Abbott Elementary, The Nice Guys, and Billie Eilish.
Week 184.
Hello hello! Happy long weekend! Here’s a recap of my week:
Things I Read
Books
If you’re looking for a book to read, try this list of contemporary romance recs, this list of other fiction recs, or this list of non-fiction recs. I also track everything I read on Goodreads.
I am having one of the slowest reading years of my adult life! I cannot get myself back into a reading routine to save my life! Ugh.
Articles
“An Impossible Choice”: Virginians Asked to Waive Constitutional Rights to Get a Plea Deal: Haven’t rage written about the criminal legal system in a minute, so it felt like time. I thought this was a really good article about the use of Fourth Amendment waivers in plea agreements in Virginia. A basic explanation of what these are: prosecutors can include a condition in a plea agreement that requires the person to waive their Fourth Amendment rights of protection against search and seizure for a certain amount of time, often many years. Normally, police officers have to have probable cause to search your person, your belongings, your vehicle, etc. If you get stopped by a cop, they cannot just search you without your permission (and you should NEVER give them permission) unless they have reasonable suspicion that you have committed a crime. That is your constitutional right. A fourth waiver requires a person to waive those rights, often for years after they have served a sentence, which means the cops can stop and search them at any time for any reason, or for no reason at all. This is bad! Prosecutors, several of which are quoted in this article, say that these waivers improve public safety, but I don’t think that’s true. The way this plays out in practice is that cops will stop someone and conduct a search that would be illegal under regular circumstances, but then later they find that the person has a fourth waiver in place. This is not a situation where cops first check to see if someone has waived these rights, and then they act. All it does is create a loophole for their bad behavior after the fact. I personally would not consider allowing law enforcement to act with impunity to be a way to improve public safety, sorry! Cops should not be able to do whatever they want to whoever they want (for many reasons, not the least of which is that they will mostly pick poor people of color). In Richmond in 2020, 96% of people who agreed to a fourth waiver were people of color. The use of these waivers is not an uncommon practice, as this article points out. It’s a very common, standard practice in many jurisdictions across Virginia and in other states as well. The Virginia legislature passed a bill to ban the use of these waivers earlier this year, but because our Governor is a useless waste of space with a pile of rocks where his brain should be, he vetoed it (and many other common sense criminal legal reforms) with no explanation. I hate that guy.
Things I Watched
TV
If you’re looking for a show to watch, try this list.
Abbott Elementary (ABC/Hulu): This is just one of the most reliably good shows on tv right now. Season three just ended this week and I loved it. I thought it built on all the story lines so well and it’s perfectly paced and so funny. The finale made me scream!! This just feels like the kind of network tv comedy that doesn’t really exist anymore, and it’s done so, so well. If you’re not already watching this, now is the time to get on board. I can’t wait for season 4.
Movies
The Truth vs. Alex Jones (Max): I don’t really even know what compelled me to watch this but it is a truly miserable cultural document. I sort of vaguely followed the two trials last year in which the parents of kids who died at Sandy Hook sued Alex Jones for spreading horrific misinformation about the shooting being a hoax, but this documentary explains the whole thing in harrowing, horrific detail. This is one of the clearest examples I have ever seen of a person who is so irreversibly unwell. This documentary is very well done and I am glad these parents were given a platform to speak about this, both in court and in this film. But oh my god, this is hard to watch.
The Nice Guys (rented): Somehow I had never seen this, despite my huge crush on Ryan Gosling. It’s so funny! It takes place in the 1970s in LA, he plays a private investigator who teams up with another guy (Russell Crowe) who basically beats people up for a living to try to find a missing woman. This is really stylistic in a way that is so fun visually, and it is truly very funny. Ryan Gosling is such a movie star and he is so good at comedy! This made me laugh so much. It’s violent but not too much, and it’s bloody but not too gross. Worth watching if you haven’t seen it.
Before Sunset (rented): I had been thinking about this movie since I watched Before Sunrise on my trip, so I watched it again last weekend. God, I love this movie. This one takes place nine years after Before Sunrise, and we learned what happened between Jesse and Celine in that time. This is about 90 minutes and takes place in real time, and it’s basically just the two of them walking around Paris talking to each other. But it is SO compelling, this sucked me in just as much as it did the first time, I watch this movie riveted and with my heart racing. It’s so good. I love them so much.
Things I Bought
You can read about my full skincare routine and favorite products here. If you need a sunscreen recommendation, try this list.
Anthropologie Colette pants: I have seen so many people, on the internet and in real life, rave about these pants and I finally caved. Unfortunately they are worth the hype!! I bought the full length version in black but they also come in cropped styles and in different colors and prints. They are so comfortable but still structured, perfect for work but also very easy to dress down. I’ve really been on the hunt for good pants that fit me well recently, as I feel like both my body and what is in style has changed quite a lot in the last few years and I don’t really know my sizes or how to dress myself anymore. I’ve bought and returned a lot of pants recently, but these are a definite win. A little pricey, but worth it to me for how versatile they are.
One Last Thing…
I am LOVING the new Billie Eilish album. I think it is by far her best work and one of the best albums of the year so far. I love The Greatest and Birds of a Feather and Chihiro, but also I’ve just been listening to the whole thing on repeat. She’s so good.
That’s it for me! I hope you all have a good week.
TTYL,
Emily