Leigh K. Hoopes

@grrleigh.bsky.social

342 Followers 704 Following

Writer, reader, creative strategist, enthusiast! Also: Queer neurodivergent Libra, cat lady, bibliophile, music/movie/tv lover, AEW Sicko, stargazer. Kentucky based, born & raised (for better or worse, but always aiming for better).

A screenshot of my iPhone lock screen: a real-time image of the waning moon. I especially love when it’s the new moon and it’s nearly invisible on the screen—a secret little shadow moon.
The West Coaster Choppers argument meme, except it’s about brutalist architecture and for once I actually agree with the old white man!! Old Man: We need to advocate for the preservation of Brutalist buildings which are under threat! Young Man: (pointing aggressively) Brutalism is an aggressive architectural style which is not designed for humans! Old: (yelling, correctly) THE FAILURE OF BRUTALIST BUILDINGS WAS A RESULT OF MISMANAGEMENT, NEGLECT, AND RACIST GOVERNMENT POLICY, NOT THE ARCHITECTURE ITSELF Young: (throws chair) IT HAS THE WORD BRUTAL RIGHT THERE IN THE NAME Old: (remains correct) THE NAME COMES FROM THE FRENCH "BÉTON BRUT" WHICH JUST MEANS RAW CONCRETE (wins argument)
Photo collage of three Henson Muppets: Fozzie Bear, the corny but enthusiastic and loyal comedian bear from the original Muppet Show The all-knowing but sometimes misguided Marjory the Trash Heap from Fraggle Rock Extreme Sweet Fiend and Binge-Eating Disorder mascot Cookie Monster from Sesame Street
Meme with the words “You not even watching the movie” and underneath, in response “Me: Yes I am” Beneath that is a four-panel square of a brown tabby cat, tucked under a fluffy orange blanket. The first picture shows the cat with its eyes open, then with their eyes narrowed sleepily. The third picture shows the cat laying back, asleep, with its front paws over top of the blanket. The fourth picture shows the cat in what I like to call “assed-out mode,” fully lying on its back, completely assed the hell out. Basically, I fall asleep during movies and/or TV shows fairly regularly, especially if a blanket is involved.
A Super Mario meme that shows Princess Peach and a purple-hued busty, va-va-voom kind of character with big sexy lips and bedroom eyes and some fucking JEWELRY on. Above Peach are the words “Girls that poop”; above the purple diva are the words “bitches that SHIT”. Poor grammar notwithstanding, guess which one I am?!
Screenshot of my results from the viral 2020s Political Compass quiz: I’m 83% woke (duh), 59% Neo-Luddite (thought it would be more than that tbh), 63% Hopepilled (and proud of it), and 83% Davos, which is a terrible name for the globalist/nationalist category because I actively loathe hearing or reading about Davos whenever it happens each year because it’s just more rich assholes bloviating on theoreticals instead of taking action in reality. My closest match is Zohran Mamdani, along with probably at least 75% of Bluesky users who have taken this quiz, and I am not mad about it!
The gorgeous, iconic, and deeply unsettling poster by Drew Struzan for John Carpenter’s frozen alien body horror masterpiece, The Thing (1982). A dark silhouette of a figure in a parka with a fur-lined hood stands with wide arms and fingers spread, legs seemingly frozen in a terrified wide stance against a jagged abstract background of dark, cool blues and frosty teal. The background evokes the uncaring menace of an ice cave, ready to shatter and impale any interlocutors who dare enter. Instead of a face, a blinding white light radiates from the furred hood, brilliant beams refracting off the sharp angles, familiar yet unholy. There is awe and wonder in this bright void, but the figure’s posture is stiff with terror, consumed by an uncanny light no human eyes were ever supposed to see. Soft wisps of ephemeral snow encircle the figure’s legs, immediately rooting us in the unlivable tundra that is itself a character in the film, another ruthlessly natural and unsentimental presence with no consideration for organic life on this planet. The tagline at the top of the poster reads “The ultimate in alien terror,” which is frankly one of the worst movie taglines ever written, but it doesn’t detract from the power of the dark, terrified figure overcome by a power it cannot and will never understand. Below the figure, in slightly askew bold all-caps white with a hard drop show, is the title: simply, perfectly and iconically, THE THING.
A photo of me, a white queer woman with short red hair and black glasses, wearing a pink shirt and maroon lounge pants, sitting on a red couch. I’m holding my phone and a giant grapefruit White Claw. Biscuits, a small tortie cat, has draped herself over my shoulder, a tiny paw reaching for my wrist. Khan, a large gray longhair cat, is wedged between my hip and the couch cushion crevasse. I’m looking at the camera over Biscuits on my shoulder, eyebrow raised, because I know this is all three of ours’ happy place.
Surya Bonaly performs a then-illegal backflip at the 1988 Nagano Olympics. It was her signature move, as the only woman skater to have ever successfully performed it, made even more difficult by the fact that she landed on one foot. The Olympic judges warned her she would be penalized for even attempting it, and she did it anyway, executing it flawlessly and receiving low scores that kept her out of much-deserved medal contention. She’s a fucking legend, and I’m glad sports history has FINALLY started to put some respect on her name.
My last four films watched via Letterboxd: My Fair Lady (4 stars), the original Robocop (3.5 stars), the original Predator (3 stars), and In Search of Tomorrow (3 stars), which actually made for great lazy Memorial Day background watching
Promotional image for HBO’s fantastic The Righteous Gemstones, a spot-on satire of Southern megachurch families starring John Goodman as patriarch Eli Gemstone, Danny McBride as eldest son Jesse, Edi Patterson as only daughter Judy, and Adam DeVine as youngest son Kelvin. It is a treat and a delight, and you don’t have to have any true familiarity with mega churches to enjoy it!
A photo of me, a towheaded blue-eyed child of about 3 in 1987, well before most of these influences took hold (except Disney, Pee Wee, Looney Tunes, and Dr. Seuss). I have wispy blond hair tied up in two ribbons and am wearing a pink t-shirt with little poofy sleeves.
“The Bleeding Heart” - Illustration by Nathan Anderson of a skeleton interwoven with veins, leading to a living heart in its rib cage. Instead of hands it has a massive sword and a bloodied shield, and its skull is deep crimson. It is extremely, intensely badass.
Photo of actor Kevin Sussman as Steve in the 2001 seminal indie comedy sleeper hit Wet Hot American Summer. Steve is basically a high school senior still going to camp with middle schoolers, and for his final performance at the camp talent show he spookily commands Skylab to fall from the heavens in a direct collision course with the camp itself! A bunch of other nerds save the day, of course, but Steve is the only one with any real lines and/or pathos
Screenshot of FCC complaint against the NFL Super Bowl Halftime Show: Ticket #: 8431072 - Bad bunny sexual explicit content Date: 2/11/2026 City/State/Zip: Gresham, Oregon 97030 Name of TV Program: Superbowl halftime Description I did not appreciate the explicit sexual content and lyrics played on television at the superbowl half time by Bad Bunny. As a family with teens we did not need to be subjected to that garbage and we want compensation for the sexual emotional abuse and overly sexualized lyrics and dances during a family event.
Screenshot of my last four movies watched on Letterboxd: Give Me Pity! (3.5 stars), The Cursed (2 stars), The Surrender (3 stars) and Frewaka (3 stars, which I’m now reconsidering, because I really did like it quite a bit)
Photo of known cinnamon roll and actual cinnamon roll aficionado Konosuke Takeshita, bar none one of the best (and undisputed cutest) wrestler currently in All-Elite Wrestling wearing a sassy red jacket with no shirt underneath and if he doesn’t get the International Championship belt from his arch rival The Rainmaker Kazuchika Okada at the Double Or Nothing PPV at the end of this month the PEOPLE ARE GOING TO RISE UP AND GIVE IT TO HIM ANYWAY BECAUSE HE DESERVES IT MORE THAN ANYONE ELSE IN THE WHOLE PROMOTION AND EVERYONE KNOWS IT SO QUIT PLAYING GAMES WITH OUR HEARTS TONY KHAN I STG THERE WILL BE HELL TO PAY. Human thumb and wretch Don Callis is behind him and we can’t wait for Takeshita to leave the stupid Don Callis Family because all it’s doing is holding him back and these are important things that need to happen
A set of concrete stairs descending into a cave. There is lush greenery around it, and a small waterfall drizzling down to the left of the stairs. It looks both inviting and terrifying, and it’s the main entrance into Mammoth Cave, in south central Kentucky. It’s one of the most incredible natural wonders of the world, and everyone should go experience it!
The filthy icon herself, PEACHES, on the bar at the Lincoln Factory in Detroit (terrible venue), accepting a shot after crowd surfing VERY precariously. Not pictured: me writhing in ecstasy à la St. Theresa of Avila
Paragraph of text from Ed Zitron: “Boosters, I am begging of you - point to one thing TODAY, from TODAY's models, that even remotely justifies burning nearly a trillion dollars and filling our internet full of slop and creating the moral distance from an action that might have blown up a school and empowering the theft of millions of people's work and having to hear every fucking day about Sam Altman and Dario Amodei, two terrifyingly boring and annoying oafs with no culture and no whimsy in their wretched little hearts.”
(Screenshot of Isaac Chotiner’s recent interview with Dante Spinotti, a rapist apologist and newly-minted propagandist who filmed and lit Melania “beautifully” and agreed when Chotiner ironically referred to them both as “journalists:) CHOTINER: One thing reporters try to do is to spotlight ideas or news stories, and what you're trying to do is spotlight her face and its beauty. I do see a real similarity there. SPINOTTI: Yeah. We were trying to do the best we could. Again, as I told you, I was the guy with a camera, with a couple of assistants in the Trumps' apartment when they came back to the White House at night. So there's an interview with Melania at that point, and we organized the lights in the best possible way.
Poster for Mimic, Guillermo Del Toro’s first US feature (1997). Neither Mira Sorvino nor Jeremy Northam are very good in it, and the astonishing practical effects make the blurry, wobbly CGI look even worse by comparison. So far my least favorite GDT, and I mostly hated Nightmare Alley.
Poster for Guillermo Del Toro’s debut film Cronos (1992). It’s a dramatic, minimalist (and ominous) image with the title CRONOS rendered as though carved from shadowy concrete. A female figure in the bottom right corner leans her head back, showing her bare throat and shoulders in stark chiaroscuro. The insect-like golden Cronos device rests near the base of her neck, its razor-sharp appendages bearing into her flesh. I regret to inform you, however, that there are no sexy ladies with long beautiful necks being punctured by Cronos device in the actual film. Marketing!
It's useless to call for civil debate as "politics in the right way"; politics has moved beyond words. Where there are words at all, they are but a way to express a meme, a vibe, an aesthetic. They are a method to channel brainrot, like any other medium of communication. To expect words to mean words, for them to attach to objects in time and space and to line up with any internal logic — this is the sort of cringe that will fade into the periphery along with the millennial pause, that half-second of silence where the older generation gathers their thoughts. - Excerpt from Sarah Jeong’s 12/31/25 Verge article “Killing in the name of…nothing”
My hand holding a copy of Brutalist Berlin by Felix Torkar. The cover is orange with sans-serif text and a photo of a particularly looming and somber concrete structure
A stack of books on a striped ottoman in front of a Christmas tree. The books are, from top to bottom: Heart the Lover by Lily King, Fearless & Free by Josephine Baker, Enlightenment by Sarah Perry, and The Story of Art Without Men by Katy Hessel
A beautiful long haired solid gray cat with green eyes, laying on a green couch with coordinating gray & white blankets and pillows
A majestic long-haired gray cat sits on a green couch, resting daintily against one of the Vera Bradley blankets my in-laws love to give us for some reason. He is very big and very dumb and very sweet and I will end anyone who disparages or harms him in any way. Have a nice day!
A woman’s hand with red nail polish, holding a copy of Jude Doyle’s fantastic DILF: Did I Leave Feminism?
A photo collage showing Harris Glen Milstead, better known as Divine, in his two roles from 1988’s Hairspray: the odious local TV network owner Arvin Hodgepile, and the delightful Edna Turnblad, mother of protagonist Tracy Turnblad. I would have done Divine playing Dawn Davenport and Dawn’s rapist/baby daddy, but I couldn’t find a good photo of the male character. TL;DR: Divine could play both the hero AND the villain IN ONE MOVIE!
A screencap of Walton Goggins in one of several many roles he was literally born to play, aged former Evangelical Christian Country singer child star Uncle Baby Billy on The Righteous Gemstones. He has a fluffy quiff of uncannily white hair and wears a dark suit and tie. He’s also wearing those transition lenses that old people love to get that never fully un-darken, even indoors. He looks perturbed, his brow furrowed, and the subtitle caption reads: “Go outside, nerd!” Which I think is good advice for just about everyone right now.
My latest 4 movies watched: The Lives of Others (3.5 stars), Singing in the Rain (4.5 stars, an all time fave comfort), Pumping Iron (3 stars, and I fucking love 70s docs), Blade Runner 2043 (3 stars)
Ghostbusters, 1984. Bill Murray as Peter Venkman confirms what everyone already knows.
A screencap of my last 4 movies watched: the Sally Ride documentary, Mickey 17, Cleaner, and Nobody
Zoomed in screenshot of a small white dog with dark eyes making the 😐 face
Screenshot of the awesome, play-in-order playlist I made for the 8+ hours I’m about to spend in a car driving across Ontario with my company’s Canadian HR director Tues-Thurs
An old selfie of me using a Snapchat filter that makes me look vaguely like Cheetara. I’m holding my Nebelung cat Khan uncomfortably and his face is squished into the giant ruff of fluff around his neck. My artist name is CAT LADY and the album title is Can You Not.
The life-changing magic of the Johnny’s Toys Birthday Castle Key. IYKYK
Encino Man, 1992. Quite possibly the most 90’s-ass movie ever made. If you say “wheezin’ the ju-uice” to me at any given moment, then I know we’re destined be best friends forever. 🤙🏻
My hand holding a hardback copy of The Reformatory, a novel by Tananarive Due. The cover is an ombré of orange to red to black with a small white building with with two doors. A grove of swamp trees clouded with Spanish moss loom over it. It’s one of the best books I’ve read in a very long time, and will be recommending it to literally everyone.
That one scenic overlook shot literally everyone has of the Mayan ruins of Tulum in Mexico, on a perfectly gorgeous but hot as balls day last October. It was packed but really fun to visit, and then we got to float in a marvelous Cenote for an hour afterwards. Take me back!
Photo of Michael Dorn (Worf), Jonathan Frakes (Lt. Commander William Riker), and Marina Sirtis (Counselor Deanna Troi) in makeup for Star Trek: The Next Generation shooting. Frakes and Sirtis are in civvies, Dorn is still wearing his Worf uniform with a random blue and white letterman’s jacket on. They all look extremely high. Meme caption reads: When the edibles kick in at the work Christmas party
The cover of Grady Hendrix’s 2020 horror novel, The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires. Doesn’t top How to Sell a Haunted House and My Best Friend’s Exorcism as my Hendrix faves, but he excels at recreating the particulars of the suburban south in the 1990s without wistfulness or overt nostalgia.
Find the cat in this picture
Khan, a large gray long haired Nebelung cat, is snuggled on a gray fleece blanket that matches his fluff almost perfectly. His back paws are curled and his front paws are bent at the “wrists,” full belly fluff exposed. His eyes are closed, and he looks like he is smiling in his sleep.
My Nebelung cat, Khan.
An animated GIF of the objectively best college mascot, Western Kentucky University’s Big Red (an agender physical embodiment of the hill upon which the school was built in 1906), driving a golf cart emblazoned with their own face across a football field, nodding and bopping to whatever song you wish to believe is playing, radiating vibes of self-appreciation and chill confidence as a cheerleader ruffles her red and white pom-poms in the back rear-facing seat. It’s a vibe, an entrance and a true arrival, a demonstration of “we out here” and “we are so back” in one subtly triumphant moment.
The stack of books I received for Christmas this year: The Unmothers by Leslie J Anderson; Prophet Song by Paul Lynch; Madwoman by Chelsea Bieker; All Fours by Miranda July; The Empusium by Olga Tokarczuk; and The Big Reveal by Sasha Velour
A relatively recent photo of Yeah Yeah Yeahs, a seminal influence on my late adolescence/early college years. Left to right: guitarist Nick Zinner (Ghost of Christmas Past), vocalist Karen O (Ghost of Christmas Present), and drummer Brian Chase (Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come). They can visit me and take me on fantastic adventures of self-introspection any old time, not just on Christmas!
A weathered daguerreotype of US poet and mystery writer Edgar Allan Poe
Screenshot of the track list for SZA’s new album LANA (which I refuse to call SOS Deluxe: LANA because IT COULD HAVE JUST BEEN A STANDALONE ALBUM I DONT UNDERSTAND ALL THESE DELUXE VERSIONS OR “ITS THE SAME ALBUM WITH TWO MORE SONGS” STRATEGY JUST PUT IT OUT AS ITS OWN ALBUM YOU WEIRDOES) track 4 “BMF” and 5 “Scorsese Baby Daddy” (track name of the year tbh), which have the most perfect track order on a given album in recent memory.
Diva Plavalaguna from The Fifth Element, a beautiful iridescent blue humanoid with an ornate neck piece and long tentacles that hang from either side of her head like hair or a veil.
Jeff Bridges as The Dude in The Big Lebowski
The Twist scene with Uma Thurman and John Travolta from Pulp Fiction
Still from the original Beetlejuice with pieces of Delia Deetz’s art, mostly made of concrete and wire and suburban angst
Cover of Madeline Miller’s novel, Song of an Achilles. It shows a rough-hewn golden helmet in Ancient Greek style on a bright teal background.
Cover of Rebecca Solnit’s book of essays, “Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities.” It has a plain, solid black cover with large white text in a simple serif font.
The cover of Arundhati Roy’s stunning, haunting and Booker Prize-winning novel, The God of Small Things. The cover photo shows layers of lily pads floating on water, accented by a tiny, delicate pink flower.
The cover of a 2000s edition of Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman. It features a portrait of him taken in his old age, and he’s heavily bearded with white hair. He looks tired but wise. I used a passage from Song of Myself as my high school yearbook quote and everyone thought I was weirder than they already did. They were right.
The cover of Matrix by Lauren Groff, one of the most gorgeous and thrilling books about nuns in the Middle Ages you’ll ever find