Afternoon Tea 11.30.2020 - Just Don't Look

The Great Reset & New Blob

November 30, 2020

After escaping some demons and much needed rest, we’re back to get this year over with! AOC & Jagmeet play Among Us, the NYC mayoral race could produce Herzonor, The Great Reset is a thing, Trump’s election fraud efforts are not a thing, and a new gelatinous jelly was discovered. It’s Monday, November 30th 2020, and this is the Tea.

Ocasio-Cortez raises $200K to fight food and housing insecurity during video game battle (TheHill) AOC continues to teach a master class in digital engagement with the youths. Not only did she raise over $200,000 for people going hungry, but the Among Us stream featured a Canadian progressive party leader named Jagmeet Singh, who continued the theme of “Hey American kids, you know healthcare is for everyone, elsewhere right?” Masterful strategy, and it is working.

Women Have Already Made History in the 2021 Mayoral Race (CityLimits) In case you weren’t sick of elections, the NYC Mayoral race is slowly kicking on, and there are more serious contenders for the Throne of Hizzoner than we’ve ever had. Between this and the emergence of ranked choice voting in NYC, buckle up.

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, reveals she had a miscarriage in July (CNN) So many women I know have suffered silently with miscarriage, and the prevailing wisdom still shushes them. The prevailing wisdom is wrong. This heartbreaking event needs to be unpacked so the women & couples who experience it can get the support they need.

The Biden Presidency Already Has Its First Conspiracy Theory: The Great Reset (Daily Beast) I’m not even going to try and summarize this one, but I can summarize best by saying it makes birther shit look quaint.

The closest the Great Reset conspiracy theorists have to an agreed-upon text comes from Catholic Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, who has a history of sending pro-Trump open letters that are picked up on right-wing blogs. In a late October letter to Trump that Carlson later promoted on his Fox show, Viganò alleged that the Great Reset was a cover for a scheme built by Bill Gates centered on the “renunciation of private property and adherence to a program of vaccination against Covid-19.”

In this theory, Viganò claimed, people who refused a global digital ID from a “health dictatorship” would be imprisoned in detention camps and lose their property.

This Is Joe Biden When No One Is Watching (Esquire) This isn’t going to change any minds of the firebrand leftists I know who have already re-trenched for a long war (Lol Neera), but I wanted to note this type of piece would be unheard of about Trump. The suffering Biden’s experienced in his life will be a profoundly different guidepost than Trump’s cruelty.

A donor who gave $2.5 million to a pro-Trump group looking for election fraud wants his money back after disappointing results (Insider) At this point, Trump’s election fraud cases are 1 win and 37 losses out of 50 possible contests? I won’t be addressing them as anything but fantasy going forward, and I suggest you show escalating amounts of malice to anyone who still wants to humor this fascist participation trophy.

Carrie Lam: Hong Kong's leader says she has to keep piles of cash at home (BBC) The leader of Hong Kong is paid only in cash by the Chinese government, proving she’s not corrupt…somehow. In case you needed a meme-worthy 2020 news item for your dinner conversation.

Inheritance, not work, has become the main route to middle-class home ownership (The Guardian) I feel like this is the opposite of meritocracy, but my lazy non-land owning brain struggles to comprehend matters such as this.

Scientists Confirm Entirely New Species of Gelatinous Blob From The Deep, Dark Sea (ScienceAlert) We identified a new type of jelly/gelatinous ctenophore off the coast of Puerto Rico. Like, on HD because we have remote operated vehicles looking for stuff. Also related to scientists looking for stuff, apparently a bunch of Australian marsupials glow in the dark?

Rockefeller, the tiny owl from the Christmas Tree, is home safe (CNN) If you’ve been following the Rocky story, you’ll be delighted to know the best thing to come out of that Peanuts Christmas Special looking tree has been freed into a conifer forest in upstate NY after spending a spa weekend a rehab center named Ravensbeard.

Small Business of the Tea: In the spirit of the season, I’ll be signal boosting a friend’s small business, craft store, or side-hustle every day until Santa arrives. To stress, none of these placements are compensated, this was not requested by them, and in some cases they won’t know before it goes live. 

Jon Reznick, one of the most talented photographers I know is opening up his store for the first time in years, and is accepting a humorously small number of custom/private commissions. After spending months traveling out west, he settled on this handful of shots to offer printed on silvery metal. The metallic print is quite different than what you’re expecting, with the photo being printed onto the metal directly. Not only does it make this wildly easier to clean, there’s no glass to break or things to swallow or hurt a toddler’s mouth on. Take a look and reach out if you fancy one of them.

Song of the Tea: Mista Trick & Donny Marco produced the first 2020 round up track of the season and it’s a lovely appetizer for the salvo of “What the hell was that” round up media we’re about to get. Also he totally looks like a Lad Pirate.

Stay dryStay flyStay batman

Big plans for 2021. You might be seeing a lot more of me.

Yours,T