Almost exactly a year ago, we celebrated a uniquely-built ballplayer with a great story. Cal "Big Dumper" Raleigh took the G:TB endorsement and ran with it, finishing 2025 with 60 homers and a .948 OPS and leading the Mariners to the seventh game of the American League Championship Series. At the time, we were a bit cautious in our appreciation, given the fact that Raleigh plays a MAGA-forward sport and was raised in Tennessee and North Carolina.
Raleigh's off to an injury-riddled slow start in 2026, but as of yet, hasn't displayed any egregiously bad politics, so we'll count that as a win. For now.
With Raleigh on the shelf, we need a new object of affection. A different beefy lad with an arsenal of quirks, perhaps. And boy, do we have somebody for you.
Red Sox left-hander Payton Tolle (pronounced TOLL-ee) made his debut in the bigs last season, appearing in seven games at the end of the season. Perhaps you caught this video of his welcome to the bigs gentle hazing session:
Tolle's settled in during this, his second campaign in the bigs (though he's technically still a rookie). He's started nine games for the middling Sox, recording 54 Ks in 53.1 innings and posting a 2.70 ERA and a 1.050 WHIP. The 6'6", 250 lb. left-hander has been one of Boston's few bright spots on the field, and an unquestionable nut job on it. Witness, for example, this...whatever it was and his post-game remarks:
As one might imagine, a lad of Tolle's dimensions who grew up in Oklahoma and played college ball at Wichita State and TCU (please no MAGA, please no MAGA), he's a fan of the cow. Here's one of his stories on the topic:
My favorite Tolle moment of the season happened last week against the Orioles. He induced a high chop to third from Orioles' catcher Samuel Basallo and then, well, then he did this:
Tolle is, as you might suspect, fast becoming a fan favorite. We'll leave you with this minute-long clip of Tolle being Tolle. Just an absolute lunatic (complimentary). Monkey never cramp.
When CBS fired Scott Pelley last week, a logical assumption was that he had a substantial 401(k) or a standing offer to work elsewhere if his former gig went sideways. Perhaps both. The longtime CBS News and “60 Minutes” correspondent had to know that one doesn’t call out the new boss in front of colleagues without repercussions.
Indeed, the consequences were swift, as the network turfed him one day after a contentious exchange at new chief Nick Bilton’s first staff meeting. Further details and Pelley’s own account of events reveal an even more dispiriting, if entirely predictable, situation.
Bilton is the hand-picked choice of network news division head Bari Weiss to lead “60 Minutes.” Put another way, one unqualified, mediocre former New York Times columnist installed another to run the network’s premier news program.
Last week’s intro staff meeting quickly devolved, according to multiple reports amid leaks from attendees, and lasted just 15 minutes before Bilton exited.
Initial reporting said that Pelley interrupted Bilton’s opening monologue to say that Weiss was “murdering” the news magazine. “She does not love this place. She was brought in to kill it, and she’s been doing exactly that," Pelley said in multiple reports in which outlets obtained audio of the meeting. Pelley added that both Weiss and Bilton are unqualified for their positions and that Bilton would “never be welcome here.” He asked Bilton why several senior staffers were fired the week prior. Bilton didn’t answer the question and responded that it wasn’t his decision (side note: journalists do not always adhere to standards to which they hold their subjects).
A Weiss deputy and new CBS editor told Pelley that he was being rude. “This is not actually productive,” Charles Forelle said. “This is not an interview.” Pelley replied, “It’s working for me.” He added, “Anybody came into our house, this is ’60 Minutes.’ I guess you wandered in expecting to read a statement off?”
Bilton walked shortly thereafter. Pelley was fired the following day, and Bilton released a whiny, self-serving statement:
“While I’m new to ‘60 Minutes,’ I’ve devoted my career to investigative journalism and storytelling. I started this job excited to collaborate and to benefit from the wisdom and experience of the ‘60 Minutes’ veterans, with you among them. For that reason, one of the first things I did in my new role was call you to talk and invite you to dinner. It is a profound disappointment that you rejected that overture and chose ambush instead. Yesterday, you hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt. I welcome a diversity of viewpoints and respectful debate among the team, but this was nothing of the sort. Yesterday’s performative display of hostility – enacted in front of the staff instead of in a civil, private conversation – demonstrated that you have no interest in contributing to the future success of the show, or approaching my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress.”
We’ll get to Bilton’s qualifications and career shortly. Pelley responded to Bilton’s remarks with a lengthy statement in which he said that new management was attempting to curry favor with the Trump administration. He lamented the loss of professionalism, experience and institutional knowledge due to those already fired. “For my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story. I’ve been told to include assertions that are unverified. To date, in every case, I have managed to ignore these instructions or refuse them. Recently, politicians have been invited to choose correspondents for interviews on the broadcast. Giving politicians control over ‘60 Minutes’ interviews is not how this is done. Finally, incompetence and unprofessionalism in the new management have wreaked havoc. In a case involving one of my stories, the entire program came within 19 minutes of not getting on the air at all.”
Bilton’s claim that he’s devoted his career to investigative journalism is dubious, at best. At the New York Times, he was a design editor in the newsroom and a researcher, and later a forgettable columnist writing about technology issues. He moved to Vanity Fair a decade ago and tried to pass himself off as having been on the front lines of the story about Theranos, the fraudulent health tech company that landed founder Elizabeth Holmes in jail after bilking investors out of hundreds of millions of dollars. He lately devoted his time to making documentaries and collaborating with Martin Scorsese on a screenplay. Like Weiss, he has never worked in TV news, yet somehow was sold on the idea that overseeing the most venerated news magazine in TV history is a fine entry-level position.
Pelley sat down with a New York Times reporter late last week and elaborated on the entire dust-up and his termination. He said that he and remaining staff were in shock after a handful of senior staffers were fired the week previously, without explanation, including the head of the show – a woman with decades of experience at the network and Emmy Awards on her resume who was given until the end of the workday to clear out her office. He was also put off by an introductory email that Bilton sent to staff in advance of the first meeting, in which he wrote that it’s no longer 1968 (the year “60 Minutes” went on the air), implying that the newsmag is stuck in the past, and seemed unaware that the show has been broadcast online, globally, for more than a decade and not just at 7 p.m. on Sundays.
At the intro staff meeting, Pelley said that Bilton sat in front of the group and simply started to read a statement from his phone, a remarkably tone-deaf ice-breaker.
Pelley felt compelled to speak up, he said, after he looked around the room and saw that he was the most senior staffer in attendance (age 68, with 37 years at CBS). As for the notion that he publicly berated the new boss, Pelley said that he believed the meeting was private and behind closed doors (subtract points for naivete, as every employee, disgruntled or otherwise, carries a portable recording device these days), and that “60 Minutes” DNA includes tension and hard questions. The next day he was called into the office, where a CBS news exec said he had committed a fireable offense and ended the meeting after 10 minutes. He said that he honestly didn't believe that he'd be fired (subtract more points for naivete). He learned later that day that he was canned.
The shakeups and firings at CBS News and “60 Minutes” are dressed up as modernizing traditional storytelling and identifying new avenues of connection and communication. As the site’s media grump, I’ve yammered about much of this previously, but it’s worth repeating that it’s yet another big corporate thumb on the scale of independent journalism. CBS was bought by Skydance Media, whose leader, billionaire David Ellison, overpaid for Weiss’s media startup and then installed her as head of the network’s news division. Both Ellison and his dad, gazillionaire Oracle founder Larry Ellison, are Trump supporters and needed a compliant FCC to sign off on Skydance’s purchase of Paramount and CBS.
Weiss alienated the room almost immediately by firing staffers, holding a “60 Minutes” piece on the notorious El Salvador prison where immigrants were sent, hosting a town hall with the widow of slain shit-stirrer Charlie Kirk, and inserting morning show haircut Tony Dokoupil as evening news anchor. She passes herself off as a centrist truth seeker, but her track record is right-wing sympathizer and Israel supporter who often targets mainstream media, “wokeness” and diversity initiatives. Now comes Bilton.
Pelley said that both Weiss and Bilton are out of their depth. He likened it to being asked to fly a 747 with hundreds of passengers to Paris. “We need adult supervision and at the moment we don’t have it,” Pelley said in the Times. “We have people who’ve been installed in these jobs who through no fault of their own have no experience in television. They don’t know what they’re doing. And there’s a subtle political bias that I’ve never seen at ‘60 Minutes’ before, or at CBS News before. So that is my hope: a return to sanity. We can save this. It’s possible to land this plane. But right now, CBS News is on fire.”
Spotify recently served up a song by the Texas Gentlemen and it was really good so I surfed over to the full album, "TX Jelly," and it was really really good. Turns out they've been around for almost ten years and I missed it.
Some songs are straightforward southern rock.
But then they have some Pet Sounds influenced stuff like this song that includes fellatio from a ghost.
And they have a funky instrumental bop serving as the title of the album.
They also have some old school country and western songs.
I encourage you to take 49 minutes out of your life to listen to TX Jelly. Based on the foregoing videos they clearly don't take themselves too seriously and I suspect their live shows are fun. They are playing at the NorVa on June 14. If only we had someone local to go see them to verify their Gheorgheness.
Similarly old and new is of Montreal's new album aethermead. I say "old" here because it's their twentieth album--they've been around for thirty years! As I mentioned in G:TB's one-and-done "beers bands and bars" podcast (which I can't find), of Montreal cannot be categorized musically. They're all over the place. As is this album, in terms of quality. It's hit and miss. I won't embed another litany of videos but this one song stood out to me as the answer to the question "What would it sound like if Steely Dan enlisted Greasetruck Studios to produce a song?"
I am thoroughly in the tank for the World Cup. The idea of it, anyway. I've seen five World Cup matches - two on the men's side in 1994 (including Mexico/Italy during the heyday of lunatic goalkeeper Jorge Campos) and three in Montreal during the 2015 Women's World Cup. I love it all - the passion, the coming together of the world's fanbases, the stress, the wall to wall soccer.
I love it all. Except for the people that run it. FIFA has always been a disgrace - a venal, corrupt vampire sucking treasure for its own ends. It may have met its match in Donald Trump, peas in a greedy, bloated, gilded pod.
As we get closer to the start of the 2026 event (Mexico hosts South Africa a week from yesterday), the global federation's veneration of gold over all else threatens, if not the integrity of the competition, certainly its reputation. The tournament's expansion to 48 teams was always a cash grab, but it doesn't seem that FIFA's higher-ups considered the fact that nobody in North America gives two shits about shelling out $400/seat to watch Curacao play Ecuador or Qatar take on Bosnia and Herzegovina.
They definitely didn't anticipate Trump's Gestapo holding up entry visas for global stars like Switzerland's Breel Embolo (who had no problem entering the U.S. for friendlies just last year) or half the South African team. Lord knows what's going to happen if Iran and/or Iraq advance. That's just the athletes and coaches - we already know that foreign fans are staying away in droves. The BBC reports that 70% of hotel rooms reserved by FIFA in advance of the tournament for traveling supporters have been cancelled. We've never seen winning like this. The best winning. The hottest country.
The upshot for me is that I'm still really excited about the matches, disgusted by the organizers, and expecting the worst from our despicable administration. My personal compromise: I'll watch, but I won't put a dollar of my own money into FIFA's coffers. A girl's gotta have standards.
You didn't come here for my crisis of conscience, though. You're here for cogent analysis and pithy previews. (I'm being told that's not necessarily accurate. Onward.) We'll get to that. But first a handful of the things we're watching:
The Fodder:
As noted above, expansion from 32 to 48 nations in the World Cup Finals is fueled by naked greed, regardless of how FIFA spins it as an expansion of opportunity. It is that for European and South American teams - seven of the 10 CONMEBOL nations are in the tournament, and fully one-third of all qualified nations are from Europe.
The 2022 World Cup featured 63 matches, including the 15 knockout round tilts. Only three of those were decided by a margin of more than three goals. We're gonna get a cornucopia this year - 104 matches to get from 48 group stage qualifiers to 32 knockout participants and on to the final. It says here that we're gonna get blowouts a lot more than 5% of the time.
So while I think it's amazing that Cape Verde and Curacao and Haiti and Uzbekistan get the chance to share the spotlight with the global powers at the top of the game, I won't be holding my breath for underdog runs.
The Yanks:
One of the significant differences between 2026 and the last time the U.S. hosted a World Cup in 1994 is the substantially heightened interest in the game here and the correspondingly elevated expectations for the USMNT. In theory, Mauricio Pochettino could field a starting lineup where every field player is a starter for a team in one of Europe's major leagues. (He probably won't, because at least one of Tim Ream and Miles Robinson will start in the back, and both of them currently play in MLS.)
Despite a roster with real, proven talent, the U.S. is an enigma. Only half the team was rostered in 2022 when the U.S. advanced out of its group and got exposed by the Netherlands in the first round of the knockouts. The Americans have had strong performances in friendlies - witness a 5-1 demolition of World Cup-bound Uruguay - mixed with desultory efforts (hello, Japan!). Tomorrow's final tuneup against Germany will either reveal a lot or tell us nothing, depending on how we decide to spin it.
I don't envy Pochettino's task of selecting a roster - it's a good problem to have that we left out a number of very good players. My primary quibble with the final 26 is more makeup and less talent. I don't think we have enough redass quotient.
The best U.S. teams in terms of performance haven't necessarily been the most talented. The 1994 team famously beat heavily favored Colombia before taking eventual champs Brazil to the wire in the knockouts. More than half of that team didn't even play for a professional club, as U.S. Soccer decided to have them train together as a group in hopes of building togetherness. It worked, and it didn't hurt that we had brawlers like Eric Wynalda, John Harkes, Tab Ramos, and Earnie Stewart on the squad. In 2002, the U.S. roster featured five players on top-flight European teams, most of whom didn't play much. Our best player was Landon Donovan. And the U.S. reached the quarterfinals and were legitimately better than Germany in that match, victimized by a handball by Torsten Frings that prevented a U.S. goal that went uncalled in the pre-VAR era. That squad had lunatics like Frankie Hejduk and Clint Mathis, and physical forces like Brian McBride, DeMarcus Beasley, and Eddie Pope.
The 2026 side? Other than Tyler Adams and maybe Weston McKennie, I don't see it. The biggest omission to me with respect to this particular attribute is that of Diego Luna. The Real Salt Lake attacking midfielder isn't pretty, but he fights his ass off, and he's very skilled with the ball, picking out passes that unlock defenses and making intelligent runs to create space for himself and others. Dude's a menace (complimentary) - that's him at right playing on after breaking his nose against Costa Rica in 2025. He stayed in that match and picked up an assist on the game's first goal. Poch chose Giovanni Reyna over Luna, picking an undeniable talent who was a locker room pariah in 2022 and gives privileged prima donna energy. I worry.
The Underdogs (Natch):
Only eight nations have lifted the World Cup trophy over the tournament's 22 editions. Only five other nations have made the final over that time. It's an elite club. Non-European and South American countries need not apply. 88 teams have appeared in semifinals since the tournament's inception in 1930. All but three of those were European or South American nations (U.S.A. (1930), South Korea (at home in 2002), and Morocco (2022)).
Here are the "outsider" sides Vegas thinks have the best chance to break that stranglehold:
Japan (+4500 - 12th-best odds)
Morocco (+5000 - 13th)
U.S.A. (+5500 - t14th)
Mexico (+5500 - t14th)
The African sides, other than Morocco, with the shortest odds are Senegal (+15000), Ivory Coast (+17500), and Egypt (+35000). Canada clocks in at +22500, pretty long for a host.
I think all of these squads have good to very good chances to advance from the group stage. I like the cut of the Mexicans' jib. El Tri are unbeaten in seven matches dating back to November 2025 and have only lost one of their previous 16. Javier Aguirre's side has a good mix of youth and experience (including Fulham striker Raul Jimenez, pictured at left), and features a number of players battle-tested in Liga MX, one of the world's most physical and competitive leagues. Combine that with group stage matches at home, and you could find a worse longshot.
Whew. That's a lot of words. It's almost as if this blog could use an editor.
I could wrap it up with a prediction, but that's exactly what They expect. Instead of one, you'll get three - the multiverse of G:TB World Cup outcomes.
First, hearkening back to the primary reason this Cup has such a greasy, gross sheen, let's imagine the most amazing, MAGA-brain-breaking version that has at least a modicum of realism. It might be magical, but let's play along, shall we. Here's what happens in that version:
The U.S. is bounced in the group stage, falling to Türkiye (this could definitely happen) and losing a shocker to Paraguay in the opener.
Both Iran (possible!) and Iraq (not so likely) go through to the knockouts.
Canada advances to the quarterfinals, sparking gleeful rallies in Toronto calling for the U.S. to be the 10th Province.
Mexico dance through the bracket, making it all the way to the final, where they eventually fall to Spain. Spain hates us at the moment, for obvious reasons.
Four African teams make it to the round of 16, and two (Morocco and Senegal) reach the semifinals.
The next outcome imagines a tournament that what would suck because the results were so goddamn boring. This one breaks down like this:
Eleven UEFA teams reach the final 16 and six get to the quarterfinals. This could definitely happen.
The host nations advance to the knockouts but all get bounced without a win.
No African teams make it past the round of 32.
Fabulous, flowing France loses to Germany in the round of 16.
South Korea and the joyous Son Heung-Min exit early.
Germany, Spain, England, and Portugal comprise an all-Euro semifinal.
And Portugal with that asshole Cristiano Ronaldo lift the trophy.
Finally, here's the definitive G:TB prediction. This is what will happen:
The U.S. does enough to advance, but Türkiye win our group.
It's a pretty chalky group stage, and there's not a ton of upset-related drama throughout.
The USMNT goes out to Argentina in the Round of 32, Poch leaves for AC Milan, and another four-year cycle of doubt and recriminations ensues.
The Turks make a run to the quarters, where they fall to Spain.
Mexico is the only host nation that wins a knockout match, but they fall to England in the Round of 16.
Mo Saleh takes Egypt on a run to the quarters.
England take out Brazil and Argentine on their way to the final.
France bests Spain in an epic semifinal.
England finally reach the top after trying and failing for 60 years. It's coming home! The Three Lions are massively talented, and they're coached by a brilliant and insane person in Thomas Tuchel.
***EMERGENCY UPDATE***
GET A LOAD OF THIS PHOTOGRAPH OF THE NORWEGIAN NATIONAL TEAM! I CHANGE MY PREDICTION. ERLING HAALAND AND HIS BAND OF MERRY VIKINGS ARE WINNING IT ALL! HEIA NORGE!
I like to think I'm generally fairly clued-in to the pop culture zeitgeist, at least for the parts of it I care the most about. Namely, sports and certain types of music. I have no idea who most actors or pop musicians under the age of, say, 40 are. I know way too much about politics - that shit is slowly breaking my brain. Perhaps not so slowly, if you listen to my wife.
Today I'm sharing a trio of things that I've become aware of recently, though others got there well before me. One of them's a dramatic series, and the other two should've been in my wheelhouse.
For my money (not much to speak of), Cillian Murphy is the best actor going. He was terrific in Oppenheimer, which is the first time I really became aware of him. Turns out the Academy Award-winner has done some other stuff. So now I'm three episodes into Peaky Blinders, and friends, Murphy's portrayal of up-and-coming Irish gangster Tommy Shelby is spectacular, all simmering rage and cold calculation. Turns out it ran for nine damn years and they made a feature film. Who knew? Guess I've got some catching up to do.
About six months ago, the algorithms started pushing a somewhat oddly-affected musician into my feeds. Stephen Wilson, Jr. is a 46 year-old musician who blends country and rock in ways that hit the chords I like. The Indiana native sounds like nobody else, though. His playing is sublime, and his voice is haunting, emotional, rasping and raw. He's been making music since he left his job in research and development in Mars' food science department in 2016. Can't believe it took me this long to hear about him. Wilson is playing The Dome in Virginia Beach in late July, if you know anyone in the area.
This cover of 'Stand By Me' from a year ago or so is the first thing I heard him perform:
And here's his single, 'Gary':
Turning to sports, check out this statistical excellence: 20 pitching wins and 20 homers in consecutive college seasons, the first time that's ever happened; career record of 91-17, with a 1.29 ERA and 937 strikeouts in 687 innings; career batting line of .514/.842/1.356; led Nebraska to its first College World Series since 2013, homered in their final game while also taking a no-hitter into the sixth inning of an eventual loss to Texas.
Oh, and that last game? She did that while she was pregnant.
I give you Jordy Frahm, friends. The Nebraska native started her career at Oklahoma, where she was a standout pitcher for the powerhouse Sooners. She came home to help lift the moribund Nebraska program (the NIL money she got certainly did not hurt, if we're being fully transparent) and got to hit and pitch - that's where her 20/20 feat took place over the past two seasons.
And after the Huskers lost to Texas and were eliminated from the Women's College World Series, Frahm and her husband Trey announced that their family was about to grow.
Big doings and a crazy coincidence from Virginia's capital city next weekend.
Yes, at week's end in Richmond, there will be a nice little assortment of music at the city's Maymont Park. A 100-acre green space in the heart of town adjacent to the James River, Maymont is celebrating a century of existence with some fun for all ages.
On Saturday night, Carbon Leaf is playing; we've touted the virtues of my old buddy Barry and his band here before. Terrific dudes playing ear-pleasing music at clubs across the country.
Leaf Barry with some gheorghies
Here's a Carbon Leaf tune ("Desperation Song") from a quality Richmond venue from a decade ago. Go check' em out!
Before that happens, though -- check this shit out.
On Friday night, a pair of local tribute acts share the bill. Full Moon Fever kick things off at 6pm; they're a killer Tom Petty tribute band that some of you may recall played my wedding 2 years ago.
FMF, Prabir and Les Coole
Prabir and his Petty-playin' cronies are good eggs and do more than justice to that catalog. Be a face in their crowd.
At 8:30pm, after my old wedding band clears out, stay tuned for the next act: Three Sheets to the Wind. They're a killer Yacht Rock tribute band that some of you may recall played my wedding 13 years ago.
Smooth all over
The canvas can do miracles, and so can these guys. Smooth music is their milieu. Topper Dandy, Capt. Max Power, & Co. are super good guys and deliver a bevy of yacht rock tunes. They should be missed... is what a fool believes, Kenny.
But seriously, what are the chances that this event features a pair of musical acts, and both bands played my weddings 11 years apart?
I'd say not strong. (I also got married in Richmond in 1997; I'd say we should see if we can find Fat Ammon or the Rhondels to play some beach music on Saturday like they did for me that day back then... but they've mostly passed on.)
Add to this unlikely odds that my old friend's band is playing the third show, and it's quite the cosmic feat.
Alas, I will be busy Friday night with my stepson's 8th grade graduation festivities. Otherwise, it'd be nice to see the old gangs and marvel at this weirdness.
Father's Day is nigh upon us and you will probably say "I don't know" when asked for gift ideas to commemorate the occasion, or maybe you don't know what to get one of the dads in your life. This post aims to alleviate that problem.
If you read G:TB you were probably born between 1968 and 1978 which means you are of exactly the right age to have seen, and been absolutely blown away by, the movie Trainspotting when it came out in 1996.
Barry! The book on which it's based is just as good and it got me into other works by Irvine Welsh including all the sequels and prequels involving the same group of radgejakeys which are available on Amazon as the "Trainspotting collection." This does not include the latest installment, Men in Love, which takes place shortly after the end of Trainspotting and before Porno. This means the new book is a sequel and a prequel. As a fan of the series I enjoyed it greatly. I guess you could come to it cold but I suspect you'll enjoy it more if you already read the other books, or at least Trainspotting. I've cited some favorite Welsh quotes before--my top choice from Men in Love is from Sick Boy (natch) and it's at least tangentially related to Father's Day:
Pah-pah, Papa: even a broken clock is right twice a day. I thank God that out of the billions of retard sperm that this miasmal mongol hound shot from those festering hee-haws intae my ill-omened mother (and countless Leith hoors), that it was the solitary, exceptional, perfect bastard that managed to penetrate her egg and furnish this saintly woman with her only son.
zwoman got me one of these small modern CD players for my birthday. It has AUX and optical jacks and Bluetooth so it works with AirPods or any other Bluetooth device. More importantly, it justifies keeping all my CDs, especially the ones that are currently only on Notify (like Done By the Forces of Nature which was removed from Spotify because I suspect it includes exactly zero cleared samples). I dig the Scandinavian vibe of the walnut version. Who doesn't dig Scandinavian vibes?
zson borrowed my softshell to clean out stables in the rain and a horse bit the zipper off (don't ask) so I went to REI to replace it during their recent 25% off sale. They didn't have anything that fit the bill, but I spend a lot of time in fleece jackets and two of them are close to crapping out so I perused REI's selection and discovered Patagonia's new (at least to me) Air Fleece. I'm not sure how it works but it keeps you warm without getting too warm (unlike their Better Sweaters) and the medium fit me perfectly. They are wildly overpriced, even at 25% off, but it's replacing two fleeces (one of which I bought about 12 years ago) and zson is about my size so he can wear it too (so long as he avoids the zipper-eating horse) so I justified it to myself and I'm hoping it will last a long time. I went with the hoodie version because who doesn't like hoodies?
There might not be a better source of content outside G:TB than The Atlantic. It's chock-full of think pieces from deep thinkers, cultural observations from cultured observers, and short fiction from non-fictional writers of all heights. Notable writers include Tom Nichols, Anne Applebaum, David Frum, Robert Kagan, McKay Coppins, Sarah Fitzpatrick, Jonathan Chait, Adam Serwer, Derek Thompson, Annie Lowrey, Jamele Hill, George Packer, Eliot Cohen, Alexandra Petri and a boatload of other Washington Post defectors. They put out new stuff online daily and offer a web-only subscription but for an extra $10 you can get also get the dead tree version mailed to your house along with a tote.
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