Link List: Go Watch Crazy Rich Asians!

Pictured above is sisig, tocino, grilled pork belly, and garlic rice from Grill 21. It was only after I decided on this photo for this post that I realized I had already posted another photo of most of the same dishes little more than a month ago! Grill 21, BCD Tofu House, Sushi Yasaka, and Congee Village are some of K and I's more moderately-priced restaurant mainstays in the city. 

1. // By now, I think everyone has read the Hollywood Reporter long-form about Crazy Rich Asians, and how Kevin Kwan, John Chu, and others involved in making the film passed on big paydays to ensure that the movie could come to the big screen with an all Asian and Asian-American cast. It's impossible to understate how important the success of this movie is to Asian-American representation in entertainment (if it doesn't succeed, I have no doubt it'd be years before we have another chance at a big-screen film where we're this well-represented in the cast). I was glad to hear from Lea (who saw an early screening) that it's a fun and enjoyable movie.  

I've mentioned before that my outspokenness on diversity and representation, which extends broader than just representation in media and entertainment, was first ignited by the whitewashing of the Avatar: The Last Airbender movie. I truly believe that more representation of this kind helps with diversity and implicit bias-related problems in other contexts. I'll be seeing the movie shortly after its wide release this Wednesday, and I hope many others will do the same, and that it'll be a raging success.

2. // This is random, but I've suddenly become interested in learning more about the issue of access to dental care and economic inequality in the US. I ordered myself a copy of Mary Otto's Teeth: The Story of Beauty, Inequality, and the Struggle for Oral Health in America (affiliate link), which is probably where this interest begins and ends, as it's a little-researched topic. I was somewhat inspired by this discussion at r/personalfinance, where someone pointed to this photographer's account of accompanying a close friend to get extensive dental work (which would have cost ~$30,000 here) done in Croatia.

Because of my own recent experience with needing expensive (though nowhere near as expensive as it could be, as I ultimately didn't need any crowns) emergency dental care, it's natural for me to be interested in this. I also still have a lingering minor cosmetic issue left over from the accident, one affected tooth is still a tiny bit out of position, and I'll need to think about whether to pursue further treatment for that at some point.

3. // In other things I've been reading online lately, I enjoyed this take on Netflix's Queer Eye and emotional labor, which Revanche first shared.

There was also this article in The Atlantic about some of the really terrible, sexist experiences many women litigators have. Because most of my work has been been in federal court (it's generally far more orderly and genteel, everyone is better behaved, and attorneys who mostly practice in federal court often consider most state court systems to be a relatively lawless and chaotic Wild West in comparison), I haven't encountered much of this kind of open and shameless sexism yet. I'm grateful to have been insulated from it so far. 

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4. // I made my way to a Uniqlo store recently because there were a few items I was interested in  trying, including a double-face wool-blend collarless coat, pictured below, and a cotton ruffle-sleeve dress. The dress, had it worked on me, would have been an excellent summer dress for the office, as it doesn't look too obviously like a casual tee dress, though it's made of that kind of material. Sadly, both items would only have looked good on me if I was taller, and in the case of the coat, a bit less curvy. (Many waist-tie coats don't look quite right on me, it's difficult to get the self-tie belt to stay in the right place, and if it slips even a bit, it makes my waist look bigger than it is.)

They also currently have many blouses and tops in the rayon-poly blend I like for wearing under by suits, including a sleeveless one, but with a different neckline from the ones I got last year (long sold out) that I really liked. I tried on the three-quarter sleeve "skipper" blouse, but alas, as with most of Uniqlo's longer-sleeved blouses in this general type of material, whether polyester or this rayon-poly blend, it didn't fit right over my chest and shoulders.