the frontline. The team brought back the loud music, sharpened food quality and leaned into the company's most irreverent instincts. Exhibit A: the Dickle, a dill pickle pizza named when a supply chain manager misspoke in a meeting. "We had mascots running around D.C. handing out free Dickle pizza," Burns says. "Abe Lincoln with a Mohawk. Ben Franklin with a neck tattoo. It was chaos. But the right kind." Burns structured his executive team like a modern basketball lineup: no rigid positions. Titles existed, but the HR leader also ran marketing stunts. The IT head pitched in at ops conferences. Burns himself stuck to T-shirts and backwards hats, signaling to franchisees that &pizza wasn't returning to corporate formality anytime soon. Their first leadership meeting turned into a tense argument. Burns took it as a good sign. "In basketball, until a fight breaks out in practice, you're not ready to play," he says. "Same goes here." The moment that convinced Burns to take the job wasn't a boardroom pitch. It was a conversation with a bartender who noticed his &pizza shirt. "Best f***ing pizza in D.C.," she told him. "But it's lost its edge." That was the truth. And honesty, Burns believes, is the most valuable currency in hospitality. "We lost our way before Covid-19," he says. "And during Covid? Forget it. But when almost 3,000 people signed up to tattoo your brand on their bodies? That's not nostalgia. That's a second chance." The second chance is paying off. Customer traffic is climbing. The team's back-of-house fixes, from food quality to ticket times, are holding strong. And the energy that built &pizza's cult following in the first place has returned. "We're not trying to be safe," Burns says. "Safe pizza doesn't get tattoos. Or host weddings." Related: How a Spot on 'The Montel Williams Show' Sparked a Restaurant Power Brand for This Miami Chef About Restaurant Influencers Restaurant Influencers is brought to you by Toast, the powerful restaurant point-of-sale and management system that helps restaurants improve operations, increase sales and create a better guest experience. Toast — Powering Successful Restaurants. Learn more about Toast. Related: A Loyal Customer Asked Him to Cater One Event. Now, He Runs More Than 1,000 a Year.
Yahoo
26-05-2025
- Yahoo
Put It In Ink - Mauldin Tattoo Shop Built On Intimacy, Art of Ink
Jeff Pence is the Tattoo Man. Maybe it's the hour (or two or three hours) that clients spend at his custom tattoo shop in Mauldin … or the love or the hate or the hurt or the joy that brings them through the door … or the artwork they've chosen to wear on their skin … or the trust … or the intimacy ... or the pain. 'The tattoo man knows everything,' says Pence, founder and owner of Magic Rooster Tattoo. 'I've tattooed people who needed that tattoo. They needed it. A family member died. They're going through a bad time. For however long they're sitting with me, that's their release.' It is healing, Pence explains. But he shrugs, he says, when clients say so. 'Tattooing is very intimate and personal. I call it an intimate ritual. You're sitting with me, and I'm sitting with you,' he says. 'When people start to feel the pain, they feel comfort. It's therapeutic. They trust us, and they tell us a lot. We're fortunate. We love every one of our clients, and we appreciate the stories they tell us. 'We're the tattoo man.' Pence opened Magic Rooster Tattoo 10 years ago. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Greater Mauldin Chamber of Commerce. The shop, with staff and clients, has raised more than $30,000 for Shriners Hospitals for Children in Greenville and hosted fundraisers for Safe Harbor and Ronald McDonald House. The shop sponsors the Woodmont Youth Association and the Weatherstone neighborhood swim team. 'We try to give back,' he says. 'We're a tight little family here.' David Dill, LeeJohn Dean, Brandy Artz and Chris Glover work with Pence at Magic Rooster, 255 W. Butler Road. 'We've been together for a long time,' Pence says. 'We run a fun, wholesome shop. We care about tattooing. We care about the direction of tattooing. We care about the tattoos you get. We're thankful that we're able to make tattoos. We're appreciative of the community that allows us to be here.' Magic Rooster – named for 'Magic Rooster Blues' by Pence's favorite band, The Black Crowes – also has the legal right to do business, which hasn't always been true for tattoo shops. Tattooing was outlawed in South Carolina until 2004. Tattoo businesses now must obtain a license from the State of South Carolina, comply with health and safety standards, and locate at least 1,000 feet away from a school, playground or church. Tattoo artists train according to rules set by the state. Pence says Florence tattoo artist Ron White was at the forefront of the fight for legalization. White was arrested in 1999 and fined after a television station showed him tattooing in his home. He ultimately took his cause to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined to hear the case. 'Tattooing was – I don't want to call it back alley, but it was kind of a taboo culture. Then we had the rise of the TV shows. 'Miami Ink.' All of them. They put tattooing in people's living rooms. A person might not have ever walked into a tattoo shop, but now they see these beautifully done tattoos from the comfort of their couch,' Pence says. 'That's how it went mainstream. We make fun of the TV shows. But they really propelled our careers.' Pence was 10 when his father died, and his uncles became powerful role models. 'They had tattoos and Harleys and long hair. I thought, 'I want to be cool like them.'' Tattoos were equally popular among his punk rock and skateboarding idols. Always an artist, Pence soaked it up. 'It was all around me,' he says. He got his first tattoo at 15, when his family moved to South Carolina from Ohio. He's lost track of how many he has today. Magic Rooster is the natural evolution. 'I worked with really great people,' Pence says. 'Guys I worked with were from the era of integrity and hard work and work ethic. Tattooing is not something you get into lightly, and it's not something that you can necessarily teach. You either have it or you don't.' Pence's mentor is Jason Eisenberg, who owns Holy City Tattoo in Charleston. Pence says he learned about tattoos, ethics, how to talk to people and how to run a shop. But when Pence and his wife, Whitney, moved to the Upstate after she graduated from the Medical University of South Carolina, Pence says he couldn't find a shop with 'the hard work, the care, the overall ethics of tattooing.' 'My way of being able to run a shop the way I wanted was to open one myself – bring in the people I wanted and have a shop that cared. I never wanted to be a business owner, but in hindsight, it's one of the best things I've ever done.' So, what about the pain of that tattoo needle? 'Tattoos don't feel like little puppies licking you. They do hurt,' Pence says. 'I tell people that it's got a little bite to it. But at the end, when you're looking in the mirror, you're thinking, 'That wasn't so bad. I could do that again.' You can sit through a little bit of discomfort for a lifetime of enjoyment.' Pence says tattoos have been found on ancient people entombed in ice. Soldiers brought tattoos home from far-flung wars and ports. But it was rock stars and celebrities who took tattoos to new heights. 'I'm lucky to have a custom shop. People come to us with an idea, and we draw it and make it their own. But if Rihanna gets a new tattoo today, that's what we'll be tattooing,' Pence says. He says the art he grew up with has given him more than he could have imagined. 'But you've got to be good to tattooing. She's eye-for-an-eye. If you treat tattooing bad and pervert it, you won't make it. 'The tattooing of yesteryear … It's come a long way. We've just got cooler jobs than you guys.' This article originally appeared on Greenville News: Put It In Ink - Mauldin Tattoo Shop Built On Intimacy, Art of Ink
Fast Company
13-05-2025
- Fast Company
If you happen to have a tattoo of the Mountain Dew logo, we have some great news for you
The odds of winning the lottery are about one in 300 million. If you have a tattoo of an old Mountain Dew logo on your body, your odds of winning Mountain Dew's new sweepstakes are much, much higher. The soda's owner, PepsiCo, is launching the contest to celebrate Mountain Dew's new logo hitting store shelves. It's asking people who have a tattoo of the old Mountain Dew logo to upload a photo to social media and tag Mountain Dew for a chance to win a trip for two to Las Vegas to get a tattoo of the new logo. Last year, Mountain Dew retired its jagged, abbreviated 'Mtn Dew' logo introduced in 2009 for a new logo that spells out the citrus soda brand's entire name. If the old visual identity was styled in the fashion of Y2K-era extreme sports and gaming, the new one was designed to look modern, outdoorsy, and retro-inspired. The new brand mascot, 'Mountain Dude,' wears long hair, aviators, and a green fur coat to convey its new brand persona. The contest is a bid to promote the rebrand with the drink's most devoted fans: people who love Mountain Dew so much they already made it permanent. Entrants just have to post a photo of their tattoo with the hashtag #DoTheDewTattooSweepstakes on Instagram or X—and no cheating, since tattoos have to be from before May 6, 2025, when the contest began. PepsiCo estimates there are 'hundreds' of people with the old logo, though a cursory search shows just five accounts have posted photos of old Mountain Dew logo tattoos. The contest will award five winners, so if you're a legal U.S. resident of one of the 50 states or Washington, D.C., and at least 21 years old with an old Mountain Dew logo tattoo, you could likely win one of the sweepstakes prizes: round-trip flights for two to Las Vegas, a three-night's stay at the Mandalay Bay luxury resort and casino, and some spending money ($500 for fun and $900 in credits for food and beverage). Who is getting this tattoo? Getting a logo tattoo is a high-commitment act of loyalty to a brand, but companies have found plenty of willing fans to trade their skin for prizes. There were 381 people who agreed to get Domino's logo tattooed on their bodies to win a '100 pizzas a year for 100 years' promotion in Russia in 2019, and Subway awarded as many as nine winners to get tattoos to win free sub sandwiches in 2022. For Mountain Dew, though, it's latest promotion is all about fan service and the love of the game. It's not handing out free cases of soda in return for getting a tattoo like brands have done before. Instead it's rewarding people who already had tattoos of the logo. It's a branding stunt, sure. But it's also a brand heritage play, since it's all about past iterations of the logo. Should winners feel attached to their current Dew tattoo, the sweepstakes fine print is on their side: Instead of getting inked with the new Mountain Dew logo, they can just pocket the $2,000.
