MONDAY, APRIL 23
Welcome back to One Day at a Time, dears—your fave gossip column, and one that has, for much of the past year, been 100 percent Kanye-free! Alas, our blissful respite has come to an end, as Kanye West has returned… WITH A VENGEANCE! And a bunch of stupid opinions! (Instead of reading on, dears, feel free to open Spotify, put on College Dropout, crank up your headphones, pretend Kanye West is still great, and skip to Tuesday! Honestly, that’s probably the better option.) FIRST… “Kanye West Professes Love for Trump, Defends Conservative Pundit in New Interview” declares People, recounting a bizarre convo Kanye reportedly had with radio host Ebro Darden, in which Kanye insisted he was being “demonized” for “challenging conventional Black thought” and attempting to “deprogram” people. THEN… Kanye hopped on Twitter to share pictures of himself wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat. “You don’t have to agree with trump but the mob can’t make me not love him,” Kanye tweeted. “We are both dragon energy.He is my brother. I love everyone. I don’t agree with everything anyone does. That’s what makes us individuals. And we have the right to independent thought.” Just a sec, dears—we just winced so hard that we have to re-apply our eyeliner, and… oh no. Oh god, no. “Thank you, Kanye, very cool!” replied Donald Trump, who lost the popular vote by 2,864,974 votes and just provided a textbook definition of the exact opposite of “very cool!” Hey, remember when Kanye appeared on national TV after Hurricane Katrina and, point-blank, told everyone watching that “It’s been five days [without federal assistance] because most of the people are Black” and that “George Bush doesn’t care about Black people”? That was a thing that happened! That was kind of a big deal! But that was a long time ago, and now Kanye is “very cool!” And BTW, why is no one asking what the fuck “dragon energy” is?! Whatever it is, we’re pretty sure we’re allergic.
TUESDAY, APRIL 24
Oooookay… soooo… we have good news and we have bad news! The good news: We’re done talking about Kanye! Hooray! The bad news? Sean Spicer has returned… WITH A VENGEANCE! You may remember him as the inept Trump lickspittle who blundered his way through press conferences and was weirdly hateful toward Dippin’ Dots. (“Dippin dots is NOT the ice cream of the future,” he angrily tweeted in 2010, adding, over a year later, that, “I think I have said this before but Dippin Dots are notthe ice cream of the future” before gleefully retweeting a story about Dippn’ Dots filing for bankruptcy.) So, what’s Li’l Spicey up to these days? Well, this week he “turned up in Manhattan, at Madame Tussauds, the tourist-friendly waxworks temple, where he had been enlisted to help unveil the likeness of a former White House colleague: the first lady, Melania Trump,” reports the New York Times! “The departure of a high-level employee from the White House usually leads to a cable television contract or a big-time consulting gig,” the NYT went on, noting Spicey “has taken a different path” by appearing “occasionally on cable” after “a rumored stint on Dancing with the Stars failed to materialize.” Standing in front of the horrifying likeness of Melania (which, remarkably, was somewhat more expressive than the actual Melania), Spicey called the wax abomination “unbelievably lifelike” and, as the NYT notes, “had some trouble coming up with a specific anecdote to share about the real Melania.” Nearby, on a table filled with sparse refreshments and a stack of plastic plates, were flyers advertising Spicey’s upcoming book, The Briefing, which we assume is mostly knock-knock jokes and word jumbles. “The wax first lady, for her part,” the NYT wrote, “looked on mutely as Mr. Spicer held court.”
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 25
You know, if you’d asked us yesterday, “So, just how far can a nitwit fall after getting fired by Donald Trump?” we’d have probably said, “Well, rock bottom is probably hanging out with a creepy wax Melania and sneakily putting ads for your upcoming coloring book next to some stale croissants.” AND YET… Donald Trump’s nominee for Veterans Affairs secretary, Dr. Ronny Jackson, “once got so drunk at a Secret Service party that he wrecked a government vehicle,” according to the New York Post, citing a report from the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee that detailed Dr. Ronny’s “reckless dispensing of prescription drugs,” his “unhinged temper” that led to “screaming tantrums,” and his “history of drunkenness on duty.” (Including a time he “drunkenly pounded on the hotel room door of a female colleague… so hard that a Secret Service agent stepped in, fearful that the ruckus would wake then-President Barack Obama.”) Good ol’ fun-time Dr. Ronny was also known as “Candyman”—due to his penchant for handing out prescription drugs, such as Percocet, “like candy.”—and, on at least one occasion, “was needed to perform his medical duties but couldn’t be reached because he was passed out drunk in his hotel room.” Piling on, one of Dr. Ronny’s coworkers noted he’s “the most unethical person I have ever worked with.” We’ll be honest, dears: We were really looking forward to writing about more of Dr. Ronny’s White House adventures! But for some reason, he’s taken himself out of the running for the Veterans Affairs job? We can’t imagine why. (Psst! Dr. Ronny! The Mercury currently has no staff physician, and we could really use a few pick-me-ups, if you know what we mean!) (Percocet, Dr. Ronny. We mean enough Percocet to kill a goddamn horse.)
THURSDAY, APRIL 26
Pocket that Percocet for the time being, Dr. Ronny, because here’s the pick-me-up we’ve been waiting for: Today Bill Cosby was found GUILTY of three counts of sexual assault! Following the jury’s verdict, the courtroom erupted in cheers, while Cosby screeched in impotent fury, calling the prosecuting attorney an “asshole.” Obviously, this verdict was an astonishing relief for Cosby’s victim, Andrea Constand, who showed incredible bravery in her long pursuit of justice, especially when accused of making up the charges in order to become famous. (Hi! Has anyone ever become a celebrity this way? NOPE.) Cosby faces up to 30 years in prison, where he will probably die the miserable death he deserves—though let’s not forget the many other women who were abused by this grotesque troll. As Teen Vogue’s Lauren Duca wrote on Twitter: “We’re all still part of the society that allowed him to traumatize over 60 women, silencing their stories with fear of backlash, while he thrived in the spotlight for decades.” Okay, doc, now we’ll take that Percocet.
FRIDAY, APRIL 27
WARNING! WARNING! If you’re currently within 50 yards of Taylor Swift, hit the deck—because her pretty head is about to EXPLODE! Why? Because Tay-Tay’s eternal arch-nemesis Katy Perry met the Pope! Katy traveled to Rome this week to give a lecture on meditation for the Vatican’s “Unite to Cure” healthcare initiative, and—yeah, we’re thinking they may have invited the wrong Katy Perry, too. Anyway! Not only did Katy touch the hand of Pope Francis, she did so while holding on to the bulging bicep of her off-again, now on-again dreamboat boyfriend Orlando Bloom, who was last seen paddleboarding with the lucky pop star in the nude, and… BLAMMM! Yuck. Did we say 50 yards? We meant 60 yards.
SATURDAY, APRIL 28
As you undoubtedly recall, the annual White House Correspondents’ Dinner is an opportunity for the administration and the journalists who cover them to eat, make jokes, and foster a chummy relationship that they absolutely should not fucking have. And usually it’s a snooze fest—but not this year! Because our new favorite comedian, Michelle Wolf, showed up to unleash a tsunami of fierce, bloodthirsty truth (in the guise of jokes) on the politicians and press in attendance. Because Trump was too chickenshit to show up, he sent press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders to receive the brunt of Wolf’s brilliant, oh-so-caustic (and absolutely spot-on) insults. “[Sanders] burns facts,” Wolf told the crowd, “and then uses the ash to create the perfect smoky eye.” Every observation Wolf made was right on the money—but nothing topped the following heat-seeking missile of truth: “I’m never really sure what to call Sarah Huckabee Sanders,” she said with a devilish smile. “What’s ‘Uncle Tom,’ but for white women who disappoint other white women?” YESSSSSSSS. While we’ll always be a proud member of Beyoncé’s beehive, we’re clearing time in our schedule to join Michelle’s “Wolf pack.”
SUNDAY, APRIL 29
BUT! Because no good deed goes unpunished, we’re sad to report that Michelle Wolf’s blisteringly funny White House Correspondents’ dinner roast was not well received by the Trump administration (haha, who cares?) or most of the White House reporters in attendance (now that’s disappointing). Apparently, the reporters took offense to Wolf’s pointed observations that the press “helped create this monster [Trump], and now you’re profiting off of him,” and in return wrote sneering tweets and articles about her performance. Well, the internet refused to have any of that, and tore into these hypocritical journalists with the same ferocity they usually save for Trump’s pack of liars. And it was well deserved, because when these correspondents sit in that briefing room, refusing to call bullshit on the constant stream of lies pouring from the White House, they are normalizing what should never, EVER be considered “normal.” The press has one job: To reveal the truth, not perpetuate lies. And with that, we’re ending this week’s column by revealing an undeniable truth: Never mix a Percocet with two martinis! (Unless, of course, you enjoy waking up 23 hours later with keyboard marks on your face.)