Tuck on Normal Gossip! Gender Reveal in Xtra! Morgan Givens on Gender Conceal!

Hey friends,

Hope you’re all hanging in there. Our new season officially starts in two days, but $5+ patrons can pregame with our new Gender Conceal episode, featuring the hilarious workplace wisdom of storyteller Morgan Givens. (If you’ve been asking us for more autism content, this one is especially for you!)

I love this chat with Morgan, but most of y’all have already heard me talk about it so I will move right along. Actually, you’ve heard me say this next part too, but I’ll say it again:

Monday is the last day to apply for our current round of grants! It’s also the last day for Gender is Dead hoodies, Eat the Cis stickers, No Cis Vampire crewnecks and all of our various other spooky merch items.

Side note: Will Betke-Brunswick, who has contributed several designs to our shop, has a new book out on November 15! It’s a graphic memoir (Maia Kobabe blurbed it!) called A Pros and Cons List for Strong Feelings. I’m reading it right now, and it is wholesome and heartbreaking and indeed full of feelings. Pre-order your copy now if you’re interested.

In other media news, Mel Woods wrote a nice little overview of Gender Reveal over at Xtra Magazine, featuring the vaguest of spoilers for our new season and a banger of a kicker.

And in other other media news, I was one of many editors on the second act of this weekend’s This American Life episode, which features Alix Spiegel profiling a trans kid. Of course, I was not in charge of how it ultimately turned out — I actually never even heard that audio; I just gave feedback on the script — so if you listen to TAL, I’d love to hear your honest opinion on the piece and the way it was framed.

I also had the honor, the pleasure, and the absolute joy of being featured in the Season 3 finale of Normal Gossip. I don’t want to spoil the story because it is full of twists and turns, so I will just say: Listen when you need a pick-me-up! You won’t regret it. (The podcast is hosted by Kelsey McKinney at Defector, who also does the GBBO challenge attempts I’m always linking to!)

Photo: A Normal Gossip promotional graphic with a picture of Tuck. Text says "Steampunk-Ass Murder Mystery with Tuck Woodstock."

And speaking of Defector links, it’s time for Links & Stuff:

• I love that Defector started as a sports website(?) but is now where I go for madcap Bake Off reenactments, field trips to the Bass Pro Shops Pyramid, and interviews with a New Zealand man who viscerally hates Jack Antonoff’s production style. We love employee-owned media!
  
• Them interviewed Chelsea Manning about her new memoir, which came out this month.
  
• In Slate: an interview between two incarcerated journalists, one of whom was released and won a Pulitzer.
  
• Also in Slate (big tonal shift lol): a journalist documents her trip on the Gone Girl cruise.
  
• If you have Washington Post access and (like me) know nothing about the Australian Outback, I really recommend this long multimedia piece on modern life in the Outback.
  
• I recently started reading The Small Bow, a newsletter about sobriety, and really related to this piece on sober dating.
  
• Incredible animal content this week, including hippos crunching pumpkins and also penguin orthopedics for someone named Beach Donkey(!)

That’s it for this week! Here’s your weekly Rhubarb. She just walked all over my keyboard so I think she wants to say hi.

Photo: Ruby sitting straight up with perfect posture. Behind her, out of focus, is a wall covered in art.

Xo,

Yr resident gender detective