All-New Small Treats!
"Our hero came from nowhere, he wasn't going anywhere, and he got kicked off somewhere."
Hello Treaters!
The very first thing I should say is thank you for finding the new Continuous Small Treats newsletter on Substack! This is the NEW online home of CST, a semi-weekly update on things that made me feel good. I hope they make you feel good, too.
1. The kids on “Junior Bake Off” (The Great British Baking Show)
If you’re interested in improving your mental health, you should probably watch Junior Bake Off on Netflix. Aside from the charm and skill of these young bakers, there’s another reason to follow it: listening to the way these kids talk to themselves about what they’re doing. Tasked with creating Baked Alaskas, Biscuit Pinatas, and a bunch of other things they’ve never heard of… they don’t freak out! They just do their best, pick the dough up off the floor, haphazardly patch their pie crusts, and GET ON WITH IT. They’re role models for us all … even if their interpretation of the “5-second rule” might not pass a health inspector’s test. I’m sure the sugar sterilizes everything anyway.
2. The Patron Saint of Breakfast Burritos: the New Mincing Mockingbird book!
Have you met The Mincing Mockingbird? Matt Adrian, the incredible artist behind all those beautiful and hilarious bird cards you’ve seen in your local bookstore or gift shop, has a new book of his paintings and it’s GORGEOUS.
Fun Fact: Matt and I “met” through Instagram, long after I was already a huge fan of his visual art (and witty titles). We’ve still never met in person but I’m an even bigger fan now of his work and that of his wife, fellow artist Kim Bagwill, who creates such clever notebooks and other objets d’art that even Beyonce uses them (no joke!). Anyway, I just got the newest book of paintings and I can’t stop looking at them.
3. Buster Keaton, my silent film star crush
Thanks to the wonderful Griffin Newman and David Sims of the film podcast Blank Check, who are currently doing a series on Buster Keaton, I’ve finally watched his incredible movies (they’re all available for free on YouTube) and WHY DID I WAIT SO LONG?!
Buster (everyone called him Buster) was not only the original movie stuntman, doing all his own (death-defying) stunts, but he invented so much of the language of film and cartoons that we take for granted today. Now I see his influence everywhere, from the violent acrobatics of John Wick, to Wile E. Coyote running headfirst off a cliff, to the sad, loony weirdness of Samuel Beckett’s Happy Days. As it says on the title card of Buster’s 1921 film, The High Sign: "Our hero came from nowhere, he wasn't going anywhere, and he got kicked off somewhere." Could there be any description more Beckettian than that?
And not only that, I’ve been reading Dana Stevens’ fascinating new biography of Buster, CAMERA MAN: Buster Keaton, the Dawn of Cinema, and the Invention of the Twentieth Century, and it turns out Buster filmed a bunch of his movies in my hometown of Truckee, California!?! Here’s a shot of Buster (in the water) being filmed by his crew… in the Truckee River.
That wraps up this edition of CST. Thanks for reading and if you enjoyed it, please repost and/or share with a friend! Thanks, Treaters. xo Buzzy