Duh! Winning!

If I find myself playing "Never have I ever"* with Jonathan Franzen, I'll make sure to use "Never have I ever... stored weed in my freezer," as Elif Batuman reveals he apparently does. I knew this clean living was going to pay off eventually!

I feel a little sorry that Batuman's extremely thoughtful essay is frankly overshadowed by this trivium about some dude, but first, she did throw it out there, and second, I think she is gaining in cool points what she is losing in highbrow esteem from all this.

* Game occasionally involving drinking in which one player says "Never have I ever [done a thing]" and the other players who have done that thing either have to drink, or do something humiliating as previously agreed upon before the start of the game. I sort of doubt anyone plays this any more, because in adulthood you must ferret out all the dangerous tidbits of other people's lives instead of having them throw them out there for sport -- which in itself is like a game in which sometimes there is drinking and sometimes there is humiliation, but there is definitely risk and the risk you cannot avoid if you want to be semi-decent at it.**
** Of all the footnotes I have ever written, this is surely the least relevant to anything, but when I write my summer-camp book I know it will be useful background.