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In a meeting with airline CEOs and coronavirus response coordinator Deborah Birx, Donald Trump let everyone know how much better he is at coronavirusing than the rest of us.

After discussing what airlines are doing to protect passengers and what passengers can do to protect themselves (seriously, wash your hands!), Trump chimed in to tell the room, “I haven’t touched my face in weeks,” adding “I miss it!”

In a humorous moment, as Dr. Birx talks about precautions people should take in washing their hands and not touching their face amid coronavirus outbreak, President Trump interjects: “And I haven’t touched my face in weeks, in weeks. I miss it.” https://t.co/aiXgwPARlr pic.twitter.com/T5ckD9y2qj

— ABC News (@ABC) March 4, 2020

He was, obviously, joking. (And it is legitimately hard to avoid touching your face.) But it’s still a weird time to try to get a laugh. 11 people in the US have died from COVID-19, with at least 149 known cases across 13 states, and Trump and his administration seem determined to screw up their response to the epidemic at every turn.

Trump: “I haven’t touched my face in weeks. I miss it.”

A real president: https://t.co/KsUzM7YINJ

— Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) March 4, 2020

On top of that, many people were quick to point out that his statement wasn’t even accurate. Not that jokes have to be 100% factual but come on:

Here’s President Trump on Monday during a coronavirus meeting https://t.co/yA7mJ2qjBL pic.twitter.com/kM4e4aDqdU

— Tyler Bartlam (@tylerbartlam5) March 4, 2020

By the way, someone should pass that advice on to Mike Pence, Trump’s appointed head of the coronavirus task force. This is from the same task force meeting as that picture of Trump:

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We’re so f***ed.

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Arguably one of the most popular and most successful golfers to play the game, Tiger Woods has been named a finalist to be inducted into the 2021 World Golf Hall of Fame.

“The Nominating Committee has selected 10 finalists who represent the highest caliber of golfers and contributors,” said Greg McLaughlin, CEO of the World Golf Foundation. “The recent enhancements to the World Golf Hall of Fame Induction criteria provide a great process to ensure the most worthy of candidates are being considered. We are grateful to the Nominating Committee for their work and anticipate the Class of 2021 being one of our strongest to date.”

The 10 finalists were selected by the Nominating Committee, which is made up of 26 individuals, including six Hall of Fame Members: Juli Inkster, Hale Irwin, Meg Mallon, Colin Montgomerie, Mark O’Meara, and Karrie Webb. In determining these individuals, each finalist met the necessary qualifications in his or her respective category by way of on-course accomplishments or significant contributions to the game.

This comes on the heels of an announcement by the World Golf Hall of Fame in January of implementing several changes to the rules of eligibility. According to the World Golf Hall of Fame website, “Changes to the eligibility include lowering the age of a Male or Female Competitor from 50 to 45 years of age or three years retired from the game. A player will be eligible for Induction provided he or she turns 45 the year of the Induction Ceremony. Additional changes include elimination of the Veterans category and replacing “Lifetime Achievement” recognition with “Contributor.” 

“Recognizing the game’s greatest players and contributors is an important endeavor and one our sport takes very seriously,” said World Golf Foundation Board Chairman and PGA TOUR Commissioner Jay Monahan in a written statement. “We are committed to regularly evaluating the selection process to ensure we approach it with both historical context and the future in mind. I believe these changes benefit the Hall of Fame Members, fans across the world and the institution.”

The World Golf Hall of Fame released the names of 10 finalists who will be considered for enshrinement in 2021. The list of finalists includes Male and Female Competitors and Contributors. 

Below is the list of finalists (listed alphabetically by category): 

Male Competitor (4) 

Johnny Farrell, United States 

Padraig Harrington, Ireland 

Tom Weiskopf, United States 

Tiger Woods, United States 

Female Competitor (4) 

Susie Maxwell Berning, United States 

Beverly Hanson, United States 

Sandra Palmer, United States 

Dottie Pepper, United States 

Contributor (2) 

Tim Finchem, United States 

Marion Hollins, United States

Woods’s contributions to golf keep mounting, despite more than a decade of health challenges and personal issues. With his victory at the 2019 Masters, Woods claimed his first major title in nearly 11 years. He tied Sam Snead’s career record of 82 PGA Tour wins later that year.

Source: Courtesy Of / Black Women Talk Tech/From L to R (Esosa Ighodaro, Regina Gwynn and Lauren Washington)

“Write the vision and make it plain” is a spiritual tenet that many of us who were raised in Black households live by. It is a lighthouse propelling us to live out our dreams without fear and in full authority of who we are called to be.

Each year an extraordinary group of Black women ascend into New York City with this same vision, armed with enterprising ideas and the vigor of creation by attending the Black Women Talk Tech Conference. It is the premiere event built by Black women for Black women in the tech space. Founders Esosa Ighodaro, Regina Gwynn, and Lauren Washington, revealed the conference expanded beyond their wildest dreams after hosting the first retreat in 2016, followed by the inaugural conference in 2017.

Source: Courtesy Of / Black Women Talk Tech

“When we first started Black Women Talk Tech, we didn’t start it to be a business, or a conference or anything,” Washington said. “We started it because we had this need to meet other founders and figure out how we can support each other and create these billion-dollar businesses,” Washington said.

“We didn’t know there was this much interest. And there’s so much interest not even just nationally, across the country, but internationally,” said Ighodaro.

On February 27-29, Ighodaro, Gwynn and Washington celebrated their fourth conference in New York City, a monumental feat considering the lack of diversity and inclusion in the ever-changing tech field. The women met in 2015 and chipped away at what was then a vision, creating a meeting space for Black women with big ideas.

But what’s important and critical about remembering the tech field is the wide range of industries which intersect within the space. The women attending and running Black Women Talk Tech are purveyors within a variety of fields related to beauty, public health, travel and technology.

Ighodaro is the founder of Nexstar, a platform helping content creators connect with Fortune 1000 companies to produce marketing campaigns. Washington founded Fundr, a platform that automates, diversifies and democratizes seed funding. Gwynn is the creator of TresseNoire, a hair care app dedicated to the specific needs of Black women.

Source: Courtesy Of / Black Women Talk Tech

Since 2017, the conference attendees swelled from 300 to over 1,000, including the expansion of chapter organizations in 10 local markets, and one in London. The four pillars of the conference are education, research, promotion and funding, using the tagline, “Roadmap To Billions.”

“Part of the reason why we want to say ‘Roadmap To Billions’ is because a lot of people don’t talk about money in that way, especially women,” Ighodaro said. “We wanted people to really know we’re being bold here and saying, ‘Hey, we’re going to have billion-dollar companies run by Black women.'”

View this post on Instagram

Congratulations to the 2020 Roadmap to Billions Pitch Competition winner, @infiuss, a blood delivery app for underserved communities!!! Special congrats to the 2nd & 3rd place winners, @tequityco and @viageur #BWTTCON2020 #BWTTRTB #BWTT #RoadmaptoBillions #BlackGirlMagic

A post shared by BlackWomenTalkTech (@blackwomentalktech) on Feb 29, 2020 at 2:30pm PST

“Part of the conference is specifically for Black women founders,” Washington said. “The first two days we have a retreat and then a founder’s day and we actually vet everyone who comes through that so that we know everyone’s on the same page and looking for the same type of content and connection, and then the summit is open to everyone.”

Unlike other events and spaces specifically held for Black communities, both Washington and Ighodaro say the conference has been warmly welcomed in the tech space. This year’s conference saw a variety of sponsors including Target, Nike, Microsoft and Goldman Sachs, as well as coveted speakers who forged new lanes in their respect fields like Courtney Adeleye, founder of The Mane Choice Hair Solution, Cara Sabin, CEO of Sundial Brands, and New York Congresswoman Yvette Clark.

View this post on Instagram

Our #WCW goes to the founders of #BWTT! We’re still on a high from #BWTTCON2020, but we just had to shout out the women who brought the vision to life! Established in 2017, Esosa Ighodaro, Regina Gwynn and Lauren Washington created the Roadmap to Billions Conference to provide an empowering experience for Black women tech entrepreneurs to learn about business growth strategies and connect with investors and other tech founders. Fast forward to three years later, Black Women Talk Tech has launched chapters in 10 cities and started several initiatives including Talk Tech Association, BWTT’s nonprofit arm. Thank you for all the you do for the organization #BWTT #BWTTCON2020

A post shared by BlackWomenTalkTech (@blackwomentalktech) on Mar 4, 2020 at 9:27am PST

“It is hard to find people who have taken a path that you want to take and it’s almost like you’re building it as you’re going. I think this new generation of women who are doing incredible are kind of creating it as they go along and that was one of the big reasons we started Black Women Talk Tech,” Washington continued.

This year the women were the most excited about implementing a self-care event on the 27th, where attendees enjoyed manicures, pedicures, massages, and absorbed wellness tips for the mind, body and spirit. But in totality, the expansion and continuous growth of the Black Women Talk Tech movement is what remains central to their vitality.

“We’ve seen so many great success stories not only just from our founders, but just the network that happens in between really smart people, like-minded, really motivated self-starters. It is incredible just to see how many people have gotten funding as a result of coming to the conference,” Ighodaro said.

Every Wednesday during the month of March, MadameNoire will highlight Black women changemakers in journalism/media, business, politics, advocacy and community organizing. Stay tuned for next week’s feature with Isha Seshay, the groundbreaking journalist who helped break the story at CNN on the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapped by the terrorist organization Boko Haram in Nigeria.

Pixar movies don’t tend to be judged in a vacuum as pieces of art unto themselves. Any given Pixar film is judged against every other film the studio has ever released. As soon as the credits roll, there’s an inclination to rank where the movie lands in Pixar’s Pantheon. It’s not something audiences and critics do with other studios; no one who reviewed The Invisible Man worried about where it belongs on the all-time Universal movies list. But the animation giant’s latest film Onward—a fantasy quest about family, growing up, and dealing with grief—comes with the added weight of covering similar terrain of classics like Up, Coco, and Finding Nemo. Not many films can live up to those expectations, and I’m not sure if Onward does either.

What I do know is that it doesn’t matter. Because Onward still has enough magic to be a wonderful and touching story all on its own.

Pixar

Onward takes place in a world that used to be full of magic. But thanks to technology (which is much easier for everyone to use than magic is), ogres, centaurs, mermaids, and other magical creatures now live in boring suburban comfort. Unicorns aren’t majestic creatures of beauty here. They’re overgrown raccoons who raid garbage cans.

The movie follows two teenage elf brothers, Barley and Ian Lightfoot, voiced by Chris Pratt and Tom Holland. Pratt’s older Barley is a fearless, D&D-loving nerd unaware of how others view him. He’s also obsessed with his world’s magical past and drives a super geeky van he affectionately calls Guinevere. Holland’s Ian is a shy, awkward teenager who’s afraid of everything. All he wants is the chance to meet his dad, who died before Ian was born.

That’s exactly the opportunity he’s given on his 16th birthday, after his mother Laurel (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) gives the boys a secret gift their dad Wilden left for them. It’s an old wizard’s staff, which, along with a magical jewel, can be used to bring their dad back for 24 hours. Unfortunately, the spell breaks on Ian midway through, and he only brings back his dad’s legs. Before the clock can run out the boys embark on a magical quest to find a second jewel so they can see their late father.

The premise combines a road trip movie with a coming-of-age story, with a dash of Weekend at Bernie’s-style physical comedy mixed in, all set in a fantasy world packaged inside a family story. That might sound like a lot, but the script makes it work, even if the combined effect is that Onward doesn’t feel like the most original story.

As soon as Wilden Lightfoot’s legs take form, the emotional weight of the story picks up. Watching the boys communicate with their father’s feet is more touching than you would imagine. But like all great Pixar movies, Onward is as funny as it is heartbreaking. There are plenty of laugh-out-loud moments and gags in the film. Some of the humor comes from how the movie fully embraces the inherent silliness of two dorky teenagers using magic for the first time. A lot comes from Pratt’s Barley, a big lovable oaf who is naturally funny without trying to be.

Pixar

There are also some genuinely exciting action sequences throughout, including one highway scene that is equal parts thrilling and hilarious. And a subplot featuring Corey the Manticore (voiced by Octavia Spencer) adds just enough to make the world feel fully realized beyond the brothers’ journey.

The strength of Barley and Ian’s story is what makes Onward work. The two brothers are likable, and it’s fun spending time with the pair and rooting for them. Each has his own strengths and weaknesses, and their relationship is loving without being perfect. Sometimes they are ideal complements, while other times they clash. And those issues come to a head when, inevitably, they have to overcome obstacles on their quest. Some problems are out of their control. Others, more personal and painful, are of their own making.

Pixar

But for as fun, touching, and exciting as the movie is for the first hour or so, it’s the last 40 minutes when Onward becomes special, in much the same way Coco did. The story we were invested in wasn’t what was most important, and the characters we were following were more complex than we thought. Everyone puts up their own defenses to deal with grief, but that can’t always shield us from the pain. And it’s always better to have help on any difficult quest, whether it be a magical one or life itself.

Onward also has one of my all-time favorite endings of any film, Pixar or otherwise. It might be a kid’s movie, but it’s challenging and mature in a way I didn’t expect. And it was better for it. The film has something beautiful and hopeful to say about both death and appreciating the love of those you still have. It expresses those ideas with a grace and understanding most stories never achieve. It’s why even though the story takes place in a fantasy world, the characters’ experiences feel real.

Pixar

I don’t know if Onward is as good as Up or Finding Nemo. I’ve seen those movies so many times, and lived with them for so long, that’s it’s not fair to compare any new film to them immediately. What I do know is that by the end I had tears in my eyes and I felt better about the world. And any movie that can do that has the right kind of magic.

4/5

Featured Image: Pixar

Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist. You can follow him on Twitter at @burgermike, and also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.

The post ONWARD’s Humor and Heartbreak Cast a Magical Spell (Review) appeared first on Nerdist.