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- Flamethrowing Dogs, Costco Gold, and the Sounds of Steven Seagal
Flamethrowing Dogs, Costco Gold, and the Sounds of Steven Seagal
Vol. 1, No. 3
Kyle Bunch
April 28, 2024
Welcome to Sunday Bunch, the weekly newsletter that gets you up to speed and ready for what’s coming in the week ahead. I’ll be your host, Kyle Bunch.
If you’re receiving this “preview edition,” you’re one of a chosen few, the people whose creative input I value the most.
Your thoughts, suggestions, ideas, etc are not expected, but definitely appreciated. You can reply to this email or shoot a note to [email protected].
On with the show…
The Rundown
The highs and lows of the week that was:
📵 TikTok got banned. The long-discussed legislation found its way through Congress, and Biden signed in short order. China retaliated, while potential acquirers are gathering war chests to get in on a potential sale, one that could take awhile as ByteDance saber rattles, promising to fight (and win) or shut down TikTok altogether.
🏈 Reggie Bush got unbanned. The USC legend and Kanye eskimo brother got his Heisman back1 , was welcomed back into the club by fellow winners like Tebow, Ricky Williams, and of course, Matt Leinart. Nature is healing.
🏛️ Trump’s Pecker was out. It was a less gassy week in Manhattan’s justice system, but a new sack of crap did stink up the courtroom: David Pecker, the publisher of the National Enquirer, took the stand to testify about his alleged role in buying and burying stories of Trump affairs.
💰 Costco’s pot of gold. Costco is moving $200 million in gold bars per month, roughly 80,000 oz. Point of comparison, China’s Central Bank purchased 160,000 oz ($400m) in March. Sure, but does the Central Bank have $1.50 hot dogs? 🌭
🤼 The Chairman sells out. WWE Founder Vince McMahon had already been exiled, but now he’ll divest of his remaining shares in WWE’s new parent, TKO. The sale should net McMahon three quarters of a billion dollars (at market close on Friday, they’d be valued at ~$779 million).
He may be gone, but we’ll always have the memeories.
@bleacherreport 😢 (via @WWE) #lebron #stephcurry #kevindurant #russellwestbrook #jamesharden #nba
💯 Cheat Sheet
A few things you should know heading into this week:
🍏 Apple is upgrading. Last week they made the latest in a series of acquisitions, scooping up Datakalab, a French company specializing in algorithm compression and embedded AI systems, the kind that might help Siri be smarter even without a connection to the internet.
👘 Meta opened the kimono. You have to hand it to Zuck, he lost like $18 billion this week and he was still in a giving mood. After advocating for “open computing,” the Facebook founder has been putting Meta’s code where his mouth is, open-sourcing their Llama 3 language model and now Horizons OS, the operating system that powers Meta’s Quest headsets.
🧚 Disney’s all-in on parks. Iger’s pumping $60 billion into expansions and new experiences at Disney parks, including almost $2 billion at the original Disneyland. The investments will help create new lands (think Avatar or Moana), as well as Disney Imagineering moonshots like autonomous robotic cast members.
🌵 There will be agave. With Cinco de Mayo on Friday, pour one out for the real heroes: the brave athletes, celebrities, and influencers working overtime to oversaturate the market ensure we have plenty of tequila options.
Did this meme dominate your feeds this week like it did mine?
(click for video + 🔊)
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POINT ⚡️ COUNTERPOINT
Robot Dog with a Flamethrower
🤖 🐕 🔥
Against
In the last twenty years, we’ve doubled the size and weight of our cars, we’ve brought to market countless new weapons for hunting, self-protection, the threat of civil war, etc. The last thing we need to add to a crazy person’s arsenal is a $10,000 robot dog that shoots fire.
For
The beauty of the robot dog flamethrower is its broad cultural appeal with the internet’s favorite characters. It’s not just the people who collect AKs like they’re Funko Pop dolls.
From the guy who trusts the self-driving on his Cybertruck too much to the dude that got stabbed at the Waffle House after a drag race gone wrong, to the rich parents who would rather give their son2 a weapon of war than have to hear him complain one more time, the robot dog with a flamethrower has the potential to bring a divided America together.
(Paid for by Robot Dog Flamethrower for President 2024.)
Musical Interlude
Twenty years ago this week:
The ponytailed purveyor of justice, Steven Seagal, dropped this track that was enough to make Bruno Radolini blush:
In 2004, Steven Seagal released a dancehall song called "Strut" in which he sings in a fake Jamaican accent and his first line is "me wan da poonani."
— Historic Vids (@historyinmemes)
2:20 AM • Apr 23, 2024
🥋 Step into the dojo and listen to the full album 🥋
Songs from the Crystal Cave
Spotify | Apple Music
Sports
🏈 The Bears nailed it. Former USC QB/amateur nail artist Caleb Williams was selected by the Chicago Bears as the #1 pick in the NFL Draft. Chicago fans are ecstatic, even if the new face of the franchise has been described as “if Prince played quarterback”.
⚾️ Shohei Ohtani is good at baseball. He’s leading MLB in just about every offensive category (with teammate Mookie Betts at #2). This week, he hit a 450-foot missle in DC that had the Pentagon on alert, then went up to Toronto and hit a 120 mph single.
🏀 Nobody beats LeBron 12 straight times. The Lakers staved off a 🧹 against Jokic and Denver last night, so the start of “where will LeBron and Bronny play in 2024-25?” summer is delayed by at least two days.
Playoffs continue today with a packed Sunday slate:
Time (ET / PT) | TV | |
|---|---|---|
Knicks vs Sixers | 1pm / 10am | ABC |
Clippers vs Mavs | 3pm / 12pm | ABC |
Bucks vs Pacers | 7pm / 4pm | TNT |
Wolves vs Suns | 9:30pm / 6:30pm | TNT |
How did we do?What did you think of this week's Sunday Bunch? |
Thanks again for reading. Have a great rest of your weekend.
Cheers,
KB
1 - ICYMI, Bush’s Heisman reinstatement puts the University of Southern California at 8 total Heisman trophies, the most in all of college football.
2 - Let’s be real, with the robot dog flamethrowers, the owner will always be a dude. Don’t expect to see a lot of bachelorettes torching wild brush with the remote control pooch.
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