Now playing: “Walk Out Music” by James Blake

Hello, it's Oscar Sunday, and I’m both exhausted and excited.

The tiredness comes from a very busy time in my professional industry where I got to review Apple's $599 MacBook Neo (it’s extremely rare to review the first version of a MacBook) and the Samsung Galaxy S26 Ultra (and this $1,300 phone actually has some cool new tricks). The excitement, interestingly enough, is also connected to a couple of projects I recently got approval on at work, that I look forward to sharing on here in the summer.

More importantly, though, I’m ecstatic about the direction I’ve found as I started to change things in my life. So, rather than write some Oscars-related thing that will have a short shelf life, I thought I’d review the last three months of my behind-the-scenes antics here at No First Drafts HQ. 

All of the below, I should note, is made possible not just by the supportive people in my life, but because of the fact that I started therapy in January 2025. That’s been a grounding influence that I want everyone to try.

A couple of months before my annual physical last year, I started to notice some bodily discomfort. The “what and where” of it all doesn’t matter, just know that you should see your doctors if you’re going through it. The point is that I learned enough from that appointment and what followed that I felt a need to get into strength training, because muscle improves how our bodies process food. This was something I had planned to do last year, before that was derailed by getting COVID. 

I was fortunate enough to have a friend who had the strength training knowledge I needed, and who also wanted to help me along the way. Her name’s Jenny and she absolutely rules, and in the last nearly-three months she’s gotten me from an elliptical-addicted lazyboy to someone who’s started to realize that difficult, new exercises that kick my butt can and likely will get easier. 

I’ve since seen and felt actually differences in how I feel and how things fit, to degrees that are frankly fantastic. In just one month, a pair of pants stopped being too tight at the waist, and I’ve also noticed my bicep muscles at a level I have never seen nor felt. Progress, and proof that consistency reaps rewards, is a hell of a thing. 

Not to stencil the word "OLD" on my face, but computers used to be stationary. In terms of our ability to focus on anything, that was so much better for us. Yes, I'm nostalgic for when computers were monolithic, and kind of stuck on a desk or table, and not something you could fit in your pocket. This is why I'm trying to spend as much of my time at home with my phone on a table near my entranceway. 

This is why I've been asking people where their phones are when they sleep. Multiple friends gave the same intimate answer of "under my pillow," and I've been there before myself. But, now, my phone is in the other room when I sleep. It's not been the easiest move to kick my phone out of the bedroom, but that's happened. I will be explaining that in more product-specific detail over on CNN Underscored in the coming weeks.

“I used to watch pro wrestling” is the understatement of the week to those who know me. I was watching a lot of wrestling, as it airs live most nights of the week. I flew across the country to see my favorites perform in a tournament. I went to England to meet friends and ... you guessed it ... watch British independent wrestling. Now, though, while social media keeps me informed about pro wrestling, my interest in consuming that industry has fallen off a cliff. 

This change could and some day may be a whole newsletter edition on its own. What happened? The short of it is that I was disappointed in the people in the industry one time too often, and most recently that may have killed my interest in the only promotion I want to support anymore, All Elite Wrestling. A single photo soured my mood, and then I couldn’t really be bothered to watch much more. I’ve seen a total of 2 hours and 10 minutes of AEW since January 21st, and while I plan to see it live with a couple of good friends in May, I am looking at that outing as possibly the end of the road.

One month or so into my new gym life, I got some tests back from the hospital that were basic wake-up calls about what I'm eating (and how I should definitely keep working out). As I’ve said before, I was on a mission to reduce the saturated fats I consumed. I also wanted to just be eating with a bit more intention and a lot less impulse.

In the month and a half that followed, I've been consistent about those goals, partially because of how much that aforementioned discomfort concerned me. I also started to think about how I wanted to get a little more agency with what I ate, so I've been cooking more and actually stopped ordering delivery. The last time I ordered anything from a food delivery service was January 23, and it was a good Thai order of drunken noodles and broccoli. But at least I’ve cut down on the up-charged, pricier versions of food I can just do pickup for.

Part of the reduction of my online ordering, though, came from the fact that we've had a lot of inclement weather as of late, and I've become hyperfixated on the aforementioned Roberto soup. 

And as I also explained last time, I've also started to dig my microwave's grave, because my home theater's new best friend is a hot air popcorn popper that I'm going to be talking about in an upcoming CNN Underscored article I'll make sure to link to here. It's partially beloved because of how much it lets you control your serving size, but when you control what toppings go on your popcorn, you get rid of doing nutrition label serving size math. 

Yes, as you may have noticed, this newsletter has become a regularly-published weekly project that delivers on Sunday mornings. Why did that change? Well, the part that I can tell you is that Victoria Song, one of my favorite newsletter writers, told me that they're weekly or they don't count. 

This has been a tricky move, going from when I'm inspired, which was around every 65 days or so on average, to every 7 days like clockwork. Fortunately, as one of my closest friends knows, I'm never at a loss for writing ideas.

I've seen this called "the analog bag," but since bags themselves are analog, I'm just going to be more direct. Whenever I'm out and about now, I've got a relatively large bag full of books, notebooks and magazines that will theoretically keep me off my phone. Also, the phone lives in that bag, so I can't be distracted by the errant notification vibrations. 

Well, as you may have seen on my Letterboxd profile, I'm still watching movies at a frankly silly pace. I'm also still doing my best to be the best friend I can for my friends. That may have meant slinking back from the folks I'm not as close to, but I am publishing this to sort of explain why I've been so hard to find as of late. 

Also, I still don't recommend changing a lot of your life at the same time, which I clearly have been. This has been a challenge, especially doing it through blizzards. But I've come out a bit stronger and more capable at being flexible with my scheduling. 

Thank you for reading this far.

See you next Sunday, I hope.