Wednesday’s Workwear Report: Draped Wool-Silk Top
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Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.
I love the cut of this draped wool-silk top from COS. Many, many years ago there was a contestant on “Project Runway” who was widely praised for his draping skills, and I’ve had an appreciation for a well-draped top ever since. (I am totally blanking on his name now — does anyone else remember this? It would have been an early-ish season!)
I would pair this cap-sleeved number with a midi skirt for an easy, but elegant, business casual look.
The top is $165 and comes in sizes XS-L.
Anne Klein has a lower-priced option that's available at Macy's for $59 in sizes XXS-XXL.
Sales of note for 4/21/25:
- Nordstrom – 5,263 new markdowns for women!
- Ann Taylor – 25% off tops & sweaters + extra 40% off sale
- Banana Republic Factory – 50%-70% off everything + extra 20% off
- Boden – 10% off new womenswear styles
- Brooks Brothers – Friends & Family Sale: 30% off sitewide
- The Fold – 25% off selected lines
- Eloquii – $29+ select styles + extra 40% off all sale
- Everlane – Spring sale, up to 70% off
- J.Crew – Spring Event: 40% off sitewide + extra 50% off sale styles + 50% swim & coverups
- J.Crew Factory – 40%-70% off everything + extra 70% off clearance
- Kule – Lots of sweaters up to 50% off
- M.M.LaFleur – Earth Day Sale: Take 25% off eco-conscious fabrics. Try code CORPORETTE15 for 15% off
- Madewell – Extra 30% off sale + 50% off sale jeans
- Rothy's – Final Few: Up to 50% off last chance styles; new favorites added
- Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
- Talbots – 30% off entire purchase w/Talbots card
Rami was the contestant, I’m pretty sure – those early seasons were so compelling!
I know everyone loves Clinique black honey, but thoughts on pink honey? Looking for something a little springier
I’m pretty fair and cool toned and like pink honey better. I do think of it as a good spring/summer color. In general I don’t find that product long lasting, but its nice to keep in the handbag
I’m cool toned and like pink honey much better. Black honey has always looked like garbage on me, though.
I just bought it and love it. I wore Black Honey for years and now it doesn’t look good anymore.
How would you clean a sink that you intend to use for bathing a baby? It’s used for handwashing only currently, but it’s in the bathroom that has the litter box and I do feel like it needs cleaning before bathing. I haven’t found a good gentle and yet effective cleaner for purposes like this. Any recs? Must be fragrance free.
I’d do a super industrial cleaning with all the chemicals, and then going forward, once it’s been rinsed enough for the baby’s use, white vinegar.
This is where I feel HOCl shines.
Here’s a link: https://www.officedepot.com/a/products/388106/Clorox-Anywhere-Hard-Surface-Sanitizing-Spray/
Safe enough to use on food surfaces, effective enough to use in hospitals.
I am a new HOCl evangelist. Love that stuff. It even got the armpit stink out of a blazer when steaming, vodka and sunshine had all failed.
I was slow to convert, but now it’s one of the things that makes me feel like I’m really living in the 21st century.
Is it truly a “gentle” cleaner or is that just marketing?
It really is gentle. There are formulations that are designed for use directly on the skin.
Just saw a TikTok with a pediatrician saying a standalone baby bath designated only for this purpose is better than sink baths (she had a case with salmonella but also mentioned other reasons).
+ 1. You can get a baby bathtub for $10 dollars, and it’s so much easier. Then you don’t have to worry about the faucet, can kneel next to the baby, don’t have to worry about splashing water on the cabinet, etc.
Also so much more comfortable for the baby and the parent. If the sink is big enough you can pop the baby bath in the sink.
Just don’t do it. So many babies get very sick from kitchen sinks, salmonella is a big one.
OP said bathroom sink.
It’s not a kitchen sink, which I would never use for that reason. It would only be used for handwashing.
I would imagine e. coli (poop bacteria) is still a pretty big concern. I wouldn’t do it. A plastic baby tub costs like $15.
OP here and the problem is that we have no good surface for the plastic baby tub. Our kitchen is tiny (apartment) and our “dining table” is even tinier. Getting up and down off the floor threw my back out the other day (chronic back problems). That’s why we’re going to try to use the one sink that’s large enough. It’s pedestal style and can’t fit a tub in or around it.
OP, if you have a washing machine, you could fill the bath with warm water and put it there. Then when you’re done, dump it.
We used a baby tub in a shower when we lived in an apartment with only one bathroom and a standup shower. We just filled up the baby tub from the shower, and bathed him on the floor of the shower. Leaned it up against the wall when it wasn’t in use. I bet you could even get a 3M removable hook that sticks to the wall to hang it when not in use.
Use the baby tub in the shower and have your husband do the bath. Little little kids don’t need baths very often anyway (we did twice a week).
Do you have a regular bathtub? We put the baby tub in the regular tub, and sat down in the tub.
Poop comes out of baby’s butt? It’s always going to be a factor. :)
People aren’t normally as susceptible to the bacteria from their own body. The concern is the baby getting sick from poop bacteria from adults’ hands if they washed in the sink. Not baby getting sick from their own poop.
Wait, really? Asking genuinely. I bathed all four of my babies in kitchen sinks along the way, and I know I (and my brother) were bathed in kitchen sinks. Considering that my youngest is like 5’3, I’m long past a point where it matters, but this never even occurred to me as an issue. I mean, sure I wiped out the sink before bathing a child, and it didn’t have dirty dishes in it, but is this a common thing that happens?
I am with you that it’s not that big a deal. My mom is a NICU nurse and when we were at her house and didn’t have the baby bath with us, she would bleach the sink, and then we would do bath time in the sink. Not ideal, but effective. Then she would bleach is again after.
Agree 1000% with bleach after baby. Having horror flashbacks to the floating poop (never mind the things that hide in all of the little rolls).
I think the risk is pretty low in terms of odds your child will get sick, but the consequences are high if they do (especially as a newborn). I just don’t understand why you’d take the risk when you can buy a baby bathtub for 10 bucks. It’s not like there’s a real benefit to the parents from doing this.
Same. My oldest was small and went in the sink until probably 20 months! (No bleach.)
I just googled this, and it’s such a good example of how the Internet works these days. There is one Instagram video of one pediatrician who had one infant with a salmonella infection likely acquired from a kitchen sink bath. This baby was 3 weeks old, just around the time that the umbilical cord heals, until which time sponge baths are the universal recommendation.
If you google ‘can babies get sick from baths in a sinks’, you now get almost 2 pages of that one Instagram video, reposted on Facebook, repackaged as blog posts, referenced on online forums and of course reddit. It could give you the impression that this is a well known issue that everyone is talking about, but it’s actually all going back to this viral video. And I get it, babies are precious and any implication of harmful practices should get proper attention.
But when you look at the pages of the American Association for pediatrics, the Mayo clinic, or Canadian or British official websites, they all mention that a sink or baby tub are both good choices to bathe a baby, as long as the umbilical cord is healed.
Thank you for this. So much of parenting is like this now.
I really appreciate this overview/information.
+1000 The internet creates some interesting boogeymen.
Thank you for bringing sanity to this discussion.
I think that the risk of introducing e. coli to your sink when you bathe a baby in there is much higher than baby getting sick from the sink.
I mean, I handle raw meat and eggs all the time, and every time after such raw food prep, I wash the whole sink and surrounding counters with hot soapy water. If I feel particularly icky, I might use a surface disinfectant.
I wash salad directly in my sink all the time as well (vs. in a dedicated washing bowl), and I have never ever gotten sick with salmonella or other nasties.
Wow, that’s wild. OP, if the sink is your best option then clean it as best you can and go for it!
+1. When my son was in the NICU immediately after birth, I had to pump milk for him in my hospital room. I asked the nurse where/how I should wash my pump parts, and she said to just use the bathroom sink and hand soap. Regular soap is effective at killing most bacteria and viruses.
long comment stuck in mod, but I can’t find sources for “so many babies get very sick”. I can find one case that is now creating panic.
This is absolutely not a “so many babies” situation. No need to fearmonger.
Do you plan to have a changing table, OP? my husband used to move the changing pad and put the baby bath there.
I always bathed my babies in the bathroom sink, or put the baby bath in the bathtub and hunched for a minute.
To answer your question, though, this would be a case for baking soda + vinegar and a good rinse, for me.
Bleach. I’d give the sink one good clean with bleach prior to bathing the baby. Make sure it is well rinsed after using the bleach. After each bath, I would clean with whatever cleaner you are comfortable with. Once a week or so, I would again clean with bleach.
There have been recent social media posts cautioning about bathing babies in sinks due to risk of other germs. There’s also a risk when they are older for them to turn on the hot water on themselves and get a burn accidentally. FWIW, my own personal hangup on sinks or bath tubs is how hard and slippery the surfaces are. Also, the height of the sink was a concern. Adding a wet squirmy baby to the mix and I was terrified she would slip or I would drop her. We bathed in a plastic baby bath tub on the floor or in the tub longer than we probably needed to for those reasons.
Agree with this.
Baby bathtub in the actual bathtub or shower is the solution.
Also, agree with the above poster that babies don’t need daily baths. Our kid had and has very sensitive skin, and when they were little, we bathed maybe once a week, and otherwise gave sponge baths. Our kid did not have extreme blowouts, though.
Even now as a 9 yr old, our kid only showers about 2-3 times a week in colder season (2 of those showers are after swimming in the pool).
The rest of the time it is twice daily washing with a wash cloth in what we call the FPPA areas – face, private parts, armpits. In summer, we shower more often, obviously.
I wouldn’t clean it outside of my normal cleaning practice. I also wouldn’t wash baby until the stump is off and then only when absolutely necessary (like a blowout). They really don’t need baths often as newborns, and they are not nearly as sensitive to germs as some of the folks here are pretending.
(If your baby is immunocompromised or premature, that’s obviously different).
Honestly, it makes no sense to be fussing over what cleaner to use in a sink if you have a cat. Having the cat is a bigger germ/disease vector for your baby than the sink ever will be. Just clean it however makes sense to you and rinse well.
This. Do a quick swipe with a rag to wipe off any hand soap residue, but if you clean your sink thoroughly once a week and only use it to wash hands, I wouldn’t do anything special. you will have enough extra chores with a newborn, don’t spend time and brainpower on this.
Thanks all. This thread went a few different places, but my baby is six months old and I can’t get him out of the baby tub on the floor right now because of a back issue. Umbilical cord and immune system factors are less of a concern now, although if course I’ll never deliberately expose him to pathogens.
it’s been a minute since I had a 6 month old, but once they can reliably sit up, my kids had an inflatable duck baby bath that fit in the bathtub (or a shower)where they could sit and splash. It may still be an issue with your back, to lift him out, though. Be well!
I’d just clean it with whatever you were using to clean the tub, because you’re just downsizing the tub. At this age, literally the only concern I would have is that babies get their own poop in the bath and it might get in his eyes and cause pink eye. Beyond that, your baby’s immune system is beyond robust enough to handle bathing in a somewhat dirty sink unless you’re not mentioning he has leukemia or something.
You are doing a great job! I agree I’d just clean it with whatever you were cleaning the baby tub with because clearly that’s working fine.
Ignore the people basing their advice on a viral video and keep on keeping on.
Wait, people clean baby bath tubs? Not sure I ever did that. My child lived.
Hahaha, same. I mean, rinse it out and maybe a quick wipe for soap residue was all the cleaning we needed.
I don’t have a baby, but I assumed so since babies poop in there and some of the above posters are thinking this baby will get salmonella from the bathroom sink, even if it’s been bleached first!
The logic is all a bit lost on me.
Not all babies poop in the bath. My kid never did.
At 6 months old, I’d be more concerned about the risk of baby slipping and falling off a countertop/sink, especially when they’re wet and slippery.
I don’t know ho deep your sink is and how wriggly your baby is, but when they start to sit and/or pulling themselves up to stand, this would be where I’d rather move to a true bathtub setup.
Is bathing together with your baby an option? Have your husband assist with the lifting aspects! He can hand you the baby and take them out after you’re done.
It’s been a long time, but we used to shower with the babies. Babies loved it.
In a major book slump. Any recommendations for a nice historical fiction novel, puzzle-y novel (like the Da Vinci code), or compulsive non-fiction? Any pageturner, really, but I’m less interested in anything with alternating perspectives or weird affectations like not using quotation marks. Give me something basic!
I love all the WWI/WWII era novels by Jennifer Robson.
Historical fiction:
Absolution by Alice McDermott for something literary but very readable
The Rose Code by Kate Quinn for some true bread and butter, can’t put down historical fiction
Non-fiction:
This one is a little out of left field, but Good Morning, Destroyer of Men’s Souls is a compulsively readable memoir about addiction and co-dependency. My entire book club loved it
All Kate Quinn is excellent.
All Kristin Hannah is a poor imitation of Kate Quinn, but fits the page-turner criteria.
My favorite Erik Larson is Isaac’s Storm, followed by Dead Wake.
+1 for Gentleman in Moscow below, The Lincoln Highway is also really good. Really anything by Amor Towels, including his recent short stories collection.
Khalid Hosseini is not as historical, but also excellent. (Beware the first chapter of And The Mountains Echoed, though, I started it on my public transit commute one morning, was not expecting to cry on my way to work)
Compulsive non-fiction – Eric Larsson (Dead Wake is my personal fave), Into Thin Air
A Gentleman in Moscow – wish I could re-read again for the first time!
The Labyrinth by Kate Mosse
I tried to get into her books based on a recommendation here, but could not get past her word choices or the descriptive sentences she chose to use. I was just rolling my eyes too often and quoting passages I found absurd to my suffering spouse.
Okay. I loved them but thanks
Solidarity on this feeling! I have a friend who criticizes the books I recommend like the above posters did, and I never talk books with her anymore because it just seems so unnecessary. We can all like what we like.
I don’t know anything about Mosse (but will check her out!), but I wanted to add that I love reviews that mention language and linguistic style. That is very helpful, I always look for descriptions of style when I browse for new books.
I recently started the Sebastian St. Cyr series set in squalid Victorian England. An Earl’s son solves murder mysteries with his background fighting the French during the revolution. It’s not a particularly new series, but I am really picky about quality writing and this did not offend. I’ve read two in two weeks and plan to get more from the library this weekend.
Maybe the Rise and Fall of DODO if the genre is okay? A lot happens.
Anything by Kate Quinn (start with Rose Code or Diamond Eye).
Historical Fiction: The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali. If you don’t know much about Iran, it’s fascinating and also a great female friendship story.
I just finished Small Fry by Lisa Brennan-Jobs, Steve Jobs’ first daughter. It was so interesting.
Nice historical fiction novel: The Frozen River by Ariel Lawhon or The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray.
Puzzle-y novel: The Bookman’s Tale by Charlie Lovett or Famous Last Words by Gillian McAllister.
Compulsive non-fiction: Finding Me by Viola Davis or Bad Blood by John Carreyrou.
I love Kate Quinn, but many if not most of her novels have alternating perspectives.
For engrossing nonfiction, I hugely and enthusiastically recommend either The Feather Thief or The Art Thief!
Recent history, but I really enjoyed Flynn Berry’s books, Northern Spy and …blanking on the sequel, but they are set in Ireland after the Good Friday Agreement but still with echoes of The Troubles.
(try The Spymaster’s Lady by Joanna Bourne! romance book but about French/English spies during Napolean’s reign)
Conclave is not historical fiction but it is a very enthralling thriller.
Is it better than the movie?
I liked it more than the movie, and found it more exciting but there’s a lot of internal thought and politicking that is hard to translate well to screen. I also found the choice to make Ralph Fiennes’ character American distracting.
Robert Harris’s books are good in general.
Geraldine Brooks writes amazing historical fiction, all eras, biblical to 20th century.
Non fiction rec: Master Slave Husband Wife. Gripping.
The Feather Thief
Only if you want to be absolutely infuriated.
Realized this comment could be read several ways – to clarify, the story was great, but it made me really angry to read about what ended up happening to the thieves.
Highly recommend “Frozen River” by Ariel Lawhon. Based on a true story of a 1700s midwife and a murder.
Compulsive non-fiction: The Wager by David Grann. About an ill-fated Antarctic sailing expedition and subsequent dueling courts martial.
Check out the Maisie Dobbs series by Winspear. The first is actually my least favorite, but I still liked it.
I love Kate Quinn, but she does a lot of alternating perspectives. The Maisie Dobbs series by Jacqueline Winspear is excellent if you like a mystery series.
For compulsive non-fiction, I would go with Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann or Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe. If you’ve never read Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, that’s technically non-fiction, but it reads like a twisty novel!
A WSJ article this morning estimated that it could take up to 40 hours to downsize a home. If only. If I were to carry everything out to the dumpster, no sorting, no reminiscing, no “I found a picture tucked into this book,” that might be 40 hours.
Signed, child of people with a lot of tangible memories and spare hammers who married into family of female hoarders
I feel your pain. I am sure many here do. In my case, I was clearing with my 2 sisters, so there was a lot of memory sharing and laughter along the way. I wish for you that there are good memories and smiles to get you through the slog.
I’ve had to pack up a house to move across the country three times in 12 years and that estimate seems wildly off for the time it takes to go through a house, get rid of anything inessential, and pack the rest, even when you’re not doing much downsizing. Though I guess trashing might be faster than packing to survive a long distance move, which helps some?
I have like 7 antique hammers in my house that “we can’t get rid of.”
Windows 95 printed manual. Yes we are definitely going to need that again.
I raise you 5 boxes of cables that don’t match any device since the early 2000s.
There’s a meme somewhere that outlines the totally real scenario where you’ll need to connect your Nokia phone to your home printer that makes me laugh.
Lololol, 40 hours to complete the job? Sure.
Bought a coat you like? Buy a couple of duplicates so that you have a backup and an understudy in case wear or tragedies occur.
Maybe they left off a zero?
I mean it’s possible… but not good. I got tired of McMansion living during covid and downsized my family from 3500 sf to 1300 sf (long story) but yes we did the packing in 1 week. Gave away a lot of furniture. Like you said, if you prioritize just getting rid of stuff, it’s doable. But if you pause to think about things, reminisce, consider different options, it will take years. My parents literally just upsized after retiring so that they could keep (hoard?) many of my grandmothers things.
40 hours? Bwah ha ha ha ha. Maybe if you are a minimalist in a studio condo.
I am very understanding of those of us who will be responsible for clearing out hoarder parents (me too), but I’m quite sure I could get through “downsizing” (I assume that means eliminating junk?) my house in 40 hours. I think some of you are either overestimating your stuff or underestimating how much time 40 dedicated hours is.
I think you’re underestimating the amount of physicality and also brain power involved. My mom cleaning out Grandma’s house would do about 90 minutes of good work, then take an hour break, then another 2 hours, 90 minute break, maybe 2.5 hours. Sure if you’re only counting being “on” that’s 40 hours. But dragging the furniture to the pick up point, taking photos, hauling trash – really really hard for most people to do in 40 hours, straight or not
The decision fatigue is exhausting in a different way, but it’s definitely physically exhausting too.
Yes. I could empty someone else’s stuff in 40 hours or the time it takes to light a match. Family stuff is different. Time becomes eternal.
I could do it in 40 hours if I just threw things away but I would want to do it in a more responsible manner which means properly donating stuff and giving it away on buy nothing, textile recycling etc. Doing it properly would take much longer than 40 h.
It does not take “much longer” to put shit in bags and drive them to your thrift store than it does to put shit in bags and put them in a dumpster.
It does take much longer to consider valuables as not “shit” and categorize them appropriately to where they should ideally go.
Either you’re keeping them or you’re not. If you’re not keeping them, the thrift store can direct them to their highest and best use.
A huge percentage is f thrift store donations end up not selling, never put out on the floor, and thrown out. Donation artificially absolves you of guilt and is not the most responsible way to deal with unwanted goods.
Okay, then just put them directly in the dumpster!
Yeah but I can have a dumpster delivered to my driveway and hire a couple people to help throw things in. And then someone picks up the dumpster. That’s pretty dang easy.
Yes that’s easy but some people are uncomfortable doing that level of environmental damage.
The stuff already exists and is junk. The difference between it rotting in someone’s house and it rotting in the dump is just its physical location.
maybe it’s just the amount of time it takes to direct a servant or professional organizer who basically just lets you do the high level directing and then leave the room while they do all the work (or the wife)
it is the WSJ after all where $900 pants and $40 million houses are the norm
So your view is that the poors can’t afford professional help with organizing but can afford to buy so much shit that they can’t organize it themselves in an ENTIRE WEEK of work…?
Buddy, people without generational wealth don’t accumulate that much stuff worth keeping. My parents raised 4 kids in a 1200 sq ft townhouse that they still live in, and if they dropped dead tomorrow we could absolutely get through all that stuff in less than 40 hours work time.
This was not my experience at all. It’s not just about stuff worth keeping, but about organizing and making sure things can ever be found again (so it may depend on how organized people were to begin with; my family was NOT).
My family of origin are all “poors” and have way more stuff than I ever will. They have been saving it and passing it down for generations.
In my experience, people without generational wealth think that everything is worth keeping.
That’s why it’s so easy – you grab the things that you know you want, invite family to grab anything they want, then toss the rest. Np worries about accidentally tossing something valuable, since I guarantee that someone was aware of it and called dibs. The only issue is if everyone in the family has hoarding tendencies.
It took a team 2.5 days to pack and load my 2500 square foot house last time I did a corporate move. Zero chances it takes an individual 40 hours.
I could downsize my own home in 40 hours because I purge and organize regularly and I know what all my stuff is. It would take a lot longer to go through someone else’s stuff and figure out what was important.
Same here. I’ve moved and downsized a lot in the past 13-14 years so I don’t have a whole lifetime’s worth of stuff accumulated. And since I moved in with my husband we’ve organized this house pretty well, too.
I would look at state, county and city sites.
Where do you look for attorney job openings?
I spent 6 years in biglaw, and then moved to the federal government. I was only looking for government jobs, so searched exclusively on USAJobs, and got my position in biglaw via my law school. It now looks like I’m getting laid off, and I don’t even know where to start in the job search.
Following. I have the same background and am in the same boat right now.
Indeed
LinkedIn
goinhouse.com
Yes these top 2 for sure. Goinhouse has quite a few outdated posts/links.
Work your network. I have been in practice for 15 years. I got my first law job from OCI. I have worked in 6 other jobs since then, and word of mouth/connections made those happen. 4 were purely word of mouth/connections. 2 were not, they were posted online but I would not have gotten them job were it not for a connection too.
There’s a legal recruiter I follow who is helping displaced government attorneys. https://risepointsearch.com
If you are considering state or local government, the best place to look is directly with the unit. If you work in a particular substantive area, check out trade organizations within that area for job listing services. And work your contacts, as others have said.
+1 on checking directly with state or local govt. I have a tenant who was working federal level and just switched to state level to escape the upheaval.
In my smallish City, our local bar association email newsletter has many listed attorney positions. I work in state government and I think two more recent hires have come to us that way. Sorry and good luck!
My friends recommend Linked In and Lawjobs.com. I recommend you read every ad in the NY Times on Sunday and apply, even if you’re not overly qualified. The same for Linked in. Make sure your resume has all of the current buzzwords for the area you worked in, because it will be scanned by AI. If you’re over 50, don’t put down when you graduated from school because it’s easy to figure out how old you are now (just add 21 for college), and it’s tough enough to get a job without being aged out. You can also try friends who know friends who are out of work and you can connect with them.
depending on how long you’ve been out and what you might be interested in most law schools have databases.
I’m not an attorney but work with many attorneys in my fed role. The last two friends who went in-house from government did it through connections they made at conferences. While that might not help you in this moment, pull the agendas for conferences that relate to your areas of expertise and see who spoke at them. Often you’ll find smaller shops or consulting firms that are using them as exposure/marketing. Also look at the conference sponsors to find businesses and look at their sites. Good luck OP!
NYS and NYC government have their own websites with job listings, other state and localities probably do as well.
I work for a recruiting firm (global) and we specialize in attorney placements. Or rather, that is one of our core recruiting businesses. Get in our database? It’s free:) https://myportal.lhh.com/easyapply?queryState=eyd0ZW5hbnRJZCc6ICcxMzMnLCdsYW5ndWFnZSc6ICdlbi1VUycsJ3VzZXJGbG93JzogJ2Vhc3lBcHBseV9wb3J0YWwnfQ==&_gl=1*h7yf93*_gcl_au*NTY5NzU3NDM5LjE3NDQzMzM3NzI.*_ga*MTYyMzQ2Mzg3NS4xNzQ0MzMzNzcy*_ga_E9VSKMS2CH*MTc0NDMzMzc3MS4xLjAuMTc0NDMzMzc3MS42MC4wLjA.
What kind of tool do I need to get Kate Middleton hair? I blowout my hair 3 days a week with a big round brush and it looks decent, but I’ve never been able to master the soft curl, particularly around the face. I’ve tried rollers (too fussy) and curling iron (takes too long and the curls are too tight). Is the Airwrap the answer? I briefly tried it and it seems hard to use, but the results I see on Instagram look close to what I’m going for.
I feel like some people just have good hair. I am not one of them. Limp fine hair. Fuzzes in humidity. Requires a professional.
same
My hairdresser even said this too me.
Hair extensions. Most of the time they’re extremely well done and hard to spot, but every now and then they’re a bit more apparent.
+1 I have and had pretty thick hair. I am Kate’s age and have long hair; now it takes a row of extensions to look the way it used to. The ends just got a little thinner which is probably why women cut their hair shorter at this age. People seem surprised when I say it’s extensions so maybe they can’t tell. I don’t really care if they can or not. Oh and it’s blown dry and curled with an iron at the ends.
Her natural hair is pretty curly to begin with, so she has a head start with bouncy volume.
This is my impression too. I have straight hair that does not hold a curl. Maybe you do, too.
I have wavy hair and it holds a curl fine, I just don’t know what I’m doing! I can do a great curled ends blow out or straight style but don’t know how to get it more like her soft spiral curves that go away from the face.
The spin and curl tool mentioned below is what you’re looking for.
I have similar hair and I can almost get there using the round blow dryer tool (mine is the shark) and a few well placed velcro rollers on the top of my head. This is key to getting the face framing (along with a cut that works for this). I also have one of those brush curling irons that help me get the curl at the ends. I can get a similar result with the shark tools air wrap thing, but it takes longer, so I don’t do it often. What I cannot replicate is the beautiful shine and bounce…my hair color and texture is not quite right I think.
Is it the combo of air and the brush surface being heated that makes it work better than a round brush and blow dryer? And is it easier to do? I cannot master the twist/flick that seems to be required to get curls with the round brush.
It is significantly easier to do for me because you are only holding one thing, rather than a brush + dryer.
It could be a wig. She recently completed Chemo, and that causes hair to fall out. I have pretty hair, but I go to the hairdresser every 2 weeks and she knows exactly what to do to keep it manageable.
She’s had this hair for well over a decade
Not all chemo has hair loss as a side effect. Every cocktail comes with its own basket of delights.
Based on the information we have (while not confirmed), it seems likely she did FOLFOX and did not lose her hair. She told a fellow cancer patient she did not use a cold cap.
She’s almost certainly currently got extensions for thinning from the treatment, but I don’t think “Kate Middleton hair” necessarily refers to the hair she as at this moment, post-cancer. She’s always had incredible hair and most of that is just genes. You could definitely help replicate it with extensions if your natural hair isn’t that thick/voluminous/easy to hold curl.
I’d bet good money that sh’es been using extensions or wiglets or whatever at least since she got engaged.
I think the argument against that is that she was regularly stalked by paparazzi for almost a decade before her engagement, and there was no huge change from pre- and post-engagement hair. I’m sure she used extensions for formal events and updos, but her hair was curling up in the heat on a royal tour to the South Pacific in a way that just isn’t possible with extensions.
Pictures of her from university have her with shiny, curly, voluminous hair. Her sister also had beautiful hair. They certainly had money to take care of it, but some people just have nice hair.
+1 to the 3:12 poster. There are photos of her from her early university days when she had juuust started dating William and she always had that really thick hair. I think she may have some extensions now that she’s post-chemo, but in general it’s just genetics. My hair is similar to hers, although I definitely don’t style it as well.
I think you can’t underestimate this factor. Celebrities don’t just have staff to make them look great for one moment, they also carefully choose the styles that highlight their natural textures and features to the maximum extent. We mainly see this one hairstyle that she totally rocks, and we don’t see her in styles that suit her less. Can’t compete unless we have similar features?
The game changer for me was the spin and curl tool- like the Chi Volcanic but the one I got is a nameless brand. If you can get a larger barrel like 1.5 inches, great. I was on a video call with a coworker and her hair looked so amazing and she told me it was this tool. It does require effort and product, so I don’t use it every day.
A heated round brush. Blow dryers don’t get hot enough for my hair to hold a curl and they somehow create more frizz for me.
I tried one of these from ghd but it was a dry heat brush. It was really hard to use. Do you mean that or a wet/dry type that also blow dried?
just because I woke up snarky today – the difference between you and her is probably the professional stylist and mid-day touch ups.
lol fair enough and this is what my husband always tells me when I comment on the gorgeous hair styles on tv. That said, I suspect there are tools available I am not taking advantage of, so I want to try them!
I think a lot of hair on TV is wigs.
Yup. And if it’s not wigs, it’s hair extensions. Also hair extensions are pretty standard for any kind of red carpet event, per my LA-area hairdresser (he does a lot of work during awards season for not-famous-but-industry people and occasionally does hair for The Very Famous if their usual person isn’t around).
I mean, snark aside, she is literally royalty and has plenty of resources at her disposal. We are regular people. The real person I know with amazing hair does do mid day touch ups. I didn’t realize how much work she put into her hair and makeup until we went on a trip together. She woke up at 6 even after a night of partying, and spent 2 hours doing her hair and makeup. Then she would do a full touch up after lunch and it would take about an hour. It made me realize I’m just not willing to put in that kind of effort.
In my teen years I would carry one of the cordless butane curling irons and re-style my hair multiple times a day. Ugh.
Wow. I hardly do anything for three hours almost every day like that lol
You need the services of a $500+/hour hair professional available to you at all times, along with a personal dietitian to ensure you are eating optimally to support skin and hair health. Also a round brush.
Volumizing shampoo/conditioner and something like the Revlon brush dryer get me somewhere close.
not to change the subject but i’m watching Hacks and jean smart wears hair pieces and now i assume basically everyone with voluminous beautiful hair does…
No some of us just truly have tons of gorgeous hair!
Yeah if people who know more know that Kate uses extensions, I’ll accept it. But my college roommate had just as much hair that was just as nice as Kate’s, and I witnessed her entire hair routine regularly.
My sister is like this. People always think it’s extensions but she just has amazing auburn hair.
This is how I wear my hair and I do big barrel curling iron + hairspray + paddle brush (just one gentle run through). The curls will be too tight at first but brushing them out loosens them up. It does take a little bit of time and I’m curious about trying the airwrap in case it’s quicker. Was actually thinking about whether now is the time before prices go up.
It’s on sale at Sephora too so I feel like now is the time.
She’s got thick wavy/curly hair to begin with and absolutely uses hair pieces. That being said I’d try something like the Chi Spin and Curl. I am useless with a curling iron but this tool is idiot proof.
The dyson airwrap never held a curl for me and my hair literally curls on it’s own so I’m not sure how that thing works for anyone who isn’t a pro or an influencer.
First, extensions. Seconds, professionals. She’s a royal – she basically exists to look good whereas I exist apparently to serve everyone else in my life (insert pitiful, self deprecating laugh…).
I get a lot of compliments on my hair despite having no skill. I dry it 98% with a hair dryer and then use the revlon brush dryer thing. I use a clip to do it in three sections – bottom layer, middle layer, and top layer. I spin away from my face on the last / top layer to create a sweeping kind of long layer that pulls away from my face. I finish with spray to keep it’s shape and Ouai hair oil.
I don’t know if that makes any sense. I’m totally making it up as I go but I absolutely get a lot of compliments on my hair that’s about the same color as Kate’s and a bit shorter. My natural pattern is not curly, maybe trending wavy but it’s kind of a hot mess. The compliments on my “finished hair” have been consistently tied to me using that brush.
The old advice was to get one of those 2-3″ rollers and put them in just around your face AFTER you’ve blow dried and styled your hair — while your hair is still hot. Then do your makeup, then take them out before you leave the house. It’s a slight curl but can also straighten previously curled hair. Also, mousse.
I’d suggest going to a Drybar and watching how the stylist does your hair, you can pick the exact look you want.
These days I might also try some of those sleep curler things but it depends what your base hair is.
Thank you. I do the rollers around the face and it gives me a hint of what I want but not enough. I have a fair amount of hair and volume, so maybe hold is what I am lacking.
I got a giant curling iron (1.5, maybe 2″) and I’ve been very pleased with the results. Way better than I ever had with blow dry brushes or a flat iron.
Since its so big, I can do pretty big sections. My hair is to my bra-line and I can style my hair in about 10 minutes as long as its already completely dry.
Checked my amazon history. The curling iron I use is 2″.
Hair extensions! My hair looks just like hers with exten$ion$!
Anyone else here a recovered workaholic? What have you done when the thought of dealing with the high levels of dysfunction in your personal life escalated, and the easy answer was to lean into work?
Honest answer, I trained for a couple marathons and I went low contact with my mom to remove a lot of the “high levels of dysfunction” from my life.
Marathon training sounds good because it’s also time consuming and you can dive into it – but it’s personal and not work.
Developing hobbies in general probably helps.
OP here… agree. And I could stand to get in better shape. I used to run cross country in high school and half marathons. I guess I got away from that and work became the drug of choice.
Boring answer – therapy to help learn to tolerate the discomfort of facing that dysfunction and disappointment. Internalizing that I need to make space for a better personal life, which means leaning out of work even before I have the kind of personal life I wanted to fill that space with. It worked! And then once I fixed/developed my personal life more I was able to avoid falling back into the workaholic trap.
This (Internalizing that I need to make space for a better personal life, which means leaning out of work even before I have the kind of personal life I wanted to fill that space with.) is helpful, thank you.
honestly, finding hobbies. Even simple ones. Like, now that it’s light out I look forward to a walk around the neighborhood after work to see what bulbs have popped up.
Yes, hobbies for sure. Put that energy towards something you enjoy.
For me, hobbies with a defined time and other people were key – too easy to think “yep, gonna go for a training run after *one more* email”; but “game starts at 7; if I’m late I’m letting my team down, walk out the door now!” worked
now i’m obsessed with dahlias :)
What a gorgeous hobby. Inspiring!
Address the high levels of dysfunction in your personal life. Boundaries or distance from problematic friends and relatives. Individual therapy. Couples or family therapy if the problematic person is your spouse or child.
Which job would you choose? Job A is my current remote role in house at a local F500. It’s a decent job but I know I am significantly underpaid, which is frustrating. If I wait a year or two I’ll probably get promoted (to get the title for a job I’m already doing) and get closer to what I should be making. Job B is a remote role in house at F500 a few hours away. The title is a lateral move, but it would be a 25% pay raise immediately. I don’t know the potential for promotion. Both companies will likely be similarly affected by the current economic situation.
how are trends around RTO in your industry? I only know a few people who remain 100% remote, so the risk of taking a remote Job B only to have it become hybrid seems pretty real.
From what I’m seeing, this isn’t even industry specific, everyone is going back to closer to full time or hybrid with most days in the office, the trend is well away from remote. For this alone I’d stick with A.
Both jobs are fully remote with no expectation of that changing. Since they both hire from all over the country I think it is unlikely. If it does, I would wait, as I don’t want to work somewhere that has an in office requirement.
Quit*
I’d revisit your expectations and make sure that even if you’re remote to start that the company is located somewhere you could commute to.
I’d trust OP’s assessment of her own industry.
I realize this is a privileged take but I won’t be commuting so this is not a consideration for me. I will take a significant pay cut or change industries before I work in an office again. I have a chronic illness and working from home has been the single best thing for improving my quality of life, including more than medication.
ok then other things to weigh-
– In this economy, goodwill is worth even more than it is normally (favors A)
– Is being 100% remote common or uncommon at either place? If uncommon at either, point in favor of the other.
– Looking around at Job A, have you seen other 100% remote people be promoted? If yes, that’s a known vs. Job B (unknown) so favors A; if no, that might be a pro for Job B because at least you get more money
What’s the argument AGAINST the one paying 25% more now? That seems like the obvious choice, but you’re debating — so what’s the crux of the debate for you?
I like my current company and would not consider leaving if I was paid market. It’s not enough money to make a difference in my day-to-day life, but the job being miserable would make a difference.
If you like your current job, and main thing you want is a salary increase, could you have the conversation? At my in-house job, the only way anyone got even close to market increases was by showing there was another offer on the table. Not pleasant but it beat the other scenario where people would actually leave, then come back 6 months later at market pay.
I think this is the best case scenario, but I need to be prepared for them to tell me to walk. They have admitted that I’m paid below market and I feel like they are dangling the promotion in front of me as the fix.
In this case, I would stick with your current job.
I’d stick with A because you have political capital there. I wouldn’t want to be new anywhere right now.
Fed here: as I think about my eventual job search (I won’t leave til I’m fired, but it’s coming…), I’m focusing on what ways I can pivot my career to have the most impact. I have a few irons in the fire – all of which will allow me to continue to positively impact my community and I’m purely evaluating them on what’s going to have the biggest impact, not traditional job searching metrics.
FWIW, I’m single, no kids, and in a decent financial situation so I can afford to do this in ways others can’t.
I’m also spending my time out of work organizing, protesting, helping my community in non political ways, sharing my professional expertise with groups that need it, emailing electeds, boycotting Amazon, etc. FWIW, ALL of my work friends are doing the same.
If I have one more friend who works in a non impacted industry and has a relatively non impacted life tell me how they’re not doing these things I will scream.
Why is it the public servants who were already bearing a heavier load doing all of the extra work now? My government employee (fed, state, and local), non profit, nurse, teacher, etc friends are putting in the work and my finance friends act lokr nothing is happening? Or they’re personally devastated but have made no changes in their actions and habits?
Hugs to you. I never worked in the pubic sector, but know it takes dedication to last there and get promoted. I think you have it figured out, but the one thing you don’t mention is a support structure like family or a boyfriend or husband to be there for you if you lose your job. See about leaning in to your family, and find a boyfriend who has been there or at least is willing to give you support and hugs as you go through the process. There’s also the local 1-888 help lines if things get dire and you don’t have a boyfriend or family nearby. What ever you do, do NOT take up alcohol. It leads only to a disaster. I’ve been there and done that.
The typo in your second sentence is making me giggle. It sure does take dedication to last there!
It’s a troll
Yeah the advice to find a boyfriend? Pls ignore this one
Ha. When I worked in Big Law I always did a control F for “pubic” before submitting documents because it’s such a common typo for public.
Ugh – if it were only so easy to go get a supportive boyfriend but it’s not and I’m single.
My friends are personally supportive of me. Some are walking the walk and as discussed above, many are not, which I’m finding very frustrating.
Family is a mixed bag – lots of “you won’t lose your job” with nothing to back that up. Some family (the retired hippies) are out protesting and doing it all. Some (my parents) didn’t vote because they didn’t like either candidate so I won’t discuss politics with them.
I also have lots of work friends who are great supports right now.
I know some of this is based on personal conversations you have had; I’m not going to get into that, because I don’t know. But I will suggest it’s very possible that people you know are doing things but not loudly. My partner and I have done a bunch of stuff, but I think a lot of people we know don’t know that? We’re not secretive or trying to hide from negative repercussions or anything like that. I just feel like if I’m spending X hours/Y dollars due to these problems, I don’t want to necessarily add to the mental space that already takes up by talking about it a lot. I realize that it’s a privilege too since it’s not my literal job at stake, which would probably take up all my mental space; I’d be happy to be a sounding board for friends who are being seriously impacted to vent. But if I’m the one talking or starting a conversation, it will be about something else right now.
Yes, what my friends and I can do for each other is take a break from the stresses and enjoy each other’s company for a little while.
I want to preface this comment by saying I totally understand where you’re coming from. As someone who is also doing all the things you mention, I do find myself wondering a bit about those who aren’t (FWIW, I don’t think it helps to focus on what people aren’t doing. They may be giving money to important causes, which is not immediately visible but also very important).
But also, I guess I just wouldn’t expect someone who chose a finance career to be AS invested as a public servant. I’m not saying it’s right, but it makes sense. You chose a career that would make an impact; they chose one that’s about making money. Of course your actions now reflect your values just like their actions (or lack thereof) reflect theirs.
Yeah it’s just really showing the differences in values now and it’s saddening
yup
Many of us don’t see those things as actually effective. Good on you, you do your thing. But I’d caution that doing it loudly and sanctimoniously is likely to backfire.
It’s great you want to improve the world but don’t look down on other people who “do less.” As a working mom, all I do is give to charity monthly, donate blood, and try to stay mentally strong to raise my kids well. It doesn’t help anyone if I drive myself into the ground trying to change the world when much of this is out of my control.
You do a lot more than most people!!! Thank you for what you are doing!
+1
I’m thinking of the quote from Mother Theresa: “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.”
Man, the “why am I such a better person than my friends!” posts sure have been frequent so far this year.
Yup. If you think your friends are trash, just stop being friends with them? Why do you need to post about this?
It sounds like you had and have more faith in all of this (you had enough faith to take a government job in the first place, and you have enough faith to think investing in emailing, organizing, and protesting are worth doing now). You may also be right, but people who never felt that way before aren’t very likely to start feeling that way now that it’s all going pear shaped?
But now that things are effed up it’s even more important to care and turn that into action!
Look I don’t think a single protest or an email is going to change things, but they’re small actions in a bigger movement that may lead to change. If you listened to Cory Booker’s filibuster he mentions a lawyer seeing John Lewis march on TV and how he started volunteering – anything can be the impetus to change.
Apathy kills. You don’t have to commit your whole life to a cause and your actions for the cause can look different than mine , but when we’re in a constitutional crisis if you choose to do NOTHING you don’t deserve the fruits of liberty and the benefits that this country gives you.
I know I go to greater lengths than most and I’ve accepted that. But I’m having a hard time with friends who say they care yet dig their heads in the sand
Then stop being friends with them if you think so little of them. I don’t think they’re bad people, for the record, but you obviously do, so why not choose to be alone with your own superiority?
Because I didn’t think they were bad people until recently. I still enjoy their company but I’m annoyed how they (and many others) are happy to loudly talk the talk but won’t walk the walk
Let your friends go be friends with people who are less judgmental of them, seriously. Harboring annoyances about your friends and talking crap about them online is not kind or being a good friend.
How old are you?
Well, I believe everyone deserves “the fruits of liberty and benefits that this country gives you” … don’t you? Isn’t that what you’re fighting for?
Yes I do. But the people who I’d expect to stay home are not the ones who are.
My liberal, mid 30s, child free by choice, well off friends are not going the least bit out of their way. But my late 70s stage 3 cancer patient aunt is out protesting every weekend.
I’m happy to shoulder the burden for those who have family obligations or crazy busy jobs or whatever. But someone with time and resources? Come on
Well, most people are selfish, many don’t have empathy and only react when something bad impacts them personally. Sad but true.
This is the type of stuff that makes us think y’all are sanctimonious. I’m not in govt but my regular job plus growing a human plus elder care is keeping me plenty busy. Sorry we aren’t all perfect and 1000% politically committed at all times in our lives! Congrats on being perfect!!
Not trying to be sanctimonious. I understand everyone is busy and has a lot on their plate – I do too and so do my coworkers.
I’m not perfect and not 100% committed. I’m still a person who likes my free time and enjoys shopping and isn’t as eco friendly as I should be.
But how dare someone come to happy hour to complain about whatever Trump is doing and do NOTHING to fight back?
FWIW, the friends I’m currently frustrated with are mid 30s, earn 6 figures, work maybe 40 hours a week, single, childfree, and don’t have elder care responsibilities. Hobbies are happy hour and going to concerts and stuff like that.
It sounds like you don’t actually like these people very much. You’re allowed to do a slow fade and connect more deeply with others who’s values align more closely with yours.
Until recently they were some of my closest friends…
If you just want to hate your friends go right ahead
It’s amazing how successful you are without even trying.
Your distain for people who have chosen not to have kids is certainly something. People aren’t obligated to live life on hard mode because you have decided to.
I think the OP is very judgmental but she literally did not say anything justifying this comment in any way. Also, it’s disdain.
Uh I’m childfree myself…
I am with you that your friends sound disingenuous at worst, maybe feel disempowered at best?
They aren’t as perfect and wonderful as you are, obviously.
Ugh it’s not that. I know I’ve always very quietly had a different world view than others (that we have a moral obligation to work for the common good) but I kept that quiet. I know it’s not popular so I don’t share that.
But these are people who at weekly happy hour bitch and moan about Trump and Elon and everything but then do nothing about it? Look I know we can’t do much but do something?
You can repeat this as much as you want but you aren’t listening to anyone’s response about why this might be and seem committed to not accepting that other people are different than you. Which is fine!
People are lazy. And tired. And overwhelmed. And scared.
And some just don’t care, or it’s all performative.
People are different, you know?
We have been expressing our concerns about the potential consequences of Trump’s leadership for a decade now. Despite our efforts, many Americans chose to support him once again. Those of us who have been advocating for change over these years are feeling quite exhausted. I must admit, my capacity for empathy is dwindling. I am far, far from alone in this.
We have moved beyond a critical turning point, and the path ahead has been established. They have the money, the political power, and the force (the support of the police and military). It may be wise to conserve our energy for the challenges that lie ahead, because things are going to get a lot worse before they get better.
Former military officer married to a current military officer. Let me assure you, Trump has much less military support than you would think. The military is silent because they must be.
Oh, man. I hope this is true.
Yep this is how I’m feeling. I’ve protested, donated, been a clinic escort, called my reps, etc etc. Fat lot of good it did. Right now my priority is protecting my family.
I’m really shocked by some responses here. We’re barreling towards fascism and the country is committing human rights abuses and ignoring due process and the OP is wrong for caring too much?
The OP is talking trash about her friends while singing her own praises. That is never a combo that plays well here.
Exactly plus OP really isn’t doing that much, very much over valuing their own activities.
No, not wrong for caring, but I get what anon at 11:32 said.
Many of us have been donating money and calling congresspeople and going to marches for a decade now. We’re tired. And so many Americans seem okay with all this.
I saw a meme about how a choir can sustain a note longer than one person because in a choir, when one person takes a breath others keep the note going. Some of us need to take a breath. Many thanks to the people keeping the note going, but please don’t focus your anger on those of us who need to take a breath.
Thank you for all
The work you’ve been doing for the last decade!!! This effort is exhausting and everyone needs to take care of themselves and take those breaks.
Trust me, my frustration does not lie with you. More with the folks who want to enjoy the music you’re providing but won’t come join the choir.
Not everyone wants to do choir. HTH!
If you don’t want to join the choir then you don’t get to enjoy the music.
If you don’t sing that’s fine – maybe you fundraise for the choir or you do the admin scheduling work. But if you want the music you must help
Plan it
To really abuse this metaphor, I don’t think choral performances are the best way to get music (in fact I find them grating), so I don’t participate in the choir. It’s not like there’s only one way to make music. OP seems to think choral music is the only option.
I don’t think protesting, organizing, emailing electeds, boycotting stores, et cetera actually makes a difference in these circumstances. I will make significant donations to local nonprofits, but I don’t broadcast that.
Self-righteousness is never a good look.
I only rarely did this stuff before this administration – I didn’t even do it last Trump admin because I felt I was more effective other ways (such as my volunteering at the local food bank and monthly donations).
But the situation has changed. So my actions have changed.
So you’ve switched from something with clear, on the ground efficacy to something less effective because…?
I didn’t stop volunteering or donating. I’ve added additional activities on top of what I was already doing.
I confess it’s hard to believe that letter writing will matter now when it never seemed to matter during the previous administration. Watching the opposition party squander four years with their own heads in the sand was a lot. And there were people warning us about where we could end up since Obama’s term. No wonder some people are burned out now.
Maybe I didn’t express myself well. I don’t hate my friends, but I am annoyed at them.
I’ve always had strongly held beliefs about public service (whether through your career or your out of work actions. I also think public service is important on the micro level (being a village for your friends – things like picking up their kid from school because you’re nearby and they’re stuck in traffic or doing the neighborhood litter cleanup) and macro level. It’s all important and needed). Just because I’ve committed to public service as a career doesnt make my work more important. Though, it is annoying to always hear “why are you doing that? You don’t have to do that” about my work – which often involves very long hours in austere conditions, sometimes long stretches away from home, on a public sector salary. It’s annoying but it’s my calling and my career and not theirs so my problem and not theirs.
When the election happened, I was upset but cautiously optimistic (last time was bad but we got through it) and was strongly rebuked by one of these friends that just because we got through it, other people died as a result of the administration’s actions. Which, I was well aware of working on the front lines of COVID and Hurricane Maria and the Afghanistan evacuation, among other crises.
It’s obviously worse now. The country I chose to serve is now perpetuating human rights abuses and making decisions that will ruin lives and kill people. And not a freaking peep from most people I know
It sounds like you had a more favorable view of USA before now than a lot of people have ever had. Maybe you are still right about what people need to do; certainly you’re right that people have a lot to lose.
My advice is to not base your friendships on this. I have friends who have never protested. I don’t think less of them for that. Some people don’t want to. That’s ok. Are they voting? In every election? Even the little ones? That’s really important too. The federal stuff gets the most air, and I say this as someone in the same space, but your friends can do good by being really concerned about their neighborhood too.
Or, just don’t be friends with them.
It took me too long to realize it, but the world is made up of two fundamentally different groups of people: those who care enough about the greater good to inconvenience themselves to help it and those who don’t.
Inconvenience can look many different ways. For some it’s a full life commitment to service (military, clergy, humanitarian aid). For some it’s a career commitment (public service, education, healthcare, non profits, etc) and for some it’s extra curricular (volunteering, coaching little league, park beautification, knitting hats for the homeless). For many it’s a combination of them.
The two groups rarely understand each other because it’s such a difference in world view.
I often feel conflicted because I often really do not appreciate the efforts of people who inconvenience themselves to serve what they perceive to be the greater good. I want to get away from the places where they serve.
One thing I do that inconveniences me to serve the greater good is that on Thursday mornings I volunteer at a soup kitchen in my town before work.
Waking up a 5AM inconveniences me, but “there but for the grace of God go I” and “do unto others as you’d want them to do unto you” so up I get to cook and serve a warm meal for my neighbors who need it before work.
What about that is something you want to get away from?
I have the same question. Most of us who do these activities are just… doing them. We’re not cementing ourselves to the highways to protest climate change.
The actions of the OP are much more akin to the soup kitchen situation. If you don’t want to, no one can force you, but why begrudge others?
I know you’re doing a good thing, but just speaking for myself, literally the food in this scenario.
(And I’ve wondered before if living with severe food restrictions can slowly wear down a sense of communal good, since meals, serving meals, and accepting food from people are all such fundamental communal activities?)
But the examples I had in mind were more like clergy, teachers, and healthcare providers… people who have power over others but who identify as fundamentally good and benign. OP’s apparent personality reminded me of some the very innocent and well intentioned authority figures who made me want to get away from church and school and never return.
Anon at 2:08– I might be misinterpreting, but are you saying you begrudge hungry people receiving food from a soup kitchen?
If that’s your intended meaning, then my only response is yikes on bikes. Sounds like you and your loved ones aren’t ever in need of a small kindness from others, so I guess congratulations.
I didn’t say I begrudged anyone anything? I said I steer clear.
I think it’s lovely to volunteer at a soup kitchen.
OP is coming across a kind of way. Doing a small kindness at or to people is different from meeting a need. Monitoring friends’ participation and keeping score from a perspective of having all the answers and knowing what to do and then judging from high who “deserves” liberty isn’t probably the way to build trust.
I’m probably your ideal human. I work in gov (not American though), am zero waste, politically active, vegan, car free etc. But you know what I also have so many hobbies, I don’t spend 100% of my time doing good, I sew, watch trash tv and go to a LOT of concerts and festivals. I genuinely don’t talk about my political activism or personal views because it’s seen as preachy so my colleagues arly happy hour probably think all I do is spend money on bands and create fancy dresses.
Oh I also have lots of hobbies and am by NO MEANS perfect. I am an omnivore, I used to buy too much on Amazon (only stopped this year), I use way more single use than I should.
My more casual friends would have no idea how much I care about the mission.
But these aren’t coworkers or casual friends. These are women I see like 3-4x a week. We talk all the time. We know a lot about each other. We’ve been friends for nearly a decade.
i’m a niche audience and sample size of 1, and I will say that I was doing emailing, phone calls, letter writing, etc. prior to the election, but given the result it feels futile. i am also jewish and since October 2023, have been trying to battle the huge increase in anti semitism and after 1.5 since October 7th, it’s exhausting, and takes a huge mental toll. yes i realize this is a selfish take, but right now i have to put on my own oxygen mask first. i was becoming so obsessive about some of these things that i was anxious all of the time, not sleeping and could not be a good mother, wife or friend. so yes, i guess in that sense im a “failure” or a “sellout” or “apathetic” or just too weak bc i’m not doing all the things
I agree that the pre-election activities feel super futile in hindsight. But I got out and marched last Saturday and it felt great.
That said, I completely agree with “put on your own oxygen mask first.” It’s fine to take a break.
I’ll give you a little anecdote that hopefully will make you think. A very recently vegetarian colleague criticized me for wearing a plastic rain coat, it’s literally the only plastic clothing garment I own AND it was thrifted. I’ve been vegan for 18 years, I’ve NEVER had an Amazon Prime account. Every time that colleague says ‘we’ or lumps our values together I recoil. I would rather go to Walmart than talk to her.
I wonder if you’ve hit a tipping point where all of the sudden you feel it is an emergency and urgent action must be taken? But the tipping point is different for everyone and we can’t sustain emergency levels of alarm/action for extended periods (without damage from stress, etc) it’s not how humans are wired. People will tune in at different times with different reactions. Were the ones who quit Amazon a decade ago off-beat because not in step with you?
Agreed. I’m exhausted by caring as much as I have since 2001.
The American people voted for this and now we have to see what happens. We’re being pushed forward into the unknown and we have to live with that. This is what “the people” asked for.
It’s so frustrating because you feel like you’re giving let’s say 60% and they’re giving 0% but it everyone gave 10% the world would be better off and people wouldn’t feel the burden of needing to do more
You are being really judgy about what counts as civic engagement. I don’t expect anyone in government to do anything more than keep the trains on the rails. Most people I know in the private sector have picked a cause to support. For me, that’s legal defense funds; others pick the food bank or maternal care, or a service organization via their church. But no way would I expect to talk about it at work, or to raise it with friends in some kind of holier than thou conversation.
Liberal, wealthy, child-free professional here. Assuming everyone has the same ability to go out and protest is a whole lot of privilege. Not everyone is able to do that. Some of us are scared that we will be deported if we are caught protesting. It’s nice that you can be in your little (I assume white) liberal bubble and sit in judgement of others, but I’m more focused on staying here to enjoy the fruits of liberty and benefits that you’ve decided I don’t deserve.
Oh my god I wasn’t talking about everyone who wasn’t protesting. I was talking about three specific friends. Whose situations I know very well. Who have nothing impeding them.
“Nothing” other than their own thoughts and opinions, which are just as valid as yours.
How have you talked to the teens in your life about careers? What have you done when they’ve had unrealistic ideas? Especially when the only source that counts for anything is TikTok?
I’m the cool aunt. My 15 year old nephew is smart but lazy. Laziest kid I’ve ever met. Uses all of his smarts to think of ways to get out of doing something rather than just doing the thing. Gets Bs with an occasional A (and an occasional C) because he can’t be bothered to put in the effort. He has a brilliant mind for computers and business when he chooses to use it.
He originally said he wanted to be an airline pilot because it was maximum pay for minimum work (my husband – an airline pilot – confirmed this lol). He heard on social media that pilots need calculus, and because he “hates math,” he now doesn’t want to be a pilot, even though my husband assured him there’s no calculus involved. So now he’s decided on neurosurgery. Why? Maximum pay, maximum prestige, and “because I’ll be doing good deeds at work, the universe will bless me with even more money.” UGH, KID. Absolutely zero mention of caring for others, curiosity about the human body, whatever normally motivates doctors…just money and prestige. (I asked him when he was going to get his grades up to get into a pre-med program to get into medical school, and he answered, “12th grade. No, the end of college. I don’t have to work hard until then.”)
His parents didn’t go to college, and I’m a lawyer, so the college advising game is mostly me. How do I help advise him here? Real life inflection points are coming up quick!
You honestly don’t. He will go to some college. He will eventually get some job. He’s 15. It’s fine.
This. There are worse ways to pick a career. Focus on nudging him away from student loan debt without a clear payoff
Yup, 100%. If you must say anything, you should say “the higher your grades are the more options you will have” and leave it at that.
Completely agree. My kid was a bit like this (the laziness without the high aspirations!) and she made it through and is now a licensed psychotherapist.
If there’s a good community college where he lives, that may be a place to start. My kid did that and ended up transferring to and graduating from a much better university than she would have been accepted to right out of high school. (Only caveat is he has to hit the ground running at community college the answer to “when do you I have to get my grades up?” is “first day of college.”)
Used a bad word, trying again:
Completely agree. My kid was a bit like this (the laziness without the high aspirations!) and she made it through and is now a licensed psychotherapist.
If there’s a good community college where he lives, that may be a place to start. My kid did that and ended up xferring to and graduating from a much better university than she would have been accepted to right out of high school. (Only caveat is he has to hit the ground running at community college the answer to “when do you I have to get my grades up?” is “first day of college.”)
I was like him. Wanting to maximize money for time worked is a great goal, but he clearly should be learning to code, not thinking neuro if that’s what he wants. Lazy is rewarded in programming, because lazy often equals figure out how to make the computer do the work, which is like the whole point.
Just point out to him how long the path through residency/fellowship for a neurosurgeon is, and also highlight what the GPA requirements for med school are. That’ll kill his dream. And then get him a programming book or class.
I am skeptical about “coding” as a lucrative career path. First it was all offshored, and now AI is doing some of it. If you want a sustainable career in tech you need to be the mastermind behind the AI, not just someone who can write code.
What? This comment is bananas. I work in IT and believe me, it’s lucrative, and I have nothing to do with AI.
It’s really hard to predict which fields will be lucrative in the future. For the past… 20? 30?… years, everyone’s answer to the job of the future has been, computers! Now we’re seeing an oversaturation of new CS graduates. The tech layoffs hit young people hard. Suddenly a vague, go into computers!, is sounding like the out of touch stuff boomers say and not real advice to high schoolers.
I think this is good advice. Maybe you could offer to gift him some programming classes or sign him up for a coding camp or something like that?
He’ll definitely need calculus for medical school too so idk why he thinks that’s a solution.
I’ll say, calculus is probably the most often and unfairly maligned subject by parents, and it makes kids afraid of it. I was afraid to take calculus because of the impact I feared it would have on my GPA and I wish I’d just done it. I ended up doing my college BF’s calculus homework for him because it never clicked for him but I was fine with it, and I never even went to class. If your nephew doesn’t care about grades then he should just go for it while he’s still in hs.
Yeah, calculus is actually not that hard and is fun because it makes so much intuitive sense. What trips kids up is that they come in without a good grasp of trigonometry and logarithmic and exponential functions.
+1. Also, computer science is an applied math degree. Anything beyond the basics of IT requires a lot more math than a pre-med would take.
At this age, I would only focus on not going into massive debt for college. He has plenty of time to figure out his career, but he should go to a state school (or a school where he has a big scholarship, but that seems unlikely with his grades) and not take on more debt than necessary. That’s by far the most important decision you make in high school. It’s really not the end of the world for a 15 year old to say they care more about money and prestige than helping others – he has plenty of time to mature (and honestly, plenty of adults feel that way too). The important thing is not making irreversible decisions like taking on massive debt to fuel some vision of a high-earning career.
Also you can tell him that I know an airline pilot who flew for United for 30 years and couldn’t do basic high school algebra, lol. (No shade to pilots! My daughter wants to be one and I think that’s fantastic. But there are some really dumb ones out there, like any profession.)
Amen to “no massive debt!”
This is classic boys now and part of the reason society is doomed. He’ll either learn eventually or won’t. Up to him.
He’ll end up like my baby brother probably. Has a good job but is so entitled and lazy he still lives with mom and dad. No girl worth while will consider dating him because he will never pull his weight. Feels entitled to a smart good looking wife but doesn’t bring anything to the table. (Unfortunately for our fathers generation a good job was enough to nab an accomplished woman, not anymore).
wow I didn’t know we were back to stereotyping identity groups and blaming them for a perceived decline in society! So retro!
Men really don’t need you to defend them so hard.
Oh Jesus, do we really need to have the “stereotyping is morally wrong no matter who you’re doing it about” conversation?
If she doesn’t defend the men how will she be picked?!
Oh yeah, the only reason a woman could say “don’t stereotype” is because she wants male attention. Couldn’t be that she has her own values and thoughts.
Do you hear yourself? Good god, the internalized misogyny.
This seems really melodramatic. All 15 year olds are self-centered.
Honestly, give him the advice and if he ignores it you leave it alone for a while. Certainly don’t bring it up more than every few months. As a software developer, he could thrive in tech if he can learn to automate boring tasks. But it’s funny how much more up-front work it takes to automate a task, rather than continuing to do it manually. At 15, I’d focus more on developing his character than career aspirations.
Let him fail. Also as gross as his views are about neurosurgery are, most doctor’s don’t care about helping patients and doing good, just prestige and money, so unfortunately he’s not off for the field.
You don’t need an apostrophe in doctors in that (wildly cynical and inaccurate) sentence.
Oh aren’t you smrt, commenting on auto correct and phone typing with thumbs.
Do…do you not have thumbs…?
There’s an a in smart, btw.
*whoosh*
that is so not true. many doctors do care, but medicine is being destroyed by private equity. As an aside – getting into medical school is extremely competitive, so if he doesn’t change his attitude, that will obviously not be a possibility. give some advice/info. maybe you have some friends you could connect him with for informational interviews? but yea, try to help make sure he doesnt leave college with massive debt
Well he’s not going to become a neurosurgeon so I wouldn’t worry about that.
Factual information is how you deal with him.
Pretty hard to get into med school if you wait until the end of college. You have to send in your whole undergrad transcript when you apply.
I wouldn’t pressure him about college – nothing wrong with being a firefighter or plumber etc.
Also pretty hard to turn on great study habits and strong work ethic at the drop of a hat, and have others believe that you can and will do it if you haven’t demonstrated that initiative to-date.
Life is going to teach him these lessons and he’s going to learn much more from them than he would from a lecture from his aunt.
I agree, when he sees how much money it costs just to sustain a reasonable quality of life, he’s going to see that the legend of the rent is way hardcore and that could really motivate him.
My cousin who is the same age is the same. I’ve tried to point out that you need grades to become a doctor (he wants to be one too). His parents aren’t open to this but honestly I think he shouldn’t go to college until he has better focus and work ethic. His parents are college educated and would be paying for college.
Programming would be great but my cousin at least wouldn’t even do the work needed to learn how to program.
I am always upbeat and positive. “You want to be a surgeon? That’s awesome! Work hard on those math and science classes. Let me know if you need help finding volunteer opportunities at a hospital.”
Keep in mind that plenty of people are successful without going to college right after high school or at all. Be supportive and let him find his way.
One of my male cousins was like this. After high school, he worked a very low wage job and partied a lot for years. Eventually, he got tired of being broke all the time. He fell in love with a blue collar field, has a great job at a university and makes money on the side with residential work, and is a loving husband and father. His path was his own and he’s a great guy.
If possible, get him into a job, any job, so he can see what working is like. Even something like lifeguarding or camp counselor which has some nice aspects to it will improve his chances of figuring life out.
Otherwise, stand back and let him fail.
It’s difficult. We have a nephew who graduated college a year ago and has made a string of idiotic career and life decisions because the only person he would take advice from was a cousin who works at a startup. He ignored the advice of all aunts, uncles, parents, and grandparents and now lives in his girlfriend’s mother’s house and works a menial job after turning down a very good real adult job because his cousin told him he could make more working for a startup but not how to get hired by one.
My daughter is in college and is always telling me how she wants to be a high school teacher but also to have a fancy kitchen and fancy vacations, which we can’t afford even though our HHI is much higher than a teacher’s. She also doesn’t want to sit at a desk and do “boring” work like her dumb boring parents do. She thinks someone is going to pay her a living wage to have fun teaching musical theater. She will not listen when her many relatives who have quit teaching tell her it’s not fun at all.
FWIW she can make good money teaching musical theatre if she would work at a fancy private school or move countries. But those jobs are competitive, like thousands of applicants, and she would need to be extraordinary.
Private schools actually typically pay worse than public schools, at least in the US. They often give teachers a better quality of life though, because you have more engaged students with more aptitude.
Hmm my BFF is a teacher at a private boarding school and earns about 120k.
Boarding schools may be different (although 120k seems incredibly high!) but statistically public pays quite a bit more than private. This is old data and the numbers have gone up but the trends still hold: $56k average for public vs $44k for private in 2011.
https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_211.10.asp
Your daughter will likely marry someone and have a higher HHI than just her income that way. Or she could write a screenplay or a novel in her summers off. Or she could be a voice coach on the weekends and supplement her income. Or she can …
There’s so many opportunities you are omitting from your vision of your daughter’s future. Let her dream a bit!
Where exactly are all these great potential husbands for young women hiding? No one I know is finding them.
Statistically almost everyone gets married. It’s so weird to assume she won’t. And yes she’ll get a summer job because normal people who aren’t the children of billionaires don’t get to choose to only work 9 months out of the year. She’ll be fine, stop limiting her.
This is a few years old stat, but 25% of 40 year olds have never married. And I suspect that number will just keep increasing. It’s not accurate to say that almost everyone gets married.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/06/28/a-record-high-share-of-40-year-olds-in-the-us-have-never-been-married/
In the OR, doing the neurosurgery.
Sidebar, but can you comment more about the airline pilot thing? For years, I’ve been reading about how tough piloting has become, the hours, and the pilots being overworked. Is this not the case?
Thanks all, for your advice – elucidating to read it all!
Hmm, I haven’t seen whichever articles you’ve seen about them being overworked.
The FAA has strict rules on how many hours per day a pilot can work, and flights have been and will continue to be grounded if a pilot is over on his hours. Even military flights when we were at war in the middle east – the military has a pilot max that’s a few hours over what the civilian max is.
To the extent that the whole commercial airline experience is lackluster these days (security, crowding, obnoxious humans, blah), the pilots are experiencing that, too. But their job is not demanding in any way.
They get to choose where they fly, when they fly, what they fly – and do it all for a handsome salary. You choose your own schedule the month before. Wanna be home for junior’s baseball tournament on the 13th? Don’t select that day. Wanna overnight in Stowe, VT because there’s a maple festival some weekend? Ok. (I will say if you’re a junior pilot for a regional airline, your salary is not handsome. It’s like $60k, but if you’re 25 and single, it’s doable.)
I’m really thinking about this trying to think what could be different that articles would be writing about. My dad was a pilot and my mom was flight attendant, so aviation’s in my blood, and I’ve been around it for all 43 years I’ve been on earth. My parents will tell you the industry has changed a ton with the advent on computers. Before, a human had to decide what flights to schedule for where when. Now a computer will tell you that if you do a certain flight at 9:30 it’ll fly 83% full, but if you do it at 10:05, it’ll fly 98% full. So that’s why every flight is full all the time, which makes everybody grouchier. So everything’s maximized, including pilots in their hours. This maximization means everything goes to pot when something goes wrong because there’s no slack in the system. But other than those general “computers stink” complaints, I just don’t know.
Wife of baby pilot here, the flying part is very low-key, the scheduling part, the training part, and the getting a job part is where all the complaints come from. Scheduling is really the biggest one that’s always ongoing – weather and mechanical failures affecting flights also affects their schedule. Big uptick on demand for flights? They can’t hire and train fast enough, they’ll be asking you to fly as much as is legal. Downturn in demand for flights? Competing against your fellow pilots for scheduled flights, hoping you don’t get laid off.
I honestly think it’s most important for you to be there for him as a person he can trust and go to. It sounds like you’re already doing that, so stay the course!
He is only 15 and will figure out things like what careers are open to him, what interests him, etc. I’m a grown adult and would love an easy job that is very lucrative!
Calculus is a prerequisite for premed
It’s been a while since college for me, but I believe calc is a pretty basic/entry prerequisite for any engineering, computer science, and life sciences degree.
It is, but my cousin got a C and still got into an Ivy League med school and a very successful career as a doctor. I don’t think a couple bad math grades hinder you hugely if your overall application is very strong.
oh, and too add…. with a curling iron, the angle you wrap it at will make a big difference on how tight the curls are. Holding it straight up and down will give looser waves than if you use it parallel to the floor.
I have to be in Charlottesville, VA this weekend. I’m staying at the Omni. What are the great student-friendly restaurants these days? Especially if walkable to the Omni? I have been there before, but with a crowd that insisted on Five Guys. Now I’m free to choose.
I’m confused by the student-friendly qualifier. Are you looking for cheap? Child-friendly? Walkable from the Omni?
Are you a student yourself? The majority of student places are on the Corner, which is not super walkable from the Omni unless you want a hike. Over there, I’d recommend eating at the Virginian or Boylan Heights if you want the student vibe. Food at both is fine but nothing spectacular, you’d be going more for the experience than the cuisine.
Off the Corner, try Guajiro’s, Kardinal Hall, or Feast if you want better food in a casual, student-friendly spot. The farmers market has also started back up again on Saturday mornings–go to the one in IX Park not the one on Water Street. All are more walkable from the Omni than the Corner.
If you give some more details about what you’re looking for, I’m happy to provide other recommendations. I hope the weather is kinder to you than the forecast is looking right now…
I like the idea of this top, but if it doesn’t even fit the model’s shoulders (look at that drag line!!) it would never in a million years fit mine.
I think it looks like she put it on backwards!
Is this just middle management woes? I feel like I’m the canary for issues in my office big and small. I’m always the first to see the problem and the first to raise the issue. But, the higher ups don’t initially see the problem and hand wave it away as if I’m complaining for no reason. Then months later they’ll tune into the issue and suddenly the sky is falling.
The latest issue I’d like advice on: a junior associate has been slacking for about a year, so most of the time he’s been with us. The senior partners weren’t working with him so they didn’t care about the multiple examples I gave — he’s new, don’t be so hard on him, etc. Now the senior folks are trying to work with him and his unavailability is suddenly an issue. Problem is, the guy’s parent recently received a terrible diagnosis and is in hospice. This is not the time to come down on him for work quality or quantity, but it seems like they’re starting the PIP process anyway. It’s frustrating that they’ve waited this long and now they’re choosing to be positively evil about timing. I’m torn on what to do here, if there’s even anything I can do?
The situation with his parents is awful, but it also sounds like he spent the last year doing nothing to build up any goodwill or a solid reputation that he could lean on to get him through rough times. So as callous as it sounds, fair consequences don’t always factor in empathy.
Wow that situation with the junior associate is Big Law in a nutshell – consistently making excuses for mediocre white men and then firing someone while their parent is dying.
For real.
What level are you at? Are you a midlevel associate, junior partner, what?
My approach would be to tell them to wait for their own good. If they PIP him now, the entire story will always be about how they put the son of a dying woman on a PIP. That’s the story he’s going to tell in interviews. Just hold tight until about June and then start the process.
Im a partner with enough of a book to feed myself and an associate (but not this associate) but not much more than that.
I don’t think you should get involved, especially if this person isn’t your direct report. Sometimes the timing on PIPs and such is absolutely horrific. I’ve managed teams for years and the one that stands out to me was an underperforming employee who was not PIPed when they should have been, but then got laid off while she had cancer. People will pick themselves up and find new jobs or use the time to spend with family members who need them or for themselves.
The direct report thing is a bit murky in biglaw. It’s honestly a terrible business model but that’s an issue for another day. There’s a pool of associates that work for all of the partners in their group. I’m one of probably 10 partners who write reviews for him. I’m not the most senior or most junior partner, and I’m not the head of the department. HR decisions are made through some black box that I don’t have a lot of insight into. No individual partner has total hiring or firing power.
I would ask whether there is space for an unpaid caregiver leave while his parent is in hospice (would FMLA cover this)? It might be the kindest option.
Man, it feels like a Friday comment section today. Had to double check it was Wednesday.
The crazy-in-chief has us all on edge this week (or else doubling down and going full conspiracy)
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