Out with the old, in with the new dinosaurs.

Once upon a time, pigs flew, hell froze over, dinosaurs roamed Alaska and Rupert Murdoch…retired?

​​I am not a huge Swiftie (or a Swiftie of any magnitude, tbh). But I can understand the significance of the Sophie Turner and Taylor Swift paps-travaganza in Real Housewives terms (the only terms that matter to me): It would be equivalent to Melissa Gorga and Jac Laurita palling up over mutual enemy Teresa. No? How about Sonja and Ramona out together after both getting with Harry Dubin. Who knows? Enough of that. Today’s newsletter is dedicated to the Luddites, freaks who talk to strangers, and dinosaurs.

🎃

A wise man (Lenny Kravitz) once said: “Grab your big scarf, it’s the first day of fall,” and, honestly, that’s my version of Christian Girl Autumn. Aside from that, I wish I could feel this enthusiastic about summer being over. 

🍬

As news broke of Rupert Murdoch’s ‘retirement’ last week, the sound of a million knuckles cracking could be heard as Succession fans—editors and reporters included—prepared to unleash a barrage of puns and send their condolences to poor Kendall. But even those convinced of their own immortality must hit the corporate ceiling eventually. It’s unlikely any one person will ever transform news media and influence its consumers again in the way Murdoch has, for better and worse. Will we ever see a press baron on his level? In short, no, Bloomberg’s Adrian Wooldridge writes. 

🍭

What do you know about dinosaurs in Alaska? Researchers recently discovered the prehistoric giants wandered around the Yukon River 100 million years ago—when the region would have been much warmer. “Finding dinosaurs in Alaska challenges everything we think we know about dinosaurs,” paleontologist Tony Fiorillo says.

🍫

Talking to strangers is one of many things that make me feel alive. Bonus points if we don’t speak the same language. 

🍩

We’re on the cusp of what feels like another industrial revolution as AI creeps evermore into our lives and threatens careers in the same way machines replaced factory workers’ jobs at the turn of the nineteenth century. Gabriela Riccardi previews journalist Brian Merchant’s Blood in the Machine: The Origins of the Rebellion Against Big Tech, which looks at what we can learn today from the OG Luddites and their resistance to technological advances that endangered their livelihoods.

🥠

If you’ve been an unwitting extra in a video that’s gone viral on social media, you’d be forgiven for not enjoying the Tube Girl trend. But there’s no denying that this is Sabrina Bahsoon’s moment—and good for her. Bahsoon, a law graduate whose music video-inspired TikToks on the London Underground have sparked a wave of shameless, windswept content creation in public spaces, tells the Evening Standard’s Amy Francombe: “Everybody is so socially anxious, especially after the pandemic. It’s like we are socially wired to not interact with each other and care so much about what other people think.”   

🍰

Marriage can be wonderful; it can also be a nightmare. One thing it isn’t, though, is a blanket cure for societal ills and inequities, despite efforts by conservatives and some academics to get us all hitched. “It’s easy to see why the marriage solution is so appealing. Like telling people that it’s their responsibility to address the climate crisis by using paper straws, or advising Black men that they need to pull up their pants and be better fathers, it off-loads the responsibility for broad and systemic reform by tsk-tskingly placing it on individuals and their intimate behaviors,” New York Magazine’s Rebecca Traister writes. Related: Governments have a problem believing single people exist. It’s not new, but it is a pronounced blind spot amid increased economic hardship, says the Guardian’s Nesrine Malik.

🍦

I link a lot to NYMag’s The Cut. It’s just consistently so good! I believe very few editors are touching Lindsay Peoples right now. I’m inspired by the growing list of Black women editors, most recently the appointment of Chioma Nnadi as British Vogue’s head of editorial content, stepping into outgoing EIC Edward Enninful’s role. 

🥓 🍳 🧀

“Moving to New York is almost always a decision informed partly by fantasy,” writes Catherine Hong in T Magazine. Well, I am an idealist of the highest order. Twelve designers and architects spill on the film and TV apartments that pulled them to the World’s Greatest City. Now, the cost of those apartments would be a different story…

🍪

Finally, feast your face eggs on these gloopy and vibrant ceramic vases by California-based artist Philip Kupferschmidt. They look like giant, melted Fox’s Party Ring biscuits! You can see them in person from tomorrow if you’re in Los Angeles.

🎁

Share to sweeten someone’s day—and have a lovely 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: