Pyjama (or pajama) DRAMA
Mōrena lil shits!!
Happy Friday (or potentially Thursday) my angels!!! I know a bunch of you love hearing recommendations from the newsletter (I’m gonna start doing way more if you’re a paying subscriber) but I thought I’d tell you about a book I’ve just finished reading called ‘Prep” by Curtis Sittenfeld. It’s based on Lee - a young girl from the Midwest - who goes to a preppy boarding school on a scholarship (think: Wild Child). Honestly, this book was SO good, and such a relaxing read (nothing traumatic/ shocking happens, so quite good if you struggle with anxiety and want a comfy read!) Actually, it’s one of those books where nothing really happens - but it captures the high school experience SO well (Lee’s inner monologue could literally have been exactly what I was thinking during high school) and I just love the way Lee thinks about people and situations. So, if you spend quite a bit of time in your head (and wanna see it reflected in print) you should add this to the list!
On that note… I really miss the SYSCA book club (and Shit You Should Read About is such a great name) so maybe 2022 is the year we bring it back besties - would you be keen?
Have the BEST weekend xxxx
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In today’s newsletter:
Biden’s One Year Anniversary
Instagram Influencers Are Cloning Their Pets to Keep Churning Out Content After They Die
Who the fuck writes all these horoscopes?
A new episode of The Shit Show!
Thank you for your condolences about Harry Styles
Pyjama Drama
Biden’s One Year Anniversary
It has now been one year since Joe Biden started doing what feels to me like the worst job in the entire world. He probs feels the same.
Some good stuff happened, like:
He reversed a bunch of Trump’s stupid Executive Orders
They signed a $1.9 trillion economic relief plan
And a $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill
Some dogs came to the white house
And some… other stuff happened, like:
Covid-19 really just made itself at home and 40% of the population still isn’t vaccinated
The US pulled out of Afghanistan and it fell back into the hands of the Taliban
Student loans weren’t cancelled
The US is facing some preeeeetty bad inflation rn (the highest in 30 years)
Not much has changed in terms of racial justice (despite America's huge 2020 reckoning)
Here are some numbers (via CBS):
6.4 million jobs added
5 countries visited (United Kingdom, Belgium, Switzerland, Vatican City, Italy)
26 weekends in Delaware
451,475 Covid deaths in 2021 (285,453 in 2020)
77 executive orders signed
1.7 million migrant apprehensions (detainments) at the southern border
11,414 refugees admitted
I’ll admit that I haven’t been following US politics very much at all over the past year (I think I got massively Trump-ed out and have struggled to go back there) but that’s just a wee update for ya!
A NEW EPISODE OF THE SHIT SHOW
Tonga, Ukraine, Teddy Bears, Cryptobros, & Hamsters - The Shit Show — open.spotify.com
As you can tell by the title we cover an ARRAY of topics today - from Prince Andrews teddy bear obsession to Russia maybe trying to invade Ukraine??? We have a volcanic eruption in Tonga, another silly purchase by a bunch of cryptobros, our fave trainspotter becoming a model, and some lovely comments from some Joe Rogan fans too.
Instagram Influencers Are Cloning Their Pets to Keep Churning Out Content After They Die
What in the 2021 is THIS???? Instagram influencers - animal influencers in particular - are literally cloning their pets - often to ensure that they can continue to make content after their original pet has died. Naturally, I wanted to find out how the hell this actually works and it turns out there are actually a bunch of ‘pet cloning’ companies - like Viagen, whose homepage reads: “The worldwide leader in cloning the animals we love.”
According to Viagen, a cloned animal is “simply an identical twin of the donor pet that is born at a later date. A cloned cat or dog shares the exact genetic identity of the donor pet–just as naturally occurring identical twins share the exact same genes.”
Here’s a little video on how it all works (it’s actually really interesting and easy to understand):
And it’s not cheap - at Viagen, dog cloning is $50,000USD, cat cloning is $35,000USD and horse cloning is $85,000USD.
So that’s been a super interesting rabbit hole to go down this morning. It still doesn’t sit right with me if you’re an influencer who’s cloning their animals just so you can continue to make money from them though…
Anyway here’s Clash of The Clones and Baxter the Clone if you’re interested in seeing some real-life case studies.
Who the fuck writes all these horoscopes?
(This is a segment I wrote last year, but I wanted to reshare it because there are so many new pals here!)
So, I’ve noticed that a bunch of you love reading the horoscopes I chuck in here, and it really got me thinking… who is actually writing them? Who’s qualified to? Well! Professional astrologers - that’s who. But, as it turns out, despite our growing desire to be told our future in a nice vague paragraph each week, business, kinda sucks for horoscope writers at the mo (actually it started sucking back in 2012), as noted by professional astrologer, Nikki Harper, here.
Basically, with the boom of “pop astrology” or ‘Urban Outfitters astrology’ horoscope writing became at once more commercialised and less valued. It’s now being passed to that junior writer who’s had a half-day of training, or people are just heading to apps like co-star (you should read about the rise of pop astrology here.) And naturally, this pisses off professional astrologers. This is also despite the “mystical services” industry being apparently now worth upwards of $2.1 billion... so there’s definitely some money to be spent on professionals.
But Harper, like other career astrologists, doesn’t really defend those one paragraph horoscope columns either, because they’re just ‘sun sign’ horoscopes (duh):
“You see, as a professional astrologer. I know better than anyone that sun sign horoscopes are by their very nature generalisations at best and at worst a load of tosh.”
This is echoed in this great piece in Refinery 29:
“Since most horoscopes are based solely on your sun sign, they focus exclusively on the position of the sun at the time of your birth, while a full birth chart reading examines the positioning of the sun, moon, houses, planets, and more. That sort of analysis is way more specific, and can’t be communicated in a paragraph.”
All of this to say, yes they’re really enjoyable to consume, but you gotta pay creators for their work!! If you want a professional astrologer analysing a birth chart and giving you beautifully tailored horoscopes - pay them!! Otherwise, have fun with your vague, sun-sign horoscope.
If this really sparks your interest, here are a few more links:
Have we hit peak astrology?
People are timing their pregnancies to get specific star signs
And you didn’t think I’d do a whole section on horoscopes without giving you yours, did you?? Who do you think I am? You can see your horoscope (written by long time professional astrologers, the AstroTwins) HERE.
Harry Styles cancelled his NZ/AUS tour
I’m not holding it against you Harry but what the fuck is UP?!?!?!!? Personally, I missed out on tickets to this - but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel for all my besties that were holding out hope!!
I also saw this comment on a radio station’s Facebook post about the shows being cancelled and honestly - I love THIS SO MUCH. Imagine being a media company that’s known for your love for Harry Styles. What a REP to have!
Live Nation NZ also commented this - so maybe all is not lost!
PS if someone wants to tee up an interview between me & harry/ help me get some tickets when he eventually comes, that would be fab (or I can just pick him up from the airport? I’m easy.)
Pyjama Drama
Yesterday I was SHOCKED to see that only 24% of you keep your PJ’s under your pillow. I THOUGHT THIS WAS A UNIVERSAL THING THAT EVERYONE DID? Where are the rest of you keeping them? I genuinely can’t believe it. And FURTHER to this - as I was writing up the mundane poll I was spelling it ‘pYjamas’ but when I went to find some pictures, google kept calling them ‘pAjamas???’ Obviously there are a lot of things that are spelt differently using the Queen’s English vs American English but I had NEVER noticed this one before. Anyway
52% of you say pyjamas, and
48% of you say pajamas
Damn, these mundane polls never fail to teach me something new. I’m also loving all the photos of you doing them in your office/classrooms - glad I can provide some conversation to fill your lunch breaks xxxxx
Teen pilot Zara Rutherford becomes youngest woman to fly the world solo
Someone DM'ed me this RIGHT before the newsletter was about to be sent and it's too good not to include!! Zara Rutherford is only 19 and is the youngest woman to fly around the world solo. If that ain't girlbossing then IDK what is???
The world this week, wrapped up for you! (The Shit Show)
Netflix is making a Chicken Run sequel??? “I don’t want to be a pie!” (The Verge)
Ghosting on this Gen Z dating app will literally make you invisible (FastCompany)
Speaking of ghosting, have you heard of West Elm Caleb? (Dexerto)
Facebook and Instagram are reportedly exploring plans to make, showcase, and sell NFTs (The Verge)
MY CARTMAN IMPRESSION (The Shit Show)
THE ERA OF SELF-DEPRECATION IS OVER. IT’S GOD COMPLEX TIME (Mel)
How the Kardashians successfully distracted us from Astroworld (Culture Vulture)
You can listen to us talk about all things pop culture on Culture Vulture, about THE WORLD on The Shit Show or watch us explain the internet on Extremely Online.
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