Roden Readers — Hello from the train! I’m en route — once again — to KII PENINSULA which many of you know is where my book Things Become Other Things takes place. I’m going back to photograph PEOPLE. That’s the aim, anyway. We’ll see if I pull it off. You can follow along in real-ish time on my new pop-up: About a Nightingale. It starts today (Feb 23, and ends on March 4, and then I delete all your email addresses).

Ridgeline subscribers — A funny thing happens when a Snickers bar goes from whole to eaten — the wrapper transmogrifies from useful to toxic. Suddenly, this thing that was keeping germs and dirt off your chocolate sugar log is now “useless” and with this comes the heaviest burden a modern person unencumbered by genocide or famine can hold: garbage responsibility. I have taken visitors for many walks around Japan. Around Tokyo, sure, but also around the hinterlands.

Ridgeline subscribers — Hello! Since I last wrote in January, I’ve published my Year Six SPECIAL PROJECTS look-back focusing on the “rules” I use to govern how I think about my membership program. Huge thanks to everyone who has joined and supported over the last six years. Now, SPECIAL PROJECTS members following along on the members-only book diary-newsletter, Nightingalingale, they’ll know that I am … uhh … busy. I’m in a tunnel of to-dos, organizing the Things Become Other Things book tour, setting up podcast recordings, writing essays aligned with TBOT, taking on other newspaper assignments, all with the aim of generating attention / interest in this forthcoming book.