Quarantine is a lot. It would be nice if my country could GET IT TOGETHER FOR LIKE 10 MINUTES so we could get over this like the rest of the world. I am happy my state is taking it seriously but I'm still very stressed, even though I know I'm incredibly fortunate, all things considered.
But instead of talking about all the things that are bad and scary right now and instead of trying to review books that I read over a year ago, I thought I'd talk about some stuff that I'm enjoying right now. Because gotta enjoy the little things right now.
Be forewarned, I haven't really thought this through so this post could fall apart pretty quickly. But I hardly post so this is something.
Central Park
It's central in my heeeaaaaaaarrrt.
It's an animated show (!), from the creators of
Bob's Burgers (!!), that is a MUSICAL (!!!) starring voice talents from Leslie Odom Jr., Daveed Diggs (HAMILTONs), Stanley Tucci, Kathryn Hahn, Josh Gad, Tituss Burgess, and Kirsten Bell (for season 1, but you may have heard that she is being recast because she is white and her character is biracial) as well as a TON of other people. There's a weird but loving family, led by father Owen, caretaker for Central Park, who just wants to make it the best park. His wife is a journalist for a hyper local paper, the kids are strange in that
Bob's Burgers-esque kind of way. But then there's Bitsy Brandenham, a super rich crazy lady who wants to take over Central Park to develop the land. And there is my fav character, Helen, Bitsy's maid/assistant who hates Bitsy (and is not subtle about this) but wants to get in the will. Basically, this is a show that checks all of my boxes. It is on AppleTV which is...not great, but this show is great and the music is great and there's a chance I may not finish this post cos I've wandered off to go watch the musical numbers.
OK OK I'm back.
Supermarket Sweep
Are you aware that both Netflix and Amazon Prime have old episodes of
Supermarket Sweep? Did you know that the host wears incredible sweaters in the early seasons, some of which I lowkey want? If you aren't familiar with the show from '90s daytime TV, know that it is incredibly dumb and super fun and do Tom and I spend time discussing what our strategy would be if we were on the show? Yes, yes we do. Because this is the level of brain activity I can dedicate to a TV show right now. Watch it for the easy trivia and rampant consumerism.
Andrea Vernon & The Corporation for Ultrahuman Protection
I have not finished this yet. I'm very much still early on. BUT I feel like this might be the story I have been looking for. The story I have been PROMISED in the past, but thus far I have not found someone who could deliver. I want a silly book about office politics and nonsense but the office is in the business of something ridiculous. I've tried ones about spies and zombie cleanup specialists and I think at least one other examples that is escaping me right now. But none of them could pull it off. But so far, this one is doing it. It's about superheroes but it's ALSO about an administrative assistant figuring out how her boss likes her coffee and I feel like as I talk about it it sounds boring but I am ENJOYING this. Because it's ridiculous. Please give me more about contract negotiations between different corporations that represent various superheroes to determine who is going to get the contract to deal with the weird alien space egg hanging over Yankee Stadium. This also happens to be narrated by Bahni Turpin, and I recently listened to her narration of
So You Want To Talk About Race which I thoroughly enjoyed, so that's just another bonus to this book. Please don't let me down.
Alright that's three things, which makes it a list. But it's getting late so it might be time to watch some nonsense and play some sudoko and further unwind. But hey, I managed to get a book related thing in here, so that's fun.
