Sunday, June 20
· Recap of the Week – Biden-Putin summit, Tokyo Olympics
o This made me laugh, in response to Putin declaring, “There is no happiness in life. There’s only a mirage on the horizon” – “Of course Putin dropped bleak Tolstoy quotes, that’s very on brand. It would’ve been much weirder if he’d said, ‘Follow your bliss,’ ‘It’s 5 o’clock somewhere,’ or, ‘Navalny, you have the floor.’”
o Yikes, only 6% of Japanese citizens are vaccinated, and the Olympics are going full steam ahead – John didn’t know what the appropriate vaccination percentage out to be, but he knew “it should be higher than the number of films in the Fast and Furious franchise.”
o The part about Olympic athletes being given free condoms but encouraged not to have sex (for social distancing reasons” led to an amazing video of an anime-style explainer on condoms, which ended with the even more amazing cliffhanger “To Be Condom” – “So much more fun than sex ed in the U.S., where it’s usually, ‘Here’s a banana, here’s a condom, let’s never speak of this again.’”
· And Now This – Westminster Dog Show
o The show’s voiceover guy offered up alternative names for different dogs, including naming a black poodle “Drama” and a corgi “Ragnaroth, Devourer of Souls.”
· Main Story – Property Assessed Clean Energy
o The PACE program was set up as a way to make energy-related renovations on homes, but John outlined how it was a well-intentioned idea that’s been heavily mangled by the predatory greed of private corporations. :sigh: What else is new?
o John realized that people under 35 might not need to watch this story, since it deals with home ownership – After helpfully defining what a homeowner was for young viewers, he added, “Don’t worry, though, that will never be you. You don’t get to do that.”
o We were introduced to Cisco DeVries, a CEO with a lot of PACE clout who describes himself as a “capitalist hippie” – “Which absolutely tracks for a guy whose name sounds like he’s about to gentrify jazz.”
o John also took issue with the name of Ygrene, a primary company that handles PACE loans – “It sounds like a contemplative jazz record put out by Kermit the Frog.”
o The main issue is that people are talked into these loans, which are in fact liens on their houses, without getting a clear explanation on what that means. After her “no money down” energy upgrades, one woman’s property taxes increased from $600 to $10,000 – “The only time the value of something should change that much is if Elon Musk shits out a tweet about it.”
o And of course we see higher concentrations of these predatory loans among minority communities, non-English speakers, senior citizens, and people with intellectual disabilities.
o The contractors who pressure homeowners to get this work done emphasize the fast loan-approval process over clear information – “I’m not sure ‘look how easy it was to get this over-stressed homeowner to sign this legally-binding contract’ is quite the flex you think it is.”
o Great line – “Nobody in this country should be losing their home because of an air conditioner. They should be losing their home because of unexpected medical bills, you know, like an American!”
· And Now This – Westminster Dog Show winner
o A montage of local news anchors puzzling over the winning dog – I loved, “It looks like a head of hair. Like, Amber, I picture just yours or my hair walking on the ground with no legs.”
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Why yes, I do have more thoughts about the Shang-Chi trailer, why do you ask? Namely: soooooo badass! I love that this movie is giving us both triad-boss-style beatdowns and glorious wuxia-style face-offs, all aided by the power of the Ten Rings. I continue to love that the Ten Rings are worn on the forearms like Hung Gar iron rings, and I love the balance Tony Leung Chiu-wai is striking in the trailer between unassuming and sinister. He can be so quiet, so still, and then flip on a dime, and I think that’s what’s in store for us with Wenwu. How is it not September yet??
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