More
Meet a tattoo artist who does for women what a surgeon can’t.
This dapper tattoo artist, Vinnie Myers, is serving a need I honestly did not know existed. And he's damn good at it. NSFW — partial nudity.
06.05.14
Community
An entrepreneurial Ph.D candidate sheds light on how technology helps her grow her small business
https://www.pitasplanters.com
Pita and David in front of their mobile plant shop
True
If there is a positive connection between mental health and caring for plants, Lupita Ríos is determined to make it her life’s work to share it with the world.
Ríos owns Dallas-based Pita’s Planters, a small business offering handmade planters, vases, art, bouquet preservation. Her love of vegetation can be traced back to where she spent her childhood—in the jungles of Guatemala—but it wasn’t until Ríos began struggling with panic attacks after college that she realized how healing plants can be.
During a particularly anxious period in her life, the only thing that brought her comfort was a plant she’d inherited from a co-worker. “Every day I would come into work and see some new growth or a new little leaf, and I would just feel so excited … it was like this little seed of light for me during a time when I was not feeling much joy,” said Ríos.
Pita in her plant shop https://www.pitasplanters.com
So she did what made sense: she kept growing plants, eventually learning how to create pots from recycled materials. During the pandemic, she and her husband opened a mobile plant store, which allowed her to share her passion with people in the community. What began as a meditative hobby quickly turned into a booming business, and Ríos, who is also working towards a Ph.D in Neuroscience, found herself overwhelmed with the things that come with being a small business owner (like keeping up with voice messages!).
“I learn as I go,” said Ríos, mentioning that one of the rookie decisions she made as a first-time business owner was to list her cell phone number under the business as the official contact number. “I quickly learned that was not a good idea! I got calls from customers left and right because the business grew so quickly.”
A friend suggested leveraging technology to keep Ríos’ sanity intact. She enrolled in Verizon Small Business Digital Ready, a free online program that offers small businesses nationwide access to over 50 expert courses and grant funding opportunities. The program includes resources created by small business owners for small business owners, covering topics such as marketing, financial planning, social media management, and more. For Ríos, this was the answer to juggling school and business without dropping any balls while the business continues to grow.
Taking control of her mobile plan was the first step in streamlining—and leveling up!—the business. Verizon’s My Biz Plan allowed her select and pay for only what she needed the One Talk App allowed her to reclaim her cell phone for personal use, and Verizon Business Assistant, a GenAI-powered text messaging solution , has been an enormous time-saver. Verizon Business’ 2025 State of Small Business Survey revealed 38% of SMBs are currently using AI–Lupita is one of many using it to help. Instead of spending precious time replying to every DM inquiring about the hours of her shop or troubleshooting a repotted plant’s wilting leaves, business owners like Ríos can set up, customize, and train a virtual assistant to field these questions.
“I didn't even realize I needed this in my life, but Verizon was like, we work with a lot of small businesses and we have a lot of tools that help set your business up so that I can focus on the products, on the marketing, on everything else. And I know that Verizon's got me covered in other ways where I don't have to think about it so much. It is so nice to have someone looking out for you and saying, ‘Yeah, you're busy. We got you covered here. We can take care of this."’
Verizon is committed to reaching one million small businesses with the resources they need to be successful by 2030—with over 450,000 small businesses like Pita’s Planters already using Digital Ready to help their businesses thrive.
Pita and David at their brick and mortar shophttps://www.pitasplanters.com
As for Ríos’ plans for after she receives her doctorate in Neuroscience? She wants to become a professor and continue growing her plant business.“Honestly, there’s nothing quite like having someone walk in who says they’ve never owned a plant before,” said Ríos. “Let me start your plant journey…within a few weeks, you’ll have a jungle in your house.”
Do you own a small business? Verizon offers over $1M in small business grants every year! Complete an application for the Verizon Small Business Digital Readyportal between May 1, 2025, and 11:59 pm PT on June 30, 2025, to be eligible for the application process for a $10,000 grant consideration.
Photo credit: Canva, @namingbebe, TikTok
There was a time when every other girl was named Ashley. That time has ended.
As we know, baby name trends are constantly changing. One generation’s Barbara is another generation’s Bethany. But it doesn’t make it any less odd when you suddenly realize that your very own name has suddenly made it into the “old and unhip” pile. And for many of us 80s babies…that time is now.
In a now-viral TikTok post, baby name consultant Colleen Slagen went through the top 100 girl names from 1986 to find which ones “did not age well” and were no longer ranked top 1,000 today. Such a descent from popularity would mark them as what she calls “timestamp names.” Spoiler alert: what might be even more surprising than the names now considered old school are the names that are still going strong.
The first name that Slagen says is “officially out” is Heather. That’s right, not even cult movie fame could help it keep its ranking.
Winona Ryder in Heathers.media3.giphy.com
Other extinct names include Erica, Courtney, Lindsay, Tara, Crystal, Shannon, Brandy and Dana. Tiffany, Brittany and Casey are also heading very much in that direction.
“My name is Brandy. The Gen Z hostess at Olive Garden told me that she’d never heard my name before and it was so unique,” one viewer wrote.
However, Andrea ranks “surprisingly high,” and Jessica, Ashley and Stephanie have survived…so far.
Gobsmacked, one person asked “How is Stephanie still in there? I don’t think I’ve met a Stephanie younger than myself at 34.”
But the biggest holdout still belongs to Jennifer. “She was a top 100 name all the way up until 2008. Round of applause for Jennifer,” Slagen says in the clip.
@namingbebe Sorry Lindsay, Heather, and Courtney. #babynames #nametok #nameconsultant #girlnames #80skid #1986 #nametrend
If your name has found its way into relic of a bygone era status, fret not. Slagen, whose name also ranks out of the top 1000, assures it just means “we are creatures of the 80's.”Of course, while we still have baby names that become incredibly common for extended periods of time (looking at you, little Liam and Olivia), the real contemporary trend is going for uniqueness. As an article in The Atlantic notes, for most of American history families tended to name their children after a previous family member, with the goal of blending in, rather than standing out. But now, things have changed.
Recently, Kelley Cole went viral on TikTok for a video in which she shared the names that Gen Z teens think are now officially for "old ladies," which they read right out of a classroom from 1985. “I was told my name was an old lady's name by the teenagers on the adolescent unit I was working on,” she begins her video. “I was surprised, so the subject came up of what names are old lady names versus young names.”
@kelleykelleykelley #oldladynames #names #girlnames #babynames #popularnames #trendynames #genx #millennial #genxnames
Laura Wattenberg, the founder of Namerology, told the outlet that “Parents are thinking about naming kids more like how companies think about naming products, which is a kind of competitive marketplace where you need to be able to get attention to succeed.”
But again, even with a keen eye on individualism, patterns pop up. “The same thing we see in fashion trend cycles, we see in names,” Jessie Paquette, another professional baby namer, told Vox. “We’re seeing Eleanor, Maude, Edith—cool-girl grandma names.”
So who knows…give it time (or maybe just a pop song) and one of these 80s names could make a comeback.
This article originally appeared last year.
via Still Watching Netflix/YouTube and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony press kit
John Mulaney and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
Comedian John Mulaney, host of Everybody’s Live on Netflix, recently shared an epic tale in his opening monologue that reminds you to be skeptical of things you read online. It all started when he wanted to do a bit on his show where his co-host Richard Kind’s fake tortoise, died. This would lead to a surprise performance by Bone Thugs-N-Harmony of their 1996 megahit “Tha Crossroads.” But booking the rap group would be much more difficult than he first thought.
“If you’re not familiar with ‘Tha Crossroads,’ it was an enormous hit,” Mulaney said, adding, “I cannot overstate how hugely popular it was with horned-up junior high kids at Catholic schools to grind with each other during the Clinton administration.” "The Crossroads" was a tribute to the band's fallen friends, including rapper Eazy-E.
Rapper Eazy-E in "Tha Crossroads."
via media1.giphy.com
To book the rap group, Mulaney and his team contacted a man they found online who claimed to manage the group, and they set up a Zoom call with him. The band members weren’t on the call, but “their manager assures us that they’re really into the idea and want to do it,” Mulaney said. The one drawback was that only four of the five Bone members would be available for the performance.
Bizzy Bone was, uh, busy. Layzie Bone, mind you, was available.
- YouTubewww.youtube.com
Things began to get strange when the show's staff had to ensure that the band wore pants that could hold a microphone, and the manager said producers needed to buy the pants themselves. A week before the scheduled performance, the manager demanded that the band get $2800 in cash for "just running around money." For reasons he didn’t explain, Mulaney had to come up with the money himself—which was tricky, since his history with substance abuse made large bank withdrawals a major red flag.
Before the band signed a contract, the manager raised the amount for the performance from $15,000 to $100,000, and half the money would have to come upfront. Mulaney claimed he was "disrespected," and the manager pulled the band out of the appearance last minute. After some investigating, Mulaney realized that the man he was talking to probably wasn't the manager for Bone Thugs-N-Harmony.
Bone Thugs N Harmony at Levis Fort- SXSW '10via Bone Thugs-N-Harmony/Wikimedia Commons
“Now, I didn’t tell you all this just to air the dirty laundry of what it’s like behind the scenes of a show,” Mulaney said. “Many guests have shaken me down for a couple of thousand dollars and canceled last minute. It happens all the time. I’m telling you about it because I’m genuinely worried. After a little investigating, I have come to believe that the man I was talking to was not the manager of Bone Thugs-N-Harmony. In fact, several sites list a different person.”
Feeling no ill will toward Bone's actual members, Mulaney asked them to please contact him to clear things up. He added that he may check out their their upcoming performance at the KIA Forum in Inglewood and didn’t “want things to be awkward.”
In the end, even though Mulaney was scammed by a man claiming to be Bone’s manager, he had to give him some respect for the clever ruse. “And to him, whomever I was dealing with,” Mulaney concluded the segment, “Sir, first off, credit where credit is due. I do indeed look like someone you could hustle over a booking for Bone Thugs-N-Harmony.”