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Writer sneaks 50 journals containing her life story into book stores across the America

“If Found Please Read” author and creator Madison White started her writing career with 50 handwritten journals and a plan to sneak them into book stores across the nation. She saved about $2,000 from her waitressing job and decided to cross the country on a Greyhound bus on her self-proclaimed book tour. What she didn’t realize was that her life would change before this adventure ever really started.


Her journals include what Madison refers to as “ramblings.” Unedited, unapologetic expressions of her life. In her writings, she tackles issues such as depression and what it was like to leave home, focusing on growing up and refusing to. She was going for raw, unedited and real.

At the start of each journal, Madison included her contact information in addition to a disclaimer and introduction to her work. She wrote that the first chapter may be hers, but that the second is the reader’s—an open invitation for them to tell their own life story. The point of this mission was to connect with strangers.

A few days before her planned departure, she went to a show and afterwards chatted up one of the musicians, explaining her “If Found Please Read” project and the journey she was about to set out on. A luck would have it, his band was breaking up and he was looking for renewed inspiration with his music. He invited himself along on her tour to play in coffee shops and bars as they traveled. He also happened to drive a Toyota Scion—a step up from the Greyhound bus.

@iffoundpleaseread

It’s just too much story! Part 3 after work and the kids go to sleep 😬 #itreallyhappenedthisway #iffoundpleaseread #streetlibraryproject #everyonehasastory #booktok #journal #story #guerillapublishing #storyforthegrankids

Madison couldn’t refuse that sweet set of wheels, and together they traveled across the country, clocking up 18,000 miles in his car. Her new friend played in coffee shops and Madison snuck her journals into bookstores, and at night they’d lay down the back seats and sleep in truck stops and parking lots. The first of Madison’s journals was found when they were passing through Portland. She received a text that read, “Is this real”?

Madison was jumping—someone had found her book. After back and forth texts, this complete stranger opened up to her saying how he related to Madison’s leaving home early because he too left home when he was young: his parents didn’t accept him coming out. Madison had embarked on this project as a way to connect with people and it had already proven to be a powerful tool.

As they continued traveling, Madison received more phone calls and texts, even meeting some of her perfect strangers in person. A total of 30 of her initial 50 journals were found and she deemed the trip a success. Oh yeah, and you may have guessed this already, but that musician who came on the road with her? Well they’re now married and have been for several years.

But here’s the really exciting thing: Madison’s starting it back up. This time, she’s on a mission to leave 1,000 handwritten journals for perfect strangers to find. You never know where they’re going to turn up! Happy hunting.

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Researchers nail down scientific reason for SIDS and it is lifesaving

Worrying over a sleeping baby comes with the territory of being a new parent. There are so many rules about safe sleep that it can be hard for parents to keep it all straight. Never let the baby sleep on their tummies. Don’t put soft things in the crib. That crib bumper is super cute but you can’t keep it on there when the baby comes. Don’t ever co-sleep. Never cover a baby with a blanket. The list of infant sleep rules designed to avoid Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, or SIDS, is endless.

SIDS is described as an unexplained death of an infant under the age of 1 year old. There is no determined cause and no warning signs, which is what makes it so terribly tragic when it happens. The worry over a sleeping baby stays with some parents far longer than it should. I recall my own mother coming to check in on me as a teenager, and I sometimes do the same to my own children, even though they’re well over the age of being at risk for SIDS. The fact that there is no cause, no explanation, no warning and nothing to reassure parents that their children will fare just fine means worrying about a sleeping child becomes second nature to most parents. It’s just what you do.


Well, maybe not anymore. Researchers from The Children’s Hospital Westmead in Sydney, Australia, have found a link to SIDS. The study released by the hospital explains not only how the babies succumb to SIDS, it also details why. For years, the medical community speculated that SIDS was caused by an unknown defect in the part of the brain that’s responsible for breathing and arousal from sleep. The theory was that the normal startle response to arouse a sleeping baby when breathing stopped or was obstructed didn’t work when the supposed defect was present.

Researchers in Australia analyzed dried blood from babies that had passed away from SIDS and compared it to infants who died of other causes and to healthy living infants. Through their research they were able to identify that the enzyme butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) was significantly lower in babies who died of SIDS in comparison to the other samples collected. BChE is a major factor in the brain’s arousal pathway, which explains why SIDS occurs during sleep.

If an enzyme that informs scientists of low BChE levels can be found in simple blood samples, this could be a game changer and a lifesaver. The hope is that doctors will eventually be able to devise a way to keep babies safe during sleeping hours, helping parents rest and reassuring those who have experienced the tragedy of losing a child to SIDS with answers.

Dr. Carmel Harrington, the lead researcher who helped make this discovery, lost her son to SIDS 29 years ago. She told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, “Nobody could tell me. They just said it’s a tragedy. But it was a tragedy that didn’t sit well with my scientific brain.” So she set out to solve the puzzle and provide some solace to grieving parents like her. “These families can now live with the knowledge that this was not their fault,” she said.

This discovery is groundbreaking for parents, doctors and scientists worldwide. The knowledge of what causes SIDS will inform research into a plan on how to proceed when low BChE levels are detected. Hopefully, when that’s achieved, everyone will sleep a little easier.

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Mom’s humiliating airport security experience shows why breastfeeding education is needed

Traveling without your baby for the first time can be tough. And if you’re breastfeeding, it can be even tougher, as you have to pump milk every few hours to keep your body producing enough, to avoid an enormous amount of discomfort and to prevent risk of infection.

But for Emily Calandrelli, taking a recent work trip away from her 10-week-old son was far more challenging than it needed to be.

Calandrelli is a mom of two, an aerospace engineer and the host of the Netflix kids’ science show “Emily’s Wonder Lab.” She was recently taking her first work trip since welcoming her second child, which included a five-hour flight from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C. Calandrelli is breastfeeding her son and had planned to pump just before boarding the plane. She brought ice packs to keep the milk from spoiling during the flight, but when she tried to go through airport security, the TSA agents refused to let her take some of her supplies.


Calendrelli shared the whole saga in a Twitter thread, which she initially deleted because she was embarrassed and anxious about the confrontation. She reshared the story in a new thread, saying, “They make too many mothers feel this way, so I’m going to talk about it bc this needs to stop.”

She explained that she was going through LAX security with two freezer bags, one of which was frozen. She only needed one frozen bag for the departing trip, but would need both of them for her return when she’d have more milk to keep cold.

“Two male TSA agents told me I couldn’t bring my ice packs through because they weren’t frozen solid,” she wrote. “I asked to speak to someone else and they had their boss come over and he told me the same thing.” He said that if she had milk on her or the baby with her, it wouldn’t be a problem. He also asked where the baby was multiple times.

Two things: 1) Why would she have breast milk with her on a departing flight when she had just left her baby? And 2) If the baby were with her, it likely wouldn’t be an issue at all because she likely wouldn’t have needed to pump in the first place.

Calendrelli said she asked multiple times to speak to a female agent and was refused. “They escorted me out of line and forced me to check my cold packs, meaning I couldn’t pump before my flight for fear it would spoil,” she wrote.

Technically, she still could have pumped to relieve engorgement and keep her pumping schedule and just dumped out the milk rather than storing it. But throwing out breast milk isn’t ideal, especially when you’re trying to manage your supply with a baby’s demand.

And as it turns out, the TSA agents were wrong. Passengers are allowed to have gel ice packs for medical purposes, and they do not have to be frozen.

But their understanding of the policy aside, the fact that they couldn’t deduce the need for the packs based on the reality of pumping breast milk speaks to the need for a broader education about breastfeeding.

Calandrelli shared that moms had flooded her inbox with their own TSA horror stories after she shared hers. “It is infuriatingly common to encounter @TSA agents who don’t know their OWN rules around bringing breast milk/formula pumping equipment on planes,” she wrote.

“Yesterday I was humiliated that I had to explain to three grown men that my breasts still produce milk when I’m not with my child,” she added. “Yesterday I was embarrassed telling them about my fear of mastitis if I didn’t pump. Today I’m furious.”

She also shared that the TSA agent treated her like “a petulant child, trying to sneak her toy through security” when he told her not to “try to sneak it back through another time.”

“There’s so much pressure to breastfeed, but @TSA makes it impossible,” Calandrelli wrote. “It’s yet another system in place that makes it harder for women to get back to work after they’ve started a family.”

Indeed, there are so many ways in which our society is not supportive of motherhood, regardless of the lip service paid to it. According to the CDC, more than 80% of babies are breastfed as newborns and more than half are breastfeeding at six months. Not all of those babies are necessarily exclusively breastfed, but it is recommended—and not uncommon—for breast milk to be a baby’s only food source for the first six months.

So we’re talking about millions of breastfeeders at any given time, many of whom will travel at some point without their babies and need to pump. And yet we have so many people who are clueless about breastfeeding. Shouldn’t the general population have a better understanding of how it works, considering that it’s a basic biological function and common experience? Isn’t this something we should be teaching in schools? It seems like it would be far more useful and valuable knowledge than much of what we force kids to learn and memorize.

If those agents had understood how breastfeeding and pumping work, there wouldn’t have been an issue at all. Pumping is, indeed, a medical need when a breastfeeder is away from their baby for a length of time. The agents wouldn’t have asked such bafflingly clueless questions or acted like this mom was doing something wrong.

If we really want to be a society that values families and supports babies, we need to make sure the basics of biology are understood and that systems don’t make things harder on parents than they need to be.

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This couple woke up one morning realizing they were snuggling a stranger’s dog

How many of us have woken up next to someone and thought, “Who is that, and how did they get here?” Recently, a woman named Julie Johnson had that “how did they get here?” moment, but it was a little different … there wasn’t a strange person in her bed, it was a strange dog. (Some might argue this is a much better option.) Johnson and her husband Jimmy woke up spooning a dog that wasn’t theirs, and they understandably had no idea where the comfy pooch had come from!

“It is absolutely normal to wake up in our house with one of OUR dogs in the bed with us,” Johnson wrote in a Facebook post. “One small problem, THIS IS NOT OUR DOG, nor do we know how she got in our house.” Again, there are worse problems to have, but waking up to a strange dog in your bed is definitely cause for concern.


Obviously the pup in her bed posed no real threat, as it was sleeping contentedly between the couple. A dog who wasn’t comfortable with people wouldn’t lay on your pillows like, “Don’t mind if I do,” that’s for sure. If a dog suddenly turned up in your bed though, you’d have to ask yourself, “Where did it come from?” Which is why Julie Johnson turned to Facebook to do some detective work. If anyone can find information quickly in a very slick way, it’s the fine people of the internet.

“This is the weirdest post I have ever had to make. 😂 Is this your dog? 🐕,” she wrote on the post.

Now for the question that’s probably on everyone’s mind: How did they not notice a strange dog climbing into bed with them? Well, the Johnsons already have three dogs. When you already have a pet in the bed, feeling an animal in your bed isn’t going to feel particularly off.

“At first, we thought it was one of ours, but they rarely lay on the pillows! In pitch darkness, I just assumed it was. Wouldn’t we all? As daylight began to creep in through our curtains we realized we were snuggling with someone else’s dog.”

Johnson told multiple news outlets that her dogs usually bark at anything and everything, but they didn’t bark at the intruder pup. Clearly, they saw the interloper as a friend, not a foe.

Thankfully, Julie Johnson’s Facebook post got spread far enough, and they were able to locate the pup’s owners. “PUPDATE: Her name is Nala and her mom is on the way to get her. Good luck getting her out of my bed mam,” Johnson amended her original post.

Nala’s mom, Cris Hawkins, made her own Facebook post, telling of Nala’s nighttime exploits.

“Our overly friendly pup, Nala, has hit an all time record for ignoring personal space and added yet another trick to her long list of houdini acts,” she wrote. She slipped her collar yesterday while being walked, ran down the street to a neighbors house, somehow managed to get IN their house, and climbed into bed with them in the middle of the night. Side note: They live quite a few houses down so I’m using the term ‘neighbor’ loosely.”

Nala is back home with her moms, and both Johnson and Hawkins have been sharing the ways her story has spread. Recently, Nala and her moms got to go back to the Johnson house, but this time they were invited for a playdate! Johnson shared the video, saying “We also had a long talk to the four of them about asking permission before spend the night parties commence!”

Here’s to a new lifelong friendship!

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Nonspeaking valedictorian delivers powerful graduation speech about using our voices

Valedictorian Elizabeth Bonker has not audibly spoken since she was little over a year old, after being diagnosed with autism. But she knows the power of communication. Her moving commencement speech was a captivating call to action for all who listened, including the millions of internet viewers who have watched and shared the video.

“The irony of a non-speaking autistic encouraging you to use your voice is not lost on me,” she told her graduating class, using her text-to-speech computer.

The small device became Bonker’s “one critical intervention” to break through barriers that made her unable to speak. Bonker noted herself as “one of the lucky few non-speaking autistics” for being taught how to type and express herself. It enabled her to emulate her hero Helen Keller, a deaf and blind woman who went on to become a respected author and disability rights advocate.


Overcoming communication challenges gave Bonker an empowered perspective. That strength and resolve came alive as she referenced Viktor Frankl’s “Man’s Search For Meaning” to illuminate the importance of forging one’s own path, before putting the concept into her own words.

“The freedom to choose our own way is our fundamental human right, and it is a right worth defending, not just for us, but for every human being.”

Being of service to others was another big component of Bonker’s speech. She provided pens to every student and asked them to write “life is for service” on a piece of their commencement program—a phrase created by the beloved Mister Rogers, their fellow alumni. She encouraged everyone to hold onto that message after graduation and use it to fuel their sense of purpose.

As for her own mission, Bonker’s dream is “communication for all.” That dream is fulfilled through her nonprofit organization, which works to provide other nonspeakers with helpful communication tools and education. She also shared her personal journey in her book “I Am in Here” to instill a sense of hope to anyone facing similar challenges.

There are several factors that might keep us from really speaking up and expressing ourselves, but Bonker’s speech beautifully captures why it’s a necessity not just for our own benefit, but to do more good in the world. Or as Bonker put it—to “be the light.”

“God gave you a voice. Use it.”

You can watch the full speech here:

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Lizzo And Selena Gomez Decided To Do A Collab Track In A Very Unusual Way

When Selena Gomez hosted Saturday Night Live this past weekend with Post Malone as the musical guest, Gomez embraced the role, doing a sneaky accurate Miley Cyrus impression during her monologue and even co-starring with the great Steve Martin in a sketch about inventing the Whoopie Cushion [insert fart noise here].

The actor and pop singer has been riding a high after a successful hosting stint (these days, as long as you don’t totally bomb, there’s a good chance you’ll be invited back someday) and took to TikTok to glow a bit. “How was snl? Iconic and I tried to be cool,” Gomez commented, on a video of her dancing in the SNL green room to Lizzo’s “About Damn Time.”

@selenagomez

How was snl? Iconic and I tried to be cool

♬ About Damn Time – Lizzo

It didn’t take long for Lizzo, who’s a bit of a TikTok Queen herself, to have some fun with the video of Gomez. In a separate TikTok video, Lizzo superimposed herself doing the same dance moves as Gomez in front of the former’s video. It ends with both of them laughing at themselves (each other?) and Lizzo’s comment on the clip said simply “Collab? @Selena Gomez.”An elated Gomez, quickly replied to Lizzo’s post, saying “YES YES YES.” And that, is how we will someday (soon?) have a Lizzo and Selena Gomez collaboration track. Happy Monday.

Lizzo is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

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Fans Think Freddie Gibbs Performed With A Swollen Eye After A Confrontation With Associates Of Benny The Butcher In Buffalo

Freddie Gibbs is well-known for being one of hip-hop’s top trolls, but it appears that his mischievous ways may have caught up to him recently. Fans on Twitter are convinced that Gibbs’ back-and-forth with Benny The Butcher escalated into a physical altercation ahead of Gibbs’ show Sunday night in Benny’s native Buffalo, New York. The evidence backing these claims is a series of photos posted to Twitter that seemingly depict Gibbs performing with swelling around his eyes — the type you might expect from someone who’d recently been in a fight (or stung by a bee, I suppose).

There have certainly been a number of tweets that purported to have seen the incident in question. One commenter claimed, “I just saw Freddie Gibbs get beat up and his chain took while I was eating in buffalo Ny.”

The feud appears to have begun — at least publicly — with Benny citing that the duo’s working relationship “came and went” during an interview with Spotify. Gibbs issued an ornery response on social media, saying, “Just keep my name out y’all mouth when y’all talking to people or doing interviews,” in a video on his oft-suspended Instagram. They have been trading barbs ever since. Incidentally, one of those barbs was Freddie inviting an unnamed critic to a “head-up fade.” If he really did have a run-in with Benny’s crew, it looks like that invite was officially turned down.

Before this, though, they seemed to enjoy an amicable working relationship, with Benny appearing on Gibbs’ 2020 album Alfredo (on the song “Frank Lucas“) and Freddie returning the favor on Benny’s own 2020 project Burden Of Proof.

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Leikeli47 Proves Her Genius On The Eclectic And Innovative ‘Shape Up’

The RX is Uproxx Music’s stamp of approval for the best albums, songs, and music stories throughout the year. Inclusion in this category is the highest distinction we can bestow and signals the most important music being released throughout the year. The RX is the music you need, right now.

Back in 2019, the fourth episode of the second season of the Black-ish spinoff Grown-ish featured the debut of Leikeli47’s video for “Tic Boom.” The lead-up to the video throughout the episode found the show’s cast preparing a watch party for a mystery artist’s video premiere, with the cast debating what makes a musical genius. The episode was an obvious reference to then-recent album premieres from the likes of Frank Ocean and Kanye West, who both got name-checked, along with Chief Keef, Drake, and Young Thug.

Then, one character makes an observation that seems obvious in hindsight but highlights an ongoing problem in pop culture – especially when it comes to hip-hop. Why are all the so-called “geniuses” men? Even now, in an era with more female rappers charting than ever before – from Cardi B and Doja Cat to Latto and Saweetie – somehow, female artists still seem to receive less attention and respect than their male counterparts. I was reminded of this over the past weekend, as my social feeds buzzed over Kendrick Lamar’s new album.

Less pronounced was the buzz for Leikeli47’s new album, Shape Up. The culmination of a beauty shop-themed trilogy including 2017’s Wash & Set and 2018’s Acrylic, on the surface, Shape Up also bears all the hallmarks of a work of rap genius. As part of a trilogy, the 14-track project comes with rich mythology of its own built by the masked rapper’s prior works. Leikeli has always defied convention, eschewing both contemporary and traditional hip-hop sounds to craft her own unique, dancefloor-ready take on the genre. She’s as informed by the drag ballroom scene as she is the trap house, with beats featuring influences from house, techno, and dancehall.

She’s also a superb rapper with one hell of a hook; taking a page from the book of the late, great MF DOOM, she has yet to make a public appearance without one of her signature face masks. She makes them herself out of bandanas and balaclavas, occasionally bedazzling or otherwise embellishing them. We don’t even know her real name; she’s like a modern-day hip-hop superhero, using her anonymity to put the focus squarely on the boundary-pushing, eclectic style she’s pioneering.

It’s hard to hear booming, confident jams like “Chitty Bang” and “LL Cool J” without wondering how they aren’t as ubiquitous as those of her female peers – let alone the breezy No. 1s accumulated by men like Drake, Future, and Jack Harlow. They’re every bit as catchy and transportive, every bit as relevant to the times, every bit as quotable and cocksure, with lines like “It’s all checks and balances, baby, the world is mine,” feeling just as much like potential Instagram captions as any of the catchphrases the above-mentioned names have offered recently.

And Leikeli can sing, too. I mean, legitimately sing, not that weird, atonal humming thing a lot of rappers have been doing in recent years. On “Done Right” and “Hold My Hand,” she switches to full-on R&B, offering tender reflections on romance and relationships minus the toxicity that’s marked the genre lately. Meanwhile, “BITM” and “Jay Walk” practically beg the listener to catwalk, strut, and vogue like it was the ball culture heyday of the late 1980s. And lest anyone doubt her rap skills, her storytelling takes the fore on “Free To Love,” while her wordplay shines on “Instant Classic.”

If this album — this consistency and cohesion in eclecticism, this total commitment to the presentation, is not the work of a genius, then the list of who all deserves such a title needs to get several dozen names shorter. If anything, the muted buzz of excitement leading up to this project’s release just proves that in hip-hop, eclecticism can be a disadvantage as much as a strength. Pushing the genre’s boundaries can earn an artist a lot of love from critics and fans, but it can just as easily take them too far beyond the margins for rap centrists who want the genre to remain the same as much as they want it to grow.

It also proves that hip-hop still has a long way to go in terms of truly including women in the conversation. Just recently, both Lil Wayne and Ja Rule admonished their peers and successors to acknowledge the contributions of women in hip-hop, with Wayne singling out Missy Elliott for her own innovative catalog. Incidentally, one of the names Leikeli47 is most often compared to is Missy (both are from Virginia, which may explain their sympathetic resonance with one another). Sometimes, it feels very much like we’ve failed the latter, who only recently began to receive flowers in the form of lifetime achievement awards and belated shout-outs from the rappers she’s inspired. The same can’t happen for Leikeli47. They say genius is never appreciated in its time, but today, we certainly have the opportunity to acknowledge her as the genius she’s already proven herself to be.

Shape Up is out now on RCA Records. Get it here.

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Woj: Teams Will Be ‘Lining Up’ To Give Deandre Ayton A Max If The Suns Don’t Want To

The Phoenix Suns have entered their offseason earlier than expected after laying an egg in Game 7 of the West semis against the Mavs, getting thoroughly outplayed by Luka Doncic and company, who seemingly made the Suns quit on their home floor by halftime in a must-win game.

It was an astonishing thing to watch because the hallmark of the Suns for the past two years has been their fight and resiliency, only to fold almost immediately under the pressure applied by Dallas in the biggest game of their season thus far. While an impressive performance from Dallas that made it clear that they have grown from postseason heartbreak in recent years, it raises some questions about the Suns and where they stand going into this summer.

Another Finals run would’ve all but guaranteed the Suns run it back again, no matter the outcome, but with Chris Paul very suddenly looking old (to the delight of some like Patrick Beverley) and a weird situation involving Deandre Ayton and Monty Williams that saw the star big man play just 17 minutes in Game 7, that doesn’t seem assured.

The Suns brass will huddle up over the next month-plus to figure out their path forward, but with cap room tight, Ayton figures to be the decisive piece on how they will proceed. Ayton was not given the max extension his fellow Class of 2018 cohorts were, and he wasn’t happy about that but pressed on this season. For the Suns, they’ll have to decided whether to match a max offer or look to swing a deal for him (as just letting him walk doesn’t solve any cap issues). Bringing him back locks them into this group with little flexibility to make changes, but obviously this group has a high ceiling when everything is clicking. If they believe something needs to change, though, he is the only avenue to make significant upgrades elsewhere on the roster via a sign-and-trade.

ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski laid out those options and made clear that there wasn’t a world in which Ayton wasn’t getting a max this offseason, it’s just a matter of where he ends up. The Suns can match any offer sheet, but if they want to trade him, they’ll need to work with Ayton to find the place that best fits what he’s looking for in a team who can also offer something substantial in return for the Suns to get something out of the former No. 1 overall pick.

It is rather stunning that Ayton finds himself in this position given his growth into a very good big man and a crucial piece of a Finals team last year. Still, his inconsistency in effectiveness and impact on games was evident this postseason, and the Suns may view their biggest need as some more ball-handling and creation rather than a big man who needs others to get him involved offensively. Ayton still has room to grow, and if he taps into that remaining potential, he’ll be well worth a max, but Phoenix clearly has questions about whether he will take that extra step.

Other teams won’t be as worried about that, believing they can bring the rest of it out of him and seeing the potential two-way dominance as a welcome addition worthy of a max. While the list of teams that can clear max cap space is very small, there are far more that could put together the salaries necessary to bring him in on a sign-and-trade. One would expect the majority of those teams to reside in the East, given the presence of Joel Embiid, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Bam Adebayo, and other quality bigs.

When July 1 rolls around, we’ll start to learn where all parties involved stand, and it’s possible the West’s top-seed will see a major shakeup.

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Pixar Releases The First Details About Its Next (Probably Adorable And Emotionally Gutting) Movie, ‘Elemental’

Disney and Pixar have started teasing details about their next surely beautiful to look at and emotional as heck animated feature, Elemental. Directed by Peter Sohn (The Good Dinosaur), the film will focus on characters named Ember and Wade in a city where residents representing the — you guessed it — four elements live together. According to Sohn, the film will pull heavily from his early years living in New York with his immigrant parents.

Via The Hollywood Reporter:

“My parents emigrated from Korea in the early 1970s and built a bustling grocery store in the Bronx. We were among many families who ventured to a new land with hopes and dreams — all of us mixing into one big salad bowl of cultures, languages and beautiful little neighborhoods. That’s what led me to Elemental,” the native New Yorker said in a statement.

You can check out Elemental concept art featuring the fiery young woman Ember and “go with the flow guy” Wade below:

Elemental Concept Art
Pixar

Elemental is tentatively slated to hit theaters on June 23, 2023. We say tentatively because Pixar employees have been bummed to see films like Turning Red and Luca get shifted to Disney+ during the pandemic. Obviously, the situation was unavoidable, and they get why Disney made the call, but these artists were a little let down after working for years for what they thought was a theatrical release.

Hopefully, Elemental will have smoother sailing towards its theatrical release, both for the artists and crew involved in making it and for, like, the rest of society, too. Real win-win there.

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)