Music, TV, books, and recipes that are helping me through the January gloom…yes, Norcal is gloomy, no, this is not me complaining and thus giving you an open invitation to tell me how much worse the weather is in the Midwest ;)
The playlist “Nancy Meyers’ Kitchen” on Spotify is an absolute delight and has sparked so much joy for me over the last few days. Lots of oldie goodness from her movies, which I have always found to have utterly charming soundtracks. I’ve played it in my own kitchen, as well as my car and at my desk for close to a week, and it leaves me feeling happy and also like watching “Something’s Gotta Give” and “It’s Complicated” on repeat. (Anyone else kind of hate “Julie and Julia?”)
DJ Earworm’s 2019 mashup is actually pretty good this year, but I really loved his Decade in Review. Also worth peeping: his “2009 v 2019” mashups - a fun eleven-minute ride through some true 2010s classics.
In the last few weeks, I’ve binged on “Cheer,” “You,” and “Sex Education” on Netlix, “Fleabag” on Amazon (how on EARTH did it take me so long to do this?! It’s utterly luminous!), and…PREPARE TO JUDGE ME…”90 Day Fiancé” on Hulu. Kendra and I are embarrassingly addicted, and it’s got an uncanny way of making me feel so, so good about my personal romantic choices, none of which include falling in love in international chatrooms with language barriers and secret catfishings and hidden sugardaddies. Truly an escapist dream, friends. Coming up next: S3 of “Good Girls,” which premieres in February, along with finishing S3 of “The Crown” and hitting “Mrs. Maisel,” about which I have heard mixed reviews (and am, appropriately, thusly devastated!). Also, throwing it out there, I’m really not loving all the girl-on-girl stupid drama on “The Bachelor” this season, and my picks for top 3 are Madison, Hannah Ann, and Kelley. We’ll see if I’m proven right!
Book-wise, I blew through Erin Morgenstern’s “The Starless Sea,” which is a beautiful, lyrical, poetry-adjacent second effort that still can’t rival “The Night Circus” in my pantheon. I also finally got around to devouring “Bad Blood,” John Carreyrou’s fantastic exposé of Elizabeth Holmes’s Theranos fraud. Next up: some professional development reading, starting with “Atomic Habits” by James Clear and “The Checklist Manifesto” by Atul Gawande. And just for fun, probably something by Ruth Reichl…it feels like everyone is reading her these days, and you all know I have terrible literary FOMO.
Cooking! I made a fantastic Chicken Florentine casserole for which you can find the recipe on page 27 of this bizarre digital magazine. Sadly, I burned the pine nuts while broiling the Parmesan crust, but I like to think it adds depth of flavor (proving I can do the mental gymnastics to justify absolutely everything). I’m also living on soup lately - enjoying this low-cal tomato basil bisque, and my perennial fallback, Italian chicken quinoa stew.
That’s all - enjoy this ridiculous brain dump :)