Class Is Canceled Until Further Notice While I Do My Job

Dear Students — I am sorry to say that I will need to cancel all classes for an indeterminate length of time while I work on doing my job. I realize you think that teaching is my job, but there are many other aspects to being a professor. In the unlikely event that you are curiou … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 18 hours ago

I Want to Go Out Like the Goodnight Moon Bunny When I Die

I was browsing the death literature the other day, and you know what they’re saying? It’s all about grip strength. It’s inversely correlated with mortality, meaning the stronger your grip, the longer you live. Yeah, you’ve been clenching all the wrong stuff. This got me thinking … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 23 hours ago

Terms and Conditions Under Which I Will Accompany You to a Live Musical Event

This Agreement is entered into between You, a Person Who Enjoys In-Person Entertainment (hereinafter “Fan”), and Me, an Introvert Who Avoids Crowds, Noise, and Congregated Delight (“Non-fan”), as a condition of Non-Fan’s attendance at a Live Musical Event (“Event”). RECITALS1 WHE … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 1 day ago

If I Had Been in the 1991 Movie Point Break Instead of Keanu Reeves

GARY BUSEY: They’ve robbed twenty-six banks in three years. And all we know about them is one thing: They’re surfers. You need to learn to surf, infiltrate the local scene, and find out exactly who these guys are. ME: Great. I’ll get a boogie board. GARY: What? No! They won’t acc … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 1 day ago

The CamelBak Languishing in the Back of Your Cabinet Would Like a Word

Hey there, it’s me. The CamelBak you bought in 2012 before a post-grad backpacking adventure. Remember that? You used to show me off to all your friends. I was a twenty-five-ounce, dishwasher-safe piece of proof of your commitment to the environment. You used to take me on trips. … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 2 days ago

Sorry Not Sorry: Why Apologies Aren’t Miracles

Agnes Callard is among the world’s most famous living philosophers, and certainly the one most likely to trend on your social media feed for a hot take or ill-advised poll (most recently, “Would you prefer to live the life of a slave owner, or the life of a slave?”) The Universit … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 2 days ago

A Good Man Is Hard to Find, Charlie Brown

CHARLIE BROWN: Hey, Lucy. What’re you doing? LUCY: I’m going to kill my mother, Charlie Brown. CHARLIE BROWN: Why would you do something like that? LUCY: Because the land stinks, Charlie Brown. Nothing but sin grows down here—that’s why folks are so religious. And I figure it doe … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 2 days ago

What Your Favorite Stephen Sondheim Song Says About You, Act II

Read Act I - - - “Good Thing Going” (Merrily We Roll Along): You’re a hugger, and you look at everyone’s Instagram stories no matter how long it’s been since you last spoke. You can name all five original members of the Rat Pack. “Liaisons” (A Little Night Music): You have a clos … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 5 days ago

The Wong-Baker Pain Rating Scale Adjusted for Ghostbusting

The Wong-Baker Pain Rating Scale Adjusted for Ghostbusting | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 5 days ago

Been There, Smelled That: Can You Smell What I Smell in Iceland?

Been There, Smelled That explores the aromas of places around the world. Travel writer Maggie Downs investigates some of the world’s most potent smells, looks at how odor cultivates a connection to place, and presents how humans engage with smells, from scents that have endured g … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 5 days ago

TikTok Is a Threat to Our Extremely Normal Media Ecosystem

“Senators push to declassify TikTok intel and hold a public hearing ahead of ban vote.” — NPR, 3/21/24 - - - Fellow Senators, I implore you to vote yes on this bill to ban TikTok, a social media platform that threatens to throw our extremely normal media ecosystem into chaos. We … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 5 days ago

What I Imagine Would Happen If I Went on Naked and Afraid

Prior to my adventure, I am assigned a primitive survival rating (PSR) by a team of experts. I have never been camping or hunting, and if I have to pee while hiking, I will turn around and drive forty-five minutes into town to a public restroom. Even so, I have combat skills and … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 6 days ago

An Open Letter to the White Person Who Just Found Out I’m Puerto Rican

Dear White Person Who Just Found Out I’m Puerto Rican, I’m Puerto Rican, and that’s going to come up in conversation with me. The reveal could look like a few different things, including an anecdote about my father, a comment about race, or a warning for you to stop saying the th … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 6 days ago

The “Babe” Index

When do you start calling the person you are dating “babe”? Psychologist and philosopher William James called this the single greatest question about human relationships. Thinkers and scientists have studied the issue relentlessly, and here are their findings. On the first date: … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 7 days ago

If They’d Told Me We Were Poor, Would I Have Been More Christian and Less Black?

The second semester of my freshman year of college, I found Jesus. When it happened—it being when I came before the saints and admitted I was a sinner in need of a savior—all I could think about was how happy my mother would be. She’d been sending (tithing) her good, hard-earned … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 7 days ago

I Am the New York Times’ Paywall, and If I Let Any Non-Subscribers in, They’ll Kill My Family

Welcome and/or welcome back. Looking to sign up for a subscription? Or maybe you’re already a subscriber? Either way, go ahead and type your email address in the box below. What’s that? Do I recognize you? That’s a good one. Ha ha. Go ahead and type your email address in the box. … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 7 days ago

Table Settings for Various Occasions

Table Settings for
Various Occasions | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 8 days ago

AI Is Threatening My Tech and Lifestyle Content Mill

As the editor of a content mill that generates great articles every 4.2 seconds, like “Five Hacks for Your Roku” and “Seven Hacks for Your Roku,” I feel the need to take a stand against the rise of AI articles and the threat they pose to my team of human writers, who we treat lik … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 8 days ago

You Think Pickleball is Bad? Try Living Next to an Eighteenth-Century Warship

I get it. Pickleball ruined your neighborhood. Tennis courts are completely booked, people you once called friends now go “dinking,” and that incessant popping sound from a plastic ball echoes off suburban walls like circling birds of prey waiting to close in on your sanity. But … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 9 days ago

Family Tours in the Kingdom of the Sick: Into the Tunnel of Uncertainty

When COVID struck Rebecca Saltzman’s family, the virus unmasked a life-changing discovery: her husband and two of their kids had genetic heart disease. The kind where people drop dead. As their healthy wife and mother, Saltzman had a new role too—guiding her family through what S … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 9 days ago

Phrases for Hiring Committees to Use Instead of “We’re a Family”

We’re like the early seasons of Great British Bake Off, where everyone helped each other and drank tea while they waited for things to finish baking and occasionally got berated by an older white man who is creepy toward some of the women. We’re like a group of high school friend … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 9 days ago

Famous Works of Irish Literature as Limericks

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde A young man of beauty and grace Tries to shield his good name from disgrace. He looks like a saint While he withers in paint, But he still finds himself losing face. Dracula by Bram Stoker A solicitor pays his respects To a count whom no … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 12 days ago

Letters to Moms: A Letter to Marmee March

In this column, Kristen Mulrooney writes letters to famous mothers from literature, TV, and film whom she finds herself relating to on a different level now that she’s a mom herself. - - - Dear Marmee, I always hoped I would be just like you when I became a mother. I dreamed that … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 12 days ago

Dashiell Hammetts’ Saint Patrick and the Case of the Emerald Asp

It was a gloomy morning, fifth century, and I was nursing a hangover that felt like I’d been worked over by a shillelagh with something to prove. I was just about to take a shot of holy water—hair of the God that blessed me—when he walked in. I should have known he was trouble. T … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 12 days ago

Going Berzerk for Bostonians

Art by Matt Smith - - - So what would happen when an ancient fuckin’ viking behrsehrkah would go behrsehrk is he’d fuckin’ go behrsehrk! N’ in ohrdah tah go behrsehrk he’d wohrk himself up intah a huge fuckin’ rage. Maybe he’d even bite down on his shield a little if he had one n … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 12 days ago

MTA New York City Subway BINGO

Art by Kat Schober. | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 13 days ago

Boeing Announces New Safety Policy: “Fuck It, We Ball”

Well, we guess the cat’s out of the bag—or as we say around these parts, the door is off the plane: we have been sending aircraft into the sky that are not sky-worthy. Frankly, they’re barely ground-worthy. And you probably heard that the whistleblower who raised all those qualit … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 13 days ago

The Meek Who Shall Inherit the Earth Lodge a Complaint

Dear Lord, Before we begin, we just want to thank you for, well, everything. For the air we breathe, the water we drink, the other waters we fish and boat on, dominion over all birds, beasts, and creeping things, and for promising all of it to us, the meek of the earth. However, … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 14 days ago

Chronicles of a Catsitter: Up Harlem Hill

Mai Tran began catsitting in 2021 while Tran was on pandemic unemployment, often staying overnight in people’s homes. Tran has now cared for twenty-two cats and traveled to ten apartments all over New York City, observing the interior lives of cat owners and appeasing their neuro … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 14 days ago

What I Think It’s Like Working at a Company That Makes Condoms

EMPLOYEE: You see any good penises lately? SECOND EMPLOYEE: It’s Tuesday. So, yes. EMPLOYEE: Me too. Our whole job is to look at, then discuss penises at a professional level. SECOND EMPLOYEE: Yes, we’re just professionals who study penises and then have meetings to discuss what … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 14 days ago

I Guess I Will Just Keep Standing Here While You Fix the Sink

Hey, thanks for coming out here. Yeah, we’ve been having trouble with this bathroom sink. So, uh, you know, have at it. I’m still here, by the way. Not, like, here here—I’ve backed up enough to give you what feels like a healthy amount of personal space. But I am still close enou … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 15 days ago

An Excerpt from Pierre La Police’s Classic Comic Masters of the Nefarious

- - -Masters of the Nefarious is a cult classic comic by the pseudonymous French artist Pierre La Police. It’s being published for the first time in English by New York Review Comics in a translation from the French by Luke Burns. In this excerpt from the book, Chris, Montgomery, … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 15 days ago

All of the Toilet Scenes in This Prestige Drama are 100 Percent Necessary

When I set out to create my award-winning prestige drama The Family, I wanted to test the boundaries of what television could be. I already knew I wanted to push the envelope by hinting at incest, having every other word of dialogue be “fuck,” and showing a character die in a gru … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 15 days ago

My Year of Election Fatigue and Relaxation

“It’s voter fatigue,” my therapist, Dr. Tuttle, explained to me. Some people just get voted out.” It all made sense. I was simply too tired of the constant voting. I began my hibernation in the winter of 2023, when the articles started. I swallowed one New York Times Op-Ed About … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 16 days ago

Sorry Not Sorry: Three Comedians, Three “Apologies”

When Shane Gillis performed his monologue on Saturday Night Live last month, he opened with a joke about why he was previously fired from the show. “Don’t look that up, please,” he says with a smile. “It’s fine, don’t even worry about it.” If you do look it up, you’ll come across … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 16 days ago

What Your Favorite Christopher Nolan Film Says About You

Oppenheimer There’s been a half-finished copy of Robert Caro’s biography of LBJ on your bedside table for the past five years. But maybe THIS year, you’ll finally get around to finishing it. You’re also likely a white male between the ages of thirty-nine and sixty-five. The Dark … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 16 days ago

Wilderness Survival Tips for Women in Male-Dominated Fields

Venturing into male-dominated fields like tech, politics, and finance is generally considered safe for women. But we’re still not out of the woods quite yet. Every year, there are countless reports of career-damaging and annoying encounters with men in the wild. Some simple commo … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 19 days ago

How to Accept an Award Without Making Your Voters Regret It

In this column, professional speechwriter Chandler Dean provides partly satirical, partly genuine “How To” advice focused on a hyper-specific subcategory of speeches—from graduation speeches to wedding toasts to eulogies, and all the rhetorical occasions in between. - - -Oh my go … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 19 days ago

I Will Do Anything to Make This Movie Studio Profitable, Except Release a Good Movie

Times are tough for our industry, and getting tougher. But this studio, home to beloved, timeless stories for over a century, won’t fold while I’m CEO. With a few strategic innovations, we will start the next chapter stronger than ever, ready for any challenge. Except for the cha … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 19 days ago

The Supreme Court Decides This Year’s Best Picture Winner

The nine justices of the United States Supreme Court sit in their conference room around a grand table fashioned out of old-growth mahogany trees stolen from a Honduran rainforest. CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: Okay, then, that’s settled. The vote is six to three to make it legal to hur … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 20 days ago

She Lives in New York and Los Angeles

Defne Sheridan is a producer. She lives in New York and Los Angeles. No, you read her bio correctly. It goes like this: Defne Sheridan is a producer. She lives in New York and Los Angeles. You might be wondering how that works logistically. But if you have to ask how someone can … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 20 days ago

Gen Z Beowulf

Beowulf, a new prose translation into Gen Z. - - -Fam. The Spear-Danes in, like, pre-Boomer days And the kings who ruled them served courage and greatness, straight facts. We have heard of these princes’ GOAT campaigns There was Shield Sheafson, canceler of many tribes, A high-ke … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 21 days ago

Been There, Smelled That: The City That Bottles Roses and Rain

Been There, Smelled That explores the aromas of places around the world. Travel writer Maggie Downs investigates some of the world’s most potent smells, looks at how odor cultivates a connection to place, and presents how humans engage with smells, from scents that have endured g … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 21 days ago

We Are the Babies of the World, and We Are Keeping Track of People Who Are Being Jerks About Us

Dear Adults of the World, We, the babies of the world, have heard your complaints about us crying on airplanes, in restaurants, and while you were standing in line for churros at Disneyland. And here’s the thing we want you to keep in mind: We are literally going to take over the … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 21 days ago

J. Robert Oppenheimer Is Gonna Party His Ass Off at the Oscars

Like Prometheus, I stole fire from the Gods and gave it to man. For the last eighty years, I have been anguished by this decision. Am I responsible for how the atomic bomb was used? Did I begin a chain reaction that will precipitate Armageddon? Have I become death, destroyer of w … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 22 days ago

The Supreme Court Rules You Cannot “Stop Hitting Yourself, Stop Hitting Yourself”

“The Supreme Court on Monday unanimously restored Donald Trump to 2024 presidential primary ballots, rejecting state attempts to ban the Republican former president over the Capitol riot.” – The Boston Globe - - -The nation’s temperature is running hot, and tensions continue to f … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 22 days ago

FAQ’s About Our Extremely Confusing and Unhelpful Sizing Guide

Thank you for shopping at MayBe. We often hear that our sizing and fit guide is complex, upsetting, and nonsensical. To mitigate any confusion, we’ve answered some of the most common questions from our customers. Q. What sizes do you offer? A. MayBe offers a large swath of sizes … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 23 days ago

If They Told Me We Were Poor, I Would’ve Taken Out More Student Loans

Having “a pot to piss in and a window to throw it out” was the greatest measure of success in my family. It was the meter to which the worth of any man, woman, or child was measured. For instance, you might wonder aloud about someone who’d caught your eye only to hear someone tsk … | Continue reading


@mcsweeneys.net | 23 days ago