Happy pills & comfort-watch recs [Like You Know Whatever]

Hi darlings,

How are you? I’m doing… okay, I guess. I’ve got to be honest, I have been dreading writing this newsletter. Why? Well, I spent my whole last newsletter writing (rather glibly) about potentially moving to another country, in the wake of a mass shooting. Then I spent last week feeling depressed and helpless, once again, in the wake of another mass shooting. This time there were children involved, and I just truly had no words. I’m not a parent or a teacher, but that shit really affected me. It probably didn’t help that I was reading too much Twitter and getting bombarded with detailed information about the attack and the victims and the cops’ response for days. One time, during another tragedy, I saw a therapist tweet DO NOT TRY TO PROCESS THINGS ON TWITTER. I always forget not to do that. I don’t always self-parent well. Sometimes my self-parent gets fed up and goes out for cigarettes and doesn’t come back for, like, four days, and by then I’m eating candy like a feral child and my hair is dirty and I have no clean laundry left.

Sometimes people tell me they want me to write more about current events here, and I’m always hesitant to do that. I’m not very good at topical satire, and I’m not a political comedian. And that is ultimately what this is supposed to be: a comedic diversion. I’m certainly not a serious, academic person like a New Yorker columnist or a CNN correspondent, or even the kind of person who would be a guest on an NPR podcast, probably. I watch too much reality TV and spend too much money on clothes and drink too many Diet Cokes. And more importantly, while I always have lots of opinions, I don’t always have an immediate “take” on things that I would feel comfortable publishing. (Although, I honestly don’t know what “take” you could have on a bunch of murdered children besides: gun reform NOW.)

But even so, there are times when tragic events happen and it feels like not addressing them when I have a platform to do so would be disrespectful and Pollyanna-y. So, please consider this me acknowledging how fucked up my country is without leaning too far into the despair that I feel and getting sucked into the quicksand of my chronic depression. I am sorry that it mostly was me rambling about myself and my personal failures for the past two paragraphs. I do not know any other way to do it and still be authentic to what this newsletter is: a frivolous, somewhat navel-gazing email from your mentally ill friend that hopefully brightens up your day a bit.

I may be moving on in what I write about, but I’m not moving on in what I care about. What breaks my heart is that we could have prevented this. Other countries let these shootings happen ONCE, and then they make sweeping changes. We let this happen over, and over, and over again. I’m so fucking fed up. I’m ready to try anything. They say this is about mental health: fuck it, fine. Let’s pass the biggest mental health reform we’ve ever had, then. There’s a big correlation between domestic violence and mass shootings: let’s address that in a meaningful way. I want to tighten up the guns, but if we can’t do that (and I don’t really believe we can’t do that), let’s at least try something else. Because we’ve already tried it their way, the “good guy with a gun” way, and it didn’t do shit. We cannot allow a political party to continue their blood sacrifice of this nation’s children purely for political gain.

Jesus fucking Christ, do you see what I mean? How am I supposed to transition from that into talking about The Circle? This is why I normally stick to pop culture.

Alright, time for some Recommendations:

• Stranger Things season 4. I’m currently in the middle of this, so no spoilies, please!! I am loving this new season of Stranger Things. Yeah, the kids are old as fuck now, but who cares? You’re saying you want the kids to look younger? That’s a little creepy, man. I’ve found reuniting with these characters to be extremely comforting, and I will miss them a lot when this (two-part) season is over.And I want to take a moment to shout out actor/comedian Brett Gelman, who plays Murray. I always like to support anything he’s in because I have a long memory and I remember when he cut ties with Adult Swim in 2016 when it came out how misogynistic they were. He put his money where his mouth was at a time when he actually had something to lose; they had recently produced three of his comedy specials and he’d voiced a character on one of their shows. Basically, they were offering him a platform and giving him work, and he gave that up to stand with women — and he’s not such a big name that he wouldn’t feel the impact of that loss. I don’t recall any other comedians taking a stand like that. It feels like all day every day we hear about the bad men in entertainment, so I wanted to remind y’all of a good one.

• The Lost City. Man, I love a good action-comedy, and they make so few of them! This was a real treat. How can you not root for the romantic combo of Channing Tatum and Sandra Bullock? And Daniel Radcliffe was such a fun choice for the villain. Also, Brad Pitt must have it in his contract at this point that he must be chewing whenever his character is introduced, because he certainly was. This was totally worth the rental fee!

• RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars 7. I had some hesitancy about this new, all-winners season of All Stars, because I kind of felt like the contestants have all already had their moments, and we’ve seen them all compete before – sometimes multiple times! I generally enjoy the regular seasons of Drag Race more than All Stars anyway, because the queens seem to have more of a fire under their asses to win. All that said… I was absolutely wrong, and this season of All Stars has been FANTASTIC so far! It’s been a dream to get to see so many talented queens face off against each other, and the competition is no less fierce for the fact that they’re all already winners. A perfect example of this was episode 2, in which they played the infamous Snatch Game. A lot of queens historically have struggled with this challenge, which requires them to impersonate celebrities. I get it: not every queen is a comedy queen, and even if you are one, impersonations are a very specific skill. I’m telling you, this was probably the best Snatch Game I’ve ever seen. After this fucking week, I can’t tell you how I needed those laughs. I’ve been a fan of Jinkx Monsoon for a while now, but what she did in this episode was nothing short of masterful. And there were so many other strong contenders: Raja as the puppet Madame (how the fuck did those facial prosthetics even work?!), Trinity as Leslie Jordan, Jaida’s charmingly inept Prince. I will be honest, it’s been a huge pain in the ass to get Paramount+ on my TV, but it was worth it for this episode alone. Can’t wait to watch the rest of the season!

• Selling Sunset season 5. What a weird season! Did you all feel that way?? It was strange and a bit of a bummer to see how much of it revolved around Chrishell and Jason’s relationship, when we knew before the season even started that it had already ended. I’ve said this before, but I feel like every season of Selling Sunset, the cast buys into a group delusion. Last season, it was that having a baby would make Christine nicer; this season, it was that Chrishell had “changed” Jason and made him want to settle down. People are who they are, man. You’ve either got to accept them as they are or keep it moving. Wait, I’m sorry, I forgot for a moment that I was writing about a vapid reality show and thought I was beginning an exciting new chapter of my career as an amateur life coach. Ignore me.

• The Circle season 5. I could watch 100 seasons of The Circle before I tire of it. The producers are fantastic at coming up with new twists to the game every season to keep it entertaining, and I’m 100% on board. This season included an appearance from two of the Spice Girls, which was fascinating because it brought up so many questions for me, like: does Gen Z know who the Spice Girls are? (Kind of.) How old are the Spice Girls now? (In their late 40s, and they look damn good.) How much do I even remember about the Spice Girls? (Very little, as it turns out – they play Spice Girls trivia on the show and I flunked it.) My favorite players this season were Frank and Rachel! Tell me your favorites!

• Heartstopper. I read a good amount of YA, and these graphic novels with a British boy-meets-boy love story have been in my Goodreads recommendations a ton of times, but I’ve never ponied up and ordered them. That just changed, because I LOVED the Netflix adaptation of this series! It does a great job of capturing the feeling of young love, and it makes my heart feel squishy and gives me butterflies. I dig it. This was a great comfort-watch after the events of the past week. After I finished the series, I flew through the graphic novels (as ebooks), and while they are as sweet and delightful as the series, I think I actually like the series more! Can’t wait to see how the series adapts some of the upcoming plot points from the novels. 👀

• Ivy City Co.’s Whimsical Dress. Once again Instagram got me to buy something through their infernal ads. Most of my IG ads are for cellulite cream and bras, neither of which are very convincing to me, so when an actual outfit pops up, I sometimes get suckered in. I’m pleased to say that at least this dress is well-made, which it should be, considering the price. I bought it in black, and it is absolutely beautiful in person and soo comfy. I don’t generally think of myself as a girly girl, but biiiiiitch, I love me some layered tulle. I’m planning on wearing it to an NYC wedding I’ll be attending in October. Another thing I love: the dress comes in sizes XXS - 3X. I’ve been actively trying to be more size-inclusive when I recommend clothing items here, because it sucks when I’m all, “Wow, that skirt’s so cute! It doesn’t come in my size though :( I guess I don’t exist to this brand :(:(:(”

• Cooking. For Memorial Day weekend, all I wanted to do was online-shop some sales, cook a lot of food, and drink some beer. I’m proud to say that I accomplished all of these lofty goals. As far as making food, I didn’t feel like anything fancy, just some hot dogs and picnic sides. I made my caprese tortellini salad (recipe here!), which is redonkulously easy, and an herby or “French”-style potato salad with fresh dill and chives and garlic-lemon-dijon dressing (here’s a decent recipe). I don’t like mayo-based “salads” because I find they’re usually soggy and overloaded with mayo and that makes me gag. Because of this, when I was vegetarian, sometimes I would go to a barbecue and the only things I could eat were hot dog buns and potato chips (I would usually end up getting drunk very quickly because of this).I also made a roast chicken last week using these two recipes. I actually think my favorite part was the vegetables that got roasted in the pan drippings – MMM. Chicken-y. I don’t have any taco updates, as I just did some reruns this week with more crispy fish tacos & Korean beef tacos. I’m still/always looking for new taco recipes, if you have any! Hit reply or leave them in the comments, please.

• Upping my medication. Consider this your sign to speak to your doctor if you’re struggling right now. I’m serious!!! Most insurance companies have telehealth options now if you, like me, are too lazy to go into an office. Let me tell you a story. For months upon months I have been sleeping far too much. I’m talking easily 10 hours a night during the week, and on the weekends, I could put in up to 12. Sometimes on a Sunday I would sleep for 10 hours, then take a two-hour nap in the afternoon. It was ridiculous. But since I am a childfree adult with somewhat limited responsibilities (woo!), it didn’t actually impact my life all that much, so I ignored it for a long time. Plus, during the early pandemic when we were stuck at home so much, I wanted the escape of sleep, so I started going to bed at like 9pm, and then I just kind of got used to it.I didn’t address this with my psychiatrist until last week, when I finally said, “hey, I think I sleep too much.” He asked me if I was having problems with “motivation” as well, and I thought of the dread I feel whenever it’s time to wash my hair, and how loading the dishwasher makes me feel like Paul Rudd in Wet Hot American Summer, and I had to admit that yeah… it’s not great. He upped my Wellbutrin, and already it has made such a difference. I can stay up later, I sleep better when I do go to bed (through the entire night!!!), and I find I don’t have to dragggg myself to do things as much.I’ve been on anti-anxiety and anti-depressant meds for five years now, and they have been a huge game-changer in my life. So why am I still so resistant to just allowing medication to do its job? I still somewhat internalize the idea that the best way to be is to not be on anything; or, if I have to be on something, to be on as little of it as possible. And this is from someone who has done recreational substances before! How do I square that? I don’t fucking know, but that’s the way my brain works sometimes.Except, the whole point here is that my brain doesn’t work, not like other people’s do, anyway. I guess I am also hesitant to switch up my medication routine because finding the right med cocktail always comes down to trial and error, and I don’t like the idea of playing around with my brain chemistry like that. Isn’t it stupid that that’s the best psychiatry can offer? “I dunno, try this and report back I guess.” It feels so unscientific. You should be able to, like, take a blood test or something that can tell you what you should be taking and in what dosage. Stupid. Anyway, even though psychiatry has a long way to go, it has also dramatically improved my quality of life, so why not try some pills if you think you need them? It’s very glamorous! Just ask Jacqueline Susann!

Okay friends, that’s it from me this week. I hope my opening wasn’t too much of a bummer, and I hope my closer wasn’t too pharmaceutical! That’s just where my life is right now!

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Until next time—dig into the comfort-watches.

Love,

Liz

XOXO