Ben Madeska
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benmadeska.bsky.social
Ben Madeska
@benmadeska.bsky.social
Artist, Writer
Pinned
I'm primarily an oil painter, making paintings like these of steaks, fish, oysters, and fruit
Reposted by Ben Madeska
This They Might Be Giants TONIGHT SHOW performance of "Birdhouse In Your Soul" from 1990 remains firmly lodged in my noggin thanks to the Tonight Show Band's full commitment and Doc Severinsen's incredible trumpeting... It took an already great song and made it transcendent.
August 23, 2025 at 8:44 AM
Ok, check one
Right, two for two
Oh, I see my mistake here
The secret to early retirement; dine out rarely, fly economy and be a Google employee making $390,000/year married to a fellow Google employee 17 years older than you who likely makes twice as much as you.
37-year-old quit her $390,000 Google job after saving up $1.5 million—see the 'no buy checklist' that helps her spend less
She left a $390,000-a-year job and now uses a simple set of rules to make her savings last in Switzerland.
www.cnbc.com
November 30, 2025 at 9:55 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
Whale fall pins are now back in stock, just in time for the holidays!! The perfect gift for deep sea lovers & marine biology fans 🐋🦀

Check them out here! shop.fossilforager.art
November 29, 2025 at 4:35 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
Saturday was the snowiest November day ever recorded in Chicago, according to the National Weather Service. The storm dumped over 8 inches of snow on parts of the city.
Saturday was snowiest November day in Chicago ever, forecasters say
chicago.suntimes.com
November 30, 2025 at 3:01 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
We have somehow, in the last couple of years, created an entire mini autistic comedy industry that is completely funded by other, more successful autistics paying it forward - both in investment and via crowdfunding. Sincere moment: I think that’s fucking beautiful.
November 30, 2025 at 1:36 PM
Reading Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead in high school was one of those times I could feel the fundamental wiring of my brain being altered

Tom Stoppard, Award-Winning Playwright of Witty Drama, Dies at 88 www.nytimes.com/2025/11/29/t...
Tom Stoppard, Award-Winning Playwright of Witty Drama, Dies at 88
www.nytimes.com
November 29, 2025 at 7:20 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
if you're in Indiana, would highly recommend writing this person and thanking them. they're going to get a lot of people yelling at them, and it would be good for ppl to see they get support when they stand up to trump.

(I think I'm going to write even though I'm not in IN.)
h/t @adamwren.bsky.social

Michael Bohacek, a Republican state senator from Indiana who has a daughter with down syndrome, says he will vote against redistricting in Indiana after Trump used the word "retarded."
November 29, 2025 at 12:36 AM
Christkindlmarket at Wrigley
November 28, 2025 at 10:14 PM
These people don't understand that the "having" of your completed work is usually the least satisfying part. I spend months and years tinkering with a painting or an essay because that's the enjoyable part
People will listen to neuroscience podcasts 18 hours a day and never shut up about optimizing themselves and still willfully forget that the point of making art is not for a computer to generate an image as quickly as possible it is to activate different parts of that brain you supposedly care about
November 28, 2025 at 4:35 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
People will listen to neuroscience podcasts 18 hours a day and never shut up about optimizing themselves and still willfully forget that the point of making art is not for a computer to generate an image as quickly as possible it is to activate different parts of that brain you supposedly care about
November 28, 2025 at 3:33 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
if you steal a cell phone or wallet in paris they kick you out of the french thieve's guild for insufficient whimsy
November 27, 2025 at 9:45 PM
Getting a cup of coffee yesterday the barista asked what I had planned for Thanksgiving and I said I made turkey confit, cooking turkey legs and thighs in duck fat last week to get ready for today and someone behind me in line audibly gasped
November 27, 2025 at 5:22 PM
Turkey Leg, oil on canvas

#art #painting #thanksgiving
November 27, 2025 at 3:27 PM
"The challenges Chicagoans have endured these last weeks I wouldn’t wish on anyone. But that time has made clear that as a city, we know how to embrace the notion that we fight for our own. Together."

www.chicagotribune.com/2025/11/26/o...
Kerry Lester Kasper: Chicago has become the ‘City of the Big Shoulders’ once again
Carl Sandburg’s words are illustrative of the moxie Chicago has always had but only recently reclaimed.
www.chicagotribune.com
November 27, 2025 at 2:33 AM
"A kid who is now where I was at the time of my diagnosis, lost and confused and struggling for an identity to guide them through all of that, will live out their life in the shadow of Kennedy’s hateful rhetoric and policies regardless of what happens next."
Another great piece by @gonebabygone.bsky.social on RFK and Trump's efforts to claw back all of the progress made by people with autism over the years.

www.welcometohellworld.com/i-will-not-g...
I will not give up that which I have tasted
Promotion of the myth
www.welcometohellworld.com
November 26, 2025 at 12:58 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
Chicago's Essential Dive Bars Vol. 2: The History And Legacy Of 12 More Iconic Watering Holes blockclubchi.co/3XzrHDf
November 24, 2025 at 3:11 PM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
Several Chicago restaurants have been ranked in a new list featuring the 100 greatest American restaurants of the 21st century, with one being named the best of the century.

Read more: https://tinyurl.com/2cep4x2w 
November 22, 2025 at 9:16 PM
A friend once said there are three types of people in the wine industry: people who started in restaurants and never left, failed academics, and lawyers looking for a career change
What’s the lore behind choosing your career path ?
November 23, 2025 at 12:36 AM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
“It’s a kick in the gut for beer history and Chicago," said Liz Garibay of the Beer Culture Center. "It’s the oldest brewing school in the United States and has taught many of the beer pioneers of the past and certainly of the modern era.”
Siebel Institute announces last call in Chicago — one that 'hurts' says Chicago brewer
chicago.suntimes.com
November 22, 2025 at 2:04 AM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
'Iran’s capital must be moved because the country “no longer has a choice,” President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Thursday in remarks carried by state media, warning that severe ecological strain has made Tehran impossible to sustain'

#Iran 🇮🇷
Iran president says capital move now a necessity as water crisis deepens
Iran’s capital must be moved because the country “no longer has a choice,” President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Thursday in remarks carried by state media, warning that severe ecological strain has mad...
www.iranintl.com
November 21, 2025 at 4:52 AM
Citizen Kane but he's told he was right and brilliant to give up his sled
In a world in which people with too much power and influence desperately need to be told and to understand when they are wrong, we are suddenly all inescapably drowning in sycophancy machines.
November 21, 2025 at 4:03 AM
A drawing professor told us "Don't worry about your style, just make the work. Then, after ten years, you'll see your style has emerged"
What’s the most significant advice you received from a teacher?

I had a Geology prof who always said “have strong opinions, loosely held”

Be passionate, assess alternatives with conviction, take sides. But don’t fall so in love with your opinions that you can’t change them with better data.
November 21, 2025 at 3:54 AM
Reposted by Ben Madeska
A Trump supporter started murdering his way through an assassination list of Democratic law makers FIVE MONTHS AGO. He murdered my colleague Melissa Hortman, and her husband Mark — and attempted to assassinate my dear friend John Hoffman and his wife Yvette. I was also on the hit list. WTF
Insanity
November 20, 2025 at 5:56 PM
Holiday season
November 21, 2025 at 1:51 AM