Plus: what's up with East 81st Street Deli?
Greetings! Here we are again, staring down the barrel of the weekend that we get one whole extra hour to fester in. Seeing as we've got this bonus time, you may as well borrow some of it to read about the internet happenings of the week. It won't take long.
Heidi Klum Wins Halloween Better Than Ever
Halloween often brings out some interesting sides to celebrities, and this year was no exception. Kim K harvested more material for The Kardashians by being the only one to turn up to Tracee Ellis Ross' birthday in fancy dress, and everyone got weirded out by Billie Eilish and Jesse Rutherford making fun of their age gap with a baby and old man couple costume.
However, there was only one woman who would truly enamor herself with the internet this year. The inimitable Heidi Klum is known for her insane Halloween outfits, and this one was probably the best yet. Sacrificing her all her limbs to fit into a hyper-realistic worm costume, this camp addition to spooky season was soon memed to oblivion. Good luck to her in doing even better next year.
Mean Candy Mom, You Are Twitter Main Character of The Week
There is no brand of crazy out there quite like Twitter Parent crazy. One minute, they're gleefully sharing how horrible they are to their kids, and the next their entire life is being exposed as a complete sh*tshow. Notoriously, the bar was set low with the ridiculousness that was Bean Dad, who refused to show his daughter how to use a can opener. Now, he finally has a female counterpart.
Agnes Callard doesn't have a snappy nickname for her child-based misdemeanor, but perhaps she doesn't need one. All we need to know is that she usually throws away the candy her kids get on Halloween, and they were overjoyed that she forgot this year. Justifying the deed by the fact that her children would write interesting memoirs, things for the philosophy professor inevitably got worse from there. It didn't take long for bad parenting to spiral into the affair she had had with a graduate student in her department, as well as a few people who were none too happy about the time that she decided to cross a picket line. It was all juicy enough for a dogpile, that's for sure.
Nobody Wants to Work Eight Hours Anymore
By and large, minimum wage customer service jobs suck. This is not a revelation! Dealing with the entitled general public is bad enough, but the rampant mismanagement has to be the cherry on the cake. This seemed to be what one Starbucks worker was getting at when he filmed an emotional video while on the clock. Complaining about crappy treatment from customers and colleagues, the rant was then broadcasted on Twitter by Trump acolyte Sebastian Gorka, who picked upon the employee being unhappy at his eight hour shift.
Combining baristas, trans identity, and a Gen Z employee unable to cope, the video was the perfect bait to wind up angry boomers — then wind up on Fox News. God forbid any of us publicly complain about having a crappy shift, or we'll face the wrath of Jesse Watters.
What's that? It's a Chicken Salad
TikTok goes through phases with food. One day, it can't get enough of the perfectly proportioned Emily Mariko salmon bowl, and the next they are dousing their meat in Nyquil. These days, though, the star of the show is a particular delicacy that can be found in Cleveland, Ohio. East 81st Street Deli has found itself in the spotlight, after patron Tanisha Godfrey was filmed singing the praises of their chicken salad in August.
Her simple endorsement seemed to please the ears of TikTokers everywhere, as the sound of her review has been used over 110k times since to applaud everything from rotisserie to the McChicken (and plenty of other, non-food based scenarios as well).
When owner Wael Herbawi was interviewed by Bon Appetit, he claimed that the store has gone from selling 30 salads a day to an eye-popping 980. Its success is comparable to that Binley Mega Chippy, the British fish and chip restaurant that also saw queues out the door this year, thanks to becoming a TikTok meme legend. The algorithm truly is the best advertising that money can't buy.
That's it for another few days of online events. It may not have been knowledge that you needed or even wanted, but it's one way to strike up a semi-interesting conversation with somebody less enlightened than you. Until next time.