Hello! Welcome to the Friday edition of this newsletter, where I list a few things I’ve recently enjoyed. This week, I talk chips, group chats, and a show on Netflix that I watched with a friend using Netflix Party… which is still a thing!
I missed the Wednesday essay again this week, which means you can expect one coming your way over the weekend. :D
1. How many layers of crunch do you need?
In life, there are products that are great, and then there are products that push the boundary of what you know is great. Products that make you think: “I didn’t know you could make it like that?” or “why isn’t the rest made like this? or “why didn’t anyone think of this sooner?” These products don’t just deliver on a basic functional level. They take your experience up a notch, and manage to do so with just the tiniest tweaks.
Anyway.
I’ve developed an addiction for GuriBee Layers, which is one such product. It’s chips, but instead of a single piece of chip, it sticks four pieces together in such a way that every bite you take is one layer collapsing on top of another layer, and another, and another. It’s crunch you didn’t know you needed. Crunch that is completely unnecessary, to be honest, but once you’ve tried it, you’d wish other chips had had it in them to deliver an experience so delightful. I’m obsessed!
2. Two-person group chats
At some point earlier this year, Avi and I whined about our days, trauma dumped, discussed potential projects, brainstormed ideas for other projects, all within a single WhatsApp chat. Whenever Avi needed input on a project she was working on, she’d reach out on the chat. Whenever I wanted to talk about ideas for this newsletter, for which Avi is often a go-to brainstorm partner, I’d look up her name and dump it on the chat too. Which means all of that would often overlap with stray rants about our days, sometimes literal mental breakdowns, lol. A regular day on the chat looked something like this:
Avi: Here’s my moodboard for the visuals!
Avi: I saw this cool thing and thought I’d try it out
Me: Ugh brooo I’m so lonely
Me: Lol I’m mellow
Me: But yes thanks I’ll check this out!
Avi: Oh noo that sucks, did something happen?
Me: This looks great I love the colorsss
Me: Nah I think I’m about to be on my period
Avi: Sameee I’m literally on Day 1
Me: Btw I have new content ideas
At least until one day I decided to create a separate chat dedicated to discussing projects. It’s a basic group chat, but with the same two people who also still talk to each other about other stuff on their regular “general” chat. Like Slack but for two. You get the idea.
As with other things I bring up in my Friday letters, this one may not necessarily be new or original. But, hey, consider this a reminder that you do not have to be a group to have a group chat! Normalize group chats for two! It can just be a dedicated space for you and a friend, or maybe even a significant other, to discuss a specific topic without having it get in the way of your day-to-day conversation.
If I was living with a roommate, for example, I can see myself having a two-person group chat dedicated to housekeeping, so as to separate that stuff from our friendship. Or, idk, if you and a friend are trying to keep each other accountable on a common goal, having a two-person group chat could be a way of making sure that common goal was constantly being followed-up and discussed without having to cut back on important life gossip (I can totally see two-person groups dedicated to scholarship applications, for example).
Compartmentalization is great, and all the more so between two people who happen to be entangled in more ways than one. I now have several ongoing two-person group chats and my life has changed for the better.
3. “Skip and Loafer” and Netflix parties!
Aidil, a good friend of mine who is based in Bali, sold this anime to me with a few keywords: friendships! crushing! friendship crushing! And we ended up watching five episodes in two days using Netflix Party (now called Teleparty) — which I did for the first time in 2020 during the pandemic and am happy to discover still works great today!
“Skip and Loafer” follows Mitsumi Iwakura, a top-of-her-class student from Japan’s most remote prefecture who moves to Tokyo to attend one of the city’s top prep schools. The show follows her days as she navigates big feelings in the big city where she has set big ambitious goals for herself. It’s about long distance friendships, navigating social anxiety, being used to exceeding expectations and discovering yourself a pretty average kid in a sea of excellent peers… each episode is a short 20-minutes packed with warmth and humor. 10/10 would recommend if you’re looking for a quick watch to savor with your nasi padang over lunch.
🌸 HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND! 🌸