Topping Up: Friday, August 22nd

It’s been a minute since I’ve had the ability to catch up with this newsletter. It’s not for a lack of news or interesting things I’m finding out there, more the opposite. 

Last Wednesday, the Santa Cruz City Council approved us to enter into a lease on a city-owned café space downtown. So,there’s a Switch Bakery & Bistro coming this fall! This is a huge step for us and the realization of a 30-year cooking journey. You can hear more on the latest episode of our podcast, Switch it On! and find out how to get on the list for some of our exclusive events as we head to opening the doors.

I’m always thinking about food. Recently, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about food science and how we apply it to make things that are good for gut health and delicious. I’ve also about how it gets used to produce products that aremarketed as healthy but may compromise our ability to heal or stay healthy. Read Beyond the Label: A Baker’s View of the Science of Processed Food.

After hearing Keira D’Amato on the Strength Running Podcast, I got in touch with her publisher to get an advance copy of her memoir, Don’t Call it a Comeback, which I reviewed here. If you are looking to be inspired about giving yourself a second chance at something, it’s hard to beat Keira’s story of coming back to running after eight years and two kids to becoming an American record holder in multiple distances. If you want the short version, her conversation with Jason Fitzgerald is really inspiring.

I’ve read an advanced copy of Aimee Donnellan’s account of the discovery of the GLP-1 and its journey to becoming Ozempic, Off the Scales. I have many thoughts on the book and this topic, so I’ll be writing more soon.

Rick Rubin has had some great guests on his podcast, Tetragrammaton. Since I was a teenager, two things I’ve been obsessed with: the band, The Cult and The X-Files. Rick has a really cool conversation with Ian Astbury of The Cult, where they catch up for the first time in a couple of decades and Ian talks about the early formation of his music career and the band. The episode with Chris Carter, creator of The X-Files, is a different kind of conversation, but both highlight how following a clear creative calling can lead to something extraordinary.

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds song, “Tupelo,” turned 40 and the singer received a gift in the form of a music video from a friend and fellow creative, Andrew Dominik (director of The Assassination of Jesse James, One More Time With Feeling, and Blonde). The video is haunting and affecting given the song’s subject matter, mashing together Elvis’ birth there and a terrible storm that flooded the town in the early 1900s. What makes it even more mesmerizing is that Dominik created the video with archival photographs brought to life using AI tools. Cave’s response and the video are both worth checking out as much of the world deifies all things with those two letters attached.

One More Thing

In July, the planet Uranus entered Gemini and will stay there for eight years. Astrologists say that it will be a period of significant change in communication, technology, and how we connect with one another. Rob Brezsny of Free Will Astrology posed a few questions we can ponder during this time, which I found useful as I move into a new space myself.

Until next time, I hope you’re connecting with other people, staying curious, and following your creative impulse to arrive at something extraordinary.