Who are you your best self around?🤔
+ Glastonbury, a Russia update, & Mr Beast was invited to go on the Titan submarine 😟
First of all, I cannot put into words how overwhelmed I was with all of the love in response to Friday’s newsletter. Bel and I have been planning this move to Portugal in the dark hours of our days, having to hide the excitement of it all until we had enough of our ducks in a row and having all of you with us just makes it feel so REAL.
I can’t believe we get to do this together and I truly mean it when I say it is the greatest joy of my LIFE that none of us are alone in all of this. To use Bel’s words: we’re leaping and hoping the net will appear!
Now - as promised - these newsy’s are gonna go back to being a bit more ✨diaristic✨ coz that’s what you LOVE, so here’s a lil recap of a gorg, grass touching, unplugged weekend I just spent in Raglan with one of my besties xx
Hope you touched some grass this weekend, wanna give u all a forehead kiss!
Who do you like yourself best around?
Something big just happened in Russia - let’s talk about the Wagner sitch
Lewis and Lana at Glastonbury
Mr Beast was invited to go on the Titan submarine
Today’s mundane poll: do you say 'bye' in your text chains or are they just never ending?
Who do you like yourself best around?
As you read above, I had a gorge weekend with one of my besties this weekend, which consisted of not a lot of doing, but a lot of thinking. On the drive out to our lil cabin Lauv’s song “I like me better when I’m with you” came on, and it got us thinking - who do we like ourselves best around?
For me, this turned into a conversation about the different people I am with each of my friends, because as weird as it is, I feel like I really am different versions of me with all of them!!! For example (and I’ll use people you know) with Rubes I’m laughing and scheming and having the best times of my whole life, with Bel I’m the softest version of me I’ve ever been, with Liv I’m existential, a little bit cynical, but at my most creative, with Dunc I’m as ambitious and business-savvy as I’ll ever be, and with my family I swear they all see a version of me that I was at high school which is absolutely not who I am now.
My bestie who I was with had a different answer - she agrees that there’s no ‘best version of herself’ with a certain person, but as she’s grown up, learnt about her values, who she is, what she cares about, she feels like she now doesn’t change around anyone she’s with - she’s the same person around all of them. And this is so true for her, she’s one of the most constant and authentic people I know. But, at high school she said there were certain people who she may have felt ‘brought her out of her shell' etc, so maybe a few years ago she would have said them.
So I want to know from you - is there a person you like yourself best around? Do you have different of versions of you that different friends bring out? Or are you the same you with all of your loved ones? Comment below!!
Something big just happened in Russia - let’s talk about the Wagner sitch
As a newsy writer, you know when you wake up to almost half of all the stories on the BBC front page being about one thing you have to write about it - so today we’re talking about Russia.
Specifically, we’re talking about an apparent insurrection in Russia from a former ally - Yevgeniy Prigozhi - and the Russian mercenary fighters he leads.
Mercenary fighters = “hired professional soldiers who fight for any state or nation without regard to political interests or issues.”
“Prigozhin, whose fighters have taken part in brutal conflicts all over Africa and the Middle East—in Syria, Sudan, Libya, the Central African Republic—claims to command 25,000 men in Ukraine. In a statement yesterday afternoon, he accused the Russian army of killing “an enormous amount” of his mercenaries in a bombing raid on his base. Then he called for an armed rebellion, vowing to topple Russian military leaders.”
Who is Yevgeniy Prigozhi and why is this important?
Well, until now he’s been a fervent supporter of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and is in charge of the Russian private military contractor known as the Wagner Group.
And why is he fighting with Putin/ Russia now?
There have been ‘internal tensions’ between Prigozhi and Russian military leaders (Prigozhi thinks they’re incompetent) and he thinks that by refusing them ammunition, the military caused a bunch of his men to die in Ukraine.
“The dispute reached a boiling point Friday when Prigozhin accused Russian forces of conducting a strike on his fighters at an encampment in Ukraine.”
Yesterday, Prigozhi broke the official narrative and straight up blamed Russian leaders (and their oligarch friends) for the invasion of Ukraine.
But why?
“Maybe Prigozhin is collaborating with the Ukrainians, and this is all an elaborate plot to end the war. Maybe the Russian army really had been trying to put an end to Prigozhin’s operations, depriving his soldiers of weapons and ammunition. Maybe this is Prigozhin’s way of fighting not just for his job but for his life. Maybe Prigozhin, a convicted thief who lives by the moral code of Russia’s professional criminal caste, just feels dissed by the Russian military leadership and wants respect. And maybe, just maybe, he has good reason to believe that some Russian soldiers are willing to join him.”
Much, muuuuch more on this story in these two sources:
Lewis and Lana at Glastonbury
Glastonbury was this weekend, and I just wanted to talk about a couple of acts/ moments that I saw on TikTok.
Lewis Capaldi
The first was Lewis Capaldi, who melts my heart and is just so obviously going through it right now.
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He came on to a warm reception, but was disappointed as he lost his voice, and was struggling to keep his tics under control: "Glastonbury, I'm really sorry," he said. "I'm a bit annoyed with myself."
He mentioned that he’s taken some weeks off to look after his mental health, and that after this set he’ll be doing that again:
"I feel like I'll be taking another wee break over the next couple of weeks. So you probably won't see much of me for the rest of the year, maybe even.But when I do come back and when I do see you, I hope you're still up for watching us."
And then as his band played “Someone You Love” Lewis stayed mostly silent as the crowd sung their hearts out for him 🥺
"I genuinely dreamt of doing this," he said as he walked off. "If I never get to do it again, this has been enough."
Mental health in musicians is something we’ve talked about quite a lot on Culture Vulture so if you’re interested in learning a bit more, listen to the episode below!
Lana Del Rey
Lana Del Rey showed up 30 minutes late to her set because her “hair takes so long” which meant that they had to cut her set to meet the midnight curfew:
“I’m so fucking late they may cut my set,” she said shortly before the midnight curfew for Glastonbury’s two main stages. “I’m sorry, my hair takes so long. If they cut the power, let’s keep going.”
And keep going she did - after the lights and audio got cut, Lana “climbed down from the stage barefoot to sing an impromptu a cappella version of Summertime Sadness to fans close enough to be able to hear her.”
And then she conducted the crowd as they all sung ‘Video Games’ together.
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Mr Beast was invited to go on the Titan submarine
As we are all well and truly aware of by now, the Titan sub imploded, meaning there is nothing left of anyone on board. I personally have seen about a million TikTok’s explaining this to me, and have a newfound respect for James Cameron amidst all this - but that’s not what I’m here to talk to you about today. Apparently, someone else was invited to go on that expedition - none other than Mr Beast himself:
Freaky.
Today’s mundane poll:
See you on Wednesday or over on Close Friends angels xxx
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That Mr Beast tweet is a bit weird bc the blue bubble is for sent messages, not received - is he sharing a screenshot from the person who invited him or?
Setting off on my final chapter of this lifetime, I find I am primarily my weirdo self with everyone. However, there are a few people for whom I have to consciously trim back my love of cursing. Dude, that shit is HARD! (That's what she said) Anywho, maybe it's the luxury of walking this crazy spinning orb for 63 years, but I finally know who I am, unabashedly, and share her with the world. That said, I have besties from my long work career who are the same eternal 10-year-old as myself with whom I have the GREATEST time.