Every time I look for new photos of Donald Trump during his Manhattan fraud trial, I’m inevitably shocked by the state of him. He’s gained weight, he’s more jowly, his eyes seem even more glazed over and whoever is doing his makeup these days despises him. Monday was Trump’s big debut on the witness stand and his makeup artist didn’t even extend the deep sienna bronzer to his hairline. Yikes. As for Trump’s testimony, this part of the case isn’t even about guilt or innocence or liability anymore. Trump was already found liable of fraudulent business practices by Judge Engoron, so this is “penalties” phase of the trial. Meaning, how much Trump will be fined for his extremely illegal and deeply fraudulent business practices and whether he’ll even be able to do any kind of business in New York again.

Donald Trump opened his high-stakes testimony Monday by pissing off the judge overseeing his civil fraud trial. “Just answer the question,” Justice Arthur Engoron scolded the former president, as he attempted to paint the case against as being brought by politically motivated “Trump haters.”

“No speeches,” Engoron said, later urging Trump’s legal team to “control your client.” “This is not a political rally.”

Even before he headed to the Manhattan courtroom Monday, Trump took a minute to fire off a characteristically unhinged social media missive attacking the case—and the judge he sat next to when he took the witness box. “Got a really Biased, Nasty, Club controlled, but often overturned, Judge, a Racist, Evil, and Corrupt Attorney general, BUT A CASE THAT, ACCORDING TO ALMOST ALL LEGAL SCHOLARS, HAS ZERO MERIT,” Trump wrote, referring to Engoron and New York Attorney General Tish James. “WITCH HUNT!”

While Trump was expected answer questions about his business practices Monday—and possibly to try to shift blame to his adult sons, who have already taken the stand—he has unsurprisingly employed the same old verbal assaults over the course of his testimony, given his notorious lack of impulse control and the political benefits he’s tried to squeeze out of the spectacle. “This is a very unfair trial,” Trump said on the stand. “I hope the public is watching.”

[From Vanity Fair]

I watched some of MSNBC’s coverage and the reporter who was stationed inside the courtroom (there’s no live TV feed, but the trial is open to the media) said that in her opinion, the judge didn’t interrupt Trump enough and that if Trump had been any other defendant, his pitiful and hateful act on the stand would have landed him in contempt of court. That being said, there’s a theory going around that the prosecution likes that Trump can’t shut up because he continues to incriminate himself whenever he opens his mouth.

Also: when the New York AG’s office attorney asked Trump if he gave certain statements in 2021, Trump claimed “I was so busy in the White House with China, Russia, and keeping the country…” He was interrupted and told that he was not president in 2021.

Meanwhile, according to a new NYT/Siena poll, Trump is leading Biden in key battleground states, one year before the presidential election. This is the same newspaper which makes every Biden achievement sound like a tragedy and that negative energy has spread out across the national media. They ALL want Trump back because they’d rather report on chaos, crime, insurrection and stupidity than competent, low-drama governance.

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.

As a way to deflect from the after-action reporting of their dumb, colonialist tour of Kenya, King Charles and Queen Camilla authorized their courtiers to go on a briefing spree about the king’s relationship with Prince Harry. It was as obvious as it was stupid, but Roya Nikkhah and Camilla Tominey both got briefed that poor Charles invited Harry (and seemingly Harry alone, not his wife or children) to his birthday party and Harry refused! I guess we were supposed to think that the poor king has only light and goodness in his heart and he’s just so desperate to mend fences with Harry (alone), except the palace sadists couldn’t help but remind their audience that the rest of the family loathes Harry. Anyhoodle, funny story: it was all palace make-believe. No invitation was extended to Harry.

King Charles is celebrating his upcoming 75th birthday with a party filled with family and friends and reports stated that Prince Harry would not be in attendance despite being invited. However, the Duke of Sussex’s spokesperson said those stories are inaccurate and “disappointing.”

“In response to UK media headlines, there has been no contact regarding an invitation to His Majesty’s upcoming birthday,” the spokesperson tells the Messenger. “It is disappointing the Sunday Times has misreported this story.”

While the Sunday Times reported that Prince Harry was invited and turned down an invitation to the Clarence House event on Nov.14, a source with knowledge of the situation clarified to the Messenger that The Palace had “never reached out.”

When reached by The Messenger, a spokesperson for Buckingham Palace declined to comment.

[From The Messenger]

LMAO. It really is amateur hour over there. While Kensington Palace is a well-known clownshow, usually Charles’s people are more prepared than this. I find it interesting to watch as Charles completely abandons “never complain, never explain” as well – Charles and his people have gone on clear, obvious and detailed briefing sprees with regards to the Sussexes since Day 1. Literally, one of Charles’s first acts as king was banning Meghan from Balmoral, bitching out Harry for wanting his wife by his side after QEII’s passing, then briefing the media about all of it. Charles did the same about Harry’s coronation attendance – for months, the palace spoke of little else besides Harry’s possible attendance. Then there was the bullsh-t about Harry staying one night in Windsor in September. I wonder why Harry decided to clap back on this one. And why did the palace lie so blatantly to Nikkhah and Tominey?

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.

This story is wild. So, in 2017, a Portland man named Joshua Smith was leaving an addiction recovery meeting when he saw a stray tabby cat in the parking lot and took the cat home. The cat was starving and had a swollen eye. Joshua named the cat Frank and loved him very much. Then, two years later in 2019, his landlord went into his apartment without notifying Joshua, which is illegal, and abducted Frank the cat. There was allegedly a no pets policy, though Joshua’s attorney says he couldn’t find any such policy or property rule in writing. The landlord claims he had his girlfriend drop Frank off at a shelter, where they checked his microchip and he was reunited with his previous owners (I do not buy this, I have to say). A neighbor saw Frank being abducted and told Joshua about it. So Joshua took the landlord to court, and won a hell of a payout, $1.375 million. Good. Kidnapping somebody’s pet is a demented thing to do, regardless of any “lease violations.”

An Oregon man’s dogged search for the truth has left him nearly $1.4 million richer.

Joshua Smith was forlorn when his feline sidekick, Frank, mysteriously disappeared.

But Smith sported a Cheshire cat smile this week after a Multnomah County Circuit Court jury deliberated less than two hours before awarding him $1.375 million for the loss of his 3-year-old tabby, oregonlive.com reported.

Smith had previously sued, claiming his landlord had “catnapped” the furball.

“The jury’s message should be loud and clear to landlords,” said purr-suasive attorney Michael Fuller, who won the case. “You need to respect the rights of tenants, especially when it comes to pets.”

The rags to riches tale began when Smith, 41, encountered the apparent alley cat on the street in 2017 and welcomed him into the humble room he rented at a drug recovery group home in Portland, court records show.

Smith returned home on April 29, 2019, and found Frank had mysteriously vanished. He sued his landlord, Devon Andrade, and the recovery house business, Pinestreet LLC, days later, the outlet reported.

As the fur flew in court, landlord Andrade fessed up that he filched Frank, saying it was a violation of Smith’s lease to have a pet, the media report said. The heartless landlord owned up and said he got his girlfriend to drop Frank off at a local shelter.

“It turned out that the people on the jury were also animal lovers,” said Fuller.

While Smith won beaucoup bucks in court, he didn’t get Frank back. Veterinarians found a microchip in the cat and returned him to his original owner.

[From The New York Post]

I couldn’t find more info about the case besides this article from four years ago here. Basically Joshua’s argument was that he was devastated by the loss of Frank the cat and was originally suing his landlord for $250K for emotional distress and violating entry laws. I’m guessing that the remaining amount is punitive damages that will go the state. Pets are great across the board but I think they can be so supportive for people in addiction recovery. Joshua says in that article linked above, “He was the only thing that loved me at the time. Girlfriends come and go. Friends come and go. Frank’s been the one constant in my life.” And even if Frank had previous owners, he clearly loved Joshua a great deal.

Cats choose their people. When I was in high school, there was a cat in my best friends’ neighborhood who had essentially been abandoned by his owners once they got a dog. Bruce was a giant, fluffy, friendly orange tabby who was always wandering down the street looking for attention. I would always pet him, and my friend’s family started feeding him on their patio. One day as I was leaving my friend’s house, Bruce just jumped into my open car door and sat on the passenger seat. I knew what that meant. I drove home with him and took him inside. I just told my mom, “this is our cat now. We have been chosen.” (She understood. She knows that’s what cats do.) Bruce was our boy from that point forward. Frank the cat chose to be Joshua’s companion, and it’s enraging that his landlord would just abduct the cat instead of having a conversation with him about violating the lease or trying to work out an agreement with pet rent or something. I really hope that Frank is okay and that his previous owners love him as much as Joshua did.

evidence photos via PageSix

Joan Collins has a new memoir out called Behind the Shoulder Pads: Tales I Tell My Friends. The book shares tales of her younger years in Hollywood and her adventures with and grief for her sister Jackie’s passing. It also delves into relationships and talks about her happy marriage to producer Percy Gibson, who is 32-years younger than she is. While doing the press rounds for the book, Joan gave PEOPLE magazine some additional insight into what makes her marriage to Percy work. For Joan and Percy, it’s all about shared hobbies and separate bathrooms.

Collins tells PEOPLE in this week’s issue that there are a few elements that have kept her marriage going strong for so many years, and they range from shared hobbies to separate facilities. To the actress, success lies in keeping a balance in her relationship, which she says she and Gibson have worked out to be “separate bathrooms and the same bedroom.”

“First of all, Percy and I were working together and we became great friends,” Collins, whose new memoir, Behind the Shoulder Pads: Tales I Tell My Friends, is now available to purchase, explains. “We found we had a lot in common. We like the same things. We like doing the same things.”

As for what those “same things” are, Collins, 90, says, “We both adored the theater, and particularly musical theater. We love reading. We love playing cards or playing Scrabble. Neither of us are particularly outdoor[sy] people. You know, he doesn’t go running out to football games. And we love going to the theater and films and we just got along.”

The combination of those mutual interests led the Golden Globe winner to conclude that she and Gibson are in “the same blood group.”

Collins and Gibson’s story began when the former starred in a play managed by Gibson’s company in 2000. She had been married four other times before their meeting, but addressed the distinction between her relationship with Gibson from past loves in her 2011 memoir The World According to Joan. She said at the time that she “kissed a lot of frogs before I found my prince.” By 2002, the couple officially wed and have been together ever since.

When it comes to critics who have called out the 32-year age gap between her and Gibson, 58, Collins makes it known that the naysayers don’t affect her.

“They don’t do it in England anymore because everybody knows how happy we are together,” she explains. “And, you know, age is — as far as we’re concerned — just a number, and that’s the way that we both feel.”

She doubles down , telling PEOPLE, “Obviously, we talked about it before we got married, but it isn’t in the slightest importance.”

[From People]

Separate bathrooms…that’s the dream right there. I was just thrilled that our bathroom has two sinks! We have two bathrooms upstairs and another downstairs. The first upstairs bathroom is the master bathroom and the other one is the one my two elementary school-aged boys use, so that’s only usable to everyone else for a short period of time after a thorough cleaning, lol. The closest my husband and I ever get to separate bathrooms is usually accompanied by the phrase, “I’m in the shower, go downstairs!”

I do think what Joan says about having similar interests with your significant other is important for most relationships to make it long term, especially during that period in life when you’re both really busy. It’s good to have common ground so you can pause and reconnect. However, I also think it’s healthy for couples to have different interests, too! You’re both individuals and being well-rounded means enjoying doing things both together and apart. I suppose having the same interests is more important when there is a 32-year age gap, though. It’s kinda blowing my mind that someone who is the same age as my grandma is married to someone who is younger than my father, but I won’t judge. Good for Joan for finding her prince and being happy. I guess the fifth time was the charm.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Joan Collins (@joancollinsdbe)

Leo DiCaprio is reportedly “exclusive” with Vittoria Ceretti now. [Hollywood Life]
Ben Affleck & J.Lo had a date night in LA! [Just Jared]
Jacob Elordi ate a lot of bacon in preparation to play Elvis. [Socialite Life]
Khloe Kardashian had a Photoshop fail on photos of her mom!! [Buzzfeed]
Robert Pattinson’s delightful voice acting is being widely praised. [LaineyGossip]
Is Loki sort of turning into Doctor Who? [Pajiba]
Wait, how did the new Hunger Games movie get a waiver? [Go Fug Yourself]
James Harden’s very uncomfortable professional divorce. [Jezebel]
I really love how RuPaul turned Drag Race into an international franchise. [OMG Blog]
Here’s an update from BravoCon about Summer House. [Starcasm]
I wish more artists would cover R.E.M. [Seriously OMG]

Here are some photos of Prince William on Day 2 of his solo Singapore trip. I realize that the Sussex Squad is doing another “mute challenge” on this trip, which is funny. In case you weren’t aware, whenever Prince William and/or Kate try to do some solo project, the squad has started going radio silent on social media. Like, they don’t even drag Will and Kate or give them negative attention. It’s funny because it actually works in a weird way – William’s Singapore trip is receiving very little attention, and the British papers were full of all kinds of exclusive reports from Buckingham Palace briefings on… Prince Harry. It feels like BP is actively attempting to distract from William’s trip too. Hilarious.

Anyway, William was “busy” on his second day in Singapore. He did some dragon boat racing, he did a photocall in front of a giant globe (because “Earthshot,” get it?) and he met the Prime Minister of Singapore, Lee Hsien Loong (in front of the globe). He also wore a baseball cap, because he’s seen Harry wear a baseball cap a lot and so now William can wear one too!

Meanwhile, one of the biggest stories in the Mail in recent days was “She turned down the Prince! So who WAS the woman William tried to date when he and Kate were on a ‘break’? A look back at the royal romances before Wills married Kate – and there are more than you might think!” That’s truly the headline!! The Mail did a deep dive into all of the women Peg allegedly dated or fooled around with before and during his relationship with Kate. What a very strange article to come out while William is doing his second solo international trip after having his staff brief reporters that he wants to be seen as a hot single guy. It’s been clear this whole time that William ordered Kate to stay home during his New York trip and the Singapore trip. It’s been clear that he’s shopping for a new girlfriend/mistress/wife too. Wonder when his hunt will be reported openly.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images.

Adele and Rich Paul started dating in the spring of 2021, from what we can tell. Rich is Adele’s first serious relationship since her first marriage went belly up, although Adele is super-private nowadays and we have no idea what any of the timelines really are for her divorce or this relationship with Rich. Adele was fully prepared to take this relationship from 0 to 60 immediately. Remember when she turned up at the BRIT Awards wearing a huge diamond ring on her left hand? Then she suggested to Graham Norton that she was engaged? That was February 2022. My theory/belief was that Rich told Adele to cool it with all of the marriage talk. She managed to not publicly pressure him into marrying her for a while, then during a recent show, she referred to Rich as her “husband.” Last week, Rich appeared on CBS’s morning show and the panel pressed him on whether or not he’s married to one of the most famous singers in the world. He didn’t want to confirm anything.

Rich Paul is responding to rumors that he and Adele are married. The Klutch Sports Group CEO, 41, told Gayle King during an appearance on CBS Mornings on Monday that the singer, 35, has “been great,” adding, “I think she would agree that we definitely helped each other.”

“We’re in a good space. Happy,” he continued. “She’s superb.”

“We’ve been great for each other,” Paul said, noting that he wasn’t getting into specifics because he’s “not the type of person” to put his personal life out in the open.

“It’s not for the media. It’s not for paparazzi. It’s for us,” he explained.

King then tried to subtly get at the rumors the couple is now married, asking Paul, “When I see her, should I say ‘Hi, Mrs. Paul?,’ ” to which he replied, “You can say whatever you want,” with a laugh.

[From People]

It’s even worse in video form, which I’ve added below. Like… you’ve been dating this woman for two and a half years and you can’t say whether or not you’ve married her? You’re living with this woman and HER CHILD and you can’t clear up the language about your relationship? I was on Rich’s side about Adele turning up to an awards show wearing a diamond ring and insinuating that she was engaged – that was legitimately a bonkers move on her part if Rich had not proposed to her or given her that ring (and it appears that he did not). But his reticence to publicly claim his lady is super-shady, in my opinion. His argument that he doesn’t want to get too personal about his private life… the man is literally promoting his memoir!!

Fine I ain’t got shit else to do today. pic.twitter.com/YinBnaxE3G

— The Original Lisa Vandercunt (@robinwannabefly) November 3, 2023

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images, Adele’s IG.

Buckingham Palace gave Roya Nikkhah and Camilla Tominey the same post-Kenya-tour briefing and told each woman to fill out their stories however they wanted. For Nikkhah at the Times, it meant “Prince Harry isn’t coming to his father’s birthday party which is good because the rest of the family hates Harry, and also Charles is a diplomatic heavyweight even though he can’t show a modicum of intrafamily diplomacy.” Tominey’s version is “The King turns 75 – with just one son by his side.” Half of it is the same as the Times piece (Harry isn’t coming to the king’s birthday part) but the other half is Tominey and Buckingham Palace trying to do some cleanup on the Byline Times cover story, about how Charles removed the Sussexes’ security and funding to “bring them to heel.” Some highlights from Tominey’s piece in the Telegraph:

The king’s birthday. Insisting any celebrations would be “minimal” and “family orientated”, one palace insider joked: “This is not Netflix, you know!” Another added: “His Majesty is not given to fuss over such things as it is, but he is [also] acutely conscious there have been many set-piece royal events of late and his firm thinking is that events to mark his birthday will be minimal.” The consensus behind palace gates is that there have been “enough fly-pasts and marches”.

Harry didn’t receive any birthday wishes: The Sussexes were unable to join their nearest and dearest at Balmoral for the first anniversary of the late Queen’s death in September, and although Harry popped into Windsor Castle to pay his respects, he had to stay in a nearby hotel because he had not given due notice of his intention to visit the royal residence in Berkshire. Then, when he turned 39 a few days later, during the Invictus Games in Düsseldorf, Germany, he did not receive any official royal acknowledgment of his birthday. The Telegraph understands that the Duke did not receive any personal well-wishes from his father or brother, either.

Incommunicado: According to one well-placed insider: “Communications between the King and Prince Harry remain pretty poor. They don’t speak much, if at all.” It perhaps doesn’t help that the “workaholic” King hasn’t ever been an easy man to pin down. Unlike most families, who communicate by text and WhatsApp, senior royals such as Charles III are rather more “old school”, preferring to communicate by telephone or letter. Traditionally, he would always schedule a call with both of his sons on a Sunday – but while he still converses weekly with William, there is remarkably little contact with his other “darling boy”.

Sources will say this with a straight face & not realize that Harry feels this way about his wife as well: “If there’s one thing that winds that man up, then it’s attacks on his wife. He’s very defensive of Camilla,” said one source. William has been similarly enraged by Harry’s depiction of his sister-in-law, Kate, as cold and unfeeling in Spare. “Both know that they’ve brought their wives into an institution that has required them to make huge sacrifices. Negative press coverage is one thing, but they don’t expect members of their own family to stick the boot in.”

Worried about Endgame by Omid Scobie: The Royal family will also be wary of the imminent publication of Endgame, the second book by Omid Scobie, who wrote Finding Freedom, a 2020 hagiography of the Sussexes, which Meghan has admitted she has contributed to, via a friend. Although the couple appear to have distanced themselves from Mr Scobie in recent months, not inconveniently, his latest literary offering promises to reveal moments the Royal family should be “ashamed of”, and “take an accurate look at whether” the royals are still models of “civility and decorum”. As one palace insider pointed out: “As Omid doesn’t actually have any royal contacts beyond Team Sussex, it’s likely to be a rather one-sided affair.”

ITV’s coverage of the Byline Times cover story: The ITV News package, which featured prominently on the News at Ten on October 26, despite unfolding events in the Middle East, repeated the claim that the couple had their annual allowance stopped when they refused to remove from legal papers the name of a palace aide they claimed had leaked a story about them moving to Canada to The Sun newspaper on January 7 2020… ITV News claimed it had “learnt of an ultimatum, issued by the royal household that may have precipitated the final rift between Charles and Harry and Meghan”, adding “it was the leaking of Harry and Meghan’s decision to leave for Canada that we understand led to a complete collapse of trust”. Yet two days after the alleged “leak”, the couple announced their royal departure on a slick new Archewell website containing well-prepared content that showed a huge amount of forward planning had gone into the move.

Why the Sussexes were cut off: Harry and Meghan were still receiving £700,000 a year from the King after they released their Megxit statement. The Telegraph understands that the late Queen was reimbursing their rent for Frogmore Cottage, their former Windsor home, where £2.4 million in renovations were paid for with taxpayers’ money out of the Sovereign Grant. Royal sources suggest that there were several reasons why they were financially cut off. Foremost was the fact that they would no longer be undertaking any official engagements after their planned departure to the US in March 2020, when they themselves had expressed a desire to become “financially independent”. As it became clear behind the scenes that they were doing commercial deals, the late Queen, and the King, reportedly became “rather fed up” that the couple “seemed to want to have their cake and eat it”.

This makes zero sense: Both were already independently wealthy, with Harry’s inheritance from his mother and the Queen Mother thought to top £10 million, and Meghan having allegedly boasted of having “several million” in the bank, thanks to her role in the US legal drama Suits. The multimillionaires’ repeated gripes about paying for their own security – which was funded by the public purse when they were working royals – understandably raised eyebrows among the royals and their staff. Little wonder, then, that royal relations remain so frosty. If the King were to make one birthday wish on November 14, it would undoubtedly be for a sustained period of silence from the Sussexes and their supporters.

[From The Telegraph]

It’s very strange that there was radio silence from the palace for two weeks about the Byline Times story, and now the palace has authorized Tominey (of all people) to try to fudge the timeline and facts at hand of the Sussexit. I mean, the woman excels at lying, she lies constantly and she even lies about Prince George’s eye color. But even her “throwing bullsh-t at the wall to see what sticks” method seems particularly strained. Anyway, Tominey is previewing the strategy for several royal stories all at once. The palace plans to blame the Sussexes for Omid Scobie’s Endgame; the palace blames Harry for their emotional and financial abuse; the king can’t be blamed for being a dogsh-t father and never speaking to his son.

Photos courtesy of Instar, Backgrid.

Tipping has increasingly become a hot-button issue in America, especially since both the pandemic and the rise of apps like Uber, Lyft, DoorDash, etc. It seems like no matter where you go or what you do, you’re expected to add a tip. While I think you should show appreciation to the people who provided you a service, it’s also gotten noticeably more widespread beyond just the service industry. What feels like it started as a way to show gratitude to essential workers who were risking their health while the rest of the country was on lockdown now feels like consumers are expected to bear the brunt for companies who won’t f–king pay their workers a livable wage.

On November 1, DoorDash started testing a new system that warns customers that they may be SOL on their food delivery if they don’t provide a tip. If a customer chooses not to leave a tip, a pop-up screen appears warning them that tipless orders may take longer to get delivered. The idea behind the warning is to incentivize customers to leave a good tip, since DoorDash has the same model that Uber does, where the driver selects the customer. Gone are the days when you were guaranteed your pizza in 30 minutes or else it’s free. Now, you may have to get into a tip war just to get your pizza delivered at all.

“Earlier this year, we began piloting new information screens in the DoorDash app. When consumers choose to add their own custom tip instead of using one of our suggested default amounts, we let them know that tips can help motivate a Dasher to quickly accept their order,” reads a blog post on DoorDash’s website. The post says that if a customer chooses to not leave a tip, the app will also let them know that their order may take longer to be accepted as a result: “This is because — as independent contractors — Dashers have full freedom to accept or reject offers based on what they view as valuable and rewarding.”

DoorDash notes that since launching this test, it’s seen a decrease in no-tip orders. The screen is being randomly tested with customers in markets across the U.S. and Canada, and DoorDash says it’s planning to carefully analyze the results of this pilot program and open up the floor for customers to leave feedback before rolling it out further.

“Everyday, Dashers go the extra mile to help connect consumers with the best of their local communities. That’s why we encourage customers to show their appreciation by tipping,” DoorDash spokesperson Jenn Rosenberg tells TODAY.com.

“As independent contractors, Dashers have full freedom to accept or reject offers based on what they view as valuable and rewarding While the vast majority of customers do leave a tip, offers that don’t include a tip can be seen as less desirable — this impacts our entire community, leading to longer wait times for customers, orders sitting longer at merchants, and less value for Dashers.”

DoorDash’s test comes after food delivery drivers have shared their experiences with deceptive customers on social media, noting the practice of “tip baiting,” in which customers entice a driver with a large tip only to lower it after the order has been delivered. Some drivers have used the phrase “no tip, no trip” to share their frustration with no- or low-tip orders, while others have gone so far as to confront customers who tip below a certain amount.

Colleen McCreary, chief people officer and consumer financial advocate at Credit Karma, says that for food delivery, an appropriate tip is about 20%, because, “You could’ve picked up the food yourself.”

[From Today]

I think “tip baiting” is terrible, and I’m sorry to the drivers who have been deceived by sh–ty customers. I just checked and it doesn’t look like DoorDash drivers can give feedback on customers in the same way that rideshare drivers can. I know people who get really competitive about their Uber and Lyft ratings. Why can’t DoorDash do a system like that? And when the company says that they see a “decrease in no-tip orders,” does that mean people add a 20% tip or they’re adding in a dollar so they don’t show up as a “no tip” order?

Honestly, I am torn between my inherent belief that we’re all in this society together and need to take care of each other and my outrage that companies like DoorDash don’t have better systems in place to protect their drivers. I absolutely believe in tipping delivery drivers, but aren’t you supposed to tip for service after it’s been provided? This pilot program has been rolled out to increase their appeal to potential drivers. Hey DoorDash, you know what else increases your appeal to potential drivers? Offering them health insurance and other benefits! This is just one more case of yet another company that essentially places the burden of their employees’ cost of living onto consumers.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by DoorDash (@doordash)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by DoorDash (@doordash)

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by DoorDash (@doordash)

Photos via DoorDash’s Instagram

During the BravoCon 2023 panel discussion a few days ago, Real Housewives producer Andy Cohen suggested that the next franchise should be Real Housewives of Montecito, and “If we can get Meghan Markle, that would be interesting.” Stay away from her, get a job. My God. That headline was percolating through the American media at the same time as a particularly nasty piece in the Times of London by Laura Pullman. Like, the Windsors are telegraphing the fact that the king and queen’s Kenya trip was a flop and that no one gives a sh-t about Prince William’s trip to Singapore (which is happening right now!). All of the major stories in the Times, Mail and Telegraph this weekend were about Prince Harry and Meghan. Anyway, I’ll spare you the bulk of this stupid Times piece “What’s next for Meghan, the disappearing duchess?” because these lunatics are pathetically desperate. But there are a few quotes and talking points which are already being echoed in other outlets:

The Sussexes took their kids trick-or-treating in Montecito: “You get literally hundreds and hundreds of kids in costumes so I’m sure that Harry and Meghan felt that was a safe place to be. Obviously with their bodyguards with guns in tow which is not very Montecito,” says Richard Mineards, a British journalist who lives down the road from the Sussexes. “It’s the ideal time to take the kids out so they wouldn’t be recognised.”

The Samantha Markle BS: On Wednesday, Samantha Markle will be back in court in Florida launching a last-ditch attempt to sue her younger sibling for comments Meghan made in the Netflix documentary and in the Winfrey interview in March 2021. In the unlikely event Samantha succeeds, Meghan could be hauled to court, forced to testify and release private messages and emails. Samantha insists that she and her younger sibling were close growing up; Meghan has said that she grew up as an only child who longed for siblings.

Graydon Carter really has a hate-on for the Sussexes: “I would measure the duration of the marriage in years rather than decades,” says Graydon Carter, the founder and co-editor of Air Mail. “I think she has run rings around poor Harry and gotten what she wanted: notoriety, money, and a title. His usefulness to her diminishes daily.” Carter, a former editor of Vanity Fair, pooh-poohs the idea of Meghan returning to acting: “If there is a Real Housewives of Montecito show in the works, she’d be a shoo-in.”

[From The Times]

This is like the fourth time Graydon Carter has said sh-t about Meghan and Harry, for no reason. He doesn’t know them, he’s never interviewed them and yet he seems bizarrely invested in making Meghan sound like a golddigger harpy, all evidence to the contrary. As for the larger narrative that Meghan needs to do something or relaunch herself… like, one of the dumb experts quoted in this piece says something similar to what I’ve noted, which is that Meghan has left a lot of money on the table. Meghan could have gotten fashion contracts, she could be doing spon-con, she could be wheeling and dealing in a much bigger way. We thought she would be once she signed up with WME, but their strategy isn’t visible at the moment. I get that the “haters” are desperate to see her, just as her fans are dying to support whatever she’s got cooking. But we wait!

Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Backgrid.