On the theory you could probably use it, here’s a brief and erratic list of decent distractions, compiled by the Jezebel staff.
Take a walk
I mean, it’s what Hillary did.
“Watching a movie so confusing you don’t have enough mental bandwidth to think about anything else.”
“Mulholland Drive is good.” —Joanna Rothkopf
Cut a check, if you can
Browse various pet adoption sites
There are a lot of very good dogs and pretty great cats on sites like Petfinder. Here, for instance, is a feline named Jezebel.
Make your bed
“In my times of deepest depression—and holy shit does this seeping hemorrhoid of a week beat them all—I set two tasks for myself: take a shower and make the bed. That’s it. You have to shower, because the human body is disgusting, but making the bed does two things: it insures you can’t lie in it all day, and it imposes order. It lets you put your mind towards something fixable. It ties the room together. When you get overwhelmed and have to lie on it to cry, it doesn’t feel quite as gut-wrenching, because you’re not facedown in half-clean tangled linens. When you come home at the end of another day of blogging about the nation being overtaken by an ochre horror-clown, at least your bed is made. Try making the bed.” —Anna Merlan
The Audubon Society’s Instagram account
Lotta good birds on this account.
Xanax
“Take a Xanax.” —Emma Carmichael
Stare at this picture of Mark-Paul Gosselaar for a while and think about the passage of time
Damn, what happened to Zack Morris?
Stare at these pictures of Trump for a while
In a complete 180-degree opposite option, look upon Trump’s face as he realizes, fuck, he’s really played himself this time.
Eat
Brendan O’Connor vouches for, specifically, “bacon egg and cheese on a everything bagel with salt pepper and ketchup,” “seltzer,” and “100 Grand candy bars.” The official candy of Jezebel is Haribo gummy candy.
Filmstruck
“Feeling overwhelmed is my normal lately, so it’s something of a relief to be overwhelmed by the selection of movies offered by Filmstruck, the new streaming service courtesy of a partnership between Turner Classic Movies and the Criterion Collection. If you’re rusty on your Fassbinder or behind on your Buñuel, the service gives you a great opportunity to catch up. Don’t be daunted by whatever stuffiness you suspect may permeate this cinephile fantasia—so much here is genuinely fun and will confront you with how alive ideas independent filmmaking once was, and how dire the expression of those ideas has become in a medium increasingly dependent on tent-pole blockbusters. If you are a true nerd like me, you’ll delight in the streaming special features ported over from Criterion’s DVD/Blu-ray releases, allowing you to legitimately educate yourself on this material. There are too many options here to name (my watchlist is in the dozens), but might I suggest starting with René Laloux’s 1973 animated movie Fantastic Planet, in which giant blue aliens keep humans as pets and astral project to a planet devoted solely for fucking? Real aspirational stuff there.” —Rich Juzwiak
“My salve will be to meditate and watch Vines a lot and read.”
—Clover Hope, who adds that she’s going to reread A Wrinkle in Time, specifically.
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