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The rising cost of living in the United States, combined with new technologies that make it easier to work wherever you like, has made it much more attractive for some to live and work in another country. Over 50 countries have made it easier by easing visa restrictions to encourage digital nomads to work within their borders.

Further, many people simply don’t like the rise-and-grind corporate mentality pervasive in the U.S. and prefer places that offer shorter workweeks, more vacation time and robust support systems.

They’re tired of the hustle and bustle of the American work culture and are looking for a life that values personal happiness, family and relaxation.

Jeronimo Noriega is an American expat showing zero interest in returning to his hometown of San Antonio, Texas. The 27-year-old student has been living in Oviedo, Asturias, in Northwest Spain for the past 14 months after his family decided to pack up its bags and explore a new lifestyle.

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In a viral TikTok video that has been seen over 5.4 million times, Noriega makes the case for why he has no interest in returning to Texas after falling in love with the Spanish way of life and cost of living.

@jeronimoooo0000

Who needs to be rich anyways give me some culture boiii

The first thing that Noriega admits is that salaries are better in Texas. However, everything balances out when you consider the cost of living. He says that people who make around €30,000 ($33,000) a year in Spain are “middle class” and that if you make €90,000 ($98,000) you can live like a king.

“Listen, if you’re making 90 grand in the north of Spain, where I live right now, you’re going to work in a limo. You’re getting drinks at the Tennis Club after work,” Noriega said in the video. He also enjoys having 3-course meals with wine and coffee for “like 20 bucks.” In an interview with Business Insider, he said he routinely eats “delicious” dinner for just $11.

But what he really doesn’t miss about life back in Texas is the rise-and-grind lifestyle.

“What am I supposed to be in Dallas 2 hours a day and the car to get to work it back and never have time to do anything? No way,” he said in the video.” I love the work culture in Spain,” he told Business Insider. “In America, I felt like my only options were to rise and grind and get beat down by the machine, but everything is different here. In Spain, they seem to value their lives over their work — it’s not even a work-life balance.”

He also says that in America, there is a deep dread within the culture that he doesn’t feel in Spain. “I love the US, but even the mood is different here,” Noriega admits. “In the US, there’s turmoil going on underneath. No thank you.”

So, Noriega has no plans of returning to the U.S. anytime soon.

“Now that I’ve had a taste of what life is like outside the rat race, I’m not eager to get back on the wheel,” he told Business Insider. “Life is long, and you never know what will happen, but I’m staying here for the foreseeable future. All I have to do is take a walk to the coffee shop, have a delicious dinner for $11, or take a break in the middle of a weekday to remind myself why I’m staying.”

“To bee, or not to bee,” is a line of dialogue in The Beekeeper, a movie so delightfully stupid I couldn’t help but kind of love it.

As I write this I saw The Beekeeper five days ago and for the life of me I can’t stop thinking about its absurd plot. A plot so absurd that it kind of overshadows how cheap the movie looks. When I have told people the plot of this movie, I can hear my words coming out and I sound like a crazy person. Once I convince the listener that I am not making any of this up, the response, every time, has been, “I need to see The Beekeeper.” So I am going to do that now because if you thought you didn’t want to see The Beekeeper … well maybe you actually do want to see The Beekeeper?

In David Ayer’s The Beekeeper, Jason Statham plays Clay, also known as The Beekeeper. The Beekeeper is both an actual beekeeper and retired member of some unstoppable super secret government strike force that, according to this movie, makes SEAL Team Six look like “pussies.” The Beekeeper has just delivered some homemade honey from his beehive to his neighbor, Eloise (Phylicia Rashad), right before she falls for an internet phishing scam that not only wipes out her bank account, but the bank account of her employer. So distraught, she shoots herself in the head.

The Beekeeper finds the now-deceased Eloise and vows revenge on the internet scammers. But Eloise’s daughter, Verona (Emmy Raver-Lampman), also happens to be an FBI agent and at first blames The Beekeeper for her mother’s death. Once that’s sorted out, Verona is now tasked with both finding the internet scammers and making sure The Beekeeper doesn’t wage a war of destruction, but also deep down kind of wants him to wage a war of destruction.

So all of this happens in the first 20 minutes of the movie. I just kind of assumed the rest of the movie would be The Beekeeper using any means necessary to find the scammers, resulting in a climatic showdown. That is not what happens. The Beekeeper finds the scammers’ boiler room-type facility fairly quickly (The Beekeeper called in a favor) and burns it down. The Beekeeper literally walks into this office with two large gas cans and sets the place on fire. Apparently, the scammers have offices all over the country, run by a rich tech bro named Derek Danforth (Josh Hutcherson). Derek Danforth and his consigliere, Wallace Westwyld (played by Jeremy Irons, who I can only assume added a new wing to his estate for appearing in The Beekeeper), send their goons after The Beekeeper, which does not go well for the goons. Ending with The Beekeeper telling Derek over the phone that he is going to kill Derek. Derek relays this information to Wallace, mentioning in passing the whole Beekeeper thing, and Wallace gets a hilariously grim look on his face and says something to the effect of, “A beekeeper told you he’s going to kill you. Yeah, you’re dead. There’s nothing that can stop him.” To Wallace Westwyld’s point, nothing does seem to stop The Beekeeper. He’s more efficient than The Terminator. I don’t think there’s one moment in this movie where anyone thinks, “Oh no, The Beekeeper is in trouble now.” Nope, just nothing but success for The Beekeeper.

Okay, here’s the part that I love. The part that separates The Beekeeper from being a dumb January action movie to a hall-of-fame dumb January action movie that, again, I can’t help myself from loving. The whole scamming enterprise is a subsidiary of a larger corporation that Derek is now running. The reason Derek is running the company now is because his mother had to recently step down from the company to become the President of the United States. Yes. Yes! Yes! This is fantastic. You know what that means? This goes all the way to the top! So to get to Derek, The Beekeeper will have to make his way past United States Secret Service. There’s a line Wallace Westwyld delivers that delighted me so much where he explains that the Secret Service is no match for a Beekeeper. So in response to this Derek hires a gang of Scottish mercenaries. This movie, hot damn. It just does not care. I can’t help but respect all of this. Please create an honorary Oscar for The Beekeeper. Dame Judi Dench walks on stage, “And the Oscar for most chutzpah without caring even one time about its audience’s intelligence goes to … The Beekeeper.” Jason Statham then runs up with a big smile and says something like, “Always bee true to your convictions. Bee safe. Bee well. Woo!”

The Beekeeper, as you might expect, is filled with enough bee puns to last a lifetime. You will never need one again. Actually, you may never need to see or want to see a movie again period.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.

The Los Angeles Clippers have been on a tear of late, moving into fourth in the West as they’ve hit their stride with James Harden alongside Kawhi Leonard and Paul George — with Russell Westbrook coming off the bench.

What made the Clippers so interesting this season is it had the potential to be the last year of this current era of stars, as Kawhi Leonard and Paul George both have player options this summer and James Harden is set to be a free agent. However, a big chunk of that possible offseason pressure was alleviated on Wednesday when, suddenly and with no notice from the usual suspects on Twitter, the team posted that Kawhi had signed an extension.

“We’re thrilled to continue our relationship with Kawhi. He is an elite player, a terrific partner and a relentless worker who knows how to win and makes it his first priority,” Lawrence Frank said in a statement. “He elevated our franchise from the moment he arrived. We feel fortunate that Kawhi chose to join the Clippers five years ago, and excited to keep building with him.”

It was an extremely rare major signing where the team got to break the news themselves, and none of the NBA’s big newsbreakers had a clue it was happening or what the details were. Adrian Wojnarowski, Marc Stein, Shams Charania, Chris Haynes, and everyone else who is plugged in to every agency and front office in the league was left in the dark, only able to tweet some form of “Kawhi Leonard has signed an extension, the team says,” without any details on length or how much money it was for.

It’s really incredible for this to happen in the current media climate, but if there was ever a star capable of pulling it off, it’s Kawhi Leonard, who rather famously moves in silence. There is also progress on a Paul George extension to line up with Leonard’s, as Woj reported after Kawhi’s signing.

About half an hour after the Clippers announced the extension, Shams finally tracked down the details on it, which is a 3-year, $152 million contract that is fully guaranteed — which is obviously a big detail given Leonard’s injury history.

Has Donald Trump eaten his last Big Mac? No, of course not, what a ridiculous question to even ask. But the former president, who once claimed that a White House doctor told him that he’s “the healthiest president that’s ever lived” (even though he doesn’t believe in exercise), has recently lost some weight.

A source told Page Six that Trump is “staying away from the Mar-a-Lago buffet” with help from his wife, Melania. The insider added that he’s “allegedly ‘dropped at least 30 pounds,’ and that ‘people at the club say he’s eating healthier,’ and less from the buffet.” He hasn’t been seen “scarfing down ice cream sundaes or chocolate cake with two scoops of vanilla ice cream on it.”

Trump has the palate of an eight-year-old. It’s honestly the most enjoyable thing about him.

In November, his personal physician, New Jersey’s Dr. Bruce Aronwald, wrote, “I am pleased to report that President Trump’s overall health is excellent.” He added, “Trump has reduced his weight through an improved diet and continued daily physical activity while maintaining a rigorous schedule.” Trump’s weight was reportedly listed as 215 pounds [in August] when he surrendered to Georgia authorities on charges related to his alleged efforts to overturn 2020 election results there.

Weight-loss drugs like Ozempic are popular in Florida, where Mar-a-Lago is based, but Trump is supposedly shedding the pounds the ol’ fashioned way. “He does lots of sport,” a source said. It’s true: he spent nearly a year of his presidency doing one sport in particular.

(Via Page Six)

Rick Grimes left The Walking Dead in Season 9, Episode 5, but it feels much longer than 5-6 years ago since he tied his record for “worst horse ride” in the entire franchise, doesn’t it? Our real-life world feels almost as chaotic as one with walker hordes and killer nuns, after all, so let’s just say that it’s been a long time, and viewers will finally be able to see Rick’s boots onscreen once more in The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live.

This isn’t happening in a movie as originally planned but, even better, in a full-on spinoff starring Andrew Lincoln and Danai Guirira as Rick and Michonne. She went looking for her missing husband as well, and she’s evidently found him from the looks of the above trailer. And how is Rick doing after life in the CRM? Not so fantastic! Janis/Anne (Pollyanna McIntosh), who is the reason that he ended up there in the first place, is also still kicking in this trailer, but Rick seems like he’s barely keeping a lid on being unhinged while in custody and otherwise starting to let his fury fly.

And boy this show is not shying away from teasing the possibility of Rick losing his hand in the promotional material for this show, since we received another look at that glove. Let’s do the synopsis thing:

The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live presents an epic love story of two characters changed by a changed world. Kept apart by distance. By an unstoppable power. By the ghosts of who they were. Rick and Michonne are thrown into another world, built on a war against the dead… And ultimately, a war against the living. Can they find each other and who they were in a place and situation unlike any they’ve ever known before? Are they enemies? Lovers? Victims? Victors? Without each other, are they even alive — or will they find that they, too, are the Walking Dead?

Wait for the end of the trailer. Yep, there it is.

AMC’s The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live debuts on February 25.

We are just weeks away from Super Bowl LVIII, during which Usher is set to perform the Apple Music Halftime Show. With over three decades worth of hits to his credit, Usher‘s halftime performance is sure to be iconic. And, we hear that the “Good Good” hitmaker is kicking it into high gear ahead of the show.

According to the Sunday Mirror, Usher is currently hard at work in rehearsals as the Halftime show is imminent. He is also reportedly on a very strict dining regimen.

“The Super Bowl has always been on Usher’s bucket list and he wants to be in the best shape to give the performance of his life to the 100 million-plus people watching. He has quit all sugar and alcohol and is rehearsing endlessly,” said a source to Sunday Mirror.

Upon the initial reports, fans noted similarities between Usher’s pre-performance diet and that of Beyoncé’s ahead of her 2018 performance at Coachella.

One fan on Twitter even noted “He on that Beyoncé Homecoming diet. We’re in for a treat.”

However, some may consider Bey’s a little more extreme, as she gave up alcohol, sugar, caffeine, meat, dairy, and bread, as revealed in her 2019 Netflix documentary, Homecoming.

Super Bowl LVIII broadcasts live on Sunday, February 11 at 6:30 p.m. EST on CBS.

I should hold a grudge against Andy Reid. I should be furious with him. I am a lifelong fan of the Philadelphia Eagles, a team known for having raucous and unruly and deeply petty fans. He coached the team for many years and never won a Super Bowl despite numerous runs deep into the playoffs. Then, after his tenure in Philly ended, he signed on with the Kansas City Chiefs and went on to win two Super Bowls, including the one held in 2023 where he faced, you guessed it, my beloved Philadelphia Eagles. In any rational world, based on the stereotypes of the fanbase I represent and my own personal deeply petty streak, just seeing his mustachioed face on my television should raise my blood pressure to worrying heights.

And yet.

Here I am.

Watching the “nuggies” commercial again and smiling like a huge goofball.

Look at Andy Reid in that commercial. Look at his face. Look, specifically, at his eyes and the little devious twinkle that appears as he walks his fingers across the table to snatch another nibble from his quarterback’s tray. He’s adorable. I want to hug him. I also want to go out and get a bunch of chicken nuggets to eat, which is extra funny because it’s not even a commercial for food. It’s a commercial for State Farm insurance. I already have State Farm insurance. This commercial, which I love, has accomplished exactly nothing for them with me as an individual consumer, other than making me love Andy Reid and crave junk food. I don’t even know if my own State Farm coverage is good. I should look into that at some point. After I get some chicken nuggets. An important part of being an adult is prioritizing things based on necessity.

It’s not his only State Farm commercial, either. There’s a whole campaign built around him and Jake. Look at this one where he’s being a little rascal with a Sharpie…

… and this one where he gives Patrick Mahomes an award and ends up thwarted by the quarterback’s loose-cannon shenanigans.

Again, adorable. Again, look at Andy Reid’s face this entire time. The man is a natural at this. He’s so good at it. He’s so good at it. Better than any football coach should be. Football coaches are maniacs, a fraternity of too-intense weirdos you would probably never want to talk to at a barbecue. Most of them look like they are in physical pain when they’re forced to talk or think about anything other than football. Most of them even chew intensely, like if they go at it hardcore enough they can somehow defeat a stick of Juicy Fruit.

But there’s Andy, right up there, a cuddly little giggle bear popping up between airings of that godforsaken Jardiance commercial, looking like the friendliest and silliest dude you’ve ever met. I… I think I love him. I’m not even conflicted about it, even given the Eagles of it all, which is ironically something I feel kind of conflicted about. And it’s all brought me, after a lot of thought, to two conclusions…

ONE: Somehow, against staggering odds, despite a slew of deep-pocketed advertising agencies mining every improv class in California to pluck out charismatic theater geeks who score well with various test groups, Andy Reid — a man who has spent most of his adult life in a dark film room watching people bonk their heads together — has become America’s greatest working commercial actor.

TWO: If he ever decides to hand in his clipboard and headset and move on from the grind of being a head coach in the NFL, someone — looking mainly at Mike Schur here, for reasons that will become clear in a second — should cast him as like the goofy chief of a bumbling police force in a sitcom set in a small town, or as the goofy manager of a diner staffed by goofball servers and cooks or really anything along those lines. Just put him in charge of a group of bozos and let him cook. Give him the kind of gig that Nick Offerman had on Parks and Recreation and Andre Braugher had on Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Steve Carell had on The Office. Not exactly like any of them, obviously. Tailor it to his strengths the way those roles were tailored to those actors’ strengths. But it could work. I swear. I swear it could work. I am as sure about this as I have ever been about anything.

In conclusion, not only is Andy Reid so good at this that he’s made me — Eagles fan, idiot, not necessarily in that order — find him absolutely adorable, he’s also so good at it that I didn’t even get mad when Snickers hired him to basically rip-off their own iconic “Who are the Chefs?” commercial from a few decades ago.

Please.

Someone.

Mike Schur.

Listen to me.

Get Andy Reid on television.

It’ll be great.

I bet.

Think about it.

Thank you.

This time of the year is usually a season of new beginnings, but for singers Stefflon Don and Jada Kingdom, it has been a time for the airing of grievances. The two artists have spent the week exchanging shots at each other in a feud that has drawn in Nigerian superstar Burna Boy and spawned a never-ending stream of reactions from fans. So, here’s an explanation of the players and how it all went down.

Who Is Stefflon Don?

Stefflon Don is a British-Jamaican rapper and singer whose 2017 breakout included appearances on tracks with the likes of Lil Yachty and French Montana and a MOBO Awards win for Best Female artist. She was featured on the 2018 XXL Freshman cover, and has continued to release singles throughout the past few years. She dated Burna Boy from 2019-2021, which is relevant to her feud with Jada Kingdom.

Who Is Jada Kingdom?

Jada Kingdom is a Jamaican dancehall singer who has gained popularity over the past four years thanks to high-profile collabs with artists like Popcaan and Skillibeng, with her most recent EP, Love Experience, dropping early this week. Her debut album, Twinkle will likely release sometime this year. She was romantically connected with Burna Boy in 2023, but has more recently been linked with Pardison Fontaine after his break from Megan Thee Stallion.

Why Do Stefflon Don And Jada Kingdom Have Beef?

On Tuesday (January 9), Stefflon Don released a new song, “Dat A Dat,” in which she slags off an unidentified female rival, accusing her of substance abuse, high body count, and selling her body for favors like jet trips. While she does not name Jada Kingdom specifically, the implication is that their time with shared beau Burna Boy may have had some overlap.

In any case, hit dogs holler, and Jada Kingdom may have felt like Stefflon Don was calling her out. She released her own track later that day, called “London Bed,” and cut through any ambiguity by making the artwork a photo of Steff with her eyes Xed out. She appears to respond, calling out the Londoner to “buss a move an’ meet mi anyweh.”

Today, Steff woke up and chose violence, coming back with her own response song, “Deadgyal Walking.” Like Jada, she dispenses with any pleasantries, getting right to the point — which is that she doesn’t think much of her would-be rival. The disses continue in much the same vein as “Dat A Dat,” accusing Jada of being a… shall we say, “loose woman.”

While Jada has yet to respond to this latest diss track, she doesn’t seem too invested in the beef to begin with. She had already seemingly moved on Tuesday, dropping an unrelated single called “Big Buddy,” as if to suggest she has more important things to do. She also said during a live she wasn’t sweating Burna Boy, who she deems kind of a hoe.

Meanwhile, fans have been watching and laughing, somewhat flabbergasted that all this apparently started over a man.

Hip-hop’s consummate trickster, Lil Nas X, has started off the new year doing what he always does: Riling folks up on the internet. After all the complaints about devil worship that were flung at the rollout of his last project, Montero, he’s apparently adopted a policy of malicious compliance, going to the other extreme with a “holy man” persona that has the same exact demographic calling for his head again — big surprise, right?

The accusations being leveled at him this time are that he’s “mocking” Christians — i.e. the same people who spent a year throwing him under the bus for his method of self-expression (not to mention his sexuality). While Nas accepts that his reputation as a troll somewhat demands that his actions be taken with a heavy grain of salt, he also denies that the purpose of this rollout is to mess with his biggest critics — at least, not solely.

But even looking at the imagery he’s shared at face value, it could hardly be said he’s mocking anything. He’s got a point; his reputation has led to this interpretation more than anything he’s shared about the new direction his visuals have taken. By casting himself as the subject in reproductions of well-known art pieces — pieces that do admittedly have religious overtones, if inaccurate ones — he has much more to say, though, than sticking out his tongue at religious adversaries.

First things first, it seems we need some art history lessons. Just like when Doja Cat had to explain the 15th-century inspirations behind her tattoos last year, it seems that adding some context could shed light on why so many people are up in arms about Nas’ promotional artwork. The single cover, which depicts Nas in the process of being crucified, is a clear reference to tons of Renaissance-era depictions of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion from the Bible, but it’s not like those depictions are strictly accurate.

https://twitter.com/LilNasX/status/174439236029821424

In fact, depictions of Christ have been controversial throughout history, with some traditions outright banning them. The Renaissance works from which we’ve taken the majority of our modern understanding of religious imagery were commissioned by the Roman Catholic Church in the 15th and 16th centuries, long after anyone would have even known what the historical Jesus would have looked like. Nas is reproducing these images, yes, but more as an expression of his appreciation of Renaissance art than as the mockery some assumed — for instance, the cover art for his No. 1 single “Montero (Call Me By Your Name)” took inspiration from Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam, which adorns the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

Likewise, Nas is far from the first artist to reproduce famous Renaissance depictions of Christ and similar iconography in his work. Before pop matron Madonna was wearing grills and du-rags, she was irritating conservative thinkers with videos for songs such as “Like A Prayer,” which juxtaposed crucifixes with sexual imagery, evoking the Church’s long, knotty entanglement with the subject of sex. The elder rap Nas depicted himself being crucified — a rather common execution practice during the Roman Empire, it should be noted — in his video for “Hate Me Now.”

As fans on Twitter pointed out, artists ranging from Kanye West to DaBaby to Tupac to Kendrick Lamar have all incorporated some aspect of these well-known symbols into the presentation and promotion of their art — symbols that were, again, invented in at least their broad aspects by artists who lived over 1,000 years after the events imagined in their work. Likewise, contrary to come of the complaints leveled at Lil Nas X, these religion-themed works are far from the only classical artwork that modern artists have reproduced or referenced to sell their music.

As for why it may seem that way, well, it’s probably because those are the works that are the most ubiquitous in Western culture. After all, it’s not like there were toy commercials disguised as kids’ cartoons name-checking the most famous West African or East Asian artists. Much like some of those early Christian traditions, some religions outright ban depiction of their most holy figures — why do you think no one ever dressed up as Muhammad for Halloween?

While Lil Nas X is far from the first or only artist to receive some modicum of backlash for his reproductions of classical Renaissance interpretations of Biblical stories, it does seem as though he’s gotten an outsized amount of it. While some of that can probably be attributed to his rep as a troll, with folks interpreting anything he does as making fun of something, it’s obvious that a lot of it stems from religion’s inability to reckon with queerness as a concept. The sad part is, like the Renaissance images Nas appropriates for his promotional campaigns, homophobia isn’t actually intrinsic to Christianity, either. But that’s a conversation for another day.

Lil Nas X has been active in the lead-up to his new single “J Christ,” whether he’s maybe (but maybe not) enrolling in a Biblical studies program, showing off some genuine gospel music, or re-creating the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. His “J Christ” video is set to drop this Friday, but ahead of then, he has again indulged in attention-grabbing antics with a new video teaser.

The 20-second video shows a long line of people in white robes, walking through a field, which looks like the iconic Windows XP wallpaper, and up a literal stairway to Heaven. In that line are a bunch of celebrity impersonators, of Taylor Swift, Kanye West, Mariah Carey, and Barack Obama, as well as a couple who aren’t quite as perfect a visual match but who appear to represent Ed Sheeran and Oprah Winfrey.

Ever since he first burst onto the scene with “Old Town Road,” Nas has proven that he’s a viral marketing master, and this whole “J Christ” rollout is just another shining example of that.

In response to backlash over his crucifixion image, Nas wrote, “the crazy thing is nowhere in the picture is a mockery of jesus. Jesus’s image is used throughout history in people’s art all over the world. I’m not making fun of sh*t. yall just gotta stop trying to gatekeep a religion that was here before any of us were even born. stfu.”

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.