Time to dig into this week's can of the trashiest news and gossip! by Elinor Jones Hi, Trash Pandas, and welcome to another Trash Report! I'm really happy you're here. You know this season of Love is Blind is bad when I'm working on my column before I'm fully caught up on the episodes. They're all so charmless! And wtf, all the action happening off camera? I need to know who to be mad at! I should probably quit watching, but then something incredible happens like Monica making Stephen Venmo her immediately upon breakup, and I'm sunk back in. I'm dying to know how much money it was. I hope it was a really precise amount, like $212.53. Drag that sleep test perv down to the last cent.  I like how I felt proud of myself for writing instead of watching trash TV, but then I just wrote about the trash TV. Whoops! Focus up, Joneser: there are real issues to discuss. For example: Arnold Palmer's Wang At the DNC a couple months ago, everybody thought it was so very funny when Barack Obama made a joke about Trump's obsession with crowd sizes, but moving his hands in a way to suggest it was really about dick size. "Ha ha," we all said. "Hilarious metaphor!" Y'all, Trump is for real for real obsessed with dick sizes! But oddly, not his own?! At a recent event in Pennsylvania, Trump went off-script and talked about the late golfer Arnold Palmer having an impressive member. At least, it's been reported as having been off the cuff. But I wonder—what if it wasn't? What if that line was workshopped by highly paid consultants who determined that a crowd who would gather to watch this man speak after decades of despicable behavior would respond quite warmly to descriptions of Arnold Palmer's dick? "That's my guy," they say homophobically. And then: "We also love huge dicks," they say heterosexually. You're kinda with me, right? It was definitely a premeditated statement. But a very weird one! For a guy who gets teased about his tiny hands, if he's going to commit to dick sizes as a talking point, why not bloviate on his own?  i was making love to my wife and she kept saying she wished she had an arnold palmer. when we were done i said “i’ll go get you that drink” she said “what drink?” pic.twitter.com/6l3D70WyRH — Ben Rosen (@ben_rosen) October 20, 2024 And you know how Trump is always trying to court famous people? He just got none other than famously racist celebrity chef Paula Deen in his corner. Is she cooking for him? Her cuisine isn't known for being heart healthy. I'm just saying that's interesting.  Trump chased that with a photo op at a McDonald's, where he stood in the kitchen of a closed restaurant to give french fries to people who were specially selected and screened by the Secret Service. The minimum wage in Pennsylvania is $7.25, so Trump would have been paid a whopping $1.80 for his 15 minutes on the line. The guy loves money, so here's some silver lining: Maybe when he violently seizes control of the government after losing a democratic election he'll finally support raising the minimum wage?? Kamala Harris, meanwhile, has also been barnstorming all the swing states, and Usher made an appearance at a rally in Georgia. The move was presumably to court young Black voters, but Usher came out dressed like a wealthy middle-aged Black woman. One specific woman, in fact, and that woman is Olivia Pope of the television show Scandal. Seriously, click through and peep that outfit—the creaminess of it all! Can someone photoshop in a bowl of popcorn and a GIANT wine glass? No disrespect, I too would drape myself in cashmere if I were rich, but if the goal was connecting with the average voter, I'm not sure if luxury textiles are the look.  Wholesome Restoration Break Politics are gross and getting grosser (and I love them—I have a problem) but you know what is the the experiential opposite of that? Actor Andrew Garfield appearing on Sesame Street to talk to Elmo about the grief he carries from losing his mom to cancer five years ago. I lost my dad to cancer 13 years ago and I'm still sad about it. Does Elmo make house calls? I've never really taken to therapy, but I bet that curious red puppet could heal me.  Allow me to apply some more balm to your weary soul: A giant inflatable pumpkin got loose in Ohio and when police were called in to clear it from the road, the pumpkin went straight for them, swallowing them up in its shit-eating grin. Welcome to the resistance, giant inflatable pumpkin.  More About Sizes The series Shrinking was just renewed for a third season. When making the press rounds, star Jason Segel claimed that Harrison Ford signed on to the project after seeing Segel's full frontal nudity in Forgetting Sarah Marshal, and said he had a "good dick." This is a great anecdote because it will never be refuted. Is anyone going to interview Harrison Ford and say like, "care to comment on Segel's claim that you were impressed by his hog?" No! Nobody would dare. Harrison Ford is a famously grumpy person to interview and he would be so mean to anyone who asked him a question like that. This was a perfect slam dunk for Segel, who gets to walk around with that unverified story for the rest of his life.  In other news about private parts (and there is an awful lot this week—I'm sorry!) rapper Ice Spice was called out on social media for wearing a lacy dress that revealed her nipples to the Victoria's Secret fashion show. But like, what else are you supposed to wear to a VICTORIA'S SECRET fashion show?! Nipples are the whole theme! Meanwhile, Sabrina Carpenter is building an entire empire off being a horny young woman dripped out in lace; she'd wear an outfit like this to run errands. Of course, Sabrina is sexy while small and white, so it's not ~dangerous~ when she does it. Me clocking out of work after doing the bare minimum #VSFashionShow2024 pic.twitter.com/plh3hrrlma — anoceangoddess (@Anoceangoddesss) October 15, 2024 Local Trash Portland State University just laid off some 90 non-tenured-track employees, as reported by our own Kevin Foster. Hey quick question: what the actual fuck? Why is everything so goddamn expensive and we pay so much of things like college when normal working people keep getting screwed over? I've never worked in academia, but I've heard there's no money in it—what exactly do colleges do with all the money people give them? I am legit asking. I don't understand the math AT ALL. And I get the election year defense that "it's not a recession!" and "the GDP is actually very huge, which means the economy is great!" but like, where is it? Donald Trump would have to sling fries at McDonald's for an hour and a half just to afford a jar of peanut butter; getting yelled at that things are fine is deeply insulting and honestly kinda gaslighty!  White ppl b like I had a turkey apple cheddar sandwich for lunch — claude (@508mph) October 17, 2024 In other local news, Portland's wildly successful Bike Bus program—where neighborhoods group up kids to take over streets and ride on wheels en masse to school—has just invited Justin Timberlake to join a ride. The rationale for this, according to an organizer, is that "everyone knows who he is." Justin Timberlake will likely join said ride, if only as a "fuck you" to the cop who pulled him over for driving drunk and had no idea who he is. "The children of some Portland neighborhoods still like me," he said needily.  That's all for now, besties. Like all of you, I received my ballot over the weekend and I'm so excited to vote! A lot of people are working very hard to turn out votes here in Oregon, and the sooner you get your ballot in, the sooner the texts and phone calls will stop. Oregon has consistently had some of the highest voter turnout in the nation, and as a lifelong teacher's pet, I want to make Stacey Abrams proud, so don't fuck this up for me. Jimmy Carter already voted and that man is, quite literally, 100 years old. I say this as I have not yet voted. But I will very soon! My eyebrow girl can't get me in until tomorrow and I cannot possibly be expected to concentrate (during my voting selfie) if the face isn't dialed in—I saw how dirty you all did Carter about how he looked voting! JK (kinda!) Voterly,