You thought that I could not get any sexier. I was sure of it myself. Sorry, Polymarket, it happened.

“Impossible,” I see in your thought bubble. “You already have Tom Jones’s presence, John Coltrane’s embodied artfulness, and Brad Pitt’s I-love-to-watch-him-go. The only thing that could make you hotter would be if you slept in a night guard.”

You would be right.

If your dentist tells you to get a night guard, get it. If you don’t trust your dentist, get a new dentist. Because you like yourself and you know how important it is to care for your teeth.

You floss every day. You brush twice a day with fluoride toothpaste that has the ADA Seal of Acceptance. Your default drink is water with fluoride, and you drink several glasses every day. You eat a lot of vegetables and fruits and other plants. You haven’t smoked tobacco since… gosh, has it been that long? Everyone loves your smile.

I cannot lie to you: this is my second night guard. I got the first one about ten years ago. I stopped using it after a few months because I was not ready to believe that I needed it.

I had lived with and hated my braces and retainers from second grade until college. They hurt and shamed me. I was not ready to do it again.

I thought of dental appliances as punishment. I was being hurt and humiliated for my deficits. It’s how I thought of my skin, nose, hair, and build. My focus and attentiveness.

Now I’m grateful for all of it. My belief that solving these problems would fix everything. The traces of enamel that have survived my bruxism. That I trust my dentist, and she deserves my trust.

Welcome to May2026’s Disappearing Moment, an inventory of my experiences. I hope you enjoy it.

Podcasts

• Berkshire Hathaway’s Annual Shareholder Meeting (2026) (I Liked It): Greg Abel and his colleagues, along with Warren Buffett and Becky Quick did a good job. They were funny, insightful, and genuine.
• Hush (I Liked It): Leah Sottile is one of my favorite podcasters. She understands the medium and knows how to use it to tell her stories.

Bougie Products

Our set of Morph (for Joseph Jospeh) Nest Prep & Store covered bowls are always in use. We bought them at Artichoke in Cincinnati.

Personal Finance and Investing

Weed your closets, drawers, and other spaces every year. Sell or donate everything you don’t use. It reminds you to buy less (and used).

Reading

• Eve Babitz, Eve’s Hollywood (1972) (I Loved It): Her chapters would be must-read posts in my feed reader. I cannot wait to listen to her other books.
• Finnian Burnett, “A Year of One Hundred Rejections” (I Liked It): Year of No. That has merit.
• Jynn Nelson, “Add an LLM policy for rust-lang/rust #1040” (I Loved It): AI's role in updating Rust has broad implications and entrenched opponents. Jynn Nelson is facilitating the discussion with humility, empathy, and intent.
• Samin Nosrat, Salt Fat Acid Heat (2017): As a reference work, it’s aces. As an audiobook, not so much. I prefer the TV series and adore her podcast with Hrishikesh Hirway.

Brettsplaining

Follow the spirit, not the letter, of recipes for savory food. Account for your ingredients (which are not static), conditions, and preferences. Stir, taste, adjust.

Survey

Last month, I asked you what I should call the new, catch all section. Brettsplaining received three votes. Three others received one vote each: 99% Perspiration; Here’s Something Nice; and Why Did I Not Know This?

This month, you get to answer a question related to my first Brettsplaining entry. I’ve always been weirded out by the idea of tasting food that isn’t finished. I’m trying to get over it. I wonder if you feel the same way.

To see the survey and respond to it, you have to subscribe via email and answer it through an email interface.

Privacy-Respecting Software and Libraries

In my experience, library staff members' technology-related privacy needs fall into two areas: Internal Technology and Systems and Supporting Constituents (e.g., faculty, students, community members).

Internal Technology and Systems

• Library staff need ways to understand needs and facilitate interaction without violating their constituents' privacy. For example, a lot of library websites use Google Analytics or embed social media widgets so they can "meet people where they are".
• Library staff need business software (e.g., email and other communications, video-based meetings, calendar and scheduling, spreadsheets, document editors) that is affordable, practical, easy to use (for end-users, many of whom are not necessarily comfortable with technology), and easy to support (for technology staff, assuming the library has technology staff). Most library staff use Google Workspace or Microsoft Office.
• While many libraries use open source software for the catalogs and member databases (see Koha and Evergreen), there are a lot of reasons that libraries choose closed source and less private alternatives.
• If library staff believe that the people they have been hired to serve are on Instagram or TikTok or Bluesky or LinkedIn or YouTube or some other social media platform, that's where they're going to focus their attention.
• For other needs, library staff often choose hosted, subscription-based services rather than self-hosted services for all of the reasons that anyone else might not choose to self-host.

Supporting Constituents

• There is already a lot of good work about supporting constituents (e.g. Privacy Field Guides, Library Freedom Project). In general, it's not an awareness issue among library staff. Maybe it's a question of asking the people at libraries who make technology decisions and set other policies what might help them choose technology that protects staff and community members’ privacy?
• Libraries are associated with free as in cost and free as in intellectual freedom. When you go to a library in person or online, you have access to books, movies, events, and other services for free, and the library doesn't track what you're doing or make you sign in when you enter the building or attend a program. It's challenging to offer the equivalent experience when students, faculty, or community members want help signing up for an email account, or downloading eBooks, or remembering their passwords, or writing and saving a resume.