Howdy, Trash Pandas! It's me, Elinor Jones, coming at you with another TRASH REPORT. I'll start with the BEST news (for you), which is that 100% of the lingering zen from my vacation has faded so I'm as anxious and freaked out as ever! You know what I think would be fun? To navigate this cruel and unforgiving gossip world together. Let's go!

I'm a Barbie Barbie, in a Barbie Barbie

The major entertainment story of the summer is Barbie dominating the box office and most of the pop culture conversation. As we are wont to do after a ~moment~ everyone is stressing about what will be the next Barbie as we receive the news that Lena Dunham is lined up to write and direct a Polly Pocket adaptation starring Lily Collins and everyone forgot how good Barbie made them feel and became angry again. Let's take a breath, friends. For one, while I'm not a Hollywood exec, I have a hard time believing that some bigwigs cobbled this plan together in the eight days since Barbie's release so let's cool it on this being purely reactionary. And for two, yes, please keep giving us things like Barbie! While Lena Dunham and Polly Pocket might not be it, I am absolutely looking forward to the influence Barbie has on the cultural landscape, and if it makes future films (even the dumb cash grabs) more progressive and weird and fun, then hooray! I'm still mad about the Jem and the Holograms movie being so boring, so like, please, keep this energy up! Have Ziwe write an LOL Doll movie. Have Janeane Garafalo direct Care Bears. Do all of it! We deserve this! Let movies be interesting (and less than two hours long) again!   

In other Hollywood news, actors are still striking, leading to many sweet social media moments of our faves with picket signs, but also making us hone in on stars who are being oddly quiet. Which brings us to Brad Pitt. According to Lainey Gossip, production on Brad's upcoming film Apex is ongoing in Hungary in spite of the strike, and while European actors may not necessarily be SAG members, it's still a really bad look. Brad Pitt might be an abusive drunk but he's not dumb, and he would know what a powerful statement it would be for his project to shut down in solidarity, which is why this is so infuriating. And it's extra infuriating that People magazine  - Brad's mouthpiece for years - would share an update on his boring relationship with a civilian to try to make us keep liking him! We're onto you, Brad.

One of the instagram stories about casts reuniting was the cast of Suits, that previously starred none other than Duchess Meghan Markle. So the British press has been talking mad shit about her (as usual) trying to egg her on about the SAG-AFTRA strike so they could say even more about her, but Meghan won't comment, which I normally wouldn't respect, but here it makes sense. Besides, she already said in her show with Oprah that she loved that her union protected her. Also, Deux Moi just said that Harry and Meghan are fine and I believe them so I think we should generally back off on these middle-aged jobless people and remember to stay mad at Brad Pitt, who is very sneaky. 

People Are Nature

The Oregonian put out a real one-two punch of stories this past week, with a thoughtful piece on a non-profit that is funding dumpsters at unsanctioned camp sites so houseless residents can keep their living spaces clean. They also published another about how our city's protected natural areas have been damaged by unsanctioned camps. It's such a wild pair of stories because story #2 could clearly be solved by reading story #1! Nobody wants to live around garbage; give people services! Both stories are great and I'm not gonna be jokey about them, just read them. Okay sorry, actually I do have one thing to say, which is: doesn't it seem weird to be like "living humans are disrupting natural area" as if living humans aren't also part of nature? It's not like a drone is out there clearing what could be vital native grasses to make a fire to cook food because they are hungry and capitalism has failed them.

He's Fine. I'm Fine.

Mitch McConnell had some sort of attack while addressing the press last week where he stopped talking and stared into space for 30 seconds before being shuffled away. The 81-year-old man is withering away in front of our eyes and rather than eat popcorn while a truly awful human who is responsible for a lot of pain publicly fails, I accidentally learned more about him. Apparently his legs have always been wobbly because he's a polio survivor and I was unwelcomingly reminded that even bad people are human beings who deserve compassion. Boo! For me, as a person who sees humanity in everyone - even those who would happily deny the humanity of others - this is a conflict that I do not enjoy! Honestly, it would be easier if he died. Then, in reading the Wikipedia page about McConnell in hopes of finding more awful things to balance out my compassion for him, instead I learned that his youngest daughter Porter McConnell is a left-wing activist and her mother - McConnell's first wife - is a feminist scholar, and now he's both human and interesting. Stupid people and their stupid nuances! Just be bad!!!

In other DC news, some guy pretty much announced that UFOs exist. Give me a tin-foil hat because I wholeheartedly believe that this information was in the Feds' back pocket for years and they were just waiting for the moment when the populace was so angry and unhinged that they'd throw this news our way like some robbers would throw a bone at a guard dog in hopes of distracting them. It's a testament to just how angry and unhinged all of us are right now that this news dropped and we're all just like "huh? Yeah, aliens. We figured as much." But the planet is on fire and like four people have all the money and eggs are too expensive, but also, somehow too cheap. Like, when we think about farm subsidies and also the environmental devastation and animal cruelty that is inherently part of factory farming, maybe eggs should cost $8 a dozen, or maybe honestly more like $40 a dozen, and the government has been more focused on what a 3rd-grader is packing in their jeans than doing fucking anything to fix all this other fucked up shit everywhere else!!! And the one thing - the one tiny thing - that'll pacify us and get us back to sitting quietly and tapping the feeder bar is television, but now everyone's on strike and we might run out of content and we are NOT OKAY!!!"  Then we're all frothing and panting and drooling while the alien team is slowly backing into the hedge like Homer Simpson being like "oh wow, jeez we really thought they'd care about aliens." 

But if they'd shared the news via a meme of somebody punching an alien and saying "welcome to earf," maybe we'd start listening? I don't know. People just really like memes.

Wow, are we all okay? That's so much trash! Thanks for holding back my hair while I barfed all over *gestures vaguely at stuff* and I am so grateful for your friendship and patience and I'd never spiral with anyone else.

Lovingly,

Elinor Jones