Never have I ever thought I would start paying attention to Macklemore. And yet, here we are. I first encountered Macklemore music a few years ago because of one particularly exuberant young man who was trying to educate me about Macklemore ahead of the annual Starry Starry Night dance for adults with disabilities. With the confidence of someone who was absolutely certain he knew more about music than I did, he was trying to convince this Broadway-, pop-, folk-listening pasto

I recently fell down an internet rabbit hole because of an influencer. Specifically, I follow That Midwestern Mom on social media, and she recently posted about a trip to what a lot of us grew up calling "the Middle East." Except she didn't call it that. She called it SWANA — South West Asia North Africa. I stared at my phone for a solid ten seconds, blinked, and thought, wait, when did that happen? So naturally, I did what any reasonably curious person does at 9 pm: I went a