July 3, 2026 by suzanne day by day

Fifteen Questions

When you typically read/write blog posts, or comment on blogs, where are you? I write posts from the armchair in my office. Sometimes I comment on posts from my phone, but I find that challenging for a bunch of tiny stupid reasons, so I much prefer to comment from my laptop, while sitting in the armchair in my office.
What’s the most interesting thing in arm’s reach right now? My kitty cat. He likes to sit on his window perch while I type. Sometimes I reach out and fluff his tail.
Which celebrity / movie / music group do you despise for no reason? I cannot stand Vince Vaughn. I don’t know why; he didn’t do anything to me personally. I also loathe Modest Mouse. Do you remember back in the early 2000s when “Float On” was popular? That was a dark time for me.
Which piece of clothing do you no longer wear but can’t throw away? I do still have my wedding dress, which I cannot imagine throwing away. I also have a pair of jeans I bought in Atlanta the summer before I met my husband. They haven’t fit in decades, but at the time, they were the most expensive pair of jeans I’d ever owned. Didn’t hurt that they became my husband’s favorite. I felt cute every time I put them on. They currently live in a box of keepsakes in my basement.
What was your worst year of school? Fifth grade was my worst year. I had an unusual academic situation that meant I was separated from my peers for half the day. My fifth grade teacher disliked me, or disliked being asked to accommodate me, and I missed a lot of pertinent material (I like to think this is why I had no grasp of US geography until my own kid studied it) and I spent the entire year feeling out of my depth and disconnected. Sunday nights were awful. I remember trying to fall asleep and having the dreadful feeling that I couldn’t swallow; in retrospect, these experiences were clearly anxiety attacks about the forthcoming school week. Somehow, my parents and I made it through the year, but holy hell was it rough.
What is your signature scent? In summer, Gucci Bloom. In winter, Hermes Twilly Eau Ginger. While I love Gucci Bloom, I am currently on the hunt for a citrusy summer scent. My husband, who has become a bit of a fragrance expert (fragheads, I believe they are called) has been researching options and buying me samples to try. I love grapefruit scents the most.
How do you feel about “cheating” on online games you play against yourself? Julie started a Connections group chat, which I adore participating in, and this question came up a couple of weeks ago. I support and admire those who play online games without any help. Your integrity is unimpeachable and I love that your morals don’t bend. My philosophy is that online games are supposed to be FUN, and if you need a little hint to help you move forward, go for it. With Connections specifically, I sometimes look up words – either to confirm they are part of the category I think they are, or because I am completely baffled both by the word and by what category it could possibly belong to. Once or twice there’s been a Connections that used icons instead of words. I definitely passed my phone to my husband on those occasions, because my brain doesn’t work that way and I feel infuriated instead of intrigued. When it comes to Wordle, I occasionally use WordHippo to help me narrow down my word choices. I enjoy using the Spelling Bee Buddy to help me get to Queen Bee. And if I’m doing any sort of crossword puzzle, I have no compunction asking my husband or kid to help me with a clue. Maybe this makes me a dirty dirty cheater and you have lost all respect for me. But I’m of the mind that struggle/challenge is only pleasurable to a point, and there’s no reason to endure torture when you are simply trying to have fun.
Have you ever met a celebrity in real life? I met Charlie Gibson when my friend appeared on Good Morning America in the early aughts. I got a haircut from Nick Arrojo, of What Not to Wear fame; the haircut was a present from my in-laws. I once ate lunch in the same restaurant as Tony Danza; I realize this doesn’t really count as “meeting” him. I’ve also had the pleasure of meeting several poets and writers, but they aren’t celebrities in the way I’m interpreting this question means.
What’s a weird thing you dislike about yourself? I am not a fan of my name. (Sorry, Mom!) It’s mine, and I’m not changing it, but it’s always felt sort of separate from me, if that makes any sense. I also think the sounds are a little harsh, possibly because of the long vowel followed by a short vowel sound, possibly because of the spondee-style stress on each syllable. Like I said, I’m not going to DO anything about it, and it only ever occurs to me when someone says my name out loud (which is less often than one might think). It’s not like I would have any idea what alternative name to choose for myself, and it’s meaningful to my mom, and it’s something I’ve grown accustomed to.
What’s your most specific piece of relationship advice? Well, “communication” is not specific. I think it’s critical to travel with a prospective spouse before you decide to tie the knot. Traveling with someone reveals so much about them – how they deal with stress, their preferences for a whole host of things (window seat vs. aisle; driving vs. being driven; relaxing beach lounger type vs. see all the sights in a big city type; hostels vs. luxury hotels; etc. etc.), their capacity for adapting to new situations, their tolerance for other cultures, and so much more. My husband and I traveled a lot while we were dating and it helped confirm our compatibility.
Who is your “favorite” relative? I loved Lisa’s recent post about her nephews and her memories of the “aunt dates” she used to take them on when they were small. None of my relatives lived close to me when I was a kid, but I definitely had a “favorite” aunt: my mom’s youngest sister. She is beautiful and cool and wasn’t afraid to employ some light cursing if necessary. I always enjoyed being around her and wanted to be just like her when I grew up. My husband has an aunt I adore as well. She is also very cool and says what she means and has a glamorous job. Even though she’s not technically my aunt, I adore her and I’m glad to have her in my life.
What is your dream car? My dad has always been a car guy – he loves beautiful vehicles and he enjoys rebuilding classic cars. While he didn’t quite pass on his love for rebuilding cars, he definitely passed on his appreciation for them. My absolute dream car is the 1955 Porsche 356 A Speedster.
Which practical subject do you wish you knew more about? Speaking of cars, boy do I wish I had leaned in to my dad’s automotive knowledge when I was younger. I would love to know more about cars and how they work and how to diagnose and address common problems. Although, right up there with car savvy, I wish I possessed more general knowledge about how to care for my yard/plants. Yes, I do realize all this information exists and there’s nothing stopping me from learning it now.
When it comes to romantic partners, do you have a “type”? Most of my romantic partners have been white and male, with dark hair and blue eyes. I tend to fall for Nerdy Jocks. Oddly enough, the majority of the guys I dated had names that began with the same letter. My husband is pretty much the exemplar: super smart, athletic, with dark hair and blue eyes.
What is your favorite picture book? My friend and writing partner (who happens to write children’s fiction) asked me this the other day. It’s such a difficult question! The ones that come to mind are Where the Wild Things Are and The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses from my own childhood, and The Skunk from my daughter’s childhood. Where the Wild Things Are is so imaginative and relatable and wild and weird. The Girl Who Loved Wild Horses has a gorgeous, haunting story and the illustrations are stunning. And The Skunk is such a strange, hypnotic story that feels allegorical to me, even though I have never been able to decode the message; I think about this book ALL the time. Of course, there are dozens of other favorites. I could probably write about this topic all day and never run out of picture books to gush over.

If you’re interested in answering any/all of these questions (I am VERY interested in your answers!), here’s the list:

When you typically read/write blog posts, or comment on blogs, where are you?
What’s the most interesting thing in arm’s reach right now?
Which celebrity / movie / music group do you despise for no reason?
Which piece of clothing do you no longer wear but can’t throw away?
What was your worst year of school?
What is your signature scent?
How do you feel about “cheating” on online games you play against yourself?
Have you ever met a celebrity in real life?
What’s a weird thing you dislike about yourself?
What’s your most specific piece of relationship advice?
Who is your “favorite” relative?
What is your dream car?
Which practical subject do you wish you knew more about?
When it comes to romantic partners, do you have a “type”?
What is your favorite picture book?

June 26, 2026 by suzanne day by day

This Went in an Unexpected Direction

Yesterday I spoke to an AI agent on the phone. At least, I think it was an AI. It did not announce itself as such; it called itself “Dane.” But maybe it wasn’t an AI? It was so humanoid that I wasn’t sure, so I spoke to it as though it could be a human, albeit one who was extremely adept at mixing conversational speech with call center script. Aside from a general AI vibe I got from Dane, it did some specific things that made me think it wasn’t human. I thought about listing them here, but I don’t want to. And now I’m realizing, perhaps for the first time, that everything I post here is already being digested and catalogued by non-humans.

Which of course I already knew. Surely there have been web crawlers as long as there have been search engines, identifying keywords and indexing my blog alongside every other thing posted to the internet.

If you have a blog: have you ever learned that someone unexpected reads your posts? Once, years ago, I learned that a colleague or maybe a classmate of my husband had stumbled across my blog. Obviously, that has always been possible; my posts are public. I write because I want to be read. I do try to remember that my words are public, and I do self-edit my posts in some ways. It’s not as though this person did anything nefarious, or even (as far as I know) commented on my posts or kept reading for any length of time. (If you’re still reading, hi!) It still felt odd, though, as if someone were reading over my shoulder. (Why it doesn’t feel that way all the time, I don’t know. You’re reading it, aren’t you? And that not only doesn’t bother me, it makes me happy!) Looking “being read” right in the face makes me squirmy. The same feeling applies when I think about an AI scouring the web for ideas about how to be more human, and landing on this post, and tucking my thoughts away for future instruction.

I started out thinking this would be a Five for Friday post, but apparently I want to talk about AI some more. It’s a topic I think about many times a day. It’s a subject I don’t know a whole lot about. It’s something that terrifies and fascinates me.

Let’s start here: The environmental implications of AI are massive and horrifying. Full stop.

A while back, I had a friend who seemed obsessed with LLMs. She used them all the time, and our conversations often included her saying things like, “I asked ChatGPT and it said…” or “I just put all my thoughts about X into Claude and it suggested…” She seemed to derive real insight from her interactions with AI. Sometimes, when we exchanged everyday gripes or concerns, she suggested that I turn to one of the LLMs for answers or clarity.

I occasionally use Chat GPT, and I do so with tremendous trepidation. I do not like what it learns about me when I ask it for things. I do not like the humanoid quality of its responses. I do not like that it makes assumptions and intuitive leaps. I do not like the image, in my head, of all the resources it’s depleting just to give me a list of books that meet a series of very specific requirements.

At a work event for my husband’s practice, some of his colleagues were discussing AI and its various applications in the medical field. Providers ask AI to summarize patient visits, which can optimize their time doing paperwork and allow them to interact with patient instead of focusing on their computers. Surgeons operate robotic tools remotely. AI can help spot pre-cancerous polyps in endoscopy videos.

Requests for my freelance work have declined in recent years. Occasionally, I decide that I want to earn more money and I look for jobs. Usually, my searches are for remote positions because I dislike wearing real clothes any more than absolutely necessary. My entire career has been in writing adjacent fields: editing, copywriting, content creation. Editing and writing are what I love to do; they are my primary skills. The job search engines turned up posting after posting after posting for various methods of training AI to edit and write.

(I use Google and Gmail every day. I click on words in my Kindle and in online content to see their definitions. I employ spellcheck in Word.)

Two men at my neighbor’s barbecue chatted about their use of AI at work. One uses it to generate marketing copy. The other uses it to write emails to customers. They agreed that AI is so much cheaper and easier and more efficient than hiring an expert to do those tasks. They noted that the output isn’t quite as good. They each shrugged.

I disabled the predictive text function on my phone. I disabled Gemini in my Gmail accounts. I refuse to look at the AI Overview in my Google search results. I feel principled and righteous. I feel irritated because I have to do so much scrolling to find a reputable source for my inquiries and I misspell so many words when I text and I overlook emails from my mom because my inbox is so clotted with advertisements.

One of my writing friends recently told me that she was quitting ChatGPT cold turkey. She had been using it to help her brainstorm ideas, refine sentences, identify plot holes… but she’d been horrified by the number of articles she’d been reading about AI use in the publishing industry. She also felt her brain wasn’t working as quickly or as deftly as it had before she’d started using AI.

(Apple Maps tells me how to get to the airport and friends’ houses and medical offices. Siri tells me what to expect from the day’s weather. Presumably nearly every airplane I’ve ever been on utilizes autopilot.)

I worry about: My lack of marketable skills. The various ways AI might impact my child’s future: her career prospects, her critical thinking skills, her mental health. The longterm effects of the systematic mutilation of our environment. Doctors relying on AI to the point of missing symptoms or eroding their own skills. Deepfakes and AI scams and chatbot-fueled psychosis.

A professor friend of mine laments the increase of AI-generated work among her students. She uses AI to pinpoint whether an assignment has been completed using AI.

Sometimes I think that it’s shortsighted and stubborn to resist a technology that could offer real improvements in efficiency and scope of knowledge. Sometimes I feel like a side character in a dystopian story, being propelled inexorably toward the collapse of humanity.

(Netflix recommends shows I might like. Google Lens helps me identify plants, and Merlin Bird ID recognizes the birds I’m listening to. Shazam tells me which song is playing on my Apple playlist of “summer songs.” My phone’s Clean Up tool removes blemishes from my photos. A robot vacuums my floors and another robot cleans my pool.)

Elevator operators, lamplighters, crossing sweepers, linotype operators, travel agents, video store clerks. I’m not the first person whose career prospects have dwindled or disappeared due to technological innovation. I won’t be the last.

There’s nothing new I can add to the conversation. There’s SO MUCH about AI I don’t know and haven’t considered. But it’s something I think about all the time and it’s something that has insinuated itself into all of our lives.

I don’t know if I can be against AI when I use it so frequently in everyday life. But I certainly don’t feel good about AI. Outsourcing our critical thinking to AI can lead to faulty conclusions (“cognitive surrender”) and stunt our capacity for analytical reasoning (“cognitive offloading”). Generative AI models and the data centers used to power them have clear, measurable environmental consequences (one estimate I read says the same query on ChatGPT uses five times the energy than a web search). There are the slippery moral, ethical, and philosophical issues of AI consciousness (or not). But AI can also increase efficiency, automate daily routines, facilitate learning, summarize and analyze vast amounts of data, and and and and.

I don’t want to contribute to the depletion of our water sources, the impairment of our ability to think, the decline of civilization. I don’t want to be left behind.

(My phone labels unknown numbers as potential spam. Canva’s AI tool alters graphics to my specifications. Google AI Mode generates a list of articles about AI.)

Some AI use may be “better” than others. But where’s the line?

I would be so very interested to hear about your thoughts regarding and experiences with AI. Do you use it at work? In your personal life? What worries you or excites you the most? This is a judgment-free zone; I feel like we are all grappling with how and when and why and at what cost.

February 27, 2026 by suzanne day by day

Cat Questions

Did you know that my tiny baby kitten is now an enormous ADULT CAT?

Because he is a fancy hypoallergenic purebred cat, we know the exact date of his birthday, and it was this past week.

*We got him a hat and a bandana, neither of which he enjoyed. But he seems to feel quite dapper in the bowtie.*

We got him a present. He LOVES it.

In his honor, I thought I would devote a post to some pressing cat questions. Questions that you have asked about this particular cat, and questions I have about cat parenting.

Is this cat’s name Lenny or Leo?

The answer to this question is yes. Okay, that’s not helpful. The real answer is, his name is Leo in my household and at the vet, but his name is Lenny in my heart. I lobbied so hard to call him Lenny, but I was overruled by my husband and child. Thus, he goes by Leo at home (Or Leo-cat. Or Mr. Fluffy Pants.). But I feel so much glee that so many blog readers continue to refer to him as Lenny. It is a delight that my much-longed-for name persists here in the digital world. Julie, in particular, reminds me that she thinks of Lenny Kravitz, and that brings me a lot of joy because I am pretty my cat thinks that his human form would bear strong resemblance to this:

In my opinion, he often shares more similarities with this other beloved if fictional Lenny:

Do you really bathe your cat?

I have mentioned several times that I bathe my cat, and this is often met with perplexity. Cats are, after all, self-cleaning. My cat demonstrates his own personal grooming activities multiple times per day, sometimes in a slightly insulting manner right after one of us has pet him.

Nonetheless, I bathe him approximately once a month, using water and original Dawn. I do this for three reasons, in no particular priority: 1. To get/keep him accustomed to being bathed, so that it isn’t traumatic to either of us. 2. To address occasional hygienic issues that affect the pantaloons area. 3. To manage the tendency of his fur to become, over time, slightly greasy – a result of his diet or, more likely, the incessant petting by hands that may or may not have food residue on them.

I used to bathe him in the bathtub, but it hurts my back. So I have begun to give him a shower. He doesn’t seem to mind the water. I hold him and the only time he seems slightly perturbed is when I lather him. He lets me know he is perturbed by gently increasing his grip on my shoulders and mewing plaintively a few times.

*He is obsessed with the shower. Loves to get in it, loves to catch drips from the shower head, loves to lie outside of it on the bath math, loves to chase water droplets on the shower doors.*

I blow dry him with a hair dryer that I prop up on books and point at where I am holding him on my lap and combing him. He seems to enjoy that part of the process. This system works, but it’s not ideal. Sometimes I daydream about getting a fancy pet blow dryer, like this one. There’s also this drying box that is WAY too expensive but that doesn’t stop me from looking at it. This one is more in my price range, and it’s also a brush.

Now I have some questions for you.

Where does all the FUR come from?

Lenny is a Siberian, and he has luxurious medium-length fur. I brush him at least once daily. AT LEAST ONCE. I vacuum at least once daily as well. And yet, every time I turn around, or every time the cat moves from one location to another, a tumbleweed of fur trundles lackadaisically across the floor. HOW? And also WHY?

The cat breeder warned me that Lenny would have two shedding seasons each year: spring and then fall. So far, neither season has ended. Shedding season appears to take place all year long. I do not like it.

Is there a special brush I should be using? I have two combs and this brush (which Leo does not like) and there are too many options for me to choose from; I find it overwhelming.

How much should I be feeding the cat?

As a reader of this blog, you are well aware of how much I fret about feeding my human child, right? Well, I worry about the cat’s food intake EVEN MORE. I find the entire feeding situation completely impossible. Everything I read (and also the cat breeder) said that we should give our cat both wet and dry food. Wet because his breed and/or sex has a propensity for developing crystals in the urinary tract, which can be dangerous and potentially fatal; the extra moisture in the wet food helps ensure he stays hydrated, which is one way to prevent the crystals from forming. Dry because it can help his teeth stay strong, and also because you can leave dry food out longer than you can the wet food.

*Severely malnourished and also STARVING.*

All the food containers say how much you should be giving your cat. There are tons of websites that offer guidance about how many calories a cat should consume, based on age and weight and indoor/outdoor status. And yet I still feel like I have NO IDEA. Sometimes he will scarf down a whole can of food. Other times he will barely nibble at it. Some days I go to refill his dry food and it’s all gone, other days he has hardly touched it. Sometimes he shows a clear preference for one flavor of cat food over another. Other days, he will turn up his nose at his favorite flavor or gobble up the entire plate of his least preferred flavor. He seems to have regular bathroom habits. He seems to be active and happy. He seems to be a fine weight and shape. Is he getting enough calories or not? Is he malnourished? Is he overweight? Does he need more flavor variety? Does he need less flavor variety? Am I leaving out too much dry food?

What do cat owners REALLY DO about the litter box?

The litter we use says 1) fill clean, dry litter box with 3” to 4” of litter; 2) scoop waste twice daily and refill box as necessary; and 3) replace entire box once a month. The litter website also says that we should replace the entire litter box every six to twelve months.

Is this what we’re doing, cat owners? Are we cleaning out and replacing all the litter every month? Are we replacing the entire litter box every six to twelve months, and, if so, is that only plastic litter boxes (which is what we have) or does that apply to stainless steel ones as well? I “scooped waste twice daily” for the first couple of months, but the cat tends to fulfill the majority of his litter box needs at night, so it seemed pointless and now I do it once a day.

WHAT ARE YOU SAYING?

My particular cat has not been very vocal. His mews have been few and far between. The most regular vocalization he has is when he welcomes us home. He sits on the kitchen side of the closed laundry room door and when we open it, he stretches and greets us with a little “mrmrmr!” Although… he does seem to be exercising his voice more frequently now that he’s getting older. It’s still rare enough, though, that any time he mews, his humans will react with extreme sympathy: “What buddy? What is it? Are you okay?” Sometimes it seems like he’s asking where we are. Sometimes it seems like he’s expressing a complaint. But most of the time, I have no idea what he’s trying to tell me.

*What I am trying to tell you is of UTMOST IMPORTANCE.*

Is this like having a human child, who starts out with grunts and then moves on to babbling and then to words or word-stand-ins? Will I eventually understand exactly what he wants, or are we always destined to stare uncomprehendingly into one another’s eyes?

Why are your pants so fluffy?!?!

A question for the ages.

I really hope you have some answers, Internet. But please share any cat questions – about my specific cat or cats in general – as well. I certainly won’t be able to answer an of them, but I would of course fret easily about any and all things that haven’t yet caught my attention.