A Thing or Two with Claire and Erica

We are so excited to chat with photo director/visual cultural commentator/incredible Instagram follow Emily Keegin about her Thingies! Also: some thoughts on where to get your gift guides this year, should you not be overwhelmed with them already. Thank you for respecting our decision not to do 2024 gift guides! If you want past installments, we have five year’s worth here. For the freshest stuff, check out Helen Rosner’s for the New Yorker, Goop (the modern Neiman Marcus catalog?), Caroline Moss of Gee Thanks!, Alisha Ramos of Downtime, T mag, The Strategist’s searchable Gift Scout, and a roundup of Substack gift guides from last year (that’ll point you toward this year’s too, certainly).  Emily’s Thingies include Thomas Tallis polychoral music from the 1500s (Fifty Shades–coded?), spraying perfume or hand sanitizer on your armpits and vodka on your clothes, passionfruit, Madness, Rack, and Honey by Mary Ruefle, and scrolling through someone else’s Instagram feed. What are your Thingies lately? Please share with us at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, our Geneva, or our Substack comments! Hire with Indeed and get a $75 sponsored job credit when you use our link. Learn from the best with MasterClass and get up to 50% off when you use our link. YAY.  

Welcome to Article Club! A few that require our attention this week span topics from an important anniversary to management tips to recommendation culture. Now off to go eat a personal pan pizza… Is it an overstatement to say that Book It! is one of our generation’s premier cultural references? This NYT story commemorates the 40th anniversary, and an LA Times article from 1985 made us feel nostalgic. See also: pins for sale on eBay and Tejal Rao’s fascinating review of Chain.  We loved “Want To Be A Good Boss? Be A Bitch.” by Samhita Mukhopadhyay for Bustle. Here’s to intergenerational slaying! The Locavore Guide to Shopping NYC by Caroline Weaver is a tribute to physical guidebooks of yore featuring 670 NYC shops. It has a a searchable digital directory too! Relevant: "The Banality of Online Recommendation Culture" by Kyle Chayka in The New Yorker. Does anybody have any intel on Cutie Eyes? Please share with us at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, our Geneva, or our Substack comments! Look to Shopify for all your ecomm needs and get a $1-a-month trial with our link. YAY.

Another day, another kookalook collection of topics from us, including new lingo care of (honorary Bob) Jack Schlossberg, wrinkle makeup, minimalist shoes, LaGuardia Airport, and a straw cupdate.    Wrinkle makeup—not what you think, probably! Check out a couple of looks by @shine__rising and rachy_mua. Related: crackle lips.    In which we dip our toes into the minimalist shoes conversation: Gait Happens, Born to Run by Christopher McDougall, and The Infinite Race 30 for 30 doc by Bernardo Ruiz are all relevant on the content front. Some brands of interest: Muki, Vivo Barefoot, and Groundies. They kind of remind us of Prada Sport from the late 90s/early aughts, Miu Miu rope sandals, and ballet flats with wide toe boxes from Sandy Liang and Proenza. Also: Let’s take this opportunity to shoutout Yoga Toes.    We’ve been considering giving our ComfiLife a break and trying a kneeling chair. Memor and Varier are good-looking options!   In the world of straw cups, Claire got a BrüMate and really likes it! (Don’t get her the MargTini though.)   Where do you stand on Eat/Pray/Love vs. FMK? Do you believe they can coexist? Let us know at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, our Geneva, or our Substack comments!   Care for your hair love with Nutrafol. Take $10 off your first month’s subscription with the code ATHINGORTWO. Learn from the best with MasterClass and get up to 50% off when you use our link. YAY.

We are DELIGHTED to have Alana Cloud-Robinson on today to share her Thingies from her perfect, wood-paneled home (more on that, clearly). She’s the author of the 831 Stories release Hardly Strangers, out tomorrow, and, wow, we can’t wait for you to read this one.   Alana’s Thingies include shoulder pads, thrifting (see: The Council Shop!), her home in Century City, and Irish culture (shoutout to Fontaines D.C., and Say Nothing).   Want more Alana? Check out The Artists Are Frightened, her premier collection of personal poetry.   Also, a really important album that is (somehow) a follow-up to our milk.com conversation.   What are *your* Thingies? Let us know at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, our Geneva, or our Substack comments!   Find some support with BetterHelp and take 10% off your first month with our link. Level-up your cleaning experience with Blueland and get 15% off your first order when you use our link. Fall in love with 831 Stories and take 15% off your order with the code ATHINGORTWO. YAY.

After this episode, we have some action items for the Bobs: 1. Petition Dairy Queen and Carvel to make their ice cream cake minis available nationwide, year-round. 2. Use “whenharrymetsallying” in a sentence. 3. Send us your thoughts on NYC Marriage Bureau merch.  We aren’t doing gift guides this year, but we’ll tell you good places to look once it's time! Start with giftguide.substack.com.  We’re excited to meet Chewbie, Hi-Chew’s new Mascot, but perhaps this is a "say less" situation? The Rat Pack is still in our lives, and it introduced us to the MeowSquad.  Speaking of local government initiatives, the NYC Marriage Bureau has merch! We especially love the Witness Tee and "I Got Married in New York City" mug.  All about Split59’s Raquel high waist crop legging, and we’ll try their Icon legging and report back. A shoutout to A24’s book Hey Kids, Watch This! It’s full of movie recs, great design, and FUN.  What menu items do you whenharrymetsally? Let us know at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, our Geneva, or our Substack comments! Hire with Indeed and get a $75 sponsored job credit when you use our link. Send your first Moonpig card for FREE with the code ATHINGORTWO. Pre-order Hardly Strangers from 831 Stories and get a free Only One Bed Keychain—and take 15% off any order with the code ATHINGORTWO. YAY.  

We have some very serious reporting about very serious topics coming your way, including the official Sanrio character rankings, a Jellycat status update, and some wild news from the domain-hoarding beat.   We have to take a moment to show some love to Kuromi, the third-ranked Sanrio character overall and Sanrio costume-sourcing, ℅  Sueju Design and Nerdy Treasures by Amy.  How Jellycat became so popular with kids and grown-ups alike. Also: Their pop=ups give Sew Your Soul vibes, in our opinion.  Let’s talk tech! Our listener Olivia shared her Notion tips, we are flatted for the credit you’re giving us for Google Tabs, and we loved the piece “The Million-Dollar Mystery of Milk.com” by Alex Mayyasi for The Hustle.   Finally, have you listened to "Longer Gone" yet?   Name how much $$ it would take for you to change your email for at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, our Geneva, or our Substack comments! Show your hair love with Nutrafol. Take $10 off your first month’s subscription with the code ATHINGORTWO. Send your first Moonpig card for FREE with the code ATHINGORTWO. Upgrade your cleaning experience with Blueland and get 15% off your first order when you use our link. Get a free Sage guidebook for parents with kids ages 5 to 12 who want to better navigate tech and their digital worlds. YAY.

Just a heads up, this episode will make you want to refresh your bra and underwear drawer! We’re talking Thingies with Lauren Sherman and Chantal Fernandez, the authors of the smart, compelling, and fast-pased book Selling Sexy: Victoria's Secret and the Unraveling of an American Icon. As mentioned, bra and underwear Thingies incoming! Chantal absolutely swears by the Tom Bra from the brand Mary Jo, and Lauren likes bras from Only Hearts, Notori Bliss underwear, and Bombas UItra Stretch Calf Socks. Also, shoutout to Le Bon Shoppe’s Her Socks.  Misc. Thingies include Chantal’s go-to assassin’s pasta and Lauren’s rejection of (most) kids' music.  Want more of Lauren and Chantal? Lauren writes Puck’s Line Sheet newsletter and hosts the companion podcast Fashion People, and you can find Chantal’s writing in The Cut (see: “The Unbranding of Abercrombie”), for starters. Friends, you gotta read Selling Sexy: Victoria's Secret and the Unraveling of an American Icon. We are thinking and talking about it a lot, a lot. Finally, for those intrigued by Soupstack, check out Anne Helen Petersen’s 3rd annual soup roundup (4th annual coming…sometime, we’d bet?!). Ella Risbridger of You Get In Love And Then is also testing crowdsourced soups, and Becca Freeman shared her favorites too. A few of our own favorites: Ottolenghi’s curried lentil, tomato, and coconut, 101 Cookbook’s red lentil with lemon, Smitten Kitchen’s carrot with miso and sesame, Thomas Keller’s butternut squash.  Actually good: Souper Cubes.  Do you have bra and underwear recs we have to know about? Please share them at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, or our Geneva!   Count on Shopify for all your ecomm needs and get a $1-a-month trial with our link. Treat your teeth well with a Slate Electric Flosser and get 10% off when you use our link. Try L.A. Burdick’s delightful and individually handcrafted chocolates (the ghosts, the coffin!). Give your first Moonpig card for FREE with the code ATHINGORTWO.   YAY.

Gather round! We have a whole lot to say about Fudgie the Whale, learning chess, finding your inner paid tier, and a whole lot more. But what’s new?    This many week post-launch of 831 Stories, we’re so grateful for the love you’ve shared for Big Fan by Alexandra Romanoff! If you’re looking for additional recs to hold you over until Hardly Strangers by A.C. Robinson comes out in November, take a peek at our list.   Did you know Fudgie the Whale’s mold moonlights as Santa during the holidays? Check out this CNN article for the deets. If you’re feeling ambitious, we love this Ali Slagle ice-cream cake recipe.    We are now deeply committed to Jouer’s Skin Barrier Cream. Shoutout to Knockout Beauty’s facialist!    We’re also hyped on Seed’s Pediatric Daily Synbiotic and Storytime Chess over here.    "If" by Rudyard Kipling has some good life advice for 8th graders and grown-ups alike.    What’s your personal paid tier? Let us know at podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, or our Geneva!   Challenge your preconceptions about the real origin of our species and check out Eve by Cat Bohannon, available everywhere books are sold. Tackle your fears with BetterHelp and take 10% off your first month with our link. Give your first Moonpig card for FREE with the code ATHINGORTWO. YAY.  

Listeners share their quirky and hilarious 'thingies,' from a unique gibbets lending library to humorous laundry struggles. The hosts dive into the sentimental value of everyday items and explore fun fashion trends like pearl tassel shoelaces. Prepare for laughs as they discuss unconventional food experiences, including the cult-favorite Garlic Expressions salad dressing. Plus, mind-bending tips on bathing rituals and makeup brush cleaning that may just change your routine. Get ready for a wild ride through relatable domestic chaos!

Status report: We’re a little bit hanging on by a thread over here, and we’re so impossibly grateful to Duckbill—sponsor of this week’s ep!—for helping us chip away at our to-do lists. (Or, better yet: taking on projects so we don’t have to put them on our to-do lists in the first place.) More on this, along with chore charts, a useful response to the having kids question, and an important discussion of snapping.   Duckbill—a recurring Thingies submission from you all—is an executive assistant for your personal life, led by expert humans and enhanced with AI superpowers. Use the code ATHINGORTWO for 50% off your first two months, plus priority off the waitlist.   Oh, look, a bunch of ideas for how to use Duckbill.   Do you have any Notion tips ‘n tricks? We’re here for them.   Tell us your favorite ways to use Duckbill at 833-632-5463, podcast@athingortwohq.com, @athingortwohq, or our Geneva!   Get support with Duckbill and take 50% off your first two months, plus priority off the waitlist, with the code ATHINGORTWO. YAY.