Hi friends!

How are you?? I am doing pretty well, since I am writing this over a holiday weekend in the US. Memorial Day here means that summer has officially begun, and in the immortal words of Kyle Cooke, summer should be fun. (Amanda? Not fun!) Last week, my husband Ross and I were briefly in NYC for a wedding, and then in NJ to visit my parents. It’s incredible how I managed to take almost a full week of PTO and come back more tired than ever, but that’s New York City for ya, baby!! I wouldn’t have it any other way.

The wedding was beautiful and so much fun, a true Brooklyn wedding full of personal touches from two very cool friends. I was honored to be included. I got to catch up with a lot of people I haven’t seen in a long time, and even meet some new ones.

However, a bleak trend emerged as I talked with the party guests, most of whom were Millennials, about what we’re all doing for work these days. It feels like the two options lately are either sell your soul or starve. Everyone’s company is pushing AI down their throats. Everyone’s getting forced back to the office. Everyone’s experiencing layoffs. People who have jobs at all feel like they ought to be grateful for them, even if they suck.

A few days later, while answering questions about my job over dinner at an Applebee’s in New Jersey, my dad asked me, “What do you aspire to?” As a social media-averse Boomer, he has very little understanding of what I do aside from my job title (although to be fair, strategy work in branded content is something I struggle to explain even to people my own age, who know what YouTube is). Somehow, I managed to change the subject, because I didn’t want to worry him by telling him that truthfully, right now, my main aspiration is just staying employed. It infuriates me that it feels like all CEOs know how to do these days is lay people off. If we’re going to continue to exist in a capitalist society, people need jobs. We used to give corporations so much credit just for being job creators, and they don’t even do that anymore.

During that conversation, my dad also asked me, “So, has your career path gone pretty much the way you expected it to?” and I burst out laughing. I mean, does anyone’s?? I thought that was just life, but maybe it’s not for some people. I don’t think most Boomers really grasp the career challenges Millennials have had to face, but my dad in particular has always struggled to understand what I want to do with my life. Anyone who really knows me knows that my ambition has been the same since I was five years old, to be a writer, but making money has had to be a different thing. But I don’t think my dad even understands creativity as a goal. One time we were talking about writing and he said I should go into technical writing, and write instruction manuals for microwaves. Like, bless his heart, but explaining to people how to use the popcorn setting is not the dream, babe.

A few months ago, I had a call with him and my mom while they were cleaning out my childhood home in preparation for moving into a retirement community. They had found some old schoolwork of mine in the attic and were asking what to do with it. “Yeah, we saved it thinking that you might be a famous writer some day and it could be worth something, but you’re almost 40 and that hasn’t really happened, so…” Nobody like your parents to sink the hot knife of failure into your heart, am I right? I told them to throw it out. Truthfully, I can’t think of a single contemporary writer whose second grade homework would be worth any money. But yeah, it didn’t feel awesome.

But don’t worry, everyone, it’s all going to work out, because Spencer Pratt is going to become Mayor of Los Angeles and blow the entire city budget on crystals, raising our collective frequency so we can all reach enlightenment!!!

In all seriousness, if you live in Los Angeles, please make sure you get out and vote by June 2nd, ideally for Nithya Raman, but certainly not for Spencer. He’s a closet MAGA Republican and an idiot, and the last thing this city needs is someone with zero experience in public service and a history of terrible money management, who wants to comply with ICE and bow down to Donald Trump. There are too many vulnerable populations at risk in this city to fuck around, not to mention whoever we elect as mayor now is going to be responsible for pulling off the Olympics in 2028. Spencer has only ever served his own interests, as those of us OG reality TV fans know. He would be an absolute disaster as mayor.

I think he’s gotten this far because he’s been so critical of our current mayor Karen Bass, who nobody is really crazy about, and because he lost his home in the Palisades fires last year, that gives him some legitimacy in his grievances. But we have got to start teaching people that just because you like when someone is critical of a politician, it does not mean that they have all the answers, or the experience to take their place. He’s also being propped up by out-of-state donations, though I know there are also plenty of wealthy people in L.A. who would probably be red hat MAGA Republicans if it weren’t social suicide in this city. Rich people love to vote for whoever is going to continue to line their pockets, but I have to say, I don’t think Spencer is a safe bet for them. Let me repeat one more time: THE MAN IS NOT GOOD WITH MONEY. He spent millions in 2012 because he believed the Mayan apocalypse was for sure happening. I am 100% certain he would end up embezzling or misappropriating city funds.

Truly, all you New Yorkers don’t know how lucky you are to have Mamdani!!! But enough election anxiety, let’s get into a few things:

- Hot take: don’t include me in Mother’s Day. Hear me out! It was recently Mother’s Day here in the US, and every year, people like to post those images that are like, “Happy Mother’s Day to:...” that are trying to be super inclusive and list all these different groups like “Single moms” or “People who have lost their moms,” etc. That’s all very nice, but I’ve noticed that more and more, these kinds of posts also include “pet moms,” and as a cat mom, I simply don’t need that. I also recently saw a post that was like, “There should be a holiday for childfree aunts!” and as a childfree aunt myself, I disagree with that, too. We don’t need a holiday to recognize a lifestyle choice that is already awesome. I love my cat, but taking care of her is not nearly as all-consuming as motherhood. When I was at that wedding recently, I spoke to a mom who was spending a rare kid-free weekend in the city with her husband. “We had the best day,” she said, and the utter rapture on her face as she described sleeping in until 9:30am and getting to sit quietly at a cafe for an hour and have a coffee… yeah, that woman definitely deserves a holiday!! Hell, give moms a whole week off!

- Widow’s Bay, season one (Apple TV). I’m obsessed with this show!! It’s a true horror comedy, set on a mysterious island in New England where spooky things have been happening for centuries. The show follows the island’s mayor (Matthew Rhys), who is trying to turn it into a tourist destination, and the locals, who are resistant to change. The impressive thing about this show is how it manages to be both incredibly funny and legitimately scary in every episode. It’s just so well done! I know people have different thresholds for scariness, but I’ve heard even people who don’t normally like horror say that the comedy in this show balances out the scary parts for them. It’s also a real who’s who of comedic actors–Jeff Hiller, Stephen Root, and Chris Fleming are just a few of the people who have made appearances so far. Also, one of the showrunners is Katie Dippold, known for her famous Babadook tweet, which is just perfection.

- Euphoria, season three (HBO Max). I’ll be honest, when I originally heard that they were making another season of Euphoria, I really wondered why. Sweet Angus Cloud had passed, Zendaya was not going to be involved, and it certainly seemed like Jacob Elordi and Sydney Sweeney had moved on in their careers. The characters were not even going to be in high school anymore. Plus, did we really need to be encouraging Sam Levinson and his pervy little male gaze?

That said, I decided to give this season a chance anyway, and I’ve actually been enjoying it more than I thought I would. I have to admit that the wedding episode was fantastic television. I wish they were giving Hunter Schafer a bit more to do, and it feels like Jacob Elordi was filming scenes on his lunch breaks between other projects, but Zendaya is amazing, and I like what they’re doing with Sydney Sweeney’s character. My main complaint is that it doesn’t feel like a final season. As of writing this, I’ve seen six episodes of the eight to be released, and it does not feel like we’re wrapping things up with these characters at all. If you’ve been watching this season, what do you think?

- Top Chef, season 23 (Bravo, Peacock). This season takes place in the Carolinas, and I’m sorry to say that I think it’s one of the weakest seasons I’ve seen. Top Chef is a show that has historically been really good at highlighting what’s unique or interesting about the cuisine of even lesser known parts of North America. They made a meal out of Wisconsin two seasons ago, for example*. Again, I’m sorry to say it, but they have not made North and South Carolina seem very compelling. And I don’t think that’s necessarily the Carolinas’ fault! I think that after so many seasons, they just might be in a rut.

The way they’ve been designing the challenges is odd. It’s very “hat on a hat.” For example, to make Restaurant Wars even harder, they made the contestants do takeout orders this time (in addition to full service). Even putting aside that Restaurant Wars is already one of the most difficult and beloved challenges on the show and doesn’t need an add-on… there’s nothing exciting about watching chefs box up to-go orders. Most of them work in restaurants that are too fancy to do takeout, so it’s not like it’s some huge sign of a great chef or something. Ross said he thought the producers were thinking, “Oh, everyone loves the takeout episode of The Bear, let’s get them to do that,” but instead of descending into chaos, everyone just seemed mildly annoyed.

The product placement has also been especially bad this season, and it makes me worry a little about what’s going on with the show’s financials, that they need to jam a different product into every scene. The one bright spot is that Tom Colicchio seems extra grumpy every time he sits down to eat, which has been very funny. I heard that he’s on a GLP-1 now, and I think he’s been letting his blood sugar get too low. The other day he was absolutely seething at the table because two people served rice dishes in the same challenge, but then he calmed down and regulated by judges’ table time. Grumpy Tom is very funny and endearing to me.

*No offense intended to any Wisconsinites! I just don’t think your food culture is very well known outside of the Midwest. I personally learned a ton from that season and loved it. Maybe they need to revisit the Midwest?

- Cooking. I made the most incredible pasta from an Ina Garten recipe a few weeks back that turned out to be both a win and a fail. A win, because it tasted amazing, and a fail, because we ended up eating it at nine o’clock at night, as I’d severely underestimated how long it would take me to make. I’m talking about pasta alla vecchia bettola. It’s basically a vodka sauce, except you slow roast the tomato base in the oven for an hour and a half, and the flavors get super concentrated. I was on board as soon as I read the recipe and saw it describe the tomatoes as “jammy.” 🤤  Then, you blend the sauce and add cream, parmesan, and fresh oregano, and toss it with pasta. It was probably the best thing I’ve made all year. Also: vegetarian! Just please note that that recipe makes a LOT of sauce, way more than is needed for the pound of pasta recommended in the recipe, so you’ll have some extra.

Other than that, I haven’t been making anything too exciting! I’m looking forward to trying some new recipes soon though, especially now that summer produce is starting to be available.

Welp, that’s it for now, my loves!

If you have a second, I’d love it if you’d like or comment on this post–just click this link to go to the post page. This post is public, so feel free to share it on social media, or forward it to a friend.

Until next time—please please vote smartly, Los Angeles!!

Love,

Liz

XOXO