Alex Sayf Cummings's Blog

The Feet of Nothing Blood

We bring you good tidings! There might be an Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement, and George Santos is being freed from political persecution in an American hoosegow...

The Transcontinental Epic Journey of the Ranlo Kid

I wrote this about a year ago when I was planning to leave L.A., and now I’m back so here we are.

Comedy on the Arabian Peninsula

 Last week, Riyadh hosted a comedy festival. I did not attend—let’s call it limited funds. After all, this is the […]

The Last Time I Rewound: VHS, Star Wars, and the Freedom to Remember

I can’t exactly recall when I watched my last movie on VHS, but the cassette tape once defined my childhood. For kids of the 1980s and 1990s, videotapes were currency—expensive objects that you treasured, rewound, and wore out.

Seatbelts to Maximum Buckling

In this week's best-of roundup, we think about Rainer Maria Rilke, the ontology of God, and Italian pop music from the 1970s.

Help Save Public Media in America — This Is the Dire Hour

The first time I really knew about NPR was when I was dating someone in college, and they wanted to listen to All Things Considered when we were driving, and I was like, what the fuck is this?

Peace in the Madness: The Openhearted Music of Summer 2025

I chose back in June to make sure I remained present and engaged with this inglorious moment by listening exclusively to newly released music. Here is an overview of 2025's Summer vibes.

Lost Histories: Forgetting and Remembering the Holocaust

After I graduated from college in 1987, I took a job at East Hill Farm and School, an alternative school located on a mountain top farm in southern Vermont.

Logic Sometimes Makes Monsters, But It Also Never Does

Diana Ross, Simone Weil, and our beloved Scaramucci go head to head in this week's round-up of reading recommendations.

Poof Foundness, or How We Love a Landlord Hex

In a time of goblin mode, we think about C.S. Lewis, Christian apologetics, and Nancy Fraser.