If you read one thing this week, make it this beautiful ode to home towns and commentary on ambition (“I worry my students might think—as I did—that life is a loaf of bread to be baked. A timer will ding and they’ll know when it’s done, when they’ve arrived”)
We love this helpful guide for splitting household tasks (including mental load) straight down the middle
Why are people so weird about only kids?
If you’ve ever dreamt of winning big on the stock market, you might reconsider after reading this WILD story about what betting on the market can do to a person’s life
This month marks the last ever print issue of US magazine Allure, and their choice of cover star in Jennifer Aniston is iconic. The accompanying interview has Jennifer talking about her fertility struggles and IVF for the first time and it’s a remarkable read, because we usually only hear from those who had their "miracle" babies (“I was going through IVF, drinking Chinese teas, you name it. I was throwing everything at it. I would’ve given anything if someone had said to me, ‘Freeze your eggs. Do yourself a favour.’ You just don’t think about it. So here I am today. The ship has sailed.”)
A love letter to cookbooks
This article for Vulture about what drove Britney Spears’ dad to control her life is an absolute mess journalism-wise but we devoured every word anyway
New York Times readers wrote in with the little rituals that keep them going and it felt like such a privilege to get a glimpse into the quiet beauty of other people’s lives
Tiny love stories (“I think about the men I’ve begged to stay and their excuses of needing time and space. I convince myself that maybe I’m not destined to have love that endures.”)
In tech news: There’s a LOT going on at Instagram this week (in-app scheduling is *finally* being rolled out, there are rumours of yet another feature to compete with BeReal, a selfie age-verification tool for teens is being tested in the UK, and no one's sure wtf Instagram notes are for) LinkedIn has won a precedent-setting data scraping lawsuit, YouTube is bringing short-form content to the silver screen, and has Meta has announced the biggest job cull in its history
If the ever-tightening gaps between holidays feel suffocating, you need to read Anne Helen Peterson’s theory of sprawling holidays (“Holidays are not accidental. Historically, they have served as a means to keep those doing the most labour from revolting: a brief release, revelry, and rest, just often enough to stead off rebellion. The irony about these newly expanded holidays is that most of them aren’t actually even days off, and many people are still required (or encouraged) to work them.”)
Recipes we saved this week: a dish that’s finally given us a reason to buy summer squash, the ultimate Bloody Mary, a pasta recipe from Korea that’s the definition of Asian fusion, a Brussels sprout and anchovy salad that you’ll either become obsessed with or vehemently hate, a simple way to prepare fennel that has us salivating and Adam Liaw’s spicy ssamjang chicken that looks like it’s not for the faint of heart
Sage advice from our favourite advice columnist Papi for when you just can’t get over a breakup
And in other news: The world needed this impromptu Spice Girls reunion this week, trying to be soft at work, the boss babification of everything, Louis Theroux is under too much pressure (and so is his nozzle), what to do if you’re not your bff’s bff, Twitter then v now, the perfect gift guide for your friends who love to entertain, Elon Musk’s PR team this week, wow the Paris Metro just wow, the corn kid still loves corn, we’ve been doing this all week too, debriefing with your friend after a first date, there’s a new kind of guy in China called the shrimp type, and Twitter has a lot of questions about Love Actually
