U. R. Just The Best
12/11/15 - We discuss why Ivanka Trump’s dad is so embarrassing, our recommended end-of-year donation, what to do when you’re jealous of your bestie, and why Sen. Barbara Mikulski writes the best emails.
Transcript below.
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CREDITS
Producer: Gina Delvac
Hosts: Aminatou Sow & Ann Friedman
Theme song: Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn
LINKS
Consider a $40 donation to ZanaAfrica Foundation to give 4 girls in Kenya period supplies to last throughout the year.
Jeb Bush is going to ‘whup’ Hillz
DJ Khaled is (still) an inspiration
Sen. Barb reminds you, U. R just the best
Sign up for The Bleed, our monthly newsletter ‘hemorrhaging posi-vibes,’ coming late January
TRANSCRIPT: U. R. JUST THE BEST
Ann: Welcome to Call Your Girlfriend.
Aminatou: A podcast for long-distance besties everywhere.
Ann: I'm Ann Friedman.
Aminatou: And I'm Aminatou Sow.
Ann: Whoa, that was extra cheerleadery today. I'm Ann Friedman!
Aminatou: And I'm Aminatou Sow! [Laughs] You know, I don't feel extra cheerleadery so I'm glad my fake it until you make it LinkedIn voice is still working.
Ann: I'm doing that thing where you smile while you're in the . . . I feel like we should watch some videos about people recording voices for animated movies.
Aminatou: You know, my thing is sometimes when I'm in pain all I can do is smile.
Ann: Aww.
Aminatou: That's just my like "Ahh!" I'm like these cramps are killing me. Smile!
Ann: Profound insight about the human woman condition.
Aminatou: Mic one, two. I've got this. This week on Call Your Girlfriend we're talking about why Ivanka Trump's dad is so embarrassing, end-of-year menstruation donations, a listener question that's about bestie jealousy, and to top it all off we'll tell you why Barbara Mikulski is everything.
[Theme Song]
Aminatou: How're you doing over there?
Ann: Oh, you know, I'm just hanging out in the closet. [Laughs]
Aminatou: Oh my god. I am also hanging out in the closet at my Chicago hotel room. It's nice in here.
Ann: You could probably rent it for definitely a couple thousand dollars a month if it were in San Francisco.
Aminatou: That's right. Shout out to the company that's paying for this right now. Holler!
Ann: [Laughs]
Aminatou: Oh my gosh, yeah, no. So I'm having cramps. I'm still dying. But otherwise I feel great.
(2:00)
Ann: Excellent. I'm in my closet with Christmas gifts that I have to finish wrapping and shipping and sending home and I have to say it's like a point of personal pride that it's December 8th and I have actually thought about things like my family's Christmas gifts. I feel a weird kind of fucked-up sense of accomplishment about that.
Aminatou: No, same. I did all of my Christmas shopping in December and I felt sick awesome about it.
Ann: Wait, you mean November?
Aminatou: Yes, November. Whatever the last month was that we came out of. [Laughs]
Ann: I was like bragging about doing your shopping in December.
Aminatou: No, in November before Thanksgiving. I was like I've got this. It was awesome.
Ann: I love my family but I am not the person who might be the best decision-maker about their tastes so I take weird notes throughout the year whenever someone even vaguely alludes to something that they might want to be gifted. I write it down immediately because I'm sort of like there's no way I'm going to come up with that on my own during crunch time.
Aminatou: No, that's good. There's one person that I shop for. Any time I buy her something I end up keeping it for myself. [Laughs] And this year I finally got two of the thing and I was like this is great.
Ann: Oh man, I did that this year. You ever make those purchases where you're like this could be a gift or this could be for me and it came and it was like this set of bracelets and I really was sort of like -- well, told myself it was for someone else. And they came and I couldn't get my hand in them. They were too small.
Aminatou: Oh.
Ann: And I was like oh, well, someone's getting a nice gift even though that's what I said originally.
Aminatou: A victimless crime. Speaking of doing nice things for other people during the holidays . . .
Ann: Oh my god, solid transish.
Aminatou: Hey, thanks. It's almost like I've been doing this podcast thing for a while now. I guess we have an update for our listeners, right? Do you want to tell us?
(3:50)
Ann: Oh, man. So we want to do kind of a group giving thing for the end of the year where we all make donations of varying amounts to the same charity under the collective power of the CYG universe.
Aminatou: Oh my god, praise hand emoji. I'm doing it. I'm doing it right now.
Ann: Ugh, all the way up. And so we sort of had this notion that we wanted to do something that was related to menstrual health and because we talk about periods constantly on the show . . .
Aminatou: And we are so blessed to live in a country and a world where we can period all over the place all the time.
Ann: Oh my god.
Aminatou: And not suffer consequences for it.
Ann: And have in-depth conversations about all the various period-related items we've tried. Privilege.
Aminatou: Exactly. So after extensive research -- what's up due diligence -- [Laughs] who did we pick, Ann? Tell the listeners.
Ann: We picked an organization called ZanaAfrica which right now is primarily based in Kenya and is expanding throughout east Africa. And basically what they do is they provide kits. They provide pads and cotton underwear that can be resized to fit all kinds of bodies to girls that would be otherwise shut out of going to school or otherwise participating in the world when they have their periods.
Aminatou: That's so cool. So where can people find all of this information?
Ann: Well, you can go to zanafrica.org which is Z-A-N-A Africa dot org and make a donation from there. Basically ten dollars provides pads for one girl for an entire year, so they suggest a four dollar holiday donation so you keep four girls stocked for the year which is awesome or you can . . . I mean I sort of think of it as increments of ten dollars is the way to go.
(5:45)
Aminatou: That's awesome. You know, one of the things that was really exciting to me about this company, or I guess this organization rather, is how they're really building a business alongside it where they're manufacturing these pads in Kenya and they use agricultural byproducts instead of wood, instead of wood pulp like most people do from South Africa, so it's a lot more affordable. And it's really having small . . . having a small woman-owned seller distributing the pads is also awesome. They're not reusable; they're disposable, because having reusables in a place without clean water, that equals UTIs and all this other gross stuff. So I don't know. That's exciting. I'm really glad that we are doing this. I'm really glad that people who are able to, like nobody should feel pressured to, but if you're able to and you want to do a group gift donation this would be a really awesome way to end the year.
Ann: Right, or if you just want to cap off something, donations you've already made elsewhere with 40 dollars to ZanaAfrica, we would love it if this is something we could do as a CYG crew.
Aminatou: Yeah. And also hot tip if you are blessed to work at a company that is matching your donation that's another thing you should look at. I love looking at my end-of-year giving and being like yes, I made all these people donate to all this woman stuff every year. [Laughs] It makes me feel better, so that's another thing to look into.
Ann: As part of our whole due diligence we called the CEO of the ZanaAfrica foundation whose name is Gina Reiss-Wilchins and you should listen to her talk a little bit more about what they do.
[Interview Starts]
C: There are one million girls in Kenya alone who miss school each year because they lack access to sanitary pads. We see menstruation or menstrual health management which is the term of art that's used within the field that we work in. We recognize that that's a human right and we believe that the onset of puberty is really the most effective time to engage girls in a range of personal health issues.
Ann: Awesome. Well we talk about periods a lot on our podcast.
C: [Laughs] How refreshing.
(7:54)
Ann: Yeah, exactly. So that was one reason why we were so interested in getting all of our listeners together to make a holiday donation to you guys. And so maybe you could talk a little bit about what 40 dollars could do and how you see that -- or how you found that dollar amount as a good base to set.
C: Yeah. I mean basically it's pretty simple math. For about 10 dollars we can supply one girl with a yearlong supply of pads. Our mission is to really make sure they not just have the sanitary pads but they also have the health education that goes along with it and one of the inspiring ways that we do it is in the form of shareable health comics. And it stars a young woman, an adolescent girl named Nia, and in Swahili that means purpose. And we watch her journey through womanhood through the comics. So we're also supporting community-based organizations and helping them provide pads to even more girls. So we've reached to date about 20,000 girls and 10,000 in the last year, because we can't do it alone.
Ann: When you mentioned humor and reaching out are there other period jokes in the comics?
C: You know, I can't say that there are jokes per se but a lot of the girls had a lot to say about these characters and how they wanted them to look and how they wanted them to act so they got really engaged and caught up in their stories. So we're hoping that that would be a good sign that they'll continue to want to follow these girls and that we not only will be able to teach them about menstruation and their periods but a whole host of other issues like STDs and whatever else will affect their health as they grow up through adolescence.
Ann: Yeah. And you mentioned that you guys have plans on expanding beyond Kenya.
C: We do. Our goal is to get affordable pads to women across all of Kenya, not just women in Nairobi, but people who might not be able to get to the supermarket but could get to a kiosk or could get somewhere in their rural area. We partner with our social enterprise and we're already reaching out to other countries in terms of just buying pads. But in terms of our education we're going to start and get it right in Kenya. We're going to hopefully grow out to east Africa. But we want to take baby steps and make sure we do this right and set a precedent in Kenya that then we can take to other countries within east Africa.
(10:15)
Ann: Awesome. And so for our listeners I would say one of the main takeaways is ten dollars equals a year of pads and products for one girl or one woman. Is that right?
C: You've got it. For as little as ten dollars we can actually make sure that they don't have to worry about that, that they can focus their energies on school instead of managing their periods and their body. We want to make sure that it's addressed as a basic human right and that needs are getting addressed.
Ann: Where can people go to make a donation?
C: Google Zana Africa Foundation or zanaafrica.org.
Ann: Awesome. Well we'll link to it too so people can find it on our website.
C: Awesome.
Ann: Listen, Gina, thanks so much for telling us about the work you're doing.
C: Oh, thank you for having me Ann. I appreciate it.
[Interview Ends]
Aminatou: Yeah, so that makes me feel awesome.
Ann: [Laughs] I mean 40 dollars to keep four girls in pads for a year is the best possible thing.
Aminatou: Seriously. Seriously. Ugh, so good. Okay.
Ann: Also just our obligation as women who talk about periods a lot. I feel like it's just the price I put into the general woman till for talking about my period so much.
Aminatou: [Laughs] Yeah, no, totally. That's so awesome.
[Music]
(11:50)
Aminatou: What else are we talking about this week?
Ann: Oh man. I mean Ivanka's dad off the rails. I don't even want to really talk about him.
Aminatou: Ugh, Ann, Ivanka's dad is such an embarrassing. It's just . . . it's insane what is happening right now.
Ann: Every time I hear foreign news services talk about him it's like "The American presidential candidate and front-runner blah, blah, blah." It's just shame, like a burning shame that I have not felt so acutely in several years.
Aminatou: Okay, let's back up and explain to the people what Ivanka Trump's dad is doing right now that is so embarrassing.
Ann: I don't even know where to begin. Like he's suggesting registries for all Muslims in the country, even those who are citizens, and checking visas at the door essentially.
Aminatou: [Laughs] So yes, so the thing is, you know, there are a couple of us who were fully waiting for, you know, you thought hover boards were going to be the worst trend of the year. It turns out that fascism is back in a big way so that's one thing about Donald Trump. One thing that's been really fascinating to me watching this whole Trump saga, some people are really bewildered about it and some people make a ton of jokes about it and then others of us who it hits a little close to home were mad. We're really mad and we think that it's crazy. But one thing that's been so fascinating to me is so many people are like "Oh, Donald Trump, he's like Mussolini or he's our Maureen Lappen (?) from France and I'm like you don't have to look at European examples of people doing bad things. George Wallace was literally a generation ago.
Ann: Right, right. And also just, I don't know, America has a pretty bad track record of saying "Hey people who fit this identity group, let's round you up or make you sign to a list." Like even in America we have a pretty shit record on that.
Aminatou: No, exactly. And somebody who started off their campaign by saying that all Mexicans are rapists, it doesn't shock me that now he wants to put Muslim people essentially in internment camps. The other reason this is a little embarrassing is because he's also making all of these ridiculous comments about Jews and our top bae, Ivanka Trump, she converted to Judaism for her husband.
(14:10)
Ann: Awkward.
Aminatou: Like very orthodox. It's going to be awkward at that house, you know? It's Hanukkah right now. I'm like please talk to your father. He's making it hard for everybody.
Ann: I mean awkward, kind of an understatement, but also kind of . . . no, that's true. And as much as a lot of people who were watching Ivanka's dad kind of move through the early primary were like "This is a joke. The way to shut him down is to make fun of him and to kind of show that we don't take him seriously," and I think that these latest comments while you're totally right they're not different from stuff that he has said in the past, something about it kind of hit this tipping point where I saw lots of people say "Okay, can we stop joking about this now and get seriously scared and upset?"
Aminatou: But here's the thing, right? The only people that have been joking about it are white people. Like the rest of us, this is not funny to us.
Ann: Well you don't think that like . . .
Aminatou: It's never been funny.
Ann: You don't think a Trump pinata is kind of a joke in its own way?
Aminatou: I mean yes and no, right? I think the danger is always imminent for people who are minorities. Like you see it and you're also not shocked that it's at all possible.
Ann: I'm not saying the threat wasn't realer for people who are non-white. Obviously that is 100% true. But I think that -- I mean I definitely have seen Trump jokes and heard Trump jokes coming from non-white people as well as white people even though maybe you're right, the underlying sentiment or stakes are really different.
Aminatou: I mean I guess so. I'm like wait, we're joking because we're scared. We're not joking because this is an SNL skit for us.
Ann: Sure. But I mean I don't know. I think even the white people have stopped joking is what I'm trying to say, I guess. [Laughs]
(15:48)
Aminatou: My favorite thing though is how the other Republicans are scared. Because here's the other thing, right? It actually doesn't matter what people who are not Republicans think because they're the ones who can stop him. And I'm like when are you guys finally going to rise up and be like enough is enough? Because he's pushing them way too much to the right. He's embarrassing them. Jeb Bush thought this was his birthright and now he's being embarrassed. It's not going to happen. And the only person keeping it 100 is my boo Lindsey Graham, single man Lindsey Graham. And so the whole thing is killing me.
Ann: Unelectable Lindsey Graham.
Aminatou: I am rooting for Lindsey Graham because he always looks so sad but he always is keeping . . .
Ann: I mean you're rooting for him but are you switching your party affiliation?
Aminatou: Of course not.
Ann: Yeah, exactly.
Aminatou: You know what I mean? Like one, I love his friendship with Joe Biden. He's so real. I love that him and his sister are basically orphans and they took care of each other and he always makes it a point to point out. And also he's not a crazy person.
Ann: Right. That always helps.
Aminatou: He's my favorite Eeyore basically is what I'm saying.
Ann: Oh man. I feel like moderate or semi-moderate Republicans are permanent Eeyores.
Aminatou: Oh my god. Who knew Lindsey Graham would get a shout out on Call Your Girlfriend? What a time to be alive.
Ann: I mean you know what though? Again this is a sign of how Trump has changed everyone's barometer for what terrible is.
Aminatou: I know. There's this also amazing clip of Jeb Bush, oh my god, what a dummy, saying . . .
[Clip Starts]
Jeb: Should I win this nomination I will take it to Hillary Clinton and I will whoop her. [Cheering]
[Clip Ends]
Aminatou: Then the best thing if you watch the clip is three seconds after he says it he can feel his own body leaving him and he's like "I can't believe I just said that crazy thing." One political party that shall not be named. They're just living in their own reality right now.
Ann: I can't even process. I mean part of it is like the reporting that I have seen from people who are trying to legit figure out who the people who support Trump are and what is going on with them, it has been so baffling, you know? It's been kind of few and far between for how much coverage he gets. I don't actually feel like I understand whether everyone is 100% as racist as he is. Probably. Or if it's just like they're caught up in some kind of packaging or momentum.
(18:15)
Aminatou: No, they're 100% racist pieces of trash. I've met some Trump supporters and . . .
Ann: Oh my god, what? Where?
Aminatou: The thing that makes me so happy is they all say this one thing. Like this is to me the common denominator of all of the Trump supporters I know is they all say "Finally, someone's saying what's really on their mind." [Laughs] And I'm like somebody is saying the racist shit that you think out loud and you're proud of that? That's crazy!
Ann: I was just curled in a ball in the corner of my closet when you said that.
Aminatou: You know, that's the one thing that they're all saying and I'm like you guys are crazy. So if there's actually anything that I am mildly happy about it's that Trump is giving a face to -- these people exist. You know, they're not some weird Republican construct or it's not some weird force of the economy is pushing them to be these kinds of people. They've always been like this. They're awful, awful people and they're all coming out of the woodwork.
Ann: Yeah. Scott Carrier who is like a white dude, This American Life journalist type, has a podcast called Home of the Brave where he talks to -- he goes on the road and interviews a bunch of people who are self-identified Trump supporters in Nevada. And it's funny because he has that NPR studied distance thing at the beginning where he's like "I'm just going to ask them to explain why they like Trump." But because you can't really explain virulent racism, once he asks them questions he's just like "Wait, what?"
Aminatou: [Laughs]
Ann: You know, he can't really help himself from asking how does that make any sort of sense, or what do you mean?
Aminatou: Right.
Ann: He has no policies about anything else. Yeah.
(19:50)
Aminatou: Classic American scaremongerer. That's like it.
Ann: Right. And so it was so delicious to be like oh, you failed at your objective quest but also frightening.
Aminatou: Yeah, it is. It's frightening, right? But there's also just this realization that just like George Wallace he just appeals to his followers in this visceral kind of way.
Ann: Right.
Aminatou: And we have to share oxygen with these people. They're terrible humans.
Ann: And also just the general frame. I know we joked all the -- we made lots of jokes about the hat, which I kind of regret now. Like in the modern context, in the context of all of this stuff, joking about a Make America Great Again hat which I know we never really believed. But I don't know, I'm sort of like that is actually super-frightening.
Aminatou: I mean it is frightening, right? It's like the hat basically means let's take our country back. I don't apologize for my loving the hat. I think the font is amazing and I love that he wears it basically to keep his hair together and it's this virulent -- how do you say that word? I sound like DJ Khaled.
Ann: Virulent, like virus. It's infecting.
Aminatou: I sound like DJ Khaled now. I'm like accreate.
Ann: [Laughs]
DJ Khaled: Accreate.
Ann: Too much time with those motivational speeches.
Aminatou: Oh my god, yeah. So anyway, Ivanka, we know that you listen so please get your dad. This is so embarrassing. It's so embarrassing, boo-boo. Don't do this.
Ann: Also at what point do you -- how bad does it have to get for you to publicly disavow your dad? If being Jewish and associated with the kind of comments he's made is not enough maybe it'll never happen. But we're with you. We're with you Ivanka if you want to stand up.
Aminatou: I know. I'm embarrassed for you more than I'm afraid we'll have your dad as president. I'm embarrassed for you.
Ann: Wow, that's strong words.
Aminatou: Whew. It's just, you know, when the people that you love just do you so dirty in public, man, it's not cool.
(21:45)
Ann: Ugh, well there . . .
Aminatou: Donald, call us. We need to talk to you.
Ann: I've got to say there was a nice little response from our girl Huma which to be fair was in a Hillary Clinton campaign email so taking that for what it's worth. But who was like "Hey, what's up? I'm a Muslim. How about everyone who gets this email shares my disgust because it's not really an option at this point to just sit by and be like yeah, let him talk like that?"
Aminatou: Ugh, it's so disgusting.
Ann: Yeah.
Aminatou: Man, Donald Trump, don't do this. I mean it's too late now. [Laughs] It is crazy. I really want to say how disgusted I also am by Rand Paul and the way that he's handling all of this. Once upon a time that man was like our civil liberties hero.
Ann: Yeah.
Aminatou: Whew. Ivanka, call your dad. Call your dad. That's all we have to say.
Ann: Don't call your girlfriend this week, Ivanka. Call your dad.
Aminatou: Call your dad. Man, dads. Whew.
[Music and Ads]
(26:00)
Ann: Let's see, do you want to do a question?
Aminatou: Oh my god. Yes, let's do a question. Okay. "My best friend and I were in the same liberal arts major within our college and would often find ourselves competing for the same jobs, internships, fellowships, etc. As it so happened she received an internship that we both applied to and was able to move to the city in which we both wanted to live and work while I received a different internship and moved to another city as well and was able to eventually find a wonderful job doing what I like. She has gone on to also get what I feel is a better job. While I'm very happy for her and only wish the best for her I struggle with these feelings of jealousy and that I'm never going to be able to get to where I want to be. Any advice on how to deal with this? XOXO."
Ann: Aww. Being right out of college is really hard.
Aminatou: [Sighs] It really is. It really is. It is. My heart really goes out to this person.
Ann: Yeah. One question that I had hearing you read that was whether she had talked to her friend about it at all and talked to her friend about how she doesn't have the job she wants to have right now. I mean I think it's interesting that she says "I have a job I really like that I think is a really good job," but it seems like it's more about her future fears. You know, I'm never going to be able to get to where I want to be as opposed to I feel like I've got a horrible situation right now.
Aminatou: Well, you know, it's also -- in reading this it's obviously so much of the grass is greener on the other side. There's one part of me that's like girl, this is your first job out of college. Trust me, zoom out ten years from now and this job will mean nothing.
Ann: The grass is greener everywhere else. Like literally everywhere else.
Aminatou: Yeah. It's like zoom out ten years, you know? I don't want to make you feel bad about your life, but hmm . . .
Ann: Yeah.
Aminatou: You know, I don't know how much it is that she's talked to her friend and her friend is like "Actually it's lit over here. My life is great." Or how much of it is her feeling bad about the situation.
Ann: I get a lot of feelings vibes from this.
(28:00)
Aminatou: No exactly, right? All of it is feelings, feelings, feelings. And here's the thing: feelings will betray you and also all of the energy that you're focusing on being jealous on your friend is time that you're not strategizing thinking about what's coming next for you.
Ann: Right, and how you can get what you actually want as opposed to comparing yourself to her.
Aminatou: Yeah, no, exactly. You know, I shared with you this quote from Dr. Phil that was in my journal from a really important episode to me.
Ann: Pause button. Pause button. You told me before we recorded that you copied this from your journal which I just think everyone should stop and appreciate that for one second.
Aminatou: Listen, here's what it says. Dr. Phil says "The only difference between you and someone you envy is you settle for less." Imagine Dr. Phil saying that in his asshole Dr. Phil voice, right? But it's true. If you start to change your life little-by-little everything eventually turns out okay. And success breeds success. Dr. Phil knows this. DJ Khaled knows this.
DJ Khaled: Accreate.
Aminatou: Everybody knows this. Also pause, DJ Khaled has a new inspirational video. And Gina, I think you should play it right now.
[Clip Starts]
DJ Khaled: You smart. You very smart. We the best. You a genius. I appreciate you. You loyal. I changed a lot. You can too. Win, win, win no matter what. Them doors that was closed, I ripped the doors off and took the hinges off and when I took the hinges off I put the hinges in the ****boys' hands. Yeah, in the ****boys' hands. You know, I took the whole door off and the hinges and I put it in the ****boys' hands. You can put the hinges in their hands too. Never give up. Never surrender. Put this money in your savings account. Buy your mama a house. Buy your family houses."
[Clip Ends]
(30:00)
Aminatou: I'm going to say something that's a little bit assholish but jealousy is not a thing I feel a lot towards other people, and I don't think that makes me a good person; I think it makes me a very oblivious person more than anything. So it's a small blessing in disguise. But real recently I found myself getting jealous about something and I was really annoyed at just how much time it was taking away from all of the other awesome stuff I could and and how much anxiety it just really breeds and how much it makes you resent somebody for nothing at all. Because here's the thing: if it had been the other way around and presumably you love this person and they're your friend you would feel awful that they were feeling that way.
Ann: Right. When you read or hear about a problem like this it's so easy to put your own lens on it. Times in my life when I've been jealous I think that the root feeling is actually just fear that I can't ever get what I want. It's not so much that I want exactly what that other person has but it's like what if I never get to whatever place I want to go to? And you're totally right which is even more horrible because then the more time you spend feeling jealous the further it feels that you are from your own specific goal.
Aminatou: Yeah. So I think, you know, it's like if you can talk to your friend about this in a real talk kind of way I think that that would be really helpful. If you think that it's too -- I don't know, sometimes I feel really petty about this shit, but if you don't want to talk about it, find a really constructive way to channel those feelings and really get to the root bottom of what it is that's causing the anxiety. And if you think that the anxieties that you're not going to achieve all of your goals and dreams one day because you didn't get this job out of college -- oh man, life has a whole other plan for you.
Ann: Right, that is not true. [Laughs]
(31:50)
Aminatou: Yeah, trust me, the defining drama of your life is not going to be the fact that you moved to this other city. And you're going to be okay. I think that it's just all about how you bounce and how you bounce back. And in this family we bounce back really hard.
Ann: Oh my god. Also ask your friend to help you. You guys work in the same field. Even if she can't say "Oh, I have a job right here," I'm sure she could say "Oh, let me help you do this thing on the side or I know this other person in . . ." I don't know. It just seems like you will be much stronger seeing her as an awesome ally -- shine theory vibes -- than sitting there stewing and just feeling jealous of her.
Aminatou: Exactly. Don't stew, you know? Get your Dr. Phil on. Oh my god, we're like the worst advice givers but I love it.
Ann: My thought was I just kept thinking about saying stew and I'm like hmm, I could go for some stew. I'm feeling hungry.
Aminatou: [Laughs] I know, that's all I want right now.
Ann: I know. One bowl meals from now until March or April.
Aminatou: Oh my god, okay.
[Music]
Aminatou: Speaking of shine theory, I noticed that we got a new batch of emails released from our girl Hills and some of them were obviously amazing but there is one from one Maryland senator, Barbara Mikulski, that we love.
Ann: Ugh, long, long-term Senator Barbara Mikulski since . . .
Aminatou: Oh my god, like love of my life.
Ann: Since like there's no women's bathroom days. Since way back.
Aminatou: I know. She's just been there forever and honestly her and Hills are really, really, really good friends and she sends her these amazing emails with awful punctuation.
Ann: Are you going to read one?
(33:45)
Aminatou: I mean I am going to read one. Here's this one. I feel like the punctuation makes it hard to read but the gist of it is "So looking forward to Monday with much anticipation and exuberance. You are the best." There are so many missing vowels from this thing, it's amazing. [Laughs]
Ann: Is this a spam email where she's trying to get Hillary to invest in a project? Like overseas?
Aminatou: Oh my god, yeah, no. It's crazy. I'm just like either she's -- you know, she's drinking really well all the time or her fingers are betraying her. But the correspondence is just lush and beautiful.
Ann: Maybe this is a Blackberry issue.
Aminatou: Ugh. I'm just going to start sending you emails that just say "You are doing such a terrific job."
Ann: I mean I think if everybody sent one of those emails per day, just picked a random friend and sent one, it would have incredible effects.
Aminatou: Oh my god. Another one was the birthday email that she sent that was so good. It's like "Dear friend, good wishes." P.S. there's like full stops between all of these words. "Blessings and a Dem victory. A lucky day for the planet when you were born. Your pal, Senator Barbara."
Ann: [Laughs] Where is . . .
Aminatou: "P.S. On the way to Boston for Warren," no big deal, Elizabeth Warren. "We are going to make it. Woopie!!!!!!!!!!" Ten exclamation points. [Laughs]
Ann: Oh my god, if she were 40 years younger this would just be prayer hands emoji, donkey emoji, and that would be it.
Aminatou: If somebody sends me a birthday greeting this year that doesn't say "A lucky day for the planet when you were born" with crazy punctuation I'm never going to talk to you ever again.
Ann: [Laughs] Filing a note away right now in my little gifts note to send you that exact text.
Aminatou: I just love -- I just love these lady senators just loving on each other. It's just perfect.
Ann: Ugh, lucky day for the planet.
Aminatou: Oh my god, thank you Senator Barbara Mikulski. You're the best.
[Music]
(35:54)
Ann: The other thing as the year winds down is we're making some plans -- we're plotting some things for 2016.
Aminatou: Plotting some things.
Ann: I'm rubbing my hands together like a super villain right now. One of which is that we're going to start doing a monthly email newsletter.
Aminatou: Ooh.
Ann: Drum roll. [Drums] Called The Bleed.
Aminatou: I'm like the name. I'm so excited.
Ann: It's just going to be all over your inbox, can't even stop it, once a month. [Laughs]
Aminatou: Just like hemorrhaging you with posi vibes and good stuff.
Ann: Exactly. Exactly. Hemorrhaging posi vibes might be the tagline of the newsletter.
Aminatou: [Laughs]
Ann: But you can sign up at callyourgirlfriend.com. We won't be sending the first one until a few weeks into 2016 at least, so it's not like this is happening tomorrow, but something to look forward to.
Aminatou: But, you know, get at the front of the line girl.
Ann: For real. For real. We're not counting yet, you know, who's signed up in week one but . . .
Aminatou: It's going to be the best. Yeah, no, plotting for 2016 is great. I can't wait.
Ann: All right. You can find us many places on the Internet, on our website callyourgirlfriend.com, you can download our show on the Acast app, or on iTunes where it would be awesome if you left us a review. You can also tweet at us at @callyrgf or email us at callyrgf@gmail.com. And you can even leave us a short and sweet voicemail at 714-681-2943. That's 714-681-CYGF. This podcast is produced by Gina Delvac.
Aminatou: See you on the Internet, boo-boo.
Ann: See you on the Internet.