America’s favorite mayor, Zohran Mamdani of NYC (fellow millennial and Upper East Sider) impressed us all with his basketball skills, netting baskets in front of current New York Knicks basketball player Mohammed Diawara. During Ramadan, he’s attended 17 iftars around the city connecting with New Yorkers to celebrate the holiest month in the Islamic calendar and connect with his constituents. It’s incredible to see a) a politician who actually seems to care about his job b) a person in a position of power being unapologetically himself (it’s not lost on me the significance of having a Muslim mayor, especially for his fellow Muslim New Yorkers) and c) his unwavering dedication to his suit collection. As much as I’ve tried to stop liking him once he was inaugurated (because he is a politician after all), I fear his cutie patootie powers still have a hold on me, just look at him:

Did you hear about the Afroman trial? I was getting snippets about it all over my feed but couldn’t quite figure out the full story until the Daily Show put together this summary. Afroman, the artist behind millennial boy anthem Because I Got High, was sued by Ohio police for defamation; the “deputies said they were publicly harassed over the viral videos, which were viewed more than 3 million times on YouTube”. They were embarrassed by actions THEY took - breaking down Afroman’s door, rifling through all his stuff, and staring wistfully at a lemon pound cake - which Afroman caught on his home cameras and subsequently turned into multiple viral music videos. The trial unfolded in public and showed these very dumb police men with the flimsiest of defenses (even one’s wife couldn’t defend him). The absurdity caused it to go viral after Afroman won his defense. Honestly, the Daily Show summary was pretty funny so if you want a laugh at the ridiculousness of America I suggest you watch. (it’s been brought to my attention that it’s unclear if Afroman is actually MAGA and he wasn’t just wearing the American flag suit ironically, so that’s a bummer if true but the story is still culturally relevant).

The WNBA players are getting paid!!! The WNBA and Women's National Basketball Players Association have been in serious negotiations since the end of last season to discuss a significant increase in the players’ pay in conjunction with the insane growth of their sport over the last few years. There’s a lot of other details in the agreement, but the high level headline is the salary cap will start at $7 million (up from $1.5 million in 2025). It almost looked like the WNBA was going to refuse any reasonable negotiations so much that the season start would be delayed (imagine being so up your own @ss as a billionaire you’re willing to lose out on revenue just because you don’t want to pay your workers more, oh wait that sounds familiar…), but the deal timing means the season can start as planned on May 8th. There’s still a lottttt of improvement in women's sports and getting equal pay, but this a a huge win for women standing on business!

Okay fine I’ll take about the Bachelorette/Secret Lives on Mormon Wives (SLOMW) drama: in an unprecedented move, ABC has cancelled this new season of The Bachelorette (like, entirely) and will run American Idol reruns in its place instead. IMO, this is actually a pretty sad story about domestic violence and abusive relationships: would-be new Bachelorette Taylor Frankie Paul (who is a main star of SLOMW and credited with creating the “mom-tok” trend on TikTok) was arrested for DV back in 2023 and that video being leaked was the catalyst to cancel her season. It’s also my understanding that her arrest and/or the aftermath (including her on-again, off-again relationship with this ex) was the opening storyline for the first season of SLOMW, so it’s not like ABC didn’t know any of this before they cast and filmed her entire Bachelorette season. I don’t watch either show (when SLOMW came out and the headlines were shock and awe about Utah Morman culture, I was like, did people not watch Real Housewives of Salt Lake City?), but this is a crazy case study of corporate greed, DV, and ignoring peoples’ wrongdoing for $$$.