Things that grabbed my attention
We Do Not Care is a movement started by Just Being Melani for women going through perimenopause and menopause and while I DO care about everything, including things I shouldn’t care about, I can hard relate to every one of the things she says - for instance “We do not care about how long it takes to put the receipt back inner pocket book after paying for our groceries. Your turn starts when we are finished, don’t rush us” and “we do not care if there are fingerprints on our glasses, we can still see”. Actually just watch all of her videos - they will make you feel seen
The other day my husband insisted on playing a podcast out loud. I prepared to listen to something very funny, because why else would he want to play it for me rather than sending it to me to listen later? But it wasn’t funny at all. The bit he played me was about god and the tenets of religion and the two people in conversation seemed earnest but smart, the woman in particular spoke expressively and intelligently, emphasising some points and making space for thought between others.
I don’t have a very long attention span and my feelings about god are set in stone and my husband knows this, so why make me listen? The conversation, he pointed out , was between a human and ChatGPT. There is only one person in the interview the other is AI. 🤯 I promise you there is no way on earth you can tell she is a large language model, it’s almost frightening.
Later I listened to the beginning of the podcast and in context the whole thing is really interesting and almost hopeful rather than scary. The episode is over two hours long so very much a tech-bro kind of podcast but the ten minutes at the top is fascinating. Listen to it here
I made this soup and everybody loved it. Have to admit to doing that thing I hate when other people do - like change the whole recipe and complain when it isn’t right. Except I changed it and never complained. (I used pumpkin instead of celeriac and I added three heaped teaspoons of stock power and a tablespoon of sugar and possibly more cream than Nagi suggested.
In news that makes me feel 98, I read about Jaz Smith’s wedding in too many place. I didn’t even know who she was but suddenly her wedding was coming up everywhere. Turns out she’s a New York influencer and when I say her wedding was everywhere I mean she posted to TikTok from her actual wedding. Over twenty times. On her wedding day.
Every detail of her wedding was live streamed, she had even created spreadsheets to organise outfits and angles and those spreadsheets were more detailed than the financial model a startup would use to pitch to investors. The part that makes me feel 98 is the feeling inside that makes me want to shout ‘it’s your wedding day - take the day off and live in the moment a little bit’.
Have we really got to the stage where every part of our lives have to be broadcast to a horde of adoring followers. 20 times! I mean post a clip of your wedding sure - but almost live streaming it - it just feels so arrogant and I don’t want to feel irritated by it but I can’t help it.
Now she’s posting from her honeymoon and I can’t help wondering if she ever takes a minute off and if her husband is happy to share his life with 490 000 other people
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Reading
You’d be hard pressed to find a person who has listened to an episode of Mamamia Outloud that isn’t a fan of Holly Wainwright. The people who haven’t yet listened are missing out.
Holly is warm and smart, wise and gentle, kind and thoughtful and every one of these qualities comes through in her writing. He Would Never is her newest novel and aside from being a propulsive page turner it is also a beautiful study on motherhood and female friendship. Her insight into family dynamics and maturing children is so accurate at times it’s like reading a masterclass on adolescent behaviour (but told with warmth and the uncanny ability to make you want to keep reading).
He Would Never centres around the members of a mother’s group and follows the families from the time they meet as mothers of newborns to this ‘last’ camping trip where the kids are 14 years old. It tackles the expected issues of new motherhood and new friendships, of changing roles and growing families but it also explores more complex issues, things we read about in salacious headlines and disturbing news stories which we try believe would never happen in our suburban, domestic lives.
Even if you have never camped a day in your life (that’s me) this book will feel like home to you.
Thanks (again) for reading to the end. See you next week.
Don’t forget to like this post, if you did. I’m still a slave to the algorithm
Lana
I made that soup this week too - swapping the celeriac for some sticks of celery and a swede and a turnip. It's been lovely for lunches this week.