Maybe you don't need to write a book? I have, six times over, and it was mostly not worth the effort. kayaoakes.substack.com/p/maybe-you-...

UC Berkeley's homoerotic football statue has entered the chat.

💚 💛 Ballers fam, @MayorBarbaraLee just announced that we're going to keep the party going! 🎉 See you there! 🍾

This game was electric! My voice is hoarse from hollering. Thanks for an amazing season.

OAKLAND WE DID IT!!!! 🏆

I reactivated just to share this post I wrote about something very important: Extremely Specific Petty Grievances. kayaoakes.substack.com/p/extremely-...

It's okay not to have a take.

gonna get some money gonna get some money probably more than I ever made in royalties take that ai www.anthropiccopyrightsettlement.com

Just a note of appreciation for whoever decided to play Journey's "Lights" at the @oaklandballers.bsky.social game last night when the lights went out. Well played. Well played indeed.

If you've been thinking of reading Elizabeth Gilbert's new memoir, please read this first, by @kayaoakes.bsky.social. And even if you don't care one bit about Gilbert, this is an excellent, helpful read about cancer, love, ego, and so much else. open.substack.com/pub/kayaoake...

What does a writer “who lives every day with cancer looming in the background like one of those giant Halloween skeletons” think about what’s she’s seen of the latest Elizabeth Gilbert memoir and the discourse around it? You should really read @kayaoakes.bsky.social, and not just to find that out.

This piece by @kayaoakes.bsky.social is really good. I recommend reading it. kayaoakes.substack.com/p/not-your-i...?

LET'S GO OAKLAND!

To be fair I also got a free pen once.

UC Berkeley asks us to provide headshots for the department website and I hate the way I look in photos, so this year I uploaded this instead.

It's true: my post cancer treatment, mid career shift that absolutely nobody predicted is that I decided to write about sports. Once, anyway! Go Ballers.

Some days I worry that Duolingo is going to hunt me down and kill me in my sleep.

The way Irish Catholic parents let you know you're in deep shit is when they refer to you by your full name including your confirmation saint's name. That means it's gonna hurt.

Just checked to see how many clickthroughs a link to an article posted on Bluesky gets and it's less than the fingers on one hand. That's... not great.

As a person who was regularly laughed at during gym class, exercise has never been my thing. But now, as a cancer patient, I either do it or die. I wrote about the people trying to outrun death over at my Substack. kayaoakes.substack.com/p/dying-at-t...

Still alive! Still writing! I have an essay in this month's issue of @commonweal.bsky.social as part of a symposium on Christian Smith's new book and religious obsolescence. Thanks to the editors for asking me to pitch in.

Someone somewhere referred to Bluesky as "Rachel Maddow's comment section" and, well, that is very accurate.

I quit all social media apps nearly a year ago and tried this one as a replacement, quit it, and now I'm back but honestly... the impulse to constantly post and scroll is just gone. My mental health is so much better when I'm not pressured to be performing an online persona.

Preaching to the choir here (pun intended) but this is an excellent time to remind editors to HIRE RELIGION WRITERS. 👋

Okay as a demi-Catholic leftist feminist who wrote for a Jesuit magazine until last fall my take is: I have no idea who this guy is. Villanova and CTU will be insufferable now. If conservatives are already bitching, that's a good sign. None of these guys have a good record on sex abuse. Not one.

Who gets to be sick in America? One thing I've learned during cancer treatment is that most of us can't afford it. kayaoakes.substack.com/p/who-gets-t...

For all of my fellow educators staring down the end of the school year: remember your Paolo Friere. kayaoakes.substack.com/p/a-teaching...

Hello all. I was close many years ago with Joshua Clover and heard that he passed away, but cannot find any confirmation of this outside of social media. If anyone has any kind of obituary etc, can you let me know?

really good piece about Lazarus from Kaya Oakes open.substack.com/pub/kayaoake...

Excellent piece on Pope Francis from the great Kaya Oakes sojo.net/articles/opi...

I'm back -- maybe just temporarily? -- because @sojo.net asked me to write about Pope Francis, and I wanted to share it with you. sojo.net/articles/opi...

Not really finding this app appealing or helpful. Oh well.

One reason I got off all other social media platforms was the popularity of people with A. No qualifications B. No experience C. No expertise all of whom glory in steering everyone into a state of despair and yep the same thing’s happening here. Apps aren’t going to save us, kids.

When I got cancer I put it in writing that my spouse will destroy any unpublished writing I’ve done and this is exactly why: it’s creepy and ghoulish to publish a writer’s diaries without their permission. I love Didion but this is just a cash grab. www.nytimes.com/2025/02/05/b...

Someone on substack referred to Bluesky as “insufferable” which feels very “I know you are but what am I?”

Every adjunct faculty member in America to the colleges and universities where they work:

My friend Jason got furloughed from his job working with refugees. If you can help out, it’s much appreciated.

If you’ve never been poor, never visited a food bank, never gotten a Pell Grant, never worn hand me downs, never parked your junky car in a lot full of new cars, never worried every single day about losing your job… maybe you shouldn’t be in charge of poor people’s lives.

Andy Cohen is a Deadhead?!?

Goddamnit my neighbor bought a cybertruck. I can’t even look at it without laughing.

Join me on Feb 12 for 𝐁𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐲 𝐁𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐁𝐞𝐲𝐨𝐧𝐜𝐞́: 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐞𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐭 𝐇𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐲 𝐨𝐟 𝐀𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧-𝐀𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐲 𝐌𝐮𝐬𝐢𝐜, a humorous, highly immersive, and historically accurate talk that uncovers the African-American roots of Country, Folk, and Americana music. Learn more: www.facebook.com/events/40597...

Google spent billions of dollars on this shit.

Me whenever someone talks about reading On the Road

It was so great to be with the wonderful crew at @queertheology.bsky.social! Thank you so much.

The halt at the NIH also means a halt to cancer research. When do we start the ACT UP style protest group of cancer patients? Imagine thousands of us showing up wheeling our chemo bags.

This is shockingly bad. How did it get this bad? The UC system isnt in great shape either but I haven’t heard of anything like this at a UC. www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news...

Substack: you should publish at C hour of X day to grow your audience! Me: fuck it, pushes publish on a Friday night when no one reads anything. open.substack.com/pub/kayaoake...

My students mentioned this executive order in class today and I hadn’t actually read it. This is chat gpt word salad. It’s garbled nonsense.

Ugh I did my last book launch here and they were so nice. With East Bay Booksellers recovering from a fire and Moe’s no longer doing events that’s bad for the east bay. www.berkeleyside.org/2025/01/21/b...

Everyone dreams of writing a book and making money from it. This is what I earned in a YEAR. In the Bay Area this is barely enough for a carton of eggs.