Notes from the Weekend & this Week’s Links 07.04.25

THE SCREENS tell us global markets are in freefall. Business Insider quotes Mark Cuban advising Americans to “go to the local Walmart or big box retailer and buy consumables now. From toothpaste to soap, anything you can find storage space for.” I notice people across the Atlantic taking heed—some with bathroom cabinets now stocked with enough makeup and skincare to last seasons, others quietly eliminating small luxuries: DoorDash, spontaneous shopping trips, dinners out. There are those in the US rushing to upgrade iPhones before rumoured tariffs push prices up by 43%. A $2,300 phone seems absurd until you consider it inevitable. The economic data provides context for these concerns—in 2024, the US imported $7.59 billion in beauty goods in 2024 alone. Perhaps their stockpiling isn’t entirely irrational.

Things are becoming so dire that one of the Substacks I subscribe to recently featured a catalogue of all the products she had been marketed alongside free alternatives she recommended. I realised I hadn’t encountered any of these advertised items myself. The irony wasn’t lost on me when, rather than being drawn to her frugal solutions, I found myself coveting the spring jacket she’d been targeted with—desire persisting even as economies falter.

Here in the UK, despite everything, a strange calm persists. Cherry and magnolia blossoms open against grey skies as if nothing has changed. Summer approaches—my favourite season—while elsewhere numbers fall and panic rises. This morning, P prepares for an early video call. We’re leaving on a trip today, our first in some time. The world might be unraveling in spreadsheets and headlines, but we still pack our bags and watch the blossoms.