Hello, and Happy Monday! Welcome to the Trash Report. I'm your friend, Elinor Jones, possibly shouting into the void because I feel like a lot of you are on a long holiday weekend and might be enjoying your lives instead of staring at one of your rectangles on this Monday morning. You're gonna do what you need to do this week, but please keep in mind that dogs and fireworks are mortal enemies, and whose side do you want to be on when shit hits the fan? Personally, I'm not doing anything special this week because the flag aesthetic is tacky and I can grill whenever I want and I'd rather do so without feeling like I'm praising the legacy of a bunch of slave owners. 

Also, this place kinda sucks?

Let's ignore all that and dig into some TRASH!

Oh No. My Tweets. Stop. I Need Those.

In his ongoing crusade to ruin what used to be the funnest place on the internet, Elon Musk recently started limiting the amount of tweets that non-verified users could see every day to a slim 600. Many of us who are addicted to the bird app (despite its steady decline since Musk took over) breathed a collective sigh of relief. None of us want to be there! Twitter sucks! It's like getting too big of a burrito, and continuing to eat it even though it's long since been tasty and now is just punishment, but it's there, so you don't stop, and when it's gone, you are not sad, but relieved. This is that. When I got my notice that I'd hit my max, it was a gut punch to my sense of reality as I realized I was wasting a beautiful Sunday, and I reevaluated some things. That Musk thinks having to set down one's phone to spend time with one's family on a gorgeous day is punishment for not paying the $8 a month is embarrassing for him, not me. I have to sit with the fact that I'll never get back the time I spent reading tweet after tweet about some Youtuber I'd never heard of before last week and her cringey ukelele apology. I'll never get that time back. I hope Musk gives me even fewer tweets to read. I hope to have a good and meaningful life. 

What Do I Think About the Supreme Court? WELL!

The Supreme Court is playing very fast and loose with narrowing their interpretations of who gets to benefit from our society's laws and I, for one, do not like it! Which is probably not a surprise. But do you know how the star of The Sopranos and White Lotus, actor Michael Imperioli, feels about them? Get ready for a new segment on The Trash Report called "What does Michael Imperioli think about that?"

What Does Michael Imperioli Think About That?

Michael Imperioli is pissed! He said that if some shitty web designer got the green light to bar non-existent gays from using her non-existent wedding website service, that means he gets to say that bigots and homophobes don't get to watch his shows. The sentiment: hard yes. The practicality? Oh, buddy. It's been a minute since my app dating days, but it used to be that being super into the Sopranos was a surefire sign of being...not necessarily homophobic, but definitely bro-tastic in a way that felt  get problematic pretty quickly. I just feel like that ship has sailed, as far as who has access to The Sopranos. And The White Lotus—homophobes aren't watching that show! It's 100 percent the gayest energy of a show that centers heterosexual relationships of anything out there. But if they say it's the thought that counts, that what Michael Imperioli thinks about that! 

What Does James Cameron Think About That?

Arnold Schwarzeneggar recently spoke at a panel about Terminator 2: Judgement Day, and credited director James Cameron with the direction he took the film. Schwarzeneggar even admitted —several times, even... too many times, if you ask me—that he was basically begging for carnage. Like, he said it a bunch of times to the point that it was weird. But, Cameron insisted that the Terminator become good, which in turn made the movie so good. Cameron was also recently in the news for his excellent judgement regarding what kind of submersibles are safe for visiting the wreckage of the Titanic. So, this has got me thinking, this is a guy with some great intuition! I'd trust him with any decision! However, this is the same guy who thought the world needed 15 hours worth of Avatar movies. So, I could see ignoring his advice from time to time. 

Lloyd Center Forever

I don't love cherishing things of the past simply because they reminded us of a time when we were happy, especially when said thing is nothing but a shrine to capitalism and excess, as a general rule. HOWEVER, Lloyd Center is fantastic, and there seems to be some real potential about what to do with the space, including new indie stores and pop-up art galleries. So like, is there no other place in the city of Portland to put a freaking baseball stadium, which is now apparently a proposal that is on the table? There are derelict buildings and empty lots all over this city that don't already house several local businesses and a place to ice skate! Like, do they think baseball will suddenly become interesting if it's being played on top of the remains of an Orange Julius and a Claire's? I'm mad about baseball generally (games too long! Outfits not cute!) and this certainly doesn't help. 

What Dies Never Stays Dead

And what's not dead at the moment is... PERMS! Apparently the new ones are softer, prettier, and more natural-looking. I got a perm in around 1991 and then immediately went to a water slide park and got it wet, which is a no-no, and my hair has been stubbornly stick-straight ever since, so I am living for this next generation to attempt what I never got for myself. Because how embarrassing would it be to be a middle-aged lady like, oh, I had to have straight hair, and it sucked for me, so now everybody has to have straight hair, or if they try to have curly hair, it has to hurt and be expensive and smell bad! What elder wouldn't want things to be just a smidge easier for those who come after us?! What kind of monster would you be! I hope that the Biden administration revisits what he can do about... perms. (This is about student loans.)

Okay, that's all for now, I gotta go get my dog into a thunder-shirt and hope that my dry-ass yard doesn't go up in flames, as I'm sure you do too. Stay safe and beautiful.

Quietly,