The Week In Recommendations 2.28.24
A new podcast about Ruby Franke, a sobering read, the perfect brush and Paris shopping. Plus, one great thing with Taylor Trudon!
This is the free edition of Rich Text, a newsletter about cultural obsessions from your Internet BFFs Emma and Claire. If you like what you see and hear, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Our latest podcast was about “Love Is Blind” 6, episodes 7-9. (Eps. 10-11 + gossip coming on Thursday!) Rich Text is a completely reader-supported project — no ads or sponsors!
Claire has been reading… 📖
Britney Spears’s memoir, “The Woman in Me,” long after everyone else already read it. (It’s for work, so no excuses this time.) I’ve also been engaging in a lot of helpless and demoralized scrolling when I get a few free moments. I thought I read something interesting in the New York Times this week, went to the app to check my history, and somehow found myself playing Wordle for the first time ever instead. It’s been a very dispiriting week, and my brain appears to flicker off and on at will thanks to sleep deprivation. Sometimes I read a little bit of Hannah Brown’s romance novel in hopes of having a little fun, but it is not doing the trick.
Emma has been reading… 📖
This very sobering feature in The Cut about the IVF patients who were immediately impacted by Alabama’s latest anti-choice ruling. (For those who are unfamiliar, the Alabama Supreme Court recently put out a ruling that defined frozen embryos as children under Alabama law.) Women are scrambling to pull embryos out of clinics and out of the state, and fertility options that were hard-earned (and painful! and expensive!) are now being held hostage as clinics and hospitals scramble to figure out how to operate — if at all — under this ruling. I continue to be horrified by the state of reproductive rights in this country, and every warning experts gave us that the right would come for IVF and birth control seems to be materializing. It’s despicable and bone-chilling and a great reminder of how fucking important it is to involve yourself in politics at the local, state and federal level. I admit that I’m struggling to hold onto hope these days, but I’m really really trying.
Claire has been watching… 📺
I did watch the latest “Curb” this week, but aside from that it has all been work-required. Things have been bleak here, from a free-time standpoint. Someone please come convince my baby that nighttime is for sleeping and daycare is a great place to drink milk from a bottle, because he’s gobbling up any possible “free time” in my schedule right now. The other day I started a movie and have been able to watch about 20 minutes of it. I don’t even have the heart to reveal what it is when I’ve seen less than a quarter of the thing. Stay tuned to see if I’ve been able to finish literally one movie by next week!
Emma has been watching… 📺
“Love Is Blind” and “The Bachelor” and all the TikToks about all the “Love Is Blind” gossip!!!! (Frankly, they’ve all been very juicy.) Honestly haven’t had time for anything else, and Hulu doesn’t even work in Paris.
is the founder of , a newsletter where she interviews teen girls. (Please let her know if there's a cool teen in your life who she should interview! Seriously!) She loves French fries, celebrity gossip, and hanging out with her dog, Fran, in Brooklyn.
Claire has been listening to… 🎧
The usual suspects, especially the first half of the latest If Books Could Kill deep dive on Steven Pinker’s “The Better Angels of Our Nature” and a fun Scamfluencers episode about a man who hit it big by taking his ziptie-style belts on “Shark Tank,” only to blow it all by leaving his company to try to become a TV star and influencer … and then try to save himself by getting into romance scamming.
Emma has been listening to… 🎧
The Rise And Fall of Ruby Franke, a Wondery/Law & Crime podcast about mom influencer/parenting YouTuber Ruby Franke, who was recently sentenced to four prison terms on aggravated child abuse charges. I wasn’t familiar with Franke before her arrest in August of 2023, but I’ve been pretty gripped by her story and what has come out since about Jodi Hildebrandt, a parenting/relationship life coach whose extreme “therapeutic techniques” seem to explain, though not excuse, much of Franke’s abusive behavior. There’s still so much I don’t know about this case, and I’m hoping the larger themes it brings up will be explored during the rest of this pod. (And yes, I did pay for Wondery+ to listen to episodes two and three.)
Claire has been buying… 🛍️
The Crown Affair Brush No. 001. The less I wash my hair (hair-washing is about seventh on my to-do list, well behind keeping kids alive, sleeping, and taping two-hour podcasts about reality TV), the more I rely on a boar-bristle brush to distribute the oils and keep it reasonably presentable and healthy. I’ve been using a Mason Pearson children’s boar-bristle brush for over a decade; a dear friend gave it to me, long before I even know what a Mason Pearson brush was, and I do love it. But it’s doll-sized and doesn’t have any nylon bristles, both of which make it more effective for smoothing the top layer of my hair rather than brushing through the full mass of it. It turns out Mason Pearson brushes are very expensive, so I thought first I would try a more modestly priced version, and went with the Crown Affair brush, which is full-sized and has a mix of longer nylon bristles and shorter boar bristles. It’s half the price of a Mason Pearson, and so far it is meeting all my expectations: It brushes out my hair effectively, distributes the oils a bit, and doesn’t turn my waves into a frizzy mess.
Emma has been buying… 🛍️
I’m sure this will come as ZERO surprise to anyone, but shopping in Paris is… divine? I’ve been focusing on only buying unique, vintage pieces or pieces from high-quality brands that I know and love but are based in Paris and thus a bit cheaper over here! I bought two pieces I know I will get a ton of wear out of at Maje, a brand that falls into the latter category: this long camel shirt with a built-in belt (très chic!) and metallic silver kitten heels which don’t appear to be for sale in the US yet, but a similar pair is on sale here.
Claire has been making… 🧶
A freestyle tofu, carrot, and rice bowl for a last-minute dinner. I’ve been experimenting more with my air fryer, so when Sunday night loomed without a meal planned, I rifled through the fridge and decided to make crispy soy-sesame tofu with carrot fries and rice. Why not? Well, it turns out I am not a recipe developer for a reason. My tofu cubes came out delicious (seasoned with a quick marinade of soy sauce, sesame oil, olive oil, garlic and ginger powder) but they were not at all crispy. The carrot fries were likewise delicious — tossed with oil, soy sauce and garlic powder — but blackened around the edges before they were soft in the middle, though I cut them pretty thin. Please send air fryer tips and tricks if you have them! But combined with rice they were a perfectly nice meal, and the preschooler ate more of them than he usually eats of our objectively more successful dinner attempts.
Emma has been making… 🧶
Dinner reservations? I’m working from Paris and Comporta for a couple weeks, and staying in my friend’s lovely but très petit flat, so haven’t been cooking much. I have however been eating my way through Paris, and already have a few standouts. One is Jew-ish restaurant Boubalé, which is both beautifully decorated and has a menu of delicious items that warm my Ashkenazi Jewish heart. It’s in the Marais.
The other is Augustin Marchand d'Vins, an absolute hole in the wall place in the Latin Quarter that doubles as a wine shop. The menu is written on a chalkboard, and the wine list is just all the many, many, many bottles on the walls. Best burrata (with fresh truffles!!!) of my life, and the wine recommendations were pretty mind-blowing.
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Hang in there Claire! You are truly in the thick of it right now and it will get better.
The freestyle bowl sounds like my creations 😂😅