The Adventures of Cat Man and Box Man: Bachelorette Season 17, Episode 1

Well, Bachelor Nation, our beloved show is finally back on our television screens and I am psyched! But the first episode left me with some questions: Were these guys really excited Katie was the Bachelorette, or is that just a line? What is the obsession these men have with capri slacks? Is Katie sex positive, or is she just a grown ass woman that knows how to communicate effectively about sex? And why were all the men sweating!?

Before we met the men, we had to be reminded that Katie is the quirky girl next door, that likes to talk about (and presumably have) sex. It feels like the producers really want us to believe that Katie is an all American girl that is totally normal and relatable. And I’m sure for the mostly white women who watch this show, she is. I don’t think we need her awkwardly looking at the camera when she shouldn’t be to prove that.

But I digress, we also learn that her parents weren’t together growing up and she felt like she never saw examples of a real relationship/marriage, which I imagine will be a theme that comes out as she eliminates more men.

I enjoyed this premiere, I’d go as far to say it’s my favorite since I began watching this show (Rachel’s season). The men seemed genuine, Katie made me believe that she’s in this “for the right reasons,” and Kaitlyn and Tayshia were a nice surprise.

Be a Katie? I’m Skeptical

There’s something I should get out the way immediately, I wasn’t a fan of Katie Thurston on Matt’s season of The Bachelor and I’m still trying to do the mental math to understand how someone who came in tenth (?) place is about to be on our screens in a matter of days as the lead.

Katie reminds me of every white girl from rom coms growing up. She’s conventionally pretty, slightly awkward, did exactly one noble thing that’s supposed to erase any harm she may have caused, and she’s “quirky” becuase she brought a vibrator to Nemacolin on night one.

To say the least, I’m not impressed. Not when there were plenty of women of color in Matt’s top ten, eight, six, that production could’ve chosen from.

Katie being picked feels like production said “we gave you TWO Black leads back to back, damn, be grateful!” as if we haven’t watched the human equivalent of Crest White Strips compete for love for the last two decades.

Flat Tummy Tea is Not A Weight Loss Plan

At the beginning of the year, a vlogger I follow on Instagram uploaded a picture of herself holding a flat tummy tea type product in one hand and a mug in the other. I was immediately disappointed because 1) she was already skinny in my eyes, 2) her vlog gave me the push I needed to start lifting weights and snack smarter and 3) it felt so desperate and off brand for her.

I wasn’t the only one, the comments under the picture were flooded with opinions about how effective a tea could really be for long term weight loss. Eventually, trolls came out and it got so bad, she turned off the comments.

Before I go any further, there is something I should disclose: I’m fat. I have been fat my entire life, even when I shed 80 pounds in college, I was still “the fat girl.”

First day of sophomore year, after a 90 minute workout. I was exhausted.

The new year, new me crowd has died down and officially turned into the “I gotta get my summer body, NOW” crowd and it’s all too much. I hesitated to write this because I’m not sure I—someone who is not the pinnacle of health—should be writing it. But I decided to write it anyway because everyone assumes only skinny women deal with disordered eating and body image issues, because not eating at all isn’t the only way people try to lose weight fast.

It’s Time to Listen to the Kids

Photo by Clem Onojeghuo  on Unsplash .

It’s really easy to get stuck in a difficult situation. I don’t mean the situations that are moderately inconvenient. I mean the soul-crushing, life altering situations. Like what happened last week in Parkland, Florida after a man took his AR-15, entered his former school and attacked dozens of innocent students and educators. Seventeen people are now dead, fifteen were injured, the gunman is still alive and the students who survived, didn’t miss a beat. They went to work. The work that elected officials should’ve been doing for years.

It hasn’t even been a week and these kids have already organized, protested and spoken up in ways that cannot be ignored. Without even realizing it, these kids are teaching us adults how to have power in situations where the world would rather see us remain powerless. They’ve shown us how we may be victims of a situation, survivors of an atrocity, but we don’t have to move forward with a victim mentality.

Here are a few ways students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School are refusing to stay silent in the wake of what’s happened in their community.