Genre fiction: Life with all the boring parts cut out.

Literary fiction: Life with all the boring parts left in, and extra boring parts grafted on after being trucked in from somewhere even more boring.

Glad this did not happen to me.

I like Lorde’s first album as much as any album I listened to in my teens or twenties. “Bravado” and “Tennis Court” from that album might be the best pop songs released in the last twenty years. (You know an album is peerless when the most well-known song, “Royals,” while still being great isn’t even in the top five best songs on the album.)

Anyway, I listen to a wider range of music now than I did in 1994 when I was 18, and I think music in general is better now — with perhaps early Tori Amos excluded. Only “perhaps,” as she was sui generis and there will probably never be an album like Little Earthquakes made by anyone again as it is an artifact of a particular time and place.

Glad I find new, great music all the time. It’s out there.

Often one of the most racially & ethnically diverse places in a town is the Walmart.

— Chris Arnade (@Chris_arnade) April 26, 2017

Yep! One of the reasons I actually like going to the WMT near my office.