The Take Down
Issue #006, A quieter week, and I nee
Hi, it’s Caroline.
After weeks of NYSE shoots and 4 AM emails and a skin tag saga that I’m still emotionally processing, this week was quiet. Not nothing happened quiet. Just slower. The kind of week where I could feel my shoulders drop a little.
I forget, sometimes, how much I need a slower week. The content machine doesn’t stop just because life slows down, but the feeling of life slowing down is its own small gift, and this week was one of them.
So this issue is a little softer. Less marquee, more pause. Let me walk you through it.
Reminder: Jon's birthday is this Thursday, May 28th. If you've been a Ticker Take viewer for any length of time, throw him a "happy birthday" online. He pretends he doesn't care. He absolutely cares.
Victoria Day, family as therapy
We spent Victoria Day evening at my parents’ house with my sister and her family. Somewhere between the food and the cousins running around, family time slipped quietly into therapy time, the kind that happens around a kitchen island, where the people who have known you the longest can hear what you’re really telling them, even when you don’t say it directly. I left feeling lighter than I arrived, which is the highest compliment I can give to a Monday night.
The video this week: Dan Ives and his 9 All-Star AI Stocks
This week’s Ticker Take is a great one: Dan Ives joined us to break down his 9 All-Star AI Stocks. Dan has been one of the most-watched voices in tech research for years, and his picks come with both conviction and reasoning. If you’ve been wondering where the smart money is looking in AI right now, this episode is the one to watch.
A home studio shoot, plus a lot of AI thinking
Tuesday was another home studio shoot with a fantastic guest and a topic I genuinely think is going to land when it drops. Cannot say more yet, but it’s coming.
We also spent a meaningful chunk of the week thinking about AI and agentic AI, specifically how we can use it inside our own business. Not just as a topic we cover, but as a tool that actually helps us produce, plan, and grow. It’s a fascinating moment because the technology is moving faster than most companies can adapt to it, and we want to be on the right side of that curve, not the late one. We also released a deep dive video on the AI Agents replacing Wall Street analysts.
On Friday, Jon went on MTS, the popular show on X, to talk tech, AI, and the broader media landscape. Worth a listen if you missed it.
AI Under the Hood: AI stocks are up 32%, and somehow still cheap
This week’s AI Under the Hood short is about a paradox that’s been bugging me, the fact that AI stocks have soared this year, and yet, on a P/E basis, they’re still historically reasonable. They’re trading at only about an 8% premium to the rest of the market, which, when you actually look at the long-term average, is cheap.
It’s a counterintuitive story, and the kind I love telling, because it forces you to look past the headline and check the math. I broke it down in plain English. Watch it here.
A small confession: my first facial in 20 years
This will sound dramatic, but it’s true: I had not had a facial in 20 years. Two decades. The reasons are layered. I am extremely particular about my skin, I use very specific products that keep it happy, and one bad facial in my mid-twenties scared me off the entire experience. (It also made me realize I’m slightly claustrophobic, which I had not been aware of until I was lying flat with a steam machine pointed at my face.)
So when a half-hour Wednesday lunch-break facial at Formula Fig appeared in a gift bag from a fellow Substacker, Sarah Bartnicka at Milk Bag, I had a choice to make. Go back into the chair after 20 years of avoidance, or politely re-gift it.
Reader, I went.
It was exactly what the doctor ordered. The 30-minute format was perfect, no claustrophobia, no overcommitment, just enough to wake up my skin without traumatizing my nervous system. I walked out with a Korean serum (vitamin C and niacinamide) and the strange, peaceful feeling of having done something nice for myself in the middle of a workday.
I will go back, which is something I genuinely never thought I would say.
The rest of the week
A manicure. Juicy jelly pink for spring, because the season called for something cheerful. A small break that felt like a big one.
Friday night softball. Another game in the bleachers, this one with a memorable cameo: our dog Lola decided to make her professional softball debut by running, smiling, straight into the middle of the field mid-game. Genuinely the funniest thing that happened to me all week. Cali was less amused. Lola was thrilled. The crowd was somewhere in between. It became the family story of the night.
Dress shopping, season of milestones edition. Two events coming up. The first is the National Ballet’s Mad Hot Ballet gala, the theme this year is Reverie, which I love. The second is my younger daughter’s Grade 8 graduation, which still does not feel real. We did her dress shopping together. (By "together," I mean I sent her loads of ideas, and she declined all of them.) She has excellent style and is a fashion icon, so we ended up with a beautiful little number.
Mom + producer mode, all week. I also helped Cali with her Com Tech class album cover project (one of those assignments that pulls you straight into the creative weeds in the best way) and ran her self-tape audition. And then, just yesterday, for an upcoming Ticker Take video, we threw cakes in Jon's face. Yes, plural cakes. Yes, on purpose. Yes, the bloopers are going to be incredible.
A Hollister night, with my teenage daughters. Friday night, the three of us huddled around my laptop at the kitchen bar, scrolling the Hollister sale together. Laughing at descriptions, debating tops, talking each other into and out of things. Fashion as the bridge. Shopping as the love language. If anyone has a teenage girl in their life, you know exactly what I’m talking about. These moments are golden, and I will take them in whatever form they come.
Jon’s AM vs. Caroline’s PM
Jon this week: filming, writing, his MTS appearance, his weekly columns, his usual content factory. Same engine, same speed.
Me this week: Ticker Take taping, AI Under the Hood production, brand calls, the manicure, the facial, the dress shopping, this Substack, and a slightly slower pace. The 11 PM brain showed up but a few times it got to go to bed before midnight, and I am calling that a personal victory.
The Wins This Week
A slightly slower week. Underrated. Recommended.
Family-as-therapy at my parents’. The kitchen island, doing what kitchen islands do.
New video live: Dan Ives and his 9 All-Star AI Stocks. Watch it.
New AI Under the Hood: the AI stocks paradox. Watch it.
Jon’s MTS appearance. Always great to see him in a different room.
My first facial in 20 years. Korean serum acquired. Nervous system intact.
A juicy jelly pink manicure. A small spring victory.
My daughter, certified fashionista. Incredible grad dress found.
Lola, athlete. A debut for the ages.
A Hollister night with my girls. Bridge built via swipe.
The Losses This Week
Sleep: Slightly better. I am cautiously, hesitantly, knock-on-wood pleased.
Cali’s reaction to Lola’s softball cameo: Less than charitable.
My patience for dress shopping (mine): Still pending. Reverie awaits.
The takeaway
Some weeks the lesson is about how much you can push. This week’s was about how much you can soften.
The facial after 20 years. The manicure. The unhurried conversation at my parents’ kitchen island. The kitchen bar with my teenagers, scrolling Hollister together. The dog who ran onto a softball field and reminded everyone that life is, fundamentally, kind of absurd.
The work was still there. The shoots still happened. The video still went up. But the week’s real shape was made by everything around the work, not the work itself.
Some weeks the gift is the milestone. Other weeks the gift is the pause. This week was the pause, and I’m not letting it pass without saying thank you to it.
Big things coming, as always. But also: pauses are allowed.
Thanks for being here. See you next week.
Caroline
P.S. Jon Erlichman Substack is up this week and worth a read. Subscribe if you haven’t, you’ll get both sides of our brain.
And don't forget to wish Jon a happy birthday this Thursday, May 28th. 😊