Meta folded, the WNBA won, and we made a second can.

Welcome back to the Watering Hole — we took a little time off and the news cycle did not. This week: a marriage ban that boomeranged, a WNBA record that quietly humbled the entire NBA, Meta picking a fight it lost, and — stick around — a little family announcement. Pour something (we have suggestions). Let's get into it.

Chappell Roan is teasing the sophomore album — announcing it's "time to welcome a hot new bombshell into the villa," because of course she did. Producer Dan Nigro says five tracks are done, including an up-tempo country song. She's also headlining Lollapalooza South America alongside Sabrina Carpenter and Lorde — a holy trinity that should qualify as a religious exemption.

Pee-wee came out — posthumously, on his own terms. Paul Reubens tells his story in a new documentary, on his own timeline and in his own words. Bittersweet, tender, and a reminder that everybody's story is theirs to tell when they're ready. Rest easy.

What to watch: Katseye: Wild Hearts hits theaters Aug 12 — bittersweet timing, since Sophia is stepping away from the group. And Don't Say Good Luck drops Aug 14 on Netflix — a musical with bisexual icon Stephanie Beatriz and Yellowjackets' Melanie Lynskey, a sentence engineered in a lab specifically for us.

The timeline's new reaction GIF is undefeated. You've seen it by now — the art-gallery clip where everyone gasps and clutches a single red rose like the sprinklers just went off, recaptioned into oblivion: "adding an egg to my instant ramen," "he's a DJ, hide the cocaine," "tn at basement while sterling closing studio." Chronically online, spiritually accurate. We didn't make it — we're simply devoted.

Senegal's parliament voted 129–0 to write a same-sex marriage ban into the constitution — and then its Constitutional Council struck it down. A rare procedural plot twist in an ugly year. Meanwhile Indonesia's president is calling "queer culture" a national threat — as if we're destabilizing anything besides a brunch reservation.

Stateside, the bigots discovered billboards — "No child has two dads" signage, which is a lot of highway to announce you've never met a happy family — and neo-Nazis surrounded a Drag Story Hour chanting slurs. There's also a live lawsuit fighting the block on trans federal workers' healthcare. Get a hobby that isn't hating a lady reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

The WNBA outsold the NBA and we are not normal about it. The 2026 All-Star Game pulled a record 19,783 fans at Chicago's United Center — topping the NBA's All-Star crowd for the first time ever (Jonquel Jones took MVP). The sapphics did that. On a Tuesday.

Trans Pride London drew a record ~150,000, and a Pride march went ahead in Oradea, Romania after being banned for four years. They keep telling us to be quiet; we keep filling streets. And in Oklahoma City, a new gothic queer bar called The Veil just opened on the 39th Street strip — protect (and go to) your third spaces.

Meta. On the eve of Dore Alley weekend, it suspended the Instagram of The Stud — one of SF's oldest queer bars — after bad-faith trolls mass-flagged a year-old trans-party post as "human trafficking." The algorithm can serve you fourteen ads for the same ottoman but cannot handle a leather event. The good news: after lawmakers and the whole city dragged them, Meta folded and restored the account. Cunt behavior, correctly punished. Sit down, Zuck.

P.S. — every rage-inducing story up top? Gay Water partners with and donates to LGBTQ+ orgs year-round — not Pride-month cosplay.