Micah's Read of the Week, Vol. 7
Wildfires, White Claws, Wellness, One-night stands, and more.
Hello, and welcome to Micah’s Read of the Week.
This is a newsletter filled with things Micah Wiener finds interesting.
Check out the introduction post here, and the entire archive of previous newsletters here.
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Lede of the Week
This will take your breathe away. From: A desperate rescue: A father's heartbreaking attempt to save his family from a raging fire
Back in the Jeep, struggling to navigate a road once so familiar but now shrouded by smoke-filled darkness, Chris almost ran over what looked like a bikini-clad woman on the road. Once he was closer, he realized she was wearing underwear. Her hair was singed, her mouth looked almost black, and her bare feet were severely burned.
He impatiently tried to help her into his car, explaining how he needed to find his wife and son, feeling like she was resisting.
Finally, she spoke. "I am your wife."
This is heartbreaking. Prayers.
Headline of the Week
Dallas Cowboys Fans Can Bring Mediocre Stadium Food Home With Game Day Meal Kits
The lede is good too:
Dallas Cowboy fans looking to replicate the special experience of eating one’s feelings while watching America’s Team go 8-8 can now do so from the comfort of their own homes.
This team sucks. I hate being a Cowboys fan.
Lots of football this weekend, and you can hear me talk about all of it on my sports podcasts, Back Door Cover and Too Much Dip. BDC sticks mostly to sports, and TMD is filled with lots of jokes from the guys at Washed Media and me. Check them out. Thank you.
Read of the Week: The Shows Must Go On. But They Aren’t the Same Without You.
The sudden absence of live audiences has upended the worlds of sports, comedy and politics. What do we lose when the crowd doesn’t show?
This story is full of fun nuggets. My favorite is about “Today” show host Hoda Kotb.
One morning, she spied some movement outside the window — it was a nurse in scrubs, lugging a rolling suitcase — and Kotb was so hungry for a taste of audience connection, “I literally held my phone number on a white piece of paper to the glass,” she said. “I was like, ‘Call me and tell me where you’re from!’”
As the pandemic rolls on, we have become accustomed to seeing studio shows with no studio audience, sporting events with no fans, and award shows without red carpets. This piece also looks at the history of television and the traditional importance of the studio audience.
TV borrowed the storytelling conventions of the theater: it was styled as an immediate event, with the viewer positioned at the scene of the action, as if watching from the lip of the stage or the sideline of the court. The classic three-camera setup mimicked the movement of the audience’s roving eye, perhaps aided with a pair of opera glasses. And even as TV absorbed more cinematic elements, playing with shifting perspectives and transpositions of time, it also built up conventions that simulate the feeling of liveness: recorded laugh tracks and cuts to the “live studio audience,” where the crowd of spectators is vetted for entrance, warmed up by producers and cued to applaud. And all that prompts the home audience to feel invested in the show. “Maybe even more than the performance, we identify with the audience.”
Of course, it’s an election year.
In politics, the crowd functions as a visual and rhetorical metaphor for democracy itself.
Check out the piece. As this pandemic shows little sign of ending, the crowd-less entertainment environment will be with us for some time.
Wellness Corner:
Take a walk
This pandemic is a weird, mostly terrible time in our history. One thing I have enjoyed is the ability to take a long daily walk with our puppy, Charlie.
Without a commute, its been possible for us to walk at least 45 minutes and normally about an hour each morning. I don’t want to sound too much like a new-age wellness coach, but I do enjoy the time to clear my head and prepare mentally for the day. On days when I’m open in the morning, I chase that walk with a mid-morning Peloton ride, and I’m at my daily fitness goal before lunch.
A neighborhood walk is an easy and inexpensive way to keep fit
Obviously, walking is good for you.
It’s aerobic, which is good for cardiovascular health. It’s weight-bearing, which is good for bone health. It works your muscles, which helps with leg strength and stability. It benefits your brain and your mood, making you feel better.
Perhaps counter-intuitively, walking can actually improve lingering pain. My knees feel better than I can remember, and I think the walking is to thank.
As you walk, your blood is flowing to joints and muscles. Keep breathing deeply. Those early twinges should let up soon enough, Vincent says. “Walking is wonderful for chronic aches and pains.”
Anyway, take a walk. And check my IG @micahwiener for more photos of Charlie the Cavapoo.
Drink a White Claw?
How Healthy (or Not Healthy) Is White Claw?
I know Summer is technically winding down, but there’s still plenty of pool time and lake days this year. And there’s no doubt that White Claw (and other spiked seltzers) are ever present wherever people are drinking outdoors. So are they healthy?
White Claw is less bad for you than most beer, wine or liquor, at least when it comes to calories. Each available flavor contains 100 calories in a standard 12-ounce can. Fruit-flavored varieties contain a more-than-manageable two grams of carbs, while the pure hard can is carb-free.
So I can drink 20 of them at a (socially distanced) tailgate, right? Sure. But is it healthy? Not really.
Whether a drink is "healthy" is more complicated than a simple calorie comparison, of course. If you intend on leisurely sipping a couple of White Claws over the course of an afternoon, you’re in great shape. Planells says the general recommendation for women is a maximum of one serving of an alcoholic beverage a day, and closer to two for men, but those figures could be stretched to two White Claws for women and three-ish for men, given its relatively tame nutritional content.
Please enjoy your three-ish Claws this weekend responsibly.
So you want to be a professional tennis player?
Sports are often said to be the ultimate meritocracy. Most are decided with unbiased scoring systems and athletes can be analytically ranked based on performance. Tennis is a great example. For decades, professional players have been ranked based on tournament finishes, and an algorithm decides the world’s rankings.
Say you’re an accountant. It’s not really possible to rank you compared to every other accountant in the world. But, let’s pretend there was a rankings system. If out of the millions of accountants worldwide, you ranked #112, you’d feel pretty damn good about yourself. You’d probably be making a very nice living.
Now, assume you’re Hunter Reese, the 112th ranked doubles tennis player in the world. Millions of people play tennis. Hunter Reese is better than 111 of them (in doubles— go with me here). He’s really good! He’s also basically paying to play professional tennis at the highest level.
From Does Tennis Owe Its Players a Living?
It was a career milestone—winning a round at a Grand Slam—and though they went on to lose in the next round to the eighth seeds and eventual finalists, Reese cashed the largest check of his career—$15,000. That single payment represents roughly one-sixth of his career earnings.
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, players at Reese’s level found it difficult to earn a living. They have to cover flights, coaching, and other expenses out of pocket, with prize money that’s far less than at Grand Slam events.
It’s a fascinating look at a sport where top stars make millions, and lower seeded players are in debt. How long would you chase the dream?
Yes, some people are still having one-night stands
Casual sex during a pandemic? Yep, still happening.
You might think that during covid-19, one-night stands would be off the table. Who wants to take the physical and emotional risk? And plenty of singles are going on digital dates for weeks or months before getting physical.
But others are forging ahead more quickly, with no intention of seeing the person again. They’re asking a lot of questions about their prospective partner’s exposure, going for it if they feel safe and then quarantining just long enough that they can get busy again — with someone new.
For some singles who are quarantining alone, the need for human connection is worth the potential exposure. As Krista, a 44-year-old woman in San Francisco, puts it: “I would risk my health a lot sooner for a sexual experience than I would for a haircut.” Sarah H., a 31-year-old woman in Philadelphia, feels that locking lips is the big risk, so “if you’re going to kiss someone, you might as well sleep with them.”
Sure, I guess. Now seems to be a historically weird time to be single.
Dessert of the Week
Frozen Avocado Cake? Frozen Avocado Cake!
Made this Sunday. It’s in the freezer now. I don’t own a spring form pan, so I just made this in a pie dish. So I guess my version is a Frozen Avocado Pie? I dunno. It was easy to make btw. Check back next week and I’ll let you know if it’s good.
Softened butter (for the pan)
8 whole graham crackers (120 g)
11 digestive biscuits or 4 additional graham crackers (60 g)
2 (14 oz/397 g) cans condensed milk
3 Hass avocados
1 pound (455 g) cream cheese, at room temperature
Pinch fine sea salt
2 lemons
2 limes
PREPARATION
Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Lightly butter the inside of a 9-inch (23-cm) springform pan.
Make the crust: Crumble the crackers and cookies into a medium bowl. Use a pestle or the bottom of a heavy bottle to crush them into fine crumbs. Add ⅓ cup (75 ml) of the condensed milk and stir until very well combined. (You can grind the crumbled graham crackers and mix them with the sugar and condensed milk in a food processor if you prefer.) Press the crumb mixture firmly and evenly into the bottom of the pan. Bake until the crust looks a little darker and smells sweet and toasty, 12 to 15 minutes.
Add the chopped avocados, cream cheese, remaining condensed milk, and salt to a food processor. Grate the zest of 1 lemon and set aside. Squeeze the zested lemon and the limes, reserving the remaining lemon for garnish. Add the juice to the avocados and process the mixture until smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
Spread the filling in the cooled crust and sprinkle with the grated lemon zest. Cover the pan and freeze until the filling is firm, at least 6 hours or preferably overnight.
Let the frozen cake stand at room temperature for 15 to 30 minutes before slicing. Dipping a thin knife into hot water between each cut, slice the cake into wedges and serve, topping each serving with freshly grated lemon zest.
Let me know if you try this as well. Photos to come next week.
Where else can I find Micah content?
Podcasts: Mind of Micah, Back Door Cover, Too Much Dip
Twitter: @micahwiener & @producermicah (Why two twitters? It’s a long story)
Instagram: @micahwiener
LinkedIn: @micahwiener
Peloton: #badboysofpelly
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