A Year on Substack!

We're celebrating with a one day only 20% off sale!

Hi followers! Why are the cat and his tummy so happy? Well it’s because this substack is juuuust about a year old! My first real post was October 30, 2022. So to celebrate, we’re having a 20% off sale! That means $40/year, $4/month.

Also I will reminisce briefly!

My first post on substack was about why young men aren’t having more sex. (Spoiler: it’s probably because they’re living at home.) Not many people read it, so my next post was about something completely different—Philip Larkin’s maybe romantic poetry.

No one read that either! But the substack grew a lot over the year, for reasons I can’t claim to fully understand (but may have something to do with going viral on Notes briefly?) I hit 5000 free subscribers earlier this week, which is puny by the standards of a lot of the bigger stacks, but which seems like a lot to me!

I’ve written about a lot of different things over the year. I focus on politics more or less (especially on fascism). But there have also been a lot of Star Trek posts, some movie reviews (like this one on how Gus Van Sant’s Psycho remake is good actually) and a whole bunch of cat pics.

Some milestones:

—I started a podcast with Teddy Wilson which had one episode and then collapsed because Teddy didn’t have time to edit it and I don’t know how.

—My most popular post is this one from March about why, yes, Republicans are in fact fascists.

—The post I’m most proud of (maybe?) is one about how masculinity is not in crisis because masculinity is a crisis.

—My most humiliating post, I’m pretty sure, is about how I used to be a Billy Joel fan.

—My funniest one may be a piece on how Anderson Cooper wants Trump to urinate on your floor.

—My weirdest post may be one about Kafka and how nobody owes you hope.

There’s a lot more to explore; I’ve written upwards of 400 posts over the course of this year. For a while I was posting twice a day! Then basically everyone said, “Noah, cut that out,” so I’m now doing more like 5-6 a week. Which is still a lot, but hopefully feels like less of a barrage.

Anyway. I just wanted to thank you all again for following me, help point you to some posts you might enjoy in the archive if you’re new, and just…idk, take a very small victory lap. I’ve been stunned at how well this year on substack has gone, and really grateful to everyone who has supported me, as reader or paid subscriber. I keep thinking it can’t last, and maybe it can’t, but here we are at a year, and that’s pretty cool.

Again, thank you! Sign up for the 20% discount if you’re not a subscriber yet, and hopefully we can make it through another orbit around the big glowing orb.