Let's call it a day?
Since we last spoke, Anna Wintour was shook to her core when she asked for a photo ID by a vaccine compliance worker outside a Broadway show, Jack Harlow released an album I'm not allowed to like, and Deux Moi announced that HBO Max will produce a show based on their life.
Meanwhile, I'm hungover AF and I'm not going to proofread this because I have a 9:45am that I need to put concealer on for.
I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
Rant of the week.
It’s fair to say that we’re all kind of over the prestige scammer genre. It was fun to do the Inventing Anna voice on TikTok and we know Amanda Seyfried is hunting for that Dropout Emmy, but by the time Bad Vegan rolled around we were ready to call it a day.
However comma, I still love watching people lie, even if I don’t need it packaged as an awards season miniseries. I talked about The Circle last week (which I’m no lie applying for the next season of because I need to play that game), but in no special order, here’s a list of some of my favorite lie-based reality shows:
Bullshit (Netflix): This is brand new and I watched the whole thing in a weekend. The show follows a Who Wants to be a Millionaire layout, where one contestant is on the hot seat facing obscure multiple choice questions. He locks in his answer, and then has to convince a panel of three jurors that Shanghai is the rainiest city in the world, and he knows that because his girlfriend studied abroad there and when he visited her it rained the whole weekend. That’s the level of detail these people give to back up their answers, and it’s so fun to try to be your own polygraph.
Survivor (CBS): Everybody needs to be watching Survivor. If you’re not watching it because you think people wearing bandanas and marching around with torches is stupid, you’re mistaken. It’s 40+ seasons of riveting, non-stop manipulation. It’s kinda like how the best part of the Bachelor franchise is analyzing the social dynamics and game strategy of the contestants, but on Survivor that’s the whole show and you don’t have to listen to disquieting kissing sounds.
The Hustler (ABC): This is the dumbest out of all the ones I’m recommending and I think it was recently canceled, but it’s sort of like if Mafia or Among Us was a game show. I’m not even going to really try to explain it because it’s too confusing, but the main takeaway is trying to convince a group of people that your idea is their idea, the same way you get anything done in corporate America.
LOSING SLEEP
The wormholes keeping me up at night.
Remember when we were all obsessed with Clubhouse for the length of an Abercrombie skirt? There’s a new app slowly climbing up the social media power rankings called BeReal, which I courageously test drove this past week.
I’d liken it most to SnapChat, in that the content is somewhat ephemeral in nature and is reserved for your closer friends, versus your Instagram collection of homies, colleagues, and bitches from dive bar bathrooms.
The basic premise is that every day, the app chooses a random time to notify you to make a post. You’re then given a two-minute window to frantically capture a semi-decent photo of whatever it is you’re up to during that time — editing an Excel sheet, cooking a stir fry, blowing your boyfriend…..I mean they said be real, right?!
The catch is that you’re also required to simultaneously post a selfie from your front camera - you can’t see what you’re doing, like when we used to take selfies at the mall with our hot pink Nikon Coolpix cameras. I’d hazard a guess that even the Hailey Biebers of the selfie world would be humbled by this process.
Once you post, you’re able to unlock access to your friends’ posts – this means no non-posting lurking, like you might on your ex’s Venmo feed. The app’s ambition is to create a low pressure, low time commitment, and uncurated social platform that isn’t overwrought with poolside posts from Aritzia ambassadors that make you want to stick a toothbrush down your throat.
It’s kind of fun right now because of how small it is — you feel like you’re getting exclusive content from your friends that’s just for the inner circle, like even more than the close friends story on IG. This also incentivizes engagement, because there’s way less to sift through and there isn’t any pressure to come up with a funny or meaningful comment.
Maybe I’m in the wrong crowd, but I haven’t really seen this catch on in the corporate NYC baddie realm yet. It kinda reminds me of YikYak, where it makes sense as a popular app in high schools or college campuses, since people are sharing a campus/city and usually with their friends versus sitting alone making slide decks in their studio apartments.
In an act of good faith, I’m memorializing some of my awful takes below so you can get a sense of the UX.
COLOR ME INFLUENCED
Credit card debt intensifies.
In the spirit of transparency, I'm a little insecure about writing this section today because my friend and esteemed NYT illustrator told me that I've been covering a lot of food news, so much so that when I rename this franchise it could have a food-themed title. Food just isn't my primary beat, so I'm semi-reluctant to share my reviews of Starbucks' new menu items, but to quote Drake, my haters are my greatest motivators.
Chocolate Cream Cold Brew: This sort of tastes like if Milk Duds were a drink. The chocolate cold foam is malty and comes on really strong, but the drink was kind of one-note for me. I also halved the amount of vanilla syrup because there was already going to be so much sweetness from the chocolate. I wouldn't order this again, but I wouldn't be mad if someone gave me a free one. I still maintain that the discontinued Coconut Cold Brew was the best seasonal cold brew flavor of all time, and a way more elevated spring/summer flavor than this chocolate milk concoction.
Lime-Frosted Coconut Bar: Speaking of coconut, I tried this new bakery item like an hour ago this morning. As previously stated, I am hungover and unwell, and historically I don't eat sweets because I'd rather get my calories from vodka, but I'm so committed to my craft that I had two bites of this just so I could bring my dedicated fans a review. I hate to say it, but it's delicious. But it's tiny and at $3.85, it's almost a dollar more than the cookie and pricier than the scone, which I would argue are more substantial/shareable items.
CHEERS TO THE FRICKEN PREKEND
"What the fuck is a prekend?"
Watching: Ziwe S2 (Showtime)
Reading: Sophie Turners' Cut Profile
Listening: Some Calm App rainforest bullshit to deal with my anger management.
