Opinions vary, but personally, we believe there’s room for a lot more high-concept fantasy in reality dating. More eerie entrances, more mystical moments, more —let’s just go with it — smoke machines. Why can’t a reality series inject a bit more “Brigadoon” into our “Bachelor”?

This is what we crave, and it’s what “The One That Got Away” delivers. Since leaving “The Bachelor,” producer Elan Gale has been trying his hand at more experimental dating shows (see: “FBoy Island,” also gloriously back this summer), and his newest is a 10-episode series on Prime with a time-travel twist. Six singles await missed romantic connections from their past, who arrive through a magical portal (some rocks surrounded by purple uplighting and smoke machines) for another chance at love. There are Confirmation class buddies, high school classmates, exes and friends’ exes — even current best friends — and they’re all ready to shoot their shot with one of the leads.

The concept is absurd and absurdly fun, and it leads the show into some interesting directions. Some aspects are, frankly, pretty troubling! For one thing, the implications of bringing back people from someone’s past for them to date again are simply different for women than for men. While the men are mostly brought peers, friends, and old hook-ups to date, the women are often faced with people they have never really had a connection with and share little in common with. The women then face pressure to give a real chance to whichever random men who showed up expecting a date, even if they feel uncomfortable with the romantic attentions of those men. One woman is sent a man who had a crush on her when she was just 18 and he was almost 30; another is sent a man she’s never spoken to who follows her on Instagram. Like…. yikes!

But the leads do have a fair amount of power within the show; they alone decide when their love interests are sent away, and while they decide, up to two of their possible connections live in a house together with all the other portal arrivals. The non-leads, dealing with a fair amount of emotional anxiety about their fate, quickly bond with each other and become vital supports, but their new friends can disappear at a moment’s notice, without even saying goodbye, if the leads choose to send them away. The dichotomy between the two groups — leads and arrivals — is stark, and creates a class hierarchy so notable that it is openly commented on by the arrivals and bubbles to the surface in at least one dramatic confrontation.

We dug into all this, plus our favorite love story of the season and all the spiciest drama, in this week’s episode. Hope you enjoy! xo

We’ve been watching…

Seasons 2 of “The Flight Attendant” and “Only Murders in the Building” have been keeping me and Greg occupied on our rare free nights. -Claire

I breezed right through the first season of Hulu’s “Maggie,” a moderately charming romantic comedy of errors about a psychic who begins seeing visions of her own romantic future. -Emma

We’ve been reading…

Elain Hsieh Chou’s madcap satirical novel, “Disorientation,” which follows a miserably directionless PhD student as she undergoes a disillusionment with her course of study that leads her to a political awakening. Ingrid Yang is a Taiwanese-American graduate student in the East Asian Studies department of Barnes University, a fusty New England college not far from where she grew up. She’s studying a Chinese-American poet, Xiao-Wen Chou, but has little interest in his work, let alone any idea what to say about him in her dissertation; at every step, her course of study has been nudged along by (mostly white) advisors who promised her job security and acclaim if she chose the right research subject. It’s a sedate place to start, but the novel soon turns into an academic mystery, an investigative caper, and a raucous send-up of American academia. As Ingrid herself — someone who always longed to fit in — begins to see the white supremacy that permeates the university hierarchy and how seeking its acceptance has left her alienated from herself, she takes the reader with her on a consciousness-raising journey. (And stay tuned for the Jordan Peterson-esque turn taken by one of her professors.)

Also, I have been feeling complicated things about the new Dakota Johnson “Persuasion” adaptation (mainly despair mixed with an unwilling fascination), and I absolutely adored Brandon Taylor’s newsletter on the movie. In it, he really digs into what makes Jane Austen’s novels tick — especially her more melancholy later novels, which include “Persuasion” — and what makes an adaptation of them successful (that is, understanding what the novel itself is actually about, rather than getting distracted by the most superficially appealing plot points). On the novel: “Where some Austen novels chronicle the bright, flashing episodes of youth, Persuasion follows a young woman who has to go on living after those episodes have concluded prematurely.” YES. I was almost crying by the end of this essay, which made me want to reread the book instead. Highly recommended: Jane Austen’s “Persuasion.” -Claire

I too was obsessed with Brandon Taylor’s “Persuasion” essay. (Honestly, his newsletter always makes me think and emote and become very jealous of his immense talent!!!)

I felt the same way about Jia Tolentino’s gorgeous, affecting New Yorker essay about the sacredness of abortion care. “Even within the course of the same pregnancy, a person and the fetus she carries can shift between the roles of lover and beloved, host and parasite, vessel and divinity, victim and murderer; each body is capable of extinguishing the other, although one cannot survive alone,” she writes. “There is no human relationship more complex, more morally unstable than this.” -Emma

We’ve been listening to…

Call me a narcissist but I DID listen to our appearance on “Sounds Like a Cult,” which is currently doing a “Cult Girl Summer” run of bonus episodes. We talked about the cult of dating apps, and even remembering the two years that I tried to date on OkCupid was difficult, but we all felt much better by the end. -Claire

The Top Hits of 1997 playlist on Spotify in preparation for the Backstreet Boys concert I went to over the weekend with my friends Liv and Alison. Speaking of which, the show was fantastic! It was nostalgic and full of pure, unadulterated joy. Also — A.J. is now the hottest and most talented one? -Emma

We’ve been buying…

Megababe natural deodorant! I have been wearing some kind of antiperspirant deodorant since adolescence, and recently I became fed up with two things: My pits still get wet and stinky by the end of the day, and the chemicals in the deodorant make me more likely to get yellow armpit stains in light-colored shirts. While searching for a replacement, either highly chemical or highly natural, I learned that basically every deodorant gives a significant amount of people an armpit rash, and they WILL leave close-up photos of this in the Target reviews section. However, the reviews for Megababe’s Smoothie Deo, a fruit-enzyme-powered natural deodorant, were pretty good. I got it, I’ve worn it for a couple days, and it seems to work better than my previous Dove antiperspirant deodorant. As of now, I’m a convert, but stay tuned for any future rashes. -Claire

I hadn’t checked out J. Crew much since it’s Jenna Lyons days, but a recent newsletter from my friend Mattie Kahn about how the brand had gotten good again, made me curious. They were having a giant sale, so though I usually resist buying final sale items, because I am a big returner, I took a risk and bought a handful of elevated basics I thought would probably work — and I was NOT disappointed. My absolute favorites include this lightweight linen beach button-up (in the perfect shade of blue), these silky drapey white cargo-style trousers, a very practical cropped tank, these extra chic cat eye sunglasses in tortoise, and these waterproof cross-strap EVA sandals which feel like walking on clouds. -Emma

Quick reminder: We’re having a virtual live show with Moment House on Sunday, July 10! We’ll be recapping the premiere episode of Kaitlyn and Britt’s (briefly) two-Bachelorette season. Plus, there will be exclusive merch, and we’ll be using the tipping function on Moment House to raise money for The Brigid Alliance, a fantastic organization that provides people with the money and support they need to travel for abortion care. Get tickets here.

After “To All the Boys I Loved Before” stole our hearts (and about 50 full hours of each of our short lives on this Earth), it was a foregone conclusion that we would watch the next Jenny Han Y.A. romance adaptation — and the next, and the next. We watched the rest of the TATBILB trilogy (though with less rapture), and now we’re watching “The Summer I Turned Pretty” — the Prime series adaptation of Han’s Summer Trilogy, which came out before her “To All the Boys” books.

Like “To All the Boys,” the new series tells the story of a high school girl who has long nursed a crush on an unattainable childhood friend — but who suddenly blossoms and is soon pursued by not one, but several hot boys.

Isabella “Belly” Conklin (Lola Tung) has spent every summer of her life at the vacation home of her mother’s best friend Susannah Fisher. The two families’ fathers visit here and there, but mostly it’s the two moms and their four children: Belly and her brother Steven, and Conrad and Jeremiah Fisher. Belly has always had a crush on Conrad, but he’s never seen her that way — until she showed up this summer with boobs. Yes, Belly is pretty now, and Conrad is taking notice.

However, so are other boys — like Cam, a sweet boy she met at a middle-school Latin convention and who dreams of being a marine biologist. Oh, and Jeremiah, who she’s always seen as more of a best friend. Meanwhile, Susannah has invited Belly to make her debut at the country club this summer, and so Belly spends her vacation learning the waltz, attending teas, and dealing with a love pyramid.

Though the love triangle is almost absurdly dramatic (what’s worse than dating the son of your closest family friend? Dating both of them within the space of a week, maybe), it’s perhaps the least compelling part of the show. Susannah and Belly’s mom, Laurel, are also working through their own problems — Susannah has a troubling secret, and Laurel, recently divorced from the kids’ dad, is struggling to write her next novel and get back out there — while trying to keep their tight friendship of many years on track. Conrad has become inexplicably withdrawn. Steven begins dating a gorgeous, wealthy rising fashion influencer, but his insecurities about his middle-class background present an obstacle. It’s truly an ensemble show, which may be what saves it from the relatively lackluster central romance.

In this episode, we discuss the tipping point between identifying with teenagers and their mothers, the soothing and yet infuriating coastal grandmother/Nancy Meyers aesthetic (with its lavish wealth; enviable, impossibly clean kitchens; and the hidden labor of making them so continually homey and luxuriant), the desire to both inhabit and critique these aspirational enclaves of white wealth, and the joys and perils of young love. Plus, Claire gets candid about life as a woman who never got boobs pretty. Mix up a big pitcher of pomegranate margaritas á la Marfa, lounge by your immense marble kitchen island, and enjoy! xo

We’ve been watching…

I binged my way through Amazon’s new bonkers reality dating show (also by producer Elan Gale who created FBoy Island and was an exec on The Bachelor), “The One That Got Away.” Singles are brought to a ~magical location~ to date people from their pasts. I didn’t find it quite as fun as “FBoy Island,” but it certainly scratched the itch for new mindless content, which frankly I needed this week. -Emma

Season 2 of Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building,” the increasingly meta murder-mystery comedy. I have to admit, my memory is so leaky that I might have to go back and rewatch season 1, because I have forgotten an embarrassing amount of plot, and it’s heavy on plot twists and callbacks. (It’s so into callbacks it will call out callbacks.) When season 2 opens, Mabel (Selena Gomez) — and, it begins to seem, all three of the amateur true crime podcasters, including Charles (Steve Martin) and Oliver (Martin Short) — is under suspicion of murdering the board president of the building, who admittedly was trying to get the three of them evicted. Plus: Amy Schumer moves in (playing a very broad version of herself) and a titillating plot emerges involving a stolen piece of erotic art that might reveal a secret part of Charles’s past. -Claire

We’ve been reading…

This excellent (and depressing and timely) essay in TIME by Taylor Harris (and edited by my friend Lori Fradkin!), aptly titled: “America Insists It Is Great. It Should Work on Being Decent.” -Emma

Elif Batuman’s “Either/Or,” which I’m now about half-way through. Our tortured heroine, Selin, is deep in mourning over the end of her first love — an unconsummated but in some sense romantic relationship with an older Hungarian student, Ivan. Now an English major, she’s reading and reading and reading, and much of the book consists of her emotional altercations with classic literature. Provoked by her reading, she wrestles with her relationship with her mother (who she both adores possessively and feels suffocated by the love of); with Ivan (who she sees in every rake, seducer, and male author who depicts a contemptible female love object in his work); and with herself and her own writerly ambitions (she is bored and infuriated by self-indulgent memoir-esque fiction like “In Search of Lost Time,” but she also recognizes that it’s the only kind of fiction she herself wants to write).

It makes me laugh, and, like Selin herself reading this kind of navel-gazing fiction, it sometimes makes me annoyed, but it really captures the process of coming of age in a way few novels do — the raw and somehow shameful emotion, the sea of internal contradictions, the struggle to reconcile the self you want to be with the one you’ve been given to work with, the many attempts to compare and contrast yourself against others to pin down what that self is and what makes it special. -Claire

We’ve been listening to…

“Smoke Screen: Puppy Kingpin,” a podcast from Neon Hum, and hosted by Alex Schuman, about the puppy mill industry, and the great — fraudulent! — lengths that invested parties will go to make money while covering up the origins of their product — in this case, PUPPIES — from buyers. The series specifically hones in on Jolyn Noethe, a puppy broker and businesswoman from Iowa who is accused of spearheading a nationwide puppy laundering (yes, like money laundering) scheme. It’s a fascinating deep dive into an industry I knew very little about. -Emma

Nothing new this week; daycare closures always cut into my podcast listening, and this past week we had two (2) Covid shutdowns in my son’s class — one from Saturday-Wednesday, and one from Friday afternoon-Tuesday. (That 1.5 days of daycare were really cherished, but I’m still behind on all my pods). -Claire

We’ve been buying…

So I first tried Neutrogena’s Hydro Boost water-based gel moisturizer because they sponsored our other pod, Love To See It. But I genuinely loved the product so much that I finished it and have now purchased a refill. It’s not oily! It soaks into the skin without leaving a weird film! And it’s affordable! Highly recommend. -Emma

This week I’ve mostly been making returns. I hate online shopping for its waste — all the shipping to my place and shipping back — but it’s been a long year and a half of trying to figure out what I like wearing now that I am in my mid-thirties and spend a LOT of time at the playground and almost none at happy hour, and it involves a lot of ordering stuff and then returning it so that I don’t drown in debt and unworn clothes. So this week, I shipped a bunch of my “not for me” purchases. I also saw a mom wearing her hair clipped up in an open gold claw clip, so I bought one, obviously. I found this Kitsch open shape gold claw clip, which seems sturdy and is definitely beautiful. -Claire

Content warning: In this podcast, we discuss some very difficult topics — notably, suicide/suicidal ideation, sexual assault and child sexual abuse. Please listen with care.

On Friday, the Supreme Court released its opinion on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. In it, the court overturned Roe v. Wade, denying the existence of a constitutional right to an abortion. The majority opinion, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, was substantially unchanged from the draft opinion leaked last month, so there was little surprise as to the outcome and the reasoning. But this time, it’s real. Across the country, state trigger laws went into effect to outlaw abortion in all or most cases, and pre-Roe laws criminalizing the procedure became relevant once again. Many clinics were forced to immediately stop providing abortions, sending distraught patients home from the waiting room mere minutes before their scheduled appointments.

This is not what we talked about on the podcast this week. We had already put the episode to bed when the opinion came down, and we both spent Friday in a haze. (In Emma’s case, the haze included writing an important and clear-eyed essay for MSNBC about whether an abortion ban violates the religious practice of Jewish people.)

But this episode ended up being, unintentionally, rather apt. Last week, we watched the Netflix docuseries “Keep Sweet: Pray & Obey,” about the FLDS (an extreme Mormon sect) and the depravities inflicted by its current leader, Warren Jeffs. We also watched “The Deep End,” a Hulu docuseries about the controversial spiritual guru Teal Swan and the dramas of her devoted inner circle. And the control and physical violation of women — and the reaction against that control and violation — are, respectively, central to those two groups.

The FLDS — especially under Warren Jeffs, a particularly cruel and power-hungry leader, but also more generally — treats women and children as forms of wealth for high-status men. To be awarded more wives is to reach a higher status in heaven; to have more children is to have more to offer the community in free, unregulated labor and in wives to offer other men. Women and girls in the FLDS were married off young — increasingly, under Warren, long before they reached legal age — and were expected to bear as many children as possible.

Teal Swan, a YouTube-popular spiritual influencer, is diametrically opposed to the FLDS in most ways. She proclaims to be an all-knowing, supreme female leader, and she espouses women’s freedom and equality; she’s also been public about having suffered serious sexual abuse at the hands of a family friend, and in her work, she looks to heal the trauma left behind by this kind of abuse. Her schtick tends toward the girlboss, in true millennial form, and she masterfully deploys feminist rhetoric to deflect criticism of her methods (which include practices that could implant false memories of trauma in the minds of her followers).

In this episode, we discuss the appeal of dangerous spiritual groups like these, the horrors of Warren Jeffs’ FLDS, the insidious girl-power faux therapy of Teal Swan, and the anxieties about gender roles and hierarchies that emerge in each.

Thank you for listening!

And a quick reminder: we’re having a live show with Moment House on Sunday, July 10! We’ll be recapping the premiere episode of Kaitlyn and Britt’s (briefly) two-Bachelorette season. Plus, we’ll be using the tipping function on Moment House to raise money for The Brigid Alliance, a fantastic organization that provides people with the money and support they need to travel for abortion care.

We’ve been watching…

“The Summer I Turned Pretty” on Prime, based on the first book in author Jenny Han’s first trilogy, which she wrote before “To All The Boys I Loved Before.” It is sweet and sad and joyous, and a beautiful meditation on both coming of age and the longevity of female friendships. -Emma

Oh, me too! Coincidence or… pod incoming? -Claire

We’ve been listening to…

I binged my way through both seasons of the “Snapped” podcast by Lucy Taylor, which I discovered by way of the “A Little Bit Culty” pod. The first season is about her personal (hellish) experience with elite Greek life, and the second season compellingly builds a wider case for the fact that sororities remain, essentially, white supremacist cultic structures. Highly recommend. -Emma

I relistened to “The Gateway,” Gizmodo’s podcast on Teal Swan, hosted and reported by Jennings Brown, before taping this episode. Then I got curious about his new podcast, “Revelations,” in which he infiltrates the Fellowship of Friends cult. The group’s founder, Robert Burton, teaches that God is expressed and sought through classical beauty, including opera, the Western literary canon, and fine wine. Being in the FOF sounds like an unusually luxurious experience for a cult. Orchestral performances and elegant dinners served by tuxedoed waitstaff are a quotidian part of life in the community. Also, allegedly, a horrifying pattern of sexual predation on male followers. -Claire

We’ve been reading…

I’ve been re-reading some books for a project that’s in its early stages, including “Big Friendship,” “Bachelor Nation” and “Trick Mirror.” -Emma

I just started the sequel to Elif Batuman’s “The Idiot,” after an indulgent reread of her 2017 novel. “Either/Or” picks up right where “Either/Or” left off, but there’s a definite shift in attitude toward the enigmatic love interest Ivan — and a new bent in our heroine Selin’s intellectual/romantic proclivities. Rather than trying to understand love through linguistics, she’s taken up an English major, and with it, an interest in the mistreated and malcontent women of the literary canon. So, a book written for 20-year-old me! What a gift. -Claire

We’ve been buying…

My absolute favorite swimwear brand, Marysia, is having a big sale on their Resort 2022 line. Their stuff is pricey, but so flattering. (I am obsessed with scalloping, their high-waisted bikinis, and all of their gorgeous, non-granny-feeling one pieces!) I never shop their line full price because I simply can’t afford it, so I jump on it when theses suits go on sale. I grabbed the Chesapeake bikini top and bottom, as well as the East River top in fern and the matching bottoms. (I was also tempted by this gorgeous Garden Maillot.) -Emma

So many iced coffees, even though I have a coffeemaker at home. Ah, summer!

Plus: breezy long summer shorts from Tradlands. (I sized down for a slightly less billowy look, but both ways are mom schlub perfection to me.) -Claire

This week we come to you with two summer romance offerings: a must-watch movie and a we-watched-it-so-you-don’t-have-to movie.

Hulu’s “Fire Island,” written by and starring Joel Kim Booster, is a groundbreaking, thoughtful, funny, and tender modernization of “Pride and Prejudice” set in Fire Island Pines, a legendary gay resort town. Centering on the friendship between two gay Asian-American men, Noah (Booster) and Howie (Bowen Yang) and the romances that they each fall into during their week in paradise, the movie also skewers the social hierarchies, racism, and classism of the gay party scene with Austenian flair.

Netflix’s “A Perfect Pairing,” starring “Sex/Life” bad boy and Claire’s least favorite male sex symbol Adam Demos, is also a film with romantic themes and a kiss at the end. Set on an Australian sheep station owned and operated by a female billionaire, the movie follows a plucky young wine agent’s quest to land the billionaire’s new winery as a client — falling in love with the station’s stoic, abs-having boss cocky in the process. It’s a movie about girlbosses, girlbosses supporting girlbosses, rocking the perfect fuschia lip while spreading hundreds of pounds of sheep manure, and chiseled men with Secrets.

“A Perfect Pairing” might technically pass the Bechdel test — because two women talk about wine acquisitions and getting promotions — but we assure you, Alison Bechdel would tell you to watch “Fire Island,” and so do we.

In this episode, we swish “A Perfect Pairing” around in our mouth and tease out the subtle flavors of Hallmark tropes, flat chemistry, farfetched plot devices, and notes of colonialism. We then dive into the limpid waters of “Fire Island,” getting a little nitpicky (in a fun way?!) about whether it follows the beats of Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice” a bit too closely, close-reading the two romances that unfold, and discussing the movie’s unsparing critique of the bigotry and exclusion that can be found in the gay social scene.

A couple reviews referenced in the pod, for further reading:

“Fire Island Is a Curiously Reluctant Romantic Comedy” — Alison Willmore, Vulture

“The Bittersweet Silliness of Hulu’s ‘Fire Island’” — Spencer Kornhaber, The Atlantic

If you enjoy this episode, consider pairing it (as it were) with our June project over at Love to See It: Summer Lovin’, a miniseries of recaps/discussions of classic summer romances. This week we absolutely geeked out over “Dirty Dancing” with Alison Greenberg, and next week we’ll be discussing “Grease” with THE Ali Barthwell.

But this — this is our special reserve: peach and mineral. (IYKYK.) Hope you enjoy! xo

We’ve been watching…

Season 2 of “Girls5eva,” the totally daffy, “30 Rock”-lite Peacock show about a one-hit-wonder aughts girl group who decide to stage a comeback 20 years after their one hit. This season, the group — composed of earnest songwriter Dawn (Sara Bareilles), diva Wickie (Renée Elise Goldsberry), Christian bimbette Summer (Busy Philipps), and group-tomboy-turned-lesbian-dentist Gloria (Paula Pell) — goes into Album Mode, navigating a music industry that looks fairly different from what they encountered around the turn of the millennium. It’s extremely light but, in the “30 Rock” tradition, can be counted on to go for as many jokes as possible in the space of a scene. -Claire

Season 2 of “Hacks,” which just wrapped its second season. 8 episodes is too few episodes of this HBO Max gem. I continue to be obsessed with Jean Smart and Hannah Einbender’s crackling comedian chemistry. -Emma

We’ve been reading…

“The Idiot,” still (who has time to finish a book these days? Send tips). -Claire

Somehow still reading “Book Lovers,” because I too seem to have lost all ability to pay attention to one thing for more than 20 minutes at a time. -Emma

We’ve been listening to…

Endlessly catching up on all my faves, of course — Normal Gossip is mid-season 2 (a gift) — but I have also recently dipped back into Poog, Kate Berlant and Jacqueline Novak’s wellness podcast, which sets the mood for me as effectively as music. It’s a red lipstick, a silk robe, a stack of obscure books piled next to a velvet armchair, a romance that I can only associate with lazy summer days. The latest episode features both a rambling conversation about the disappointments of boutique hotels and a critique of the tone of voice one falls into when listing consumer complaints. -Claire

We’ve been buying…

A stretchy crinkle bikini from the English company YouSwim! This summer I realized I just couldn’t bear the idea of a constricting bathing suit — I just wanted something basic, flattering, and able to absorb some size fluctuations. I got the Poise High Waist Two-Piece in Ink, and it is the platonic ideal of a bikini, in my opinion. I have also been ogling these made-to-order crinkle suits from Canadian brand Loope; the color-blocking options are perfection. -Claire

The Skims Fits Everybody Bandeau in both black and neon pink. I was in need of a summertime non-underwire bra to wear under nap dresses and other loose sundresses. These feel good quality, keep the girls in, and don’t break the bank. -Emma

“Normal People” was the first Sally Rooney streaming series to enrapture the viewing public, with Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones bringing sensitive jock Connell and snooty social outcast Marianne to life onscreen. But “Conversations With Friends” is the original Rooney, the debut novel that launched the Irish writer to such massive fame and acclaim that her public persona now primarily revolves around her discomfort with being so famous and acclaimed. This spring, the team that adapted “Normal People” for Hulu worked backwards to adapt her first novel, also for Hulu.

Whereas “Normal People” is a fairly straightforward romance, “Conversations With Friends” takes on a more complex relationship: a foursome made up of Frances and Bobbi, two university students/ex-girlfriends/best friends/creative partners; and Melissa and Nick, a 36-year-old successful writer and her 32-year-old husband, an actor. The two dyads become entangled when Melissa (Jemima Kirke) sees Frances (Alison Oliver) and Bobbi (Sasha Lane) performing spoken word together and initiates a friendship. She and Bobbi, the gregarious sides of their respective couples, are drawn together; Frances and Nick (Joe Alwyn) find solace with each other and soon embark on an affair. Frances, whose perspective the audience takes throughout, tries to sort through her feelings for Nick and Bobbi, and even Melissa, while each relationship affects the group dynamic and sends other relationships twirling in different directions.

In this episode, we have a friendly conversation about this adaptation, the performances of Mr. Taylor Swift and Jessa from “Girls” (so sorry, guys) as well as their younger costars, and what the book/show have to say about ethical and unethical non-monogamy, marriage, generational conflict, and power. Hope you enjoy!

We’ve been reading…

Finally finished “The Candy House,” which did absolutely stick the landing, and have moved onto some lighter summer fare, by way of Emily Henry’s “Book Lovers.” I am loving the way that this novel plays with the Hallmark/Lifetime movie tropes about sad career women and small town hunks. It’s a delight! -Emma

I wanted to read Elif Batuman’s “Either/Or,” and then realized I couldn’t remember “The Idiot” (like, at all? This book came out in 2017. Help). So I’m rereading “The Idiot,” and maybe it’s that I no longer feel suffocated by the cloud of rhapsodic buzz that hovered over its initial release, but it’s so much funnier and more absorbing than I remembered. It’s a bit like Sally Rooney in the polished remoteness of its prose, but nerdier, denser, and more packed with dry-as-the-Sahara wit. -Claire

We’ve been listening to…

Maintenance Phase’s incredibly informative episode on calories. As someone who has spent years trying to develop a better relationship with my body and food, as well as challenge my own internalized fatphobia, I find Maintenance Phase to be an incredible resource, but this episode in particular was so helpful in challenging ideas we tend to assume as nutritional ~truths~ — like the simple maxim “calories in, calories out.” I have sent this episode to at least 3 friends because it’s so good. -Emma

Not to recommend another Michael Hobbes joint, but he guested on Kaitlyn Burns and Oliver Ash-Kleine’s podcast, “Cancel Me, Daddy,” to talk about the Amber Heard-Johnny Depp trial. In it, he talks about his initial disinclination to pay attention to the trial (relatable) and his realization that because so many left/liberal commentators and journalists felt exactly the same, right-wing commentators and TikTok stans were able to control the public narrative. I will cop to having ignored the trial myself, and to having had my vague opinions influenced by the balance of what people seemed to be thinking at first; in a society that is not only incredibly misogynistic but in the midst of an active backlash to feminist activism, that is a recipe for having your brain poisoned by the right.

Speaking of brain-poisoning on the right, I also really appreciated a crossover ep from two of my favorite pods: the hosts of Five Four appeared on Know Your Enemy this week to talk through the legal history and implications of the impending Supreme Court decision overturning Roe. -Claire

We’ve been watching…

Besides binging all 12 episodes of “Conversations With Friends” in succession, I’ve also been watching “Under The Banner of Heaven,” the FX show based on John Krakauer’s 2003 nonfiction book of the same name. It follows the history of Mormonism intercut with some very disturbing true crime, and explores the perils of religious extremism. Plus, Andrew Garfield and “Normal People’s” Daisy Edgar-Jones. -Emma

Greg and I have started the latest season of “Breeders,” Martin Freeman’s FX dark comedy about a London-dwelling couple who are struggling with the travails of parenting. Both of their children are adolescents by this season, and Freeman’s character, a dad with serious anger issues, has nearly destroyed his relationship with his teenage son through his bouts of rage. It’s still funny, but often pretty sobering; like “Workin’ Moms,” it started out as a charmingly unsentimental comedy about loving parents who have rougher edges than the idealized sitcom mom or dad, but evolved into a sometimes bleak look at how those rough edges — especially an uncontrolled temper — can have more profound consequences than scandalizing pearl-clutching moms at playgroup. Anyway, lots of therapy for me, just in case! -Claire

We’ve been buying…

I mean… I went a little crazy during the Nap Dress Summer Hill House drop. (Is it an illness? Yes! Obviously!) Some of the pieces I’m most excited about (all still in stock!) are this sweet pink lace Ellie, the Ophelia dress in Rose poplin, the Alexa top (loving both patterns in this one and its adjustable neckline), the Lucia dress in cotton voile, and for extra funsies/sun protection, this Rose Sun Hat. Can’t wait to wear some of these this summer as I pretend to be a fancy lady of leisure. -Emma

It probably goes without saying that I also have a new summer nap dress or two headed my way (the lilac stripe linen Ellie will probably be the more practical choice but I couldn’t resist trying on the pink roses Ellie too). But I also decided that I have reached the wide linen trousers stage of my life, and to start the transition, I ordered these Tradlands trousers in sienna. They are so soft, can be worn the way I like (very high-waisted), and look great with a basic tank. (They’re an ethical brand, aka pricey, but I do have a referral link for a lil discount!) -Claire -Claire

We’re in the midst of a streaming content bubble. Everything is being optioned; every week, three or four shows drop into the flooded TV landscape that boast giant budgets and star Matt Damon or Jessica Biel. Streaming series are being made out of books that haven’t even come out yet and TV shows that came out less than 20 years ago. Any news story that garnered a moderate amount of national attention — even decades ago — is at risk of being turned into a prestige drama.

And it just so happens that many of the big stories of the last five years involve startups that rocketed to multibillion-dollar valuations only to collapse under the weight of unsustainable growth, executive misconduct and mismanagement, and/or fraud.

This spring saw the release of three major TV shows that depict the rises and falls of three such companies and their troubled founder/CEO leaders: “Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber” (Showtime), “WeCrashed” (Apple TV+), and “The Dropout” (Hulu). Call it a micro-genre! Summer of scams plus billions of dollars in venture capital!

The shows vary significantly in quality — if you’re only going to watch one, we recommend choosing “The Dropout,” Liz Meriwether’s deft take on Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos — but they necessarily share many similarities. They feature a central antihero, whose motives and psyche must be grappled with; a host of VCs and board members who serve first as allies and then as antagonists to the antihero; a mass of lower-level employees whose exploitation is mostly rendered in broad strokes; and a final reckoning in which the founder finally loses control over the company they view as part of their own identity.

Along with tapping into streaming and TV companies’ unquenchable appetite for bankable IP, these stories tap into something specific in the audience: a potent blend of schadenfreude, the human thirst for crime and punishment, and politically thwarted but powerful rage against the excesses of capitalism. We want to see the tech titans pay for their misdeeds; we enjoy seeing them brought low. (Even if “low” just means going elsewhere, with billions of dollars to soften the blow.) CEOs aren’t our heroes anymore; no one wants to watch a show unironically called “Girlboss.” We want to watch them humiliated.

On this episode, we talk about the cultural moment that created this mini-genre, the tropes and archetypes that construct it, and the three shows that exemplify it. We dissect the bland oddity that is “Super Pumped,” a show that seems to have been creatively driven by which specific cultural products the creators thought would be fun to have in it (Pearl Jam, Quentin Tarantino, video games); revel in the perhaps-too-fun “WeCrashed” and Anne Hathaway’s gripping performance as WeWork first lady Rebekah Neumann; and finally we fangirl a bit over “The Dropout” and that Lil Wayne office dance scene that haunts our nightmares.

We’ve been reading…

Jessica Goodman’s new Y.A. thriller, “The Counselors,” which is finally out next week! Set at an idyllic summer camp serving the children of New York’s elite, it’s the perfect blend of summery escapism — you can practically taste the melting ice cream sandwiches and hear the yells of campers splashing in the lake — and suspenseful.

I’ve also been reading “Elsewhere,” by Alex Schaitkin, a dreamily unsettling novel set in a secluded town with its own peaceful way of life, and an inexplicable secret: Every now and then, one of the mothers in the town simply disappears. It’s an absorbing meditation on how women enter the state of motherhood and become both more intensely surveilled than ever and also, somehow, more invisible than before. (It will be out in June.) -Claire

Speaking of tech-fueled dystopias, I am still reading Jennifer Egan’s “The Candy House.” My ability to read quickly has been somewhat deadened by the pandemic, but the creative structure of this novel has gripped me. -Emma

We’ve been watching…

“Workin’ Moms” is back with season 6, and you know I’m back to watching ambitious Kate and mean-tempered Anne, along with their old mommy-group cohort, try to juggle parenthood, marriage, and work. As ever, the parenting part seems weirdly simple, or at least quiet — how do they get their toddlers to spend so little time shrieking “The Wheels on the Bus” over and over? And demanding that their mommy sit in a specific spot on the floor and sing along with them while playing with a truck in a specific way? — and they play pretty fast and loose with the publication timeline of books in this season. But it’s still reliably funny, and it ended on a TOTAL CLIFFHANGER so now I need season 7 immediately. Very rude to end sitcom seasons on cliffhangers! Uncool, guys! -Claire

I… have been binging “Bling Empire,” Netflix’s reality series about Asian billionaires and billionaire spawn (some millionaires, too) living in Los Angeles? It’s like candy for your brain. Not nutritious at all, but a fun rush. -Emma

We’ve been listening to…

Season 2 of “Normal Gossip” has begun (hell yeah), and I’ve got two songs on repeat: Dagny’s “Love You Like That” and Hayley Kiyoko’s “For the Girls.” If you’re not sure why, please get yourself a box of tissues, watch this, and then watch this. -Claire

For reasons that should be obvious, I too have been listening to Hayley Kiyoko’s “For The Girls,” as well as making my way through her back catalogue. I’ve also been on a kick of listening to songs that evoke the emotional drama of my teen years — which mostly means a whole lot of whiny alt-rock, like “Paper Heart” by the All-American Rejects and late ‘90s Green Day. lol. -Emma

We’ve been buying…

I got #influenced into buying the East Fork mug, from the cult-followed Asheville, NC pottery company. We have a whole shelf of mugs, and only a couple I actually like using — our Love to See It mug, obviously, and a random Urban Outfitters mug with an “A” on it because they were out of “C” mugs. I like to be able to put all four fingers into the handle; I like a little heft. If you’re like me… yeah, the East Fork mug lived up to the Instagram hype. The handle is pleasingly thick and capacious, and the whole vessel has a pleasing weight. The glaze (I chose the Eggshell shade) is beautiful and silky to the touch. -Claire

I’ve been putting the finishing touches on my new in-home work area since I moved. I have a lot of books, and also like to hold onto certain magazines that I’ve collected over the years. I was looking for a beautiful, space-saving way to display them, and I finally found it in these (super affordable!) FRIADE wall racks. I used these wooden racks with faux leather straps for magazines by my desk, and this one (I’m a sucker for rattan!) as a small-space-efficient bedside “table” of sorts, where I can put whatever book I’m reading and my eye masks. -Emma

Tan France. An indoor water feature. A sculptural swoop of scarlet sleeve. A fake montage of all the ladies arriving. Amanza undergoing 3 hours of glam squad work for a 90-second proof-of-life FaceTime appearance. Chrishell blushing joyfully over a special someone named G Flip. The Oppenheim twins weeping while continuing to hold their faces nearly immobile.

The “Selling Sunset” season 5 reunion had it all — except for the presence of Christine Quinn, the show’s long-running villain, who has apparently ghosted the show and its audience.

This week, we came back together to discuss some of the biggest revelations and pettiest debates of the reunion. We belatedly litigate the question of whether Christine actually bribed Emma’s client to switch agents, dig into the fraught gender dynamics of Jason’s and Chrishell’s respective decisions around having children and the liberatory potential of queer family structures, and come to a final conclusion on whether Emma’s Emma-panadas are really… empanadas. (No.)

Enjoy! xo

After five too-brief seasons of “Selling Sunset,” it was finally time for us to tackle the realtor reality soap — and finally time for me (Claire) to take a crash course in learning to tell 5-7 almost identical long-legged blondes apart from each other. (It’s a steep learning curve, but I can now reliably tell the difference between Emma and Christine, based on minute differences in lip plumpness.)

Like this season’s newcomer, agent Chelsea Lazkani, I plunged sans context into the cesspool of entrenched grievances that is the Oppenheim Group and merrily began to choose allies and enemies. Then I went back and viewed the four previous seasons, watching in enthralled horror as Christine’s friendships blossomed and wilted in an almost comically consistent pattern. Each season of the show is a fascinating document, constructed of lip fillers, couture miniskirts, 6-inch strappy stilettos, wedding invitations unreceived and coffee dates gone awry. Also: escrow. I’m at least 30% closer to understanding what “escrow” means after binging this show, as well as 65% closer to believing, against all evidence, that I will own a $4 million house with an infinity pool by the age of 42. Look, no one ever doesn’t buy a $4 million house on this show, so I can only assume the experience is universal.

Since Rich Text is new to “Selling Sunset” — and especially since I was absorbing all five seasons of drama simultaneously — we had endless material and could have talked for 12 hours. We compromised at two hours, in which we discussed the show’s very sleek, very tan, very L.A. aesthetic; whether the Oppenheim boys have charisma; whether we’re team Christina or team Chrishell; the limits of dividing and conquering; and what kind of home we’d buy with a budget like the buyers on this show.

NOTE: This episode does not cover the reunion episode! Emma had to move (and I had to get a haircut, equally important and stressful) on Friday, the day of the reunion drop, so we weren’t able to squeeze in a taping. But we will be back later this week with a mini-episode on the reunion (spoiler: AHHHHH) and also touch on some of the season five drama that we forgot to mention because I was so overwhelmed by how often Heather must get her hair professionally braided.

Hope you enjoy! xo -Claire

We’ve been reading…

Matt James’s surprisingly illuminating memoir, “First Impressions,” which offers more substance and insight than most post-“Bachelor” books (low bar, but nevertheless).

Also, the upcoming debut “Schmutz” by Felicia Berliner. It’s a very, uh, explicit novel about a young Hasidic woman who gets a laptop for her accounting studies and quickly becomes addicted to porn. Definitely NSFW. -Claire

Finally started Jennifer Egan’s “The Candy House.” I absolutely loved 2011’s “A Visit From The Goon Squad,” so I’ve been very excited to get into the long-awaited follow-up novel. I also loved Jia Tolentino’s New Yorker essay on the potentially radical nature of public, universal motherhood/care work. -Emma

We’ve been watching…

Five seasons of “Selling Sunset.” Obviously. I’m a professional. -Claire

The second season of “The Flight Attendant” on HBO Max. I love a thriller vibe, and I love Kaley Kuoco’s zany energy. -Emma

We’ve been listening to…

Some pods about the recent Roe vs. Wade news, including a satisfyingly rude episode from the lefty Supreme Court podcast “Five Four” and an “On the Media” episode about underground networks of activists teaching each other how to administer safe abortions outside of a doctor’s office. -Claire

The second season of “Queen of the Con” about a scammer CPA in Orange County. You know I love a good scam story. -Emma

We’ve been buying…

A lipstick from Merit Beauty, in hopes of reconnecting with my orange-red-lipstick-wearing roots. Also, an extremely soft nightgown from Hill House’s PJ collection. The days of summer glamour are coming! -Claire

I’ve been moving, so I have mostly been buying a whole lot of home things? My favorites include: these Threshold Coiled Rope bins from Target, this Wirecutter-recommended bath mat, this Backdrop paint in Surf Camp for an accent wall, and this indulgent wallpaper from Anthropologie which I am going to attempt to put up myself in my closet. (Because I am now living with a man, my more maximalist, pattern-driven tastes have been banished from the main living spaces. Rude!!!) -Emma

What if you really did have to work all the time? What if there were no family, no friends, no evenings or vacations, not even eight (okay, six and a half) hours of restful slumber?

Would a stack of colorful erasers and an occasional offering of melon or deviled eggs be enough to make this life worth living? What about collegial but superficial friendships with a handful of coworkers? A quarterly stack of waffles and burlesque performance? Constant assurances that you’re part of a family and that your work has profound, benevolent meaning?

“Severance,” the buzzy Apple TV+ show pushes the question to its limit. The series follows Mark (Ben Scott), an office worker at a creepy mega-corporation called Lumon who, along with his officemates, has undergone a procedure called “severance” to separate his work and personal memories. Though they leave the office every day at five and go home to their lives, they remember nothing that has happened at work. And because severed workers retain no knowledge of their outside lives once inside, the process essentially creates a new person, a new consciousness, who lives in the windowless office. It’s a work-life balance so complete that it ceases to be a balance at all.

As the series opens, Mark and his team are seemingly content with their lot — the little in-jokes, the incentives (erasers and waffle parties), the assurances that they’re making the world a better place as part of the Lumon family. Behind the carrots, of course, are sticks: when workers don’t fall in line, they’re psychologically tortured. But when Helly (Britt Lower) joins the team and refuses to accept that she can’t leave, the whole group begins to radicalize. Office comedy blends into dark corporate satire, which blends into scifi thriller as the workers begin to untangle the mystery of what Lumon is doing, why they’ve been created, and how to end their imprisonment.

It’s a beautifully realized, powerfully acted, and startlingly funny show, so we had the best time talking through the premise, the aesthetic, the performances, the misery and solidarity found in office drudgery, the many forms of labor exploitation, and even some fan theories about season two.

We’ve been reading…

“Sea of Tranquillity,” the newest Emily St. John Mandel novel. If you’ve read her previous two books, “Station Eleven” and “The Glass Hotel,” you probably know that there’s some slight overlap between them — a couple of shared characters, hints that they exist in the same universe. “Sea of Tranquillity” draws even more heavily from the world of “The Glass Hotel,” but with a strong sci-fi twist. It dips into 19th century British Columbia and 25th century moon colonies, and several places in between. The common link is a time-traveling detective who’s investigating a glitch in the fabric of time. (Much of the novel also seems to be drawn from her reflections on having written a popular pandemic novel just a few years before a catastrophic pandemic.) By the end, I found myself pretty distracted by my conviction that the time-travel element didn’t quite hang together, making the whole central thread of the book suspect. Not my favorite of hers, but she does go some lovely places with the question of what makes a life worth living — a perennial interest in her work. -Claire

I just started reading an advanced copy of our bud Jessica Goodman’s latest thriller, “The Counselors,” and I am hooked! I mean… camp vibes! Murder! Teen angst! First loves! What more could you want from a well-crafted, propulsive novel? -Emma

We’ve been watching…

Oh, everything! It’s been a catchup week over here. I finally finished “Bad Vegan,” Netflix’s breathless true-crime documentary about how the celebrity chef owner of Pure Food and Wine, a groundbreaking raw vegan restaurant in NYC, got sucked into a cultish relationship with some guy named Shane who used to tweet with Alec Baldwin (apparently this was considered cool in 2011). I’d never followed the story, so it was all new and fascinating. Points off for the troubling ending to the series; after presenting mountains of evidence that chef Sarma Melngailis was in a psychologically abusive, cult-like relationship, the shows pivots to lightly suggesting that maybe she was trying to scam her abuser and just wasn’t as successful as he was. It left an odd taste in my mouth, to say the least. -Claire

The second season of “Upload,” Amazon Prime’s underrated dystopian tech show. “Upload” explores an America in which the wealthy can now upload their consciousnesses to a private digital afterlife. The series focuses on Nathan Brown (Robbie Amell), a 27-year-old computer programmer who dies under mysterious circumstances and is uploaded into Lakeview, an elite digital afterlife, and his very-much-alive handler, Nora Antony (Andy Allo), who is a mid-level employee of Horizen, the shady mega-corporation that runs Lakeview. If you like the Big Tech themes of “Severance,” highly recommend checking out “Upload.” -Emma

We’ve been listening to…

“Scamfluencers,” the new scam pod from Scaachi Koul and Sarah Hagi. The first two stories they’ve zeroed in (a ballet company grift and an actor-producer who pretends to be backed by Howard Schultz) have been totally new to me and profoundly satisfying to hear unravel. -Claire

“Sympathy Pains,” a new podcast hosted by journalist Laura Beil, about Sarah Delashmit, a woman who spent two decades faking muscular dystrophy, cancer, lost pregnancies, and other traumas, in order to solicit friendship, favors and sympathy from the people around her. -Emma

We’ve been buying…

A chunky-knit cotton cardigan from Everlane, in their spring sale! After a year of feverishly, compulsively shopping, trying to figure out a functional style for myself post-baby and mid-Covid, I am really trying to cool my jets and settle into a wardrobe I feel good about. (Thanks to Dacy Gillespie’s Mindful Closet Instagram, into which I took a deep dive last month, for the inspiration.) I’ve been trying to pare back my closet, find things to sell or store or donate, and focus on making sure I have things at hand every day that I can reliably feel good in. And apparently I feel great in a sturdy cardigan? Incredible that it took me 33 years to really figure that out. -Claire

I also indulged in a little Madewell mega-sale shopping. I snagged this MWL Knit Cami and a pair of MWL Form High-Rise Leggings, both an extra 50% off. I have been trying to get back into a regular movement/exercise routine to help with my anxiety, and as dumb as it sounds, sometimes having a cute outfit to do it in is a helpful motivator. (Also, forcing your friends to move with you.) -Emma

If you watch “The Bachelor,” in some small part, to soak in the befuddling spectacle of 24-year-old women weeping because they’re not engaged yet and will never be chosen… boy, has Netflix got a series tailor-made for you!

“The Ultimatum” is the streaming platform’s latest romance reality show, and, more specifically, it’s part of the Lachey cinematic universe. Like “Love Is Blind,” the show is hosted by the notoriously happily married B-list couple, Nick and Vanessa; also, like “Love Is Blind,” it forces its participants to drink out of matching metallic wine glasses, and it bills itself as an “experiment.”

The hypothesis: Taking time apart and seeing other people can help established couples decide if they’re ready to get married.

The experimental design: Six couples, in which one partner wants to get engaged and the other doesn’t, exchange partners for a three-week “trial marriage,” followed by a three-week “trial marriage” with their original partner.

The results: The various couples break up or get engaged, thus proving that Nick and Vanessa are correct. About something.

Okay, so the scientific method is not closely followed in the course of this experiment, or at least what we remember of it from 9th grade chem.

But what this show does offer, in abundance, are very, very young people who desperately want to get married now. Not when they’re 25, not when they’ve dated for four years, not when their partner is ready, but now. The cast is appropriately unhinged for a juicy dating show. Some standouts:

• April, a 23-year-old influencer who almost exclusively refers to herself as “April,” as in, “April has had that maternal instinct since she was a little girl. April wants her own little girl.”

• Rae, a 24-year-old who explains that her man should propose because “I have my degree, I stay in the gym, I cook, I clean, and I know how to fuck.”

• Colby, a 25-year-old who dresses like a middle-aged ranch-owner and wants his girlfriend Madlyn to marry him immediately so that everyone will know she belongs to him.

• Madlyn, a 24-year-old who treats Colby with barely-veiled contempt but seems completely open to marrying him at the end of this experience.

• Alexis, a 25-year-old who admits she’d leave her boyfriend if he didn’t make enough for her to live a lavish lifestyle.

Though these characters can be jaw-dropping to watch in action, one thing these Netflix dating shows have going for them, oddly, is a fair amount of nuance. While “Bachelor” cast members are almost always neatly slotted into archetypes — villain, wifey, good guy — and carefully edited to keep their roles clear to the audience, even the most off-putting of the characters on “The Ultimatum” are shown as complex, confusing, complete humans. Even Alexis, who comes off as nosy, rude, and self-centered, is presented through the eyes of her boyfriend, Hunter, as lovable for her strong opinions and sense of self.

It’s juicy, disturbing TV — compulsive viewing, but also a bit concerning. The structure of the show involves taking a relationship with a fair amount of preexisting issues — disagreements about having kids, about money, about compatibility — and, without any apparent therapeutic support, injecting a huge dose of jealousy and insecurity. When the original couples reunite, they each not only have to deal with whatever physical and emotional connections their partner had while they were separate, but they have to field hurtful comparisons to the temporary partner. Most of the participants, by the end, seem to regret having done it, even if they got where they needed to go in their relationships.

On this week’s pod, we discussed as many twists and turns of “The Ultimatum” as we could jam into a two-hour taping. Hope you enjoy! xo

We’ve been reading…

I’m still reading “Pure Colour” by Sheila Heti, and it’s only getting wilder and woolier. For a long stretch, a leaf is simply having a conversation with themself (themselves)? I can’t describe it in a short blurb, I can only highly recommend. -Claire

A lot of brisket recipes to prepare for Passover seders. (Which by the time this comes out, will have already happened.) I settled on Alison Roman’s horseradish-y, shallot-y recipe, with a few tweaks of my own, like adding tomato paste. -Emma

We’ve been watching…

“Severance”! I’m a bit late to the melon party — Emma insisted that I watch for a future pod — but having just finally finished “Station Eleven,” I was very ready to start another show with some real teeth. -Claire

I binged “Severance” in less than 48 hours. I am still shook. -Emma

We’ve been listening to…

Randall and Jake, fresh off “The Ultimatum,” opening up a bit more about their experiences on the Ringer Reality TV podcast. We particularly loved hearing Randall call out his partner Shanique’s haters for being unable to accept an outspoken Black woman, and learning a bit more about what was going on with Jake and April’s relationship off-camera. -Claire

“Scamfluencers,” Wondery’s podcast, hosted by journalists Scaachi Koul and Sarah Hagi, about people who wield influence, both off and online, and use it to grift. The first two episodes are about a ballet company with allegedly lofty ideals, that ended in chargers of domestic violence and murder. -Emma

We’ve been buying…

These beautiful Swedish Hasbeen boots, which I coveted all fall and winter. I wore my Target knockoffs almost every day, but they were getting pretty scratched and gross by the end of the season, so when I saw that Bloomingdale’s had marked down the shearling clog boots I had originally longed for, I pounced. They were still a major splurge (though I was lucky to be able to combine a couple sale deals), but they’re super comfortable and I know they’ll be a cold-weather staple. -Claire

I saw my friend wearing these Everlane Easy Jeans with an elastic waistband, and I had to have them. Now that I’m going out to eat again regularly, I’ve re-remembered the deep discomfort of jeans cutting into your abdomen for a protracted period of time while sitting. They also happen to be on super sale right now. -Emma