Month: November 2023

When two people in a romantic relationship hold hands out in public, it symbolizes their connection to one another and shows the general public they are an item. “It feels good to hold hands with someone we know because it’s all about wanting to be close to them,” Toni Coleman, LCSW, a psychotherapist and relationship coach, told Women’s Health.

As with kissing and hugging, “research shows that touch, like holding hands, releases oxytocin, a neurotransmitter that gives you that feel-good buzz,” Coleman added.

However, according to writer and social media influencer Eli Rallo, hand-holding can mean many different things depending on how you do it. She used a recent photo of musician Taylor Swift and her new beau, football player Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs, to demonstrate her point.

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The couple was recently spotted in public with a tight interlocking grip. “I just want to make something abundantly clear: [intertwined finger hand holding] is something very different to [paw hand holding],” Rallo said.

Warning: Video contains mildly adult subject matter.

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@elirallo

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“[Intertwined] is giving ‘last night we said I love you for the first time now we can’t stop saying it,’ ‘we can’t keep our hands off each other,’ ‘we have both mutually agreed this is the greatest lay of our lives,’” Rallo continued.

“[Paw] is we hate each other, but we are still together because it is convenient.”

Rallo then went on to show some photos of Swift holding hands with different men, noting that she had an interlocking grip with her former boyfriend, Jake Gyllenhaal. “This leads me to believe two things, and this is a working thesis,” she continued. “Number one, hot men are always going to hold hands [with interlocked fingers]. Number two, men who are good in bed are always going to hold hands [with interlocked fingers].”

“You should never settle for one of these paw things,” she concluded.

Commenters on the video weren’t entirely on the same page with Rallo. Many say they choose the paw grip with their partners, not because of the lack of passion in their relationship but because it’s more comfortable.

“Intertwined fingers is awkward,” Keetinamobina wrote. “Sometimes the intertwined fingers thing is painful for some of us,” JSainte17 added.

While Tay noted that whether she “waffles” or pancakes” has to do with her relationship status. “I called interlocked hands waffle and the other one pancake—I must be waffled at all times—but if I’m mad, I pancake,” she wrote.

Even though Rallo got mixed reviews in the comments, body language experts agree with her.

Celebrity body language expert Karen Donaldson told Women’s Health that the interlocking grip symbolizes a heightened desire to be and stay connected. “This is a display of a strong and deep bond in the relationship,” Donaldson said.

Those who enjoy the firm “but not interlaced” palm-to-palm action may have feelings for one another that are less intense or unequal. “Depending on where you are in your relationship, this handhold style could be a protective grip. But most likely, the person doing the tighter hold is the dominant one in the relationship and is aiming to take charge,” says Donaldson.

“Or, if it’s a newer relationship, the couple may be finding a way to stay connected because they aren’t yet ready to interlace fingers,” movement pattern analyst Alison Henderson added.

YouTube is taking steps to introduce labels on videos, especially as Artificial Intelligence (AI) becomes increasingly prevalent in visual media. In a new blog update, the video platform confirmed that while they won’t be banning AI usage, users will have to disclose when they do use it in videos within the “coming months.”

This would include music videos and songs, as well as “especially important” cases like election coverage or “content showing someone saying or doing something they didn’t actually do.”

“To address this concern, over the coming months, we’ll introduce updates that inform viewers when the content they’re seeing is synthetic,” YouTube’s statement read. “Specifically, we’ll require creators to disclose when they’ve created altered or synthetic content that is realistic, including using A.I. tools.”

They added, “When creators upload content, we will have new options for them to select to indicate that it contains realistic altered or synthetic material. For example, this could be an A.I.-generated video that realistically depicts an event that never happened, or content showing someone saying or doing something they didn’t actually do.”

A test example of the AI label is shown on the site, with an example noting something is “Altered or synthetic content,” even on YouTube Shorts.

Read YouTube’s complete statement about AI here.

The Clippers latest loss to the Nuggets in Denver on Tuesday night highlighted one of the weak points of L.A.’s current roster construction, which is that with Mason Plumlee injured, they have just one big man in Ivica Zubac and have to play small an awful lot of the time.

Against Nikola Jokic and the Nuggets, that proved to be a bit of a catastrophe, as Denver scored on every single possession (aside from one late turnover) in the final six minutes of the game, as Jokic dominated smaller opponents and picked apart double teams when the Clippers sent help. While L.A. has plenty of other issues with making their star quartet work together, they also have to figure out how to best balance their roster and adding another big man would help do that.

That help will likely be arriving fairly soon, as Shams Charania and Adrian Wojnarowski report the Pacers and Daniel Theis finalized a contract buyout that paves the way for the German big man to sign as the Clippers new backup center.

Theis has mostly been out of the rotation in Indiana, as he doesn’t exactly fit their up-tempo style and has appeared in one game for eight minutes of action. In L.A., he figures to be a backup for Zubac while Plumlee is out, and with James Harden already lobbying for more pick-and-roll actions, he figures to find himself paired with Harden some to try and give the former MVP more of the action he wants when on the floor.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife proved to be a hit with fans of the classic ghost-hunting team, and now, Sony Pictures is bringing back both the new and old team for the sequel Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. Alongside the original Ghostbusters, Mckenna Grace and Stranger Things Finn Wolfhard reprise their roles as the next generation of Spenglers, who aren’t afraid of no ghosts.

Here’s everything we know about the supernatural sequel:

Plot

Picking up after the events of Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Frozen Empire drops Phoebe, Trevor and their mom Callie Spengler in New York City where both generations of Ghostbusters are in for the fight of their life.

Here’s the official synopsis:

In Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, the Spengler family returns to where it all started – the iconic New York City firehouse – to team up with the original Ghostbusters, who’ve developed a top-secret research lab to take busting ghosts to the next level. But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.

Cast

Reprising their roles from Ghostbusters: Afterlife are Mckenna Grace as Phoebe, Finn Wolfhard as Trevor, Carrie Coons as Callie, and Paul Rudd as Gary Grooberson. Frozen Empire will also bring back the original Ghostbusters cast of Ernie Hudson, Dan Akroyd, Annie Potts, and Bill Murray. Patton Oswalt and Kumail Nanjiani are also along for the ride.

Release Date

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire will scare its way into theaters on March 29, 2024.

Trailer

You can watch the official teaser trailer below:

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire opens March 29, 2024.

If you were unable to attend the 2023 edition of Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival, and for some reason also missed the Amazon Music live stream of Tyler The Creator’s epic set, have no fear. The full set is now available to watch on YouTube, from its claw crane opening to watching T charge around onstage firing a handheld flamethrower with a maniacal gleam in his eye. Clocking it at around an hour and three minutes long, the set encompasses tracks from across his catalog, from “Yonkers” to “Wusyaname,” including his “Lumberjack” call out to fans for booing Drake at the last Flog Gnaw festival.

One of the set’s other highlights is Tyler telling his fans that he won’t be playing any new music. “Y’all wanted new music?” he teased. “Aw aw, and I wanted a father, but you don’t get everything. So, I’m gonna go through my catalog instead, and you pieces of sh*t are gonna sing along.” Later in the set, though, he addressed one of the elephants in the room, saying, “COVID f*cked us!” and thanking fans for returning to Camp Flog Gnaw despite the time away. Although it isn’t captured in the video above, it seems like no one had more fun at Flog Gnaw than Tyler himself, as he joined Baby Keem and Kendrick Lamar onstage and jumped around in the photo pit at Clipse’s set, proving himself as much a fan as anyone else.

You can watch Tyler The Creator’s full set above.

Taylor Swift had Swifties in Argentina shook this past weekend. During the Latin leg of her Eras Tour, Swift gave a Midnights fan favorite a slight update. During a performance of “Karma,” a song whose lyrics contain “Karma is the guy on the screen / coming straight home to me,” Swift changed a single word, which made all the difference.

Swift sang “Karma is the guy on the Chiefs / Coming straight home to me,” which was met with cheers from the audience. The lyric change comes as a nod to her beau, Travis Kelce, who is the Kansas City Chiefs tight end. A clip that was later uploaded to social media sees Kelce hearing the change in real-time, and appearing equally as surprised.

On his New Heights podcast, which he co-hosts with his brother Jason, Kelce admitted that he didn’t know this would transpire.

“I might have had a little bit of a clue,” Kelce said, “but definitely when I heard it come out of her mouth, it still shocked me… I was like, ‘Oh, she really just said that.’”

This particular moment was well-received among the Swifties and Kelce himself, as was evidenced by the passionate kiss the two shared after the concert.

Tuesday night’s In-Season Tournament action saw the intensity get ratcheted up a few notches as a few games saw some scuffles with T’s handed out, with the biggest coming in the first two minutes of Wolves-Warriors when Klay Thompson and Jaden McDaniels got latched onto each other and refused to let go in a jersey tug-of-war.

That led to Rudy Gobert trying to pull Thompson off of McDaniels and then Draymond Green jumped in to throw Gobert in a chokehold, which he refused to let go of for some time. Luckily for the NBA, the chain of guys grabbing opponents from behind to drag them away ended with Draymond, who was ejected, alongside Thompson and McDaniels. After the game, Gobert called it “clown behavior” and said he wasn’t surprised, noting Green has a propensity to get tossed in games where Steph Curry isn’t playing.

Others weren’t as thrilled that Draymond was able to throw Rudy in a sleeper without having something happen to him, with former Wolves point guard Patrick Beverley laying out how he was disappointed in Karl-Anthony Towns, saying “I taught you better than that” and believing KAT should’ve thrown Draymond in a chokehold himself.

KAT is the perfect lightning rod for this exact kind of thing, as he’s never really shaken the “soft” label, but I can’t really blame him for not trying to earn his own ejection and suspension for escalating things. For one, that’s just not him, and beyond that, it would’ve been real bad for the Wolves if he got himself tossed from that game. I’m not surprised this is PatBev’s takeaway, but that’s also his role on a team. The star shouldn’t be the one risking suspensions and ejections, because they’re critical to the team’s ability to win. Neither KAT or Ant should be tasked with the goon role as well, and beyond that, it’s an NBA fight. It’s almost all performative, there weren’t actual fists flying, and we all know how the league adjudicates these things, handing down bigger punishments for those that escalate them further.

Yes, Draymond had Rudy locked in pretty good to that sleeper and he’ll unquestionably get a suspension for it, but you can let that go and go get the win, as they did. Beyond that, I doubt Rudy’s opinion on Towns has changed at all after this because KAT wouldn’t be the one you’d expect to jump in and throw hands for any reason in the first place.

2021 was a great year for music. This particular year reintroduced us to Billie Eilish, as she released her sophomore album, Happier Than Ever. This particular album turned the promising newcomer into a budding great — someone who will be remembered in the years to come. 2021 also introduced Olivia Rodrigo, a child actor turned singer, to a new audience, as her hit singles “Drivers License” and “Good 4 U” dominated the pop charts.

Having become very familiar with the ways of the music industry, Eilish felt a sense of urgency to protect her younger counterpart.

Is Billie Eilish’s ‘Goldwing’ about Olivia Rodrigo?

In an interview with Los Angeles Times, Eilish revealed that a Happier Than Ever deep cut was partially inspired by Rodrigo.

“Nobody has had anybody else’s life, you know? But I do feel a protectiveness over Olivia,” said Eilish. “I have a song called ‘Goldwing’ from my last album that’s kind of about her. I’ve never said that to anyone. It’s not only about her. I was just thinking about her when I was writing it. She was coming up, and she was younger than me, and nobody had ever been younger than me.”

On the song, Eilish sings:

They’re gonna tell you what you want to hear
Then they’re gonna disappear
Gonna claim you like a souvenir
Just to sell you in a year

This portion of the song may reflect the harsh realities of entering the spotlight at a young age. But thankfully, we know these young ladies are looking out for each other.

House of the Dragon had no problem overcoming the fiery train wreck that was the final few Game of Thrones episodes. Thankfully, the new series, a prequel, picks up George R.R. Martin’s Fire and Blood book and keeps the more crowd-pleasing part of “fire” intact. There’s a reason why walls of whole NYC buildings showed clearly visible battles from street level as people celebrated a new event series that focused upon Dragons and those with the Blood of the Dragon running through their veins.

In Season 1, the audience got to know King (of Bad Decisions) Viserys (RIP) with Paddy Considine delivering upon all of the mistake-making monarch’s physical ailments with excruciating detail. Princess Rhaenyra (Millie Alcock) eventually became Queen Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy), and Prince Daemon (Matt Smith) cycled through a few wives and generally acted like an unrepentant rogue before marrying Rhaenyra and not quite giving up that vibe. The season ended with Team Black and Team Green divided, seemingly for good, after Aemond unintentionally killed Luc, which has made this battle for the Iron Throne even more personal than it already was, years after Rhaenyra was disgusted by her father and Alicent’s decision to marry.

After HotD became a ratings home run, HBO rapidly announced that a second season would be in the works. Less than two years later, that season is done filming and is now taking the post-production laps before premiere. Let’s talk about what information has funneled out so far.

Plot

The Dance of the Dragons received a too-poetic label in the book, as GRRM acknowledged within the text. I guess that’s the Westeros sense of humor for you, but soon enough, we’re going to see the Targaryen house pretty much take each other out as much as possible through aerial battle, although the show is currently planned for four seasons, so not everyone shall slide down the walls of Dragonstone into oblivion.

We will meet even more dragons, and tellingly, Daemon’s late-first-season strategy moves include changing out the jilted Caraxes for the older Vermithor. His former rider? King Jaehaerys I Targaryen, who brought stability to the realm, and a huge part of that was the threat of Vermithor. Let’s just say that his new dragon is more imposing, even if poor Caraxes tried to deliver well during Stepstones battle. Also, it seems like a positive sign for Team Black that Vermithor did not try to eat Daemon when he began singing.

Presumably, Aemond still has the biggest dragon, Vhagar, even though he clearly cannot control her. And Team Green appears to have the public’s support in King’s Landing, given that Aegon II received quite the round of roaring applause. This, somehow, was enough to motivate Aegon into actually wanting to rule, but Team Black appears to have the military advantage as of now. Not only does Daemon have Vermithor, but there’s also Vermax (with Jacaerys riding), Syrax (with Rhaenyra riding), and Meleys (with Rhaenys riding). Seasmoke is still unclaimed, too, and hanging in Driftmark. And speaking of which, the Targaryens have the not only the skies covered but also the seas, given House Valaryon’s allied status.

The fighting will serve as the key plot point, and expect much more maneuvering on both sides. Perhaps Alicent will even whip those feet out.

Cast

Returning cast members include Emma D’Arcy (Rhaenyra Targaryen), Matt Smith (Daemon Targaryen), Olivia Cooke (Alicent Hightower), Ewan Mitchell (Aemond Targaryen), Tom Glynn-Carney (Aegon Targaryen), Eve Best (Rhaenys Targaryen), Steve Toussaint (Corlys “Sea Snake” Valaryon), Fabien Frankel (Ser Criston Cole the terrible), Sonoya Mizuno (Mysaria/that White Worm), and Rhys Ifans (Otto Hightower). Sadly, there shall be no more King Viserys unless the show decides to show Paddy Considine doing ghost form.

Release Date

Mercifully, the TV gods were allowed to continue production during the writers’ and actors’ strikes since scripts were already locked, and the production films in Europe. So, no delays from the original release plan have occurred, and HBO has confirmed that this show will return in early Summer 2024. That’s not too shabby for an epic production, and heck, it’s a lot faster than the back half of Game of Thrones.

Trailer

HBO is keeping the suspense in hand as far as footage goes. So far, there are zero legit teasers or trailers (although there are fakes/fan versions out there) for Season 2, but we are keeping our eyes peeled, and not in an Aemond way. There will be more developments coming!

HBO’s first ‘House of the Dragon’ season can currently be streamed on Max.

Rod Wave is currently on tour promoting his new album Nostalgia, but some concertgoers will look back at their night with anything but. Over the weekend’s tour stop in Washington, DC, parking lots around Capital One Arena were hit by a wave of car break-ins, resulting in a spate of tweets from attendees about their damaged vehicles. However, initial reports may have inflated the numbers somewhat; while there was an unusually high number of break-ins, it was nowhere near the reported figure of 200. (Yet another reminder to never take SayCheeseTV at face value.)

According to Newsone, a police spokesperson confirmed that “around 10” cars were broken into, with local reporters noting that in at least two cases, guns were stolen from the vehicles in question.

DC police have reported a surge in car-related crimes recently that even almost impacted President Joe Biden’s granddaughter Naomi Biden. A Secret Service agent said he fired at a would-be robber who tried to break into her car.

Meanwhile, Nostalgia turned out to be the Florida rapper’s fourth No. 1 album, hanging onto the top spot for two weeks despite negative reception from critics and abuse allegations that curtailed his promotional cycle. If “cancel culture” can’t stop him, these break-ins will probably only be a minor setback too.