You're A Peach, She's Impeached [#42]

Hey friends,

Well, it happened. South Korea got rid of its president. Extraordinary moment to be here in Seoul.

Not everyone took the decision well — President Park's supporters had a hard time accepting it and clashed with police, leading to the deaths of at least three senior citizens. I was close enough to hear the melee, but after the big announcement I holed up in a Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf to file. And also because I've been tear gassed and on the wrong end of a dozen semi-automatics wielded by scared cops before (cough Ferguson cough). Since then, not so eager to hang out on the "front." 

What I Read
What kind of sleeper are you? Radioactive boars are a real thing. But maybe not as damaging as baby boomers. This is the kind of man Trump is. The incredible discursive interview with Letterman. Where have you been, Richard Simmons? The benefits of being bilingual. The benefits of being biracial. How to teach young children about social justice. Tricks to reduce the "ahs" and "ums" in your speech. Tips to make sure women's voices are heard in meetings. The first worldiest of first world problems. Screen time is the new smoking? Notes from a wedding reporter's notebook. A wedding dress made of Taco Bell wrappers. A conversation with Zadie Smith. A conversation with Joan Didion. A conversation with Ariel Levy.

What I Wrote/Talked About
The latest North Korean missile test. China versus South Korea over Thaad, which sounds like someone's frat boy ex-boyfriend but is actually a missile defense system. The big impeachment decision. The day after the decision. And for less serious talk, I visited with Sweet and Sour, a podcast about Asian-Americanness, to riff on Korean beauty standards, "yellow fever" and hyphenated names.

What I Watched
Our friend and source, Bob Kelly, is suddenly a viral sensation after his kids barged into his Skype interview with the BBC.

He says he's feeling weird and overwhelmed by all the interest in him, but I found every frame of this entire episode to be delightful. "It deserves a Zapruder style frame-by-frame analysis," wrote blogger Ben Thompson. AND THEN HE DID THE ANALYSIS.

Recommendations

• Thug Notes! How were these not in my life before?! I watched 12 of 'em in a row. The analysis is pure gold.

• A book-that's-shorter-than-a-New Yorker-piece: Dear Ijeawele, or A Feminist Manifesto in 15 Suggestions

• In 11th grade, my bestie Erin and I read a bunch of Thoreau and decided we wanted to become transcendentalists. Now Walden is a video game.  

• Michael Clayton is on Netflix now and if you haven't seen it, you should. It's among the "Films I Rewatch Over and Over," along with Office Space, Lost in Translation and Out of Sight (even though Out of SIght has J-Lo in it).

As always, I'd love to hear from you with your thoughts or links worth sharing. Write me back or send me a tweet anytime.

Simplify, simplify,

Elise 

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