HeyJaredActually Good Things
A weekly guide to what you might want to buy, try, do, or at least look into. Written by longtime shopping writer Theresa Holland.
- Indexed issues, last 90 days
- 11
- Latest publication
- Sep 18, 2026
- Audience
- Checking…
- Earliest in this view
- Jul 3, 2026
Latest issues
Are pants a prank? (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Actually Good Things is a weekly newsletter written by a consumerism culturist.This week—while pondering Disney execs’ choices to feature certain reality TV characters on which shows with what storylines and when—I’m thinking about the best bottoms.Pants season is upon us. A welcome change, as wearing shorts can be an emotional rollercoaster punctuated by wedgies.Is it just me, or do pants feel like a prank lately? Like, just when you feel like you’ve fou
Ode to tortoiseshell (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Actually Good Things is a Friday-morning newsletter written by an internet expert who’s tested, like, a lot of stuff.This week—while watching nearly all of Sterling Point in a day (I was sick) and going, “Hey, it’s pretty good,” followed by “Ah-ha! It’s partially improv”—I’m thinking about one of my favorite patterns: tortoiseshell.Tortoiseshell mimics the natural shell of an actual tortoise. Well, technically not a tortoise—the hawksbill sea turtle.It’s got that speckled, mottled, resin-like ap
Witches are so back (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Actually Good Things is a weekly newsletter with product recs and musings on what we buy and why.This week—while working from home among feral, un-camped kids and weeping softly through the Travis Barker documentary (America’s sweetheart, folks)—I’m cheering for the witches of our current moment.Like fashion trends, hype over supernatural beings comes in waves: vampires, zombies, mermaids, ghosts. Right now, it’s witch szn. Leading us into crone culture, we’ve got Practica
Back-to-school by proxy (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Actually Good Things is a Friday-morning newsletter with recommendations from a human being who makes a living testing products.This week—while rewatching Cruel Intentions, a film for the ages set during the prelude to a new academic year—I’m getting into a back-to-school (by proxy) mood.An unexpected pleasure of being a parent is reliving the back-to-school season from the sidelines. And personally, September feels more like a start to something than January 1.Here are actually good things a gr
August, the Sunday of summer (opens the original)
Read excerpt
Actually Good Things is a weekly newsletter authored by an internet expert who knows what to buy and why.This week—while making my friends take a big sniff of Gap’s throwback fragrances and watching them transport back to middle school via olfactory-evoked memories—I’m doing a summer send-off.Seasonal travel is done, camps are wrapping up, and the new school year is approaching. I’m not in an ~autumn state of mind~ yet, but it does feel like the sunny season is nearing its end.And that’s fine ‘c
Publishing over time
Last 90 days. Choose a month to open its work.
Recurring subjects
Named in the text we hold. One piece can cover several.
Audience
No verified audience measurement yet.
About this data
Counts cover the work we have indexed. Tone needs enough text and a confident classification. Excerpts and episode notes are not full articles or transcripts.
Identity or attribution wrong? Suggest a correction.