Children’s Culture Guide for Adults: What Happened to Simone Biles at the Olympics?
The Delta Option spreads, Congress is investigating a coup attempt, and the West Coast is on fire. But to hell with summer! So let’s talk about the mental health of gymnasts, ducklings and what happens if you eat ten pounds of bananas.
This Week In Sports: Simone Biles Leaves Olympics
24-year-old super gymnast Simone Biles shocked the world earlier this week when she pulled out of the Olympic individual and all-around competition. Biles was considered a gold medal contender in almost every competition, but it was all too much.
“It’s been a long year and I think we’re too stressed. We should have fun here, ”Biles said. “I came in and felt that I was still doing this for other people. It just hurts my heart that doing what I love was taken away from me in order to please other people, ”she added.
As expected, the terrible people in the world drew dire reactions, including conservative activist and moron Charlie Kirk, who called Biles “a shame for the country” and told his audience, “We are raising a generation of weak people like Simone Biles.” washes (all of them would have had the guts to compete if they were world-class gymnasts and not an assistant manager in a batting cage).
Sorry Charlie, but the opposite is actually true. We are raising a generation strong enough to prioritize the mental health of stupid competition and wise enough to know when to end it. The days of someone like Kerry Strug being called a hero for competing despite injuries that could permanently incapacitate her are mercifully over. In addition, Biles’ departure allowed her 18-year-old teammate Sunisa Lee to take home the gold in the all-around, so even with the second row, the US was still number one, babe.
Labor Relations This Week: Children No Longer Want To Work Horrible Jobs
Just as Simone Biles refuses to compete in the Olympics, young people everywhere are turning down low-paying summer jobs at retail chains and fast food restaurants. This is an insult to our entire past; without a heartbreaking summer trapped in a Dairy Queen’s hot box to get them ready, kids might expect basic decency when employing adults too! Labor shortages in the hospitality industry are so severe that some shops and restaurants are cutting opening hours and some are even considering raising employee wages.
Opinions are mixed as to why the Tylers and Olivias of our country do the same as Bartleby Scrivener. Some blame the expansion of unemployment benefits caused by the COVID relief package, while others argue that these jobs suck and owners should just pay people more if they expect them to come along. Personally, I think the culprit is the rise of angry Karens attacking McDonald’s workers with iced tea machines .
This week’s TikTok Mini Trends: Abandoned Ducks and Frozen Honey
“Steve, what’s going on on TikTok,” I hear you ask. Well dear reader, this week is all about abandoned ducks and frozen honey.
The ducks came from influential people who hired the little bird to take adorable photographs. Oops ! So cute ! But it turns out that caring for a real duck is kind of difficult, which is why TikTokers dump their new pets at animal shelters after the photo shoot. A spokesman for the Montreal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals told Washington Newsday : “We received 60 ducks this year from January 1st to date. Last year we had six ducks. “
The honey trend is less disturbing and tastier. Many, many people on TikTok freeze honey and eat it – the video under the hashtag #FrozenHoney has over 220 million views. Unlike the jellied pheasant trend, popular at the Palace of Versailles in the 1700s, frozen honey is easy to make. You simply pour honey into a plastic water bottle and freeze it. It doesn’t freeze to a solid state, but it does provide a sweet, semi-soft popsicle you can squeeze into your mouth – just what you need for a Global Warming Day in the park.
In Music This Week: The Rise of NPR’s Tiny Tabletop Concerts
The Dumb Liberals on National Public Radio are a lot of things – thoughtful, erudite, sonorous – but they were never “cool” until NPR’s web music series Tiny Desk Concerts appeared. Internet shows have become a popular venue for non-wack musicians to perform on the Internet.
The series began back in 2008 with performances by alt-folk and quirky eccentrics such as Doctor Dog , The Tallest Man on Earth, and my personal cult favorites,Screaming Women , but the series grew in popularity and international isolation led to a series featuring musicians from yourself at home. Eventually, groups and singers that really interested people started performing on the show. Artists such asAnderson .Paak & The Free Nationals , Ty Dolla $ ign ,Justin Bieber, and even K-Pop superstarsBTS have graced NPR’s site with modest performances. Go through the entire archive , but don’t blame me if you fall down the musical rabbit hole you never get out of.
Viral Video of the Week: What Happens If You Eat 23 Bananas After Fasting?
Chubbyemu is a pharmacist who posts amazing, true-to- life medical stories on his YouTube channel. In aviral video thisweek, a good doctor details a case in which a fitness enthusiast interrupted a week’s fast by eating 10 pounds of bananas. You would probably suspect that this is a terrible idea, but the genius of the video lies in the insanely detailed explanation of exactly why this terrible idea and how exactly the subject’s body went awry due to the overuse of bananas. ChubbyEmu goes down to the molecular level with this shit. When you stop shaking from the danger of overdosing on bananas, watch what happens if youdrink a lava lamp (bad stuff),eat Tide pods (worse), or eat25 bags of silica gel labeled “Don’t eat” “ on them (surprisingly not-super-bad stuff.)