The Daily Valet. - 10/1/21, Friday

✔️ We're Still Here

October 01, 2021

Friday, October 1st Edition

Cory Ohlendorf, Editor in Chief of Valet.

I’ll be finishing ‘Squid Game’ this weekend. How about you?

Cory Ohlendorf, Editor ⋯ @coryohlendorf

Today’s edition is presented by

Today’s Big Story

The Government Didn’t Shut Down

Biden signs bill hours before deadline

Congress on Thursday approved a measure to fund the government into early December, and President Biden signed the bill hours later, staving off a shutdown that was set to occur after midnight.

The House voted 254-175 to advance the measure. Just hours earlier, the Senate voted 65-35—a display of bipartisanship in both chambers. The back-to-back votes by the Senate and then the House averted one crisis, but delays on another continue as the political parties dig in on a dispute over how to raise the government’s borrowing cap.

The cap allows the government to rack up debt to pay its bills. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has told Congress that her agency will run out of flexibility to avoid missing payments after October 18, at which point Washington would face the unprecedented threat of default unless Congress acts.

The new spending bill does not include the debt limit increase. But it does include money to resettle Afghan refugees, disaster aid for victims of Hurricane Ida and support farmers who lost crops from drought, wildfires and hurricanes.

Meanwhile, the House is bracing for a highly anticipated vote on an infrastructure bill (that may not have the support it needs to pass). Some progressives have vowed to vote against the bill to invest in the nation’s roads, bridges and other infrastructure—angry that Democrats have not yet reached agreement on a multitrillion-dollar companion bill with funding for social services and to address climate change.

After the liberal revolt, Democrats said they would bring the measure back up later today, giving them more time to agree on a separate social safety net bill. The New York Times said the accomplishment of Thursday’s spending bill was “overwhelmed by the acrimony on display within the president’s own party.”

↦ Dig Deeper: What’s in the bipartisan infrastructure bill? From Amtrak to roads to water systems, here’s what you need to know.

Big Drop in Teen Vaping

But health officials urged caution in interpreting the new data

Teen vaping plummeted this year as most American students were forced to learn from home during the pandemic, according to a government report released Thursday.

Still, an estimated 2.06 million U.S. middle and high school students are regularly using electronic-cigarettes with Puff Bar, Vuse and Juul among the most popular products.

And while that's a 40% drop from last year, health officials urged caution in interpreting the numbers, which were collected using an online questionnaire for the first time. Once kids are grouped back together in school, the puffing could come back.

But even before the pandemic, a number of new restrictions were curtailing underage use of e-cigarettes. And according to the Associated Press, some kids may have recently been scared off by an outbreak of vaping-related illnesses and deaths (most were tied to a filler in black market THC vaping liquids).

↦ FYI: About 85% of youth e-cigarette users overall said they used flavored products with fruit, candy, desserts or other sweets being the most popular.

Partner

When the weather turns, you need protection. Nothing is more comfortable, or reliable than a waxed jacket.

The End of Robocalls?

The FCC will close a loophole that still lets foreign scammers reach your phone

You may've noticed that you're getting fewer spam calls lately but the Federal Communications Commission still has a lot of work to do to put an end to them.

CNET says it's like a game of whack-a-mole: Stop one and more pop up. But Jessica Rosenworcel, acting chair of the Federal Communications Commission, thinks she's found a new hammer to stop the illegal automated spam calls originating from overseas.

She's proposing to close a loophole in FCC regulations to require “gateway providers” to stop robocalls before they get to your phone. The agency adopted the proposal, called the Targeting Gateway Providers to Combat Illegal Robocalls this week.

The providers would be required to know more about their overseas customers, for instance by confirming that the customer is authorized to place a call using a North American telephone number. The providers would also have to block calls if the FCC flags them as illegal.

↦ FYI: On average this year, U.S. consumers have received 4.3 billion unwanted calls a month.

A Weekend Pairing

Squid Game + Soju

Have you seen the South Korean dystopian horror thriller Squid Game yet? Maybe you've only heard things about it this week. Or perhaps you've started it but haven't gotten to episode six yet (hang on!). In any case, this is what you should do this weekend: Fire up Netflix, sit back and sip on some Soju to calm your nerves.

British GQ calls the show “bonkers and addictive but also, crucially, emotionally resonant.” It's also been called everything from silly and immature to thought-provoking and uncompromising—truly an original and surprising mixed bag. Vulture says just two weeks after its premiere, the show has become a massive social-media phenom and the No. 1 show on Netflix's popularity charts in 90 countries, including the U.S.

So what's it about? The drama centers around a group of people (all down on their luck and deeply in debt) who play each other in life-or-death games to win an insane amount of money. The stakes are high, the visuals are vivid and when you're eliminated from this game, you're really eliminated.

↦ Your Pairing:What better to sip while watching this than Korea's national spirit? This one from Hwayo is a traditionally distilled rice soju aged in oak barrels. There's a faint grain-like sweetness with a hint of citrus, not unlike chewing some Botan rice candy.

In Other News

↦ This Amazon Prime Perk Ends Oct. 25. Here’s What It Means for Your Membership.

↦ More Than Half of U.S. Police Killings Are Mislabelled or Not Reported, Study Finds

↦ Scarlett Johansson, Disney Settle Explosive ‘Black Widow’ Lawsuit

Other Things We’re Talking About Today

James Bond’s watches

Electric scooter racing

These ‘Squid Game’ masks

Partner

The Old School Remedy for Bad Weather

Why waxed cotton will never let you down

Invented in a Scottish mill that wove sails for the British clipper fleet back in the 1850s, waxed cotton canvas was developed to waterproof a mariner's clothing and gear. Which is how the legendary British brands like Barbour and Belstaff got the idea to start fortifying their outerwear with a wax coating to combat wet, rainy conditions.

Over the decades, the multi-step process has been refined, yielding jackets that are lighter and more breathable, but still impervious to inclement weather (not to mention road burn and other potential hazards). But thankfully, the protective coating still develops that distinctive worn-in patina after some thorough wearing. They're the ideal outerwear for transitional weather, when the coated cotton shell provides an equal amount of warmth, breathability and protection from precipitation.

Flint and Tinder raised the comfort levels on the classic waxed jacket by cutting theirs from Martexin 7 oz. sailcloth and lining it all the way with a soft, insulating flannel—even down the sleeves. It's so popular, the jacket now comes in nine different colors and holds the record as Huckberry's best-selling jacket of all time. Unlike most of the other waxed jackets on the market, this one is soft right out of the box. But then it molds to your body and gets even softer.

And that's not the only jacket they offer. There are a slew of outerwear options, all benefitting from that proactive waxy layer. Herewith, just a few of our favorites from Huckberry's fall lineup.