Hello, you. How’re you doing?
Welcome to the Hello You Sunday Supplement, Issue 6
Social media’s not what it should be. Algorithms have flattened everything so it’s harder to find stuff to read that’s worth your time. Our newsfeeds are just a slop conduit serving us rubbish and nonsense.
Hence the Hello You Sunday Supplement. It’s a weekly delivery of links to articles that I think you’ll find interesting to read whilst enjoying your Sunday morning coffee.
Do a friend a favour. Hit this button, and share the Sunday Supplement with someone?
And do me a favour? Hit ‘Like’ or the little heart symbol at the top or bottom of this email?
In keeping with the Hello You World Headquarters policy of continuous product improvement, there’s a new heading on its way shortly, but first …
Something to listen to while you read
Exactly one week before my fifteenth birthday, this concert was broadcast on BBC TV. And I saw a glimpse of a sophistication and elegance of adulthood that I have since consistently failed to emulate.
Forty-odd minutes of absolutely top-class performance. Leave it playing while you read these links, or sit enthralled in front of the whole thing.
The Manhattan Transfer, live on the Old Grey Whistle Test
This is why this newsletter is a little late this morning. Specifically, repeated viewing of the segment from the 14’40” mark where they rip into ‘Don’t Let Go’, previously a rough-hewn barnstormer by Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, transforming it completely. Everything about it is perfection: the singing, the arrangement, the choreography, the band … and Janis Siegel’s lead vocal? The way she does a squeal on the word ‘stop’? Let alone the physicality of the performance … Fourteen-year-old me sat down to watch this as a boy, and stood up afterwards a man.
That new heading I mentioned earlier …
If you read one thing this week, make it this
(Thanks to Karen for suggesting I pick one piece to highlight in each Supplement.)
This year’s World Mental Health Day, last Thursday, was themed around mental health at work. This is something about which I have Very Strong Feelings Indeed.
More than half of all sick days are taken due to mental ill health
Looking after your mental health and wellbeing when you're at work is so important
If you’re a manager, experts at Mind can help you build a healthy and supportive work environment
Here’s how bosses are helping support positive mental health
How to tell when work stress is too much
How to recognise burnout, and what to do if you’re affected
Closely related to this: Women are told to lean in and dare to lead, to be a girlboss and to speak up. But nothing is easy about this. And none of it is risk-free
And for fellow journalists and media workers: ‘You need to demonstrate the highest values yourself’ - Five tips for building a culture of care in your newsroom: strategies for newsroom leaders
OK, that’s more than one thing, but I feel this is so bloody important.
News and analysis for the news-avoidant (like me), starting as always with the good stuff from Positive News
Extinct beasts came ‘back from the dead’, a ‘life-changing’ study launched, and the UK boosted worker rights, plus more good news
What if you wanted to make a game an awful lot like Minecraft, but skip all the pesky ‘safety’ bits? Roblox is just an ‘online game platform and game creation system’, right? Erm … no. Roblox which has become a digital cesspit. And the numbers don't add up, either
‘Because secondhand is feckin’ grand’: how clothes swapping became huge in Ireland
‘I’m running out of ways to explain how bad this is’
'It’s just that the contemporary opponents of pasteurization—the “raw milk” movement, as they call themselves—are so fucking dumb, and so knee-jerk about it' - Raw milk (of all things) and the collapse of consensus reality
Folk, tradition, history and heritage
… and, something good to watch on linear broadcast TV!
When you’ve watched Gone Fishing with Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse tonight, don’t change channels or turn off the TV. The programme that follows it is equally enthralling, just in a different way.
Charlie Cooper’s Myth Country, a three-part investigation into a handful of folk traditions, myths and legends, is a joy. Read this interview with Charlie and the good people at Tradfolk, and if you missed episode one, find it on BBC iPlayer
Hello You 67: 'We just decided life's too short'
Ever wished you could just take off?
Alison and Mark, a Shrewsbury couple in their 50s, decided to do exactly that. Their two-year odyssey’s almost over, but where has it taken them? And what will they do next?
Find out in this week’s episode of my podcast Hello You
And to make sure you don’t miss anything, whether it’s an episode of the Hello You podcast or the Sunday Supplement, why not subscribe? If you really love what I do, you can take out a paid subscription (and I’d be very happy and grateful) but you don’t have to. Hello You will remain free for everyone, for ever. You might just help keep it - and me - going, though.
OK, back to your weekly good-stuff round-up!
Nature and environment
Nice: Grazer is the third female winner of Fat Bear Week
Not at all nice, sadly: Nature is disappearing. The average size of wildlife populations has fallen by almost three-quarters in the last fifty years
Quirky (still trying to think of a better title for this bit)
You could fling your old junk. Or you could *really* fling your old junk. Don't tell me you're not tempted. Hurry, auction ends Friday
Thought-provoking (likewise)
This is a lovely piece of writing. The Welsh church fighting for survival ... in the centre of Birmingham
Music
The enduring mystery and compelling weirdness of the Jaynetts’ ‘Sally Go Round the Roses’
Arts, culture and photography
A surprising number of creative people have visions, hear voices, or report strange encounters in dreams
Gentlemen's ties through the years
Some photographs: Dog Show
Last weekend, I was invited by Grinshill Animal Rescue to take some photographs at their dog show.
It wasn’t the best day for it - grey and drizzly - but who cares when there are dogs?
Media and journalism
Never mind the quality, feel the ... story count. FFS. (Check if this is your local paper?)
Double the number of men are being quoted as experts compared to women on the UK’s biggest broadcast news programmes. Mind-bogglingly, that's an improvement
And after World Mental Health Day’s focus on wellbeing in the workplace: ‘You need to demonstrate the highest values yourself’ - Five tips for building a culture of care in your newsroom: strategies for newsroom leaders (Yes, I’ve included this twice. Don’t ask)
Social media, aka The Big World O’ Crazy
'... the widespread deployment of verbal violence directed at women as a tactic to shut their voices down is a phenomenon that belongs to the digital age. And it is possible because of social media' - Here's how some women tackle the tsunami of abuse to ensure their voices are heard
‘… he seems like an unwell elderly man posting AI slop for an audience of bots on Facebook. Imagine that ... you were looking at the feed of a relative. What would you say or do?’
How Shit is AI?
You will be tricked by AI. It's inevitable
Hello You is about people, stories and ‘the complexities of life’. Catch every episode of Hello You, and each issue of the Sunday Supplement, by subscribing on Substack
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Final Thought, à la Jerry Springer
'Just because you don’t know or understand something doesn't mean it's a conspiracy. For example, I don’t know how yogurt is produced. But that doesn’t mean yogurt comes from the Illuminati.'
- Matthew Cappucci, a meteorologist frustrated by the bollocks some Americans have been coming out with regarding Hurricanes Helene and Milton
How was that for you?
I hope you enjoyed the Hello You Sunday Supplement Issue 6. If you have thoughts, questions, suggestions then leave a comment
And I’m always glad to hear from you
Once again, I’d be thrilled beyond words if you could hit Like on this, or wherever you’ve found it, or both. And my joy would be complete if you would subscribe
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Thank you for being there
Take care of yourself, and take care of the people around you. I hope they’re taking care of you, too.