It’s no secret that I love my podcasts. Give me podcasts about financial independence (Afford Anything), give me podcasts about the U.S. Welfare System (The Uncertain Hour) and the effect that Porn Hub has had on our culture (The Butterfly Effect). Give me podcasts with Relationship and Sex Therapist Esther Perel (Where should we begin). And give me allll the quirky NPR podcasts I can possible get. My latest obsession is The Indicator with co-hosts Stacey Vanek Smith and Cardiff Garcia.
Stacey is a familiar voice if you know Planet Money’s work. Planet Money is the funny, casual, deep look into financial news, money and economic work from around the globe. And The Indicator is an off shoot of Planet Money featuring one short daily show with a financial number (or “indicator”) you show know about.
From JOBS FRIDAY where they dig into the jobs report numbers going past the unemployment rate and into results that show us more about what is going on in our economy, to facts about social security and retirement (and how under prepared most of us are), to battles between economists like (Adam) Smith Vs. (John Maynard) Keynes and their importance to our daily lives. It’s pure geeky, educational (and entertaining) goodness. One of my favorite series they do is overrated/underrated where they ask an expert in an industry or a company CEO about things happening with their industry and if they are overrated or underrated.
Anyway, enough gushing about economic indicators, I’m here to tell you about my girl crush on the co-host Stacey Vanek Smith.
Who is Stacey Vanek Smith?
Before diving deep into her biography and looking her up on Twitter (I LISTEN to her voice and have never seen her before) let me tell you what I know about Stacey: She’s from Boise, Idaho, she has a great personality and amazing banter with her co-host Cardiff Garcia, and she geeks out about financial stuff like the best of us. I don’t know for sure, but I imagine she was super nerdy in high school and these days when she heads home for the holidays is like SUCK IT to all the cheerleaders who are stuck in Boise making dinner for their balding, former high school football star husbands because her life is NPR glamor in NYC where she gets to travel around for stories about money and the economy.
But who is Stacey Vanek Smith REALLY?
Thanks to her bio on NPR , I can confirm Stacey is from Idaho and grew up working on her parent’s cattle ranch. She HAD to have been a big nerd in high school because she got herself into Princeton where she got her Bachelor’s in Comparative Literature and Creative Writing. Then she went on to get her Masters in Broadcast Journalism at Columbia.
Proof that high school nerds (almost) always grow up to be smart, successful and attractive, here is what Stacey looks like:
I actually can’t find much about Stacey online, which furthers my fantasy that she’s just a bad ass hardworking biatch with a vibrant social life in Brooklyn. Obviously because I’m now 35, by “vibrant social life” I mean she grabs a nice red wine after a long day at the NYC NPR offices with a few friends before making a healthy dinner and settling in to her latest Netflix true crime binge on the couch cuddled up with her cat. I just know we’d be BFFs.
And because EVERYTHING GOES BACK TO TWILIGHT (#EBTT) here is a story Stacey reported in 2008 about the Vampire Movie that was expected to be BIG in the box office: Vampire Flick Expected to Make a Killing.
(It did, Stacey, it did)
I went through all of her Twitter media to find evidence of a partner or spouse, and while there are wedding photos that come up when I Google Image her, they don’t look like her. Plus I feel like MY Stacey Vanek Smith, the one who blows an air horn on JOBS FRIDAY and geeks out over economic indicators and binge watches true crime after a glass of wine with friends while eating her Hummus Tahini salad from SweetGreens wouldn’t get married in San Francisco and take her photos in front of the Golden Gate Bridge like a basic bitch.
Her wedding would for sure be back home in Idaho in front of those former cheerleaders who never left town while Ryssdal, Inskeep and Shapiro fly in for the special occasion and do a special report from Boise’s local NPR affiliate KBSX 91.5 FM with some financial indicators about the cost of weddings.
Are you girl-crushing on Stacey Vanek Smith yet?
Download The Indicator and listen with me daily. You’ll love it, trust me!
