eM&M Recommend!

Nov 10, 2025

Every day we stumble upon things we just can’t wait to talk to each other about or that we wish everyone would see — and each month, we are going to be sharing some of these favorite things with you.

We are always on the hunt for new discoveries, so we invite you, we implore you, we entreat you, we beg you to share your favorite things with us by commenting on the posts! We will read and explore your recommendations and if we love what you love, we’ll share your favorite thing on a future list. (And yes, of course, if we share your recommendation, we’ll publicly praise you for being the genius you are!)

Some of our favorites will come with invitations for creativity, or nonsense, or social action, and who knows, maybe even some GISH-ish-ness from time to time.

You’re our favorite,

-Em & M

eM&M Recommend!™ ~ DECEMBER 2025

1. The Work of Art by Adam Moss

Misha gave this book to 14 people for Christmas last year. He thinks it’s that good. Adam Moss, the book’s author, interviews dozens of artistic luminaries like George Saunders and Steven Sondheim and poet laureates and painters and dancers and composers and everyone in between about the process of making their art. Reading it, you come to see there are so many commonalities between how these great artists approach their works—and it has the inspiring impact of demystifying the process. You see how art-sausage is made. If you have creative seeds in you, this book will water them.

**Adam Moss, the author, has agreed to talk with us about the work of writing the Work of Art, so if you do pick up a copy of this book and start reading it, please comment below with your questions for Adam.

Leave a comment

2. This Recipe for Homemade Ginger-Turmeric Tea

You can keep adding water and simmer this on the stove for a week (maybe keep a lid on it). We often have a pot simmering at our house (Misha often forgets to turn off the stove when he goes out and has ruined 2 pots by boiling off the water and incinerating the solids. We don’t recommend trying that at home.)

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

Precise Molecular Gastronomy Recipe:

     Mostly fill a good-sized pot with water.
     Slice up a good amount of fresh ginger root,
     Slice up a "so many" of turmeric root,
     Add the  juice of some lemons,
     Several big glugs of honey.

Simmer for hours or days adding more honey and lemon to taste. The ginger gets spicier as the days go by! We usually squeeze 5 or 6 days out of one pot.

3. Podcast: Everything is alive: Luis, Can of Cola

This is an extremely enlightening podcast that gives a microphone to voices that too often we do not hear.

0:00

-26:48

4. Throwback Movie Night: Tootsie

We recently watched this with the kids. Misha had seen it when he was young; Emily hadn’t seen it at all. We all loved it all the way through (except for the kids, who seem to have very little taste when it comes to pop-cultural heritage). What’s a favorite movie of yours from more than a decade ago?

Leave a comment

5. Podcast: The Outlaw Ocean

This may be the best investigative journalism we have ever come across, it also taught us both a tremendous amount about food systems, modern slavery, and the lawlessness of international waters. ALL the episodes in this series are great, but we recommend you start here: Season 2 China Trilogy Episodes 1,2,3 and the shrimp processing episode (Season 2, Episode 5).

Ian Urbina, award-winning journalist, best-selling author, and creator of The Outlaw Ocean, is joining us here on The AnteSocial for an in-depth conversation very soon, so we recommend you bone up now!

6. Le Poisson Steve

Emily here: As much as we like to think it is us teaching our children, the reverse is true at least equally as often. For example, the kids regularly educate us about the latest trends and newest developments in language that cannot be found in Webster’s Dictionary. The long list of things we don’t pretend to be cool enough to understand include blanket fall videos, watching other people play videogames, ASMR videos, and the real origin of those two sequential, single digit numbers that will go unnamed here (but that rhyme with “fix heaven”). Recently however, as I was whining to Atti (my eldest daughter) that it was past my bedtime (9:30, in case you want to judge), she said “Wait, wait! You just have to see this one thing!” Then she played me this video. And then I asked her to play it again, and then I asked her to play it again, and went off to bed feeling happier and more energetic. I am unable to explain it. Perhaps you can?

7. This Great Poem: Baloney by Louis Jenkins

Misha here: This is one of my favorite poems because it does what only the best poems do—it captures a simple moment and then extrapolates from that little thing to the biggest questions in the universe. In this poem, the writer sees teenagers making out, which reminds him of being young and passionate, which stirs nostalgia, which reminds him of childhood’s baloney sandwiches, which reminds him to remind us to look for ways to see everything in the world from a different perspective. Poetic disruption at it’s finest. What’s a favorite poem of yours?

Listen to this poem as read by Misha and Maison Collins:

0:00

-1:24

Leave a comment

8. Beating the sun at its own game.

We’re both morning people and with five kids in the house, the quiet hours of 5-7am are precious jewels. When we manage to get up before the sun, it feels like we’ve beaten the day at its own game. They say that staring at the horizon as the sun rises is really good for your circadian rhythm and that doing so boosts energy throughout the day. (And who are we to argue with “them”?)

9. This thoughtful analysis by Sarah Keyworth

This was particularly resonant to us because it touches on an issue that has been particularly present for us in the bedroom.

10. The Roundhouse, a novel by Louise Erdrich

Last year we had dinner with a novelist friend. When we asked how his book was coming, he said, “Unfortunately, I read The Roundhouse, and it was so perfectly-written that I realized I had to throw everything I had written out and start over.” With a review like that, we had to read it ourselves. We did, and we both loved it. We keep coming back to this book in conversation.

(Warning to readers– this book deals with some heavy material including sexual assault, but the prose is beautiful and the story is moving and, in some ways, uplifting.)

11. This:

We happen to really love single-panel cartoons. If you have any favorites, we would love to see them. You can upload images and videos to The AnteSocial Chat, which you can find on our homepage.

12. Science World

Emily again. On a recent trip to Vancouver I dragged all five kids to Science World in an attempt to remind them that fun can be had without the aid of a screen. Entertaining a group of six with an age range from 7 to 42 is no small feat, but hours later, I had to drag us all out to catch our flight in time. As if we needed more reasons to move to Canada? It was just so great and I wish every community, and every child had access to things like this science museum (and they should be free, which this most certainly was not, but that’s another topic for another day). Below is a video of the best exhibit we found that day. When I showed it to Misha, I expected him to offer a nerdy, unsolicited explanation of what ferrofluid is, but instead, and much to my delight, he proclaimed, “What the fuck is that?!”

13. BE MAKE THE LIGHT YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD!

There’s already too much darkness in the world—and to add to that, at this time of year the sun sets so damn early… but we can SOLVE these problems! How are we bringing light into the world this month? Show us your Words Of Optimism for the coming year, written in light. (You can do this by writing a word or phrase using “light painting,” spelling it out in holiday lights, writing a word in pin-prick art, using a Lite-Brite, projecting your statement on a wall, or any other creative way you want to demonstrate your idea using light as your medium.) Submit your Words of Optimism to us via this chat thread by 11:59 PM PT on December 31, 2025 — and yes, there will be random prizes.

ONE MORE THING WE LOVE: You.

We’re so grateful for you, our pocket friends, our AnteSocial community.

Help us get to know you! In two words or less, tell us what you love (or what you’d change) about the holidays!

BONUS! eM&M’s 2025 Gift-Giving Recommendations

(All free. All heartfelt. All allowed to be delightfully imperfect.)

Really good hugs. Free, underrated, always the right size, and usually renewable. (This is one gift you won’t mind them returning.)
Home-made holiday ornaments. Misha and Finnley (our 7-year-old) made ornaments out of sticks, pine branches, and rocks. Misha’s Trump ornament was… something. No one knows where to put it.
Hand-written letters. When was the last time you received one? Exactly.
Handmade holiday cards.
Poems. They don’t have to be good to matter.
Playlists! Here’s one of ours.
Jar of love notes: Write 5-10 things you love about someone or times they made a difference in small ways. Put them in a container of your choosing. Add Ribbon.
Muffins, cookies, pies, banana bread. Some things never get old.
A book. You loved it, and now it needs a new home. Share the lit love!
Pocket Pep Talk: Record a minute-long reminder that you love someone & share it with them so they can play it whenever they’re having a bad day.
A handmade snowperson. Making new friends has never been easier (or more literal)!
Time. It’s cliche, but it’s true: it’s the most precious gift you can give someone. Share it in a way that is meaningful to them.