Does the EU's housing and energy guy get any sleep?
If you had to pick the two most stressful topics in European policy right now, might you say… energy and housing? Those two areas are the remit of one (remarkably chill) EU commissioner, Dan Jørgensen, Denmark’s Commissioner for Energy and Housing. We don’t typically interview politicians, but when Commissioner Jørgensen’s team came our way, we said yes – because when it comes to his two areas of European policy, right now, we have no shortage of questions to ask. Also on the docket this week: the fight over Poland’s constitutional court and Norway’s cheeky rebuke to the lame duck in the White House.
Do you also have a Monstera in your living room?
Vinyl records, coffee table books, low-maintenance pot plants: from Dublin to Dubrovnik, all good hipsters have the same stuff. The Italian writer Vincenzo Latronico captures this boring international aesthetic beautifully in his hit novel ‘Perfection’, while skewering millennial life in general. Do you like hearing about Lisbon food, the internet vs real life, and everything that’s wrong with the word ‘expat’? Then you’ll love our inaugural book club conversation, even if you haven’t read the book. We’re also talking this week about a fugitive Polish politician’s transatlantic dash, and the questionable Frenchness of a celebrated giraffe. Listen to the end if you want to know why we are launching a side-business importing sun loungers.