Hey you guys, this week was kind of a thing what with the tornadoes and terrorism. But you know what? It’s Friday, and it’s a long weekend. So let’s catch up on the news and then go to our happy places.

It comes up in every book group I’ve ever joined, but it still irked me when a woman made this contribution during my current book group’s last meeting: “I hated it. I didn’t like the main character at all. She just seemed so weird.” Cue a collective internal sigh from the rest of the group. 

When I get up in front of a room full of teenagers and tell them that consent is sexy, I mean it. I’m not telling them that just to get some hippie feminist agenda across. I’m not telling them that because it’s the trendy, politically correct line in the wake of Steubenville and the military sexual assault epidemic. I’m telling …

Last week, my sister and I took a bunch of kids on a last big carefree holiday before the oldest ones start school in September. Out of both necessity (we needed a place that we could all reach comfortably by train) and a bout of nostalgia, we decided on a sleepy little town in Brandenburg.

That was the idea. Riley was supposed to be Mr. Joe Guy. We were gonna do dumb things like hold hands through the daisies going “tra la la.”

My workout playlist is filled with some embarrassing nonsense, folks, and I love it.

The world continues to be a horrible place this week. Let’s keep fighting the good fight, ladies! (Trigger warnings for pretty much everything apply.)

This week on Mad Men we learn that even uppers cannot put Don Draper in a better mood or make him a likable person. Also, Betty’s skinny again, but we don’t get to see how that happened. Keeping with the theme of the episode, uppers? Anyway, here we go!