I'm sorry I ghosted you
Back in May I sent you all a very confident email saying I’d be going back to writing fortnightly newsletters. It has come to my attention (by which I mean it’s been niggling away at me for weeks) that the last newsletter I sent was at the end of June. It is now the middle of August which means there’s only one logical conclusion: I ghosted you.
I’m really sorry about that. I have definitely learnt a lesson there which is not to over-promise because when you fail to deliver it feels terrible. So this time I am going to set better boundaries and I’m going to endeavour to stick to them!
The reality is, I can’t give this newsletter the love and energy it deserves while I’m also trying to make the podcast. This is partly because I don’t have the time to do both well (and also keep on top of my work deadlines) but it’s partly financial too. I simply can’t be working on two unpaid (or, in the case of the podcast, extremely low-paid) projects at once.
So this is my official notice that The Overthinker’s Guide To Sex is taking a sabbatical until the podcast series is wrapped. But it will return and I actually have some really exciting plans for what I’d like to do next with it. Rest assured that I have not run out of ideas, I just need to park them for a while until I can give them my full focus.
In the meantime I just want to say a huge thank you for sticking with me and being such a brilliant, thoughtful, exciting bunch of readers. As ever, if you have any thoughts you want to share, any ideas of your own or burning questions about the topics we discuss here, you know where to find me!
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A couple more things to (over)think about in my absence!
I’ve been listening to Shon Faye's podcast, Call Me Mother lately and I love it. It’s aim, she says, is to show queer people grappling with issues today that they belong to a much bigger history and from my point of view at least it does exactly that.
Still on podcasts, people keep recommending The Log Books to me so I’m going to check that out v soon.
This story of a married mum who tried to have a secret date with a woman which didn’t turn out to be the fantasy she hoped sparked annoyance, sympathy, and frustration.
The Times Magazine ran a big undercover investigation into gay conversion therapy last week which is really eye-opening and quite a heavy read but worth it. The journalist, Emily Sargent has also made a podcast series about the investigation. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you there’s a big content warning on this one for homophobia.
Elsewhere, at The Times, though, it’s apparently still 2011 with people writing about the novelty (and tedium) of dating apps!
I’m obsessed with the ongoing debate over whether or not the Hot Vax Summer is actually happening. At the start of June, The Guardian was absolutely convinced it was all about to kick off, even as the New York Times was running pieces detailing why it almost certainly wasn’t. Undeterred, NPR insisted it was still on, only for Vice to burst the bubble with an explainer that it categorically wasn’t. At this rate it’ll be September before anyone decides.
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The Overthinker’s Guide To Sex is written by freelance journalist Franki Cookney.
To read more of my work, or to get in touch with me go to frankicookney.com. You can also find me on Twitter, and Instagram.
