Petah!! Petah the Newslettah is Ready! It's Sweatah Season, Petah!

Happy Thursday, everybody! That's right–it's little Friday! I have been off of work most of all this week, so the days are all blurred together for me, but if you think that Thursday is the right day for it to be today, you go right ahead. I am happy for you.

What have I been doing with my time off, you might ask? No, you didn't ask? ok. Well, I've been chillin'. Literally, it's dang cold now! What in the hell happened? My top scientists are on this, but in the meantime, it is officially Sweater Weather.

I have been in the market for some new hoodies these last couple weeks, on account of wanting to dress in a potato sack all of the time and that being mostly not a good thing to do. Hoodies are the next best thing. The market is tough though. I am what your local Kohls would call Big & Tall, and though I don't have too much trouble finding hoodies that technically fit, it is hard to find adequately potato sack-like fits. And then there are all the other questions. Zipper or pullover? Heavyweight or lightweight? Lined? Do I want a little picture of Snoopy on there or Kermit the Frog? The dialogue tree with the hoodie salesman never ends.

And so in my time of great need, I have been asking myself, why have I loved the hoodies that I have loved? What have I disliked about the hoodies I have loved? Going through the list of the best hoodies I can remember owning, my pullover hoodie for the wrestling team from my sophomore year of high school was billowy and soft, but was cropped a little weird. The Disturbed hoodie I had around the same time was a nice weight, was black (ideal hoodie color imo), and had a design from an album I really liked, but was a little slimmer fit than I'd have liked and in hindsight has a dogshit, evil band's name on the front of it. I had a plain lavender lightweight hoodie in college I liked, but it was just too lightweight. I currently have a Bobby Hill hoodie that I really love, and it is nice and loose but also has a weird crop for my 6'4" long-torsoed body.

But what was the most perfect hoodie I ever owned? For Christmas in 7h grade, I was gifted a hoodie that I had been eyeing at Wal-Mart every time we went grocery shopping. It was a black zip-up hoodie, with a design on the front of Stewie Griffin dressed up as Angus Young from AC/DC, playing Young's signature cherry red Gibson SG. In 2007, this hoodie couldn't have cost more than 15, maybe 2o dollars. And yet, it was the perfect weight, was about as warm a hoodie I've ever had, it fit loosely and also stretched almost to my knees. I was already nearing six feet tall at 12 years old, and had always been a heavier kid, so I wasn't used to things fitting, and I definitely wasn't used to things feeling big. I could drown in this hoodie, and it felt nice to drown in something with enough space to not be seen. Also, it had Stewie Griffin. I love that little guy! And guitar!! AC/DC!!

And so my current problem remains—I need good hoodies and the best one I have ever had hasn’t been made in almost 20 years. I looked for it on eBay, and while there were some listings, none in my size, and most with a price higher than I can justify.

As it stands anyway, I don’t really like Family Guy in the same way anymore. For all of middle school and probably most of high school, it was my very favorite show. I fell asleep to it on Adult Swim quite literally almost every night for a decade or so. My siblings and I waited for new episodes on Sundays. We watched the first few seasons on DVD every time my friends and I stayed over at each other‘s house. We spoke in catchphrases and pretended to be the Giant Chicken that fights Peter. One of the first songs I learned on guitar was ‘Rock Lobster’ by the B-52s because of a recurring cutaway gag. I named a hamster ‘Stewie.’ I had a great hoodie.

None of those things are true of me at 30, except maybe the Giant Chicken thing, but that’s more metaphorical now. Aren’t we all just a big chicken who wants to fight someone’s dad and husband?

I do, though, still watch the show more often than I like to admit in polite company. It doesn’t bother me, in theory, that something is crass for the sake of being crass (I can’t particularly say it does much for me). It doesn’t bother me to watch trash or for people to know I watch trash or for them to think I am trash because of it. I’ve had lots of time to get over that specific brand of self-consciousness. Hell, that is why we're here writing or reading this newsletter, isn’t it?

It does bother me, at this stage in my life, though, when things are hurtful. And I think a lot of Family Guy is pretty hurtful. It depends on the season; it depends on the writers on staff; it depends on the episode; at this point, it depends on the decade it was written in. From what I can tell from having the show on in the background for a couple of hours at a time before bed some nights, present-day episodes seem to punch down a bit less, but I can’t say that with much authority.

The show is not where I am at in life anymore, and neither is the hoodie, though I probably would wear it if I were able to find it. It reminds me of a more callous person that I used to be, of more callous people that I used to know. Some of its very genuinely incorrigible nastiness is pointed at me and people I love now. When it's not doing those things though, it makes me laugh a lot. Few shows comfort me more than it does, even now as I watch it less and less. I see that dumb little genius baby or the dog with a martini or, uhh idk Seamus the pirate, I get the warm fuzzies in my chest.

So where does that leave me? I don't know. I probably won't buy the hoodie even if I find it in my size. I will probably watch Family Guy less. But I will still probably watch it. And it will remind me of that worse self I was, and those broken past relationships, and of the smell of microwave nachos in bed at 12 AM. I will feel a little bit of shame, and that is fine. As I continue to live a life less defined by Family Guy and more by some nebulous goal to not make the world worse for others to exist in, it will fade.

As always, here's a poem about it.