TueDo List: Sweaty Summer + Social Detox + Gen X Tweets
Plus: Kathleen Hanna gets glam and Tracy Chapman makes history
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THIS WEEK
📖 READ: Gen X is in charge? Whatever. Why menopause representation matters and how racial weathering is causing early menopause in Black women. What’s the best sex you ever had? Just a fun writing exercise from George Saunders. Soaking up The New Yorker Therapy issue.
👀 LOOK: The Wham! wormhole. Every Rapinoe goal at the 2019 World Cup. There’s a Gen X color palette. 🤔 (We’re “effortless contemporary.”) Why isn’t this on American TV? What AI thinks Barbie would look like in each state. Kathleen Hanna doing a makeup “tutorial.”
🎧 LISTEN: Tracy Chapman is the first Black woman to hit #1 on the US country charts. Charli XCX + a Toni Basil reference. Lazy summer single from Slow Pulp. Siouxsie Sioux takes “her fucking shades off.”
🤣 LOL: We’re not immune to a good Gen-X tweet… or 50. Freckle tattoos? Why? Hilarious Yelp reviews on Jersey boardwalks and beaches. Stay petty. Amy Poehler killing it on TikTok.
🛒 ADD TO CART: We’re bookmarking the Vogue Prime Day guide, and CNET, Jezebel, and Wardrobe Oxygen. Non-denim denim is a thing. Our kingdom for a kaftan.
📺 WATCH:
Wednesday: Tiffany Haddish in Season 2 of the murder mystery/comedy The Afterparty (Apple TV+).
Thursday: Timothy Olyphant and Claire Danes star in the twisty crime thriller Full Circle (MAX), while our fave vampires from the Isle of Staten return! What We Do In The Shadows (FX Networks).
Friday: Theater Camp (Theaters) is an original comedy that could become a cult classic for theater kids, while Bird Box Barcelona (Netflix) is the first international spin-off of the 2018 post-apocalyptic thriller. They Cloned Tyrone (Netflix), a pulpy, sci-fi mystery caper starring John Boyega, Teyonah Parris, and Jamie Foxx.
Sunday: You Won’t Be Alone— an ethereal folk horror that’s less scary than it is deeply moving, say critics. (Peacock)
STORY: Summer of My Discontent
By Wendi Aarons
It’s hot. It’s been hot. It’ll continue to be hot. I don’t know when it won’t be hot. We’ve been living under something called “The Texas Heat Dome” for weeks. It’s a ridiculous term, and also what my nickname will be if I ever join a menopausal roller derby team. “Awwww shit y’all! The Texas Heat Dome just rammed her wheels into Killer Karen’s eye sockets to win the game! Wowee! Is there, um, a medic in the house?”
Forget it. That sounds exhausting…
TUENIGHT 10: Alisa Kennedy Jones, Screenwriter, Author and TED Talk Alum
Your Age: 53
Basic bio: Alisa Kennedy Jones, founder of THE EMPRESS (a kick-ass newsletter that’s all about making the perimenopause/menopause journey a little less hellish for women everywhere) is a multi-talented powerhouse. She’s a memoirist, blogger, and screenwriter whose work has appeared on NPR, TED, and in the Academy Award-nominated documentary CRIP CAMP, produced by Michelle and Barack Obama.
Alisa is also a fierce advocate for disability rights, neurodiversity, mental health and epilepsy awareness. Her TED talk about late-onset epilepsy—and how it taught her the brain is uniquely wired for storytelling—completely transformed the perception of creativity, electricity, and the brain.
Additionally, her debut bestseller, Gotham Girl Interrupted, made waves in the field of narrative medicine on a global scale.
IT’S ME, MARGIT: Unspooling Social Media
By Margit Detweiler
On July 5, in the span of 24 hours, I went from being intrigued and almost giddy with the brand new Threads app, the Twitter alternative from Meta, to feeling massive dread and removing it from my home screen. I haven’t yet deleted it from my phone because apparently you can’t delete it without deleting Instagram. Nasty one, Zuckerberg.
The day also marked my fifteenth anniversary with my husband…
Have a cool week TueNighters!
Too much good stuff. And KATHLEEN! (Now I must go watch THE PUNK SINGER doc on her again.) xo