Being a freelancer is expensive! Some unique opportunities opened up for me and I need your help to make them happen.

Thank you all for your patience! Without further ado, it's This Year In Videogame Blogging 2025, complete with a bonus This Week In Videogame Blogging, December 28, 2025! critical-distance.com/2026/01/01/t...

In one of my final two pieces for the year, I wrote about why I couldn’t stop trying to solve mysteries in 2025 aftermath.site/mystery-game...

The Post interviewed almost 100 sources for this comprehensive, revelatory account of how RFK Jr. has disrupted public health in America. It's the capstone to a year of extensive reporting by @rachelroubein.bsky.social, @lenasun.bsky.social & @laurenweberhp.bsky.social. Gift link: wapo.st/48YSPC1

EXCLUSIVE: @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social will be sworn in as mayor on midnight on January 1 inside the old abandoned City Hall subway station, saying that he sees the venue as a symbol for the aims of his upcoming administration.

Joke's on you, Baby Steps-- I don't even *want* the god damn cup

A year and a half ago or so, I read that an entire stadium in Tacoma had booed a trans runner. I wanted to know more. She was 16, and she had stood on a podium in one of the country’s most liberal states and listened to 10,000 people boo her. What I learned surprised me: wapo.st/49lnBUK

"The win had changed her life, but not in the ways she had hoped." A devastating, deeply moving story by my dear friend @caseyparks.bsky.social about how poverty, politics, and cruelty shaped a trans teenage runner's world.

As per TheGamer (but not this article?) Valnet is starting a... mod site? www.thegamer.com/ggmods-new-m...

this week's post is something i've been working on for a long time, and is a little guide to living the good life. Or it's early aughts punk nostalgia. Or it's my response to tradwife culture. margaretkilljoy.substack.com/p/the-punk-r...

While calling it "the bamboo series" is a uh bold choice, I do respect the hustle of using the attention to highlight work you're proud of (will it work?), and god help me there is probably a blog in me about what exactly this whole thing actually says about the substack ecosystem lol

This little kids' book is way more fun in Irish

OK, the Dyker Heights lights were worth the bike ride

NEW: A jubilant crowd welcomed a Meriden, Connecticut, teen home today after more than six months in immigration detention — just in time for his Christmas birthday. My latest for @ctinsider.bsky.social — www.ctinsider.com/news/article... #nutmegsky

Screwing around with playing "Fairytale of New York" on my mandolin and reminded how this time last year I made @nikostratis.com rank all the "faggot"s www.anxietyshark.ca/and-the-bell...

OK it’s super fucked up and most notably backwards lmao but we did do it, we knit something

concentration camps.

🚨🚨 SCOOP @ms.now : The Department of Veteran Affairs has quietly implemented its abortion ban following a DOJ memo issued last week. This will affect 9 million veterans and their dependents, and has been a long time coming: It was outlined in Project 2025. Read/share 👇

Four rows from the end of knitting my first Thing I realized I got off somewhere and the pattern is on the incorrect side, do I rip it all back (a thing I don't feel confident doing and will surely fuck up) or keep going and just call it idk variation

Had more than one person tell me they wanted to hear "a Catholic commentary track for WAKE UP DEAD MAN," and it was a fun excuse to rewatch the movie with my Jesuit friend JRod as we talked about how this thing feels from the perspective of young clerics currently immersed in theology studies.

!! Here’s a link to full video of the 60 Minutes segment that Bari Weiss killed last minute, via @jasonparis.bsky.social: is.gd/paU8Ko (It was uploaded to the Global TV app in Canada, seemingly by accident, and has now been taken down)

Statement from EA about the tragic death of Vince Zampella.

Roblox CEO Dave Baszucki donated $2.5 million to Trump's White House ballroom project, per NYT

Vince Zampella, video game developer behind ‘Call of Duty' franchise, killed in crash www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/v...

🚨JOB ALERT🚨 Enjoy writing clever headlines and assigning one-of-a-kind stories? Have an eye for detail and a knack for turning rough copy into sparkling prose? We're looking for another editor to join our small but elite team covering New York City news and culture: hellgatenyc.com/hell-gate-is...

Riled myself up enough to blog my hatred of the OMNY card machine as a machine

No one is putting the OMNY card machine in an art museum! The machine is bad! It is the same soul-less techy bullshit as everything else these days!

Again, from Michael Grynbaum, here is Sharyn Alfonsi's full email. It must be read:

“One of Ms. Weiss's suggestions was to include an interview with Stephen Miller…” “Ms. Weiss also questioned the use of the term ‘migrants’ to describe the Venezuelan men who were deported, noting that they were in the United States illegally…” www.nytimes.com/2025/12/21/b...

"'If the standard for airing a story becomes ‘the government must agree to be interviewed,’ then the government effectively gains control over the 60 Minutes broadcast. We go from an investigative powerhouse to a stenographer for the state,' Alfonsi wrote."

Oh no

All of these links went to promotion of this story earlier today. All these links are dead now — that's how thoroughly they've scrubbed this.

We went to the Transit Museum to see the old-timey trains!

I went with cardamom buns but I forgot that I'm complete shit at making them and I don't have high hopes here

I am experiencing a holiday religious crisis: should I make cardamom buns or babkas right now?

lol ok

I am so deeply sorry to be in the position to have to pull this lever again, but I just watched my car get towed away and I don't really know what else to do anymore. More details in the update & description, but if you're able to help out or share, we would be grateful beyond words.

BREAKING: The U.S. is preparing to stop recommending most childhood vaccines and defer to doctors instead. The plan, which is not finalized, marks a fundamental shift in the U.S. vaccine strategy, @lenasun.bsky.social & @rachelroubein.bsky.social report. Gift link: wapo.st/4aXfzn5

Stunning new revelation: Epstein hung out almost exclusively with guys who had black boxes where their heads should be.

NEW: Many Democratic Senators said they hadn't seen Marjorie Taylor Greene's anti-trans bill and didn't say if it would fail. The only one who gave a hard commitment? Greene's fellow Georgian Raphael Warnock. www.independent.co.uk/news/world/a...

Is anyone who follows me versed in those, like, social media videos where companies mow someone's lawn/fix their roof/etc for free? Does it work bc YT ads/marketing? Is that enough $ to offset the costs? What is the deal with these things? Are they sketchy?

Here's an example of how useless and frustrating internet laws to "protect kids" are in practice: When I'm in Ohio, where I am during the holidays, I can't use my Bluesky DMs—unless I hand over my ID to a company owned by Epic Games. Why? To protect kids, of course! spitfirenews.com/p/why-i-have...

Feels important that I let you all know the possibility of trying to make roasted chestnut ice cream has occurred to me

NEWS: They're adding Trump's name to the Kennedy Center building right now. www.washingtonpost.com/entertainmen...

NEW: The third and final part of my series from immigration court with illustrator Matt Stevens is out today. In it I look at how asylum became one of the only ways for millions of immigrants to stay in the country. My latest for @ctinsider.bsky.social: www.ctinsider.com/news/article... #nutmegsky

loool amazing

On our final stream of the year, we're discussing Divinity/BG3 studio Larian's ill-advised AI usage, and then we're handing out our first annual Stuff Of The Year awards to games, moments, appliances, trash, and whatever else defined 2025 for us. We go live at 4 PM ET www.twitch.tv/aftermathdot...

NEW: For the last seven weeks, Naughty Dog has enacted mandatory overtime for staff to finish an internal demo of their next game, Intergalactic. The game won't be out until 2027, leaving some staff wondering: If they're crunching now, what will next year be like? www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Bad that this only registers as the 153rd shittiest thing that’s happened this week

If this were true, they wouldn't be banning the medical care that does this.