Snow that doesn't settle is a metaphor
e. roohi, this time twice in one week, a mini edish
Big mood on this Sunday:
A small thought about ‘it’s snowing!’ texts
Of all the ways that technology and connectivity has changed the way we live in the last decade, one very small way is that I have not been surprised to wake up to snow since I was in my adolescence.
In London, snow is enough of an event that in addition to the texts (‘Guys, it’s snowing! [snow emoji]’), there are also sometimes news alerts (‘Snow in Southeast UK to disrupt [whatever it is disrupting – today it was vaccination centres in Essex]’). Even when I was in college, a text would usually go around on snowy mornings early that I would read it before getting out of bed and looking outside.
I am not even certain that this is something that I miss, but it is something that is missing.
Anyway, I woke up this morning and it was snowing! But, of course, I knew that already.
Send me more of your good news!
Juding by some of the responses to Wednesday’s newsletter, I think I probably gave off the impression that overwhelmingly I feel, well, overwhelmed. (Which I do, of course. Don’t we all? But it comes and goes in waves.)
Anyway, I appreciated the updates and check-ins and the news of your vaccinations! Send me more?
A watch list
Considering the obscene number of hours that I spend watching TV and to a lesser extent movies, the fact that there hasn’t been a regular watch list component to this newsletter is a surprise to you and me both. Here are some things I have watched recently that I might recommend:
Superstore: A dumb, feel-good show about working at a Walmart with some zinger jokes about unionizing.
Afterlife: A sort-of dark, sometimes funny short series in which Ricky Gervais works through life after the premature death of his wife.
Back to Life: A less dark, more funny series about a woman reintegrating into life in her tiny English hometown after 18 years in prison. Sort of like Afterlife combined with a true crime pod.
Bling Empire: The best part is when one of the characters gives birth and after her baby is born is like ‘good thing I like [my baby], I can’t wait to take it home and put it in my Hermes handbag’, and then in another episode she wonders if her new baby is her mom reincarnated and muses, ‘I should really stop breastfeeding him if that’s the case.’ So anyway, goals?
Taskmaster: Comedians do dumb/weird tasks on camera and get judged. Have been told by my brother that I am “too British now” because I like this show and he “doesn’t get it”.
Tag: A movie about adult men who still play tag, which is actually very good and funny.
Here is something I don’t recommend, but if you have watched it can you message me so we can talk about how bad it was?
The Circle: A movie with Tom Hanks and Emma Watson about a fictional social media company that has some vague nefarious plans. This movie should have been good, but wasn’t at all??
I’ve been following
Some news threads I’ve been following this week:
Many are expecting more bad news about Armie Hammer to drop soon. He was outed as an abusive cannibal in January (read Hunter Harris’ piece on it). And a few days ago was dropped by his publicist and agency. Today, Anne Helen Peterson’s newsletter was about interrogating the power structures behind why he never quite made it as a big movie star, but also why he was able to keep getting chances.
Donald G. McNeil Jr., the health reporter at the New York Times and whose coverage of the pandemic I actually really appreciated, resigned after it came to light that he had said the n-word to a bunch of middle schoolers in 2019. Ugh.
Another NYT resignation! Andy Mills, the producer of Caliphate, is gone. After the news about Caliphate – you know that pod which was reported out by non-Arab speaking reporters and largely built on stereotypes of the Middle East that they did not choose to investigate enough to realise they were releasing a fabricated story – broke, the female reporter on the project was reassigned, but Mills was allowed to keep on keepin’ on. He even went on to host the Daily, the Times’ biggest audio platform, the Monday after the news broke while on that same Monday the Daily’s regular host popped into the long-dormant Caliphate feed to release an interview with Executive Editor Dean Baquet about everything that went wrong on the project. Anyway, following that, lots of stories started coming out about Mills, including that he once poured his beer on the head of a colleage at a bar (???) something he confirmed in his resignation letter (????). So he’s gone from the NYT now as well.
Reply All is doing a mini-series on Bon Appetit, and whew boy it is juicy.
Hilaria Baldwin, née Hillary Thomas, is back on social media. She’s spent the last month “listening, reflecting, and asking myself how I can learn and grow”. But she also says she was “raised with two cultures, American and Spanish, and I feel a true sense of belonging to both.” So ok lol – we still on this grift, y’all.
Some comedian on Twitter tweeted as a joke “as the creator of Emily in Paris can I just say.......why the fuck were we nominated for a Golden Globe LOL I made that show as a prank”, and some news sites published it as actual news, crediting her as the show’s creator.
Some food for thought
that’s it – happy Sunday evening & thanks for reading. this is the e. roohi weekly – a misnamed irregular newsletter sharing a collection of thoughts on how to exist thoughtfully in an increasingly thoughtless world + links to thinks I’ve been reading and/or cooking. if you found this newsletter via a link or someone forwarded it to you and you’ve enjoyed it and want to read more, I’d love it if you subscribed – and would love it if you wanted to recommend this newsletter to a friend.