An (apple crumble) affair to remember

This one is for the pirrrates.

Sometimes, you think you’ve missed out on something you desperately want, only to see it’s been waiting for you the whole time. Take, for example, my love affair with Marks & Spencer’s blackberry and apple crumble. Time escaped me last Sunday and, before I knew it, I had 25 minutes before closing to get to the shop and hope that my dear treat would be in stock. When I got to the dessert aisle, I searched high and low among the rows of rhubarb crumbles, triple chocolate brownies, cherry pies and New York cheesecakes. None were good enough; my beloved was not there.

Or so I thought! As I stretched my neck like an anguished giraffe one last time, I glimpsed a purple box on the top shelf. There it was in all its glory, and there I was, eyes wide and pupils dilated. The last apple and blackberry crumble, barely visible at eye level! I grabbed it and practically skipped to the till—mission accomplished. Moral of the story: Nothing will come between me and a crumble (as my dear and longsuffering friend Robyn will never let me forget). Welcome to Quality Sheet! This week is all about crispy Rs, faceless women and kindred spirits. 

🍬

Power, fertility, class, health, non-conformity, knowledge, femininity—all represent the significance of long hair across cultures and religions. Dazed’s Kristen Bateman on the appeal of lengthy locks around the world.

🍭

“Some of my favorite relationships in life have been with teachers, professors, and older co-workers,” says The Cut’s J.P. Brammer (yes! Shoutout to Ms. R, former teacher and one of my favourite people). This is a thoughtful answer to a reader’s question on the importance of nurturing connections with people who make you feel understood. Related: A note about deep friendships, connections and kindred spirits I’m grateful for on my other newsletter, Colouring Outside the Lines. Click here to sign up!

🍪

Let’s talk about loneliness, that taboo yet all-too-human condition that’s all around us at the moment. Isolation is rising at such dire rates that it’s been declared a public health crisis in the U.S. and dubbed a ‘silent epidemic’ in the U.K., and countries across the world are figuring out how to remedy this. Forbes contributor Christine Comaford lays out psychiatrist Edward Hallowell’s questions to ask when you’re feeling a lack of connectedness and emotional intimacy with others and yourself. 

🍫

Ahhh. Arrrr. Alr? The ‘crispy R’, so satisfying and moreish (listen to it here), is actually a thing! Blows my mind. “You can learn an awful lot about people, culture, and politics by studying R, it turns out,” says Atlas Obscura’s Dan Nosowitz, who spoke to several linguists to find out all about this trick of the tongue.

🍩

If you were lucky enough to be able to work from home—or, in fact, anywhere—during lockdown, you may have considered enjoying that novelty on a beach or in the mountains of another country for months at a time. Digital nomadism has exploded since 2019, but with that freedom comes a dark side of privilege, environmental costs, gentrification and inflation in global cities with drastically cheaper costs of living, writes Darcie Imbert in Atmos. Related: If you’re set on spending time abroad, an early adopter of the trend talks about how to do it thoughtfully. 

🍰

“What is a woman when she is no longer presented to us as an object of beauty?” Surrealist painter Ewa Juszkiewicz is challenging “polite” depictions of stylish women in 18th and 19th century portraits, swapping out girlish smiles for faceless heads and incorporating fashion references from both century-old magazines and next season’s runway in her paintings. By adapting original works in a new way, the women Juszkiewicz portrays are rekindled with their individuality, she tells the New York Times’ Chantel Tattoli. 

🍯

Are Beyoncé and Taylor Swift current equivalents to Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen? Possibly, and even beyond, Jim Cullen, who writes about the rise of the latter two icons in his new book Bridge and Tunnel Boys: Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, and the Metropolitan Sound of the American Century, tells the New York Times’ Sopan Deb. 

🍦

“Corporatisation and commercialisation have not only dulled people’s tolerance for critical thinking but have warped their expectations about what it means to read philosophy, seeing it only as something that can make them happier,” media scholar Dr Siobhan Lyons writes in Aeon. As the discipline of philosophy has become more specialised over the past 60ish years, it’s also become more obscure. Its insularity and lack of direction has left it open to being misunderstood through ‘pop philosophy’ and entrepreneurs pushing self-help content, Lyons says. While that helps widen access to the subject, it could have detrimental effects on the future of philosophy and how it helps us to understand the world.

🥠

Are all of Robbie Williams’ outfits timeless, or are we all just trying to dress like vintage Robbie Williams? Because I’ve definitely counted at least two of these outfits in the wild recently (and I’ve tried to copy #2 a few times). 

🎁

Thank you for reading. Share to sweeten someone’s day—and have a lovely rest of your week!

Isabel :)

Get in touch/share links/follow me:

I have another newsletter that explores what it means to live freely! It goes out a few times a month, you can subscribe below: