things i am watching and/or reading and/or listening to instead of doing my work
sure it's nice outside, but so what?
the old man
IF THERE WAS EVER A PIECE OF PROGRAMMING MADE SPECIFICALLY FOR SAMANTHA McKIVER IRBY IT WOULD BE THIS. are you fucking kidding me????? old ass jeff bridges shuffling around grunting incoherently while killing bad guys and chilling with his cute attack dogs????????? “he thought he’d left the past behind. but revenge can’t wait forever.” let’s get that tattooed somewhere! i was literally vibrating with joy through the entire first episode. i would watch a thousand hours of this shit.
cha cha real smooth
i read that one times critic’s pan of this movie and you know what? she hated it and that’s okay, people are allowed to hate things!! but i liked it. i am not, hmm how do you say, uhhh…………….a critical thinker? and i never will be, because that makes life hard. i just want things to wash over me while i clap like a seal. anyway, maybe i’m just a sucker for a sweet, hapless loser trying to figure his shit out, but i thought the movie was super charming. andrew (cooper raiff, who wrote and directed and stars) is just so fucking likable. how could you not fall in love with this sunny dude? i also liked the kid, and leslie mann, who is great in everything. plus dakota johnson is in it being very whispery and mysterious and sad, and i just love her. that face! i would watch her do anything!
old episodes of new york undercover on BET
i was sitting at home a couple of saturdays ago watching my life pass me by in slow motion when i decided to see what was on TV. some of my fondest childhood memories were the many beautiful, temperate afternoons i spent indoors cross-legged on the shag carpet directly in front of the television, watching hours and hours of wkrp in cincinatti and sanford and son and what’s happenin’!! and [every other late 70s show in syndication at that time]. if i sat on the floor at this point in my life i would just have to die there, but i did spend many hours on the couch watching an afternoon marathon of my favorite crime procedural including the commercials, which was a special treat because i forgot how BET has all the black versions of commercials like we’ll only buy toothpaste if we’re sure that it’ll work on black teeth. black people driving nissans??? and eating breakfast cereal???????? i love it so much.
self care leigh stein
here’s an irresistible blurb: “self care is a skewering mockumentary about influencer culture, internet feminism, and the infinite ways that big tech capitalizes on our worst fears and insecurities. utterly teeming with humor, this is exactly the sort of book that dorothy parker would have written if she'd been reincarnated as an instagram celebrity." catherine lacey
HOW COULD YOU NOT WANT TO READ THIS.
kentucky sports radio
my man matt jones is just the absolute best. he’s smart and funny and kind and handsome as hell; he reads books, he’s progressive, he’s a lawyer, plus he wrote a very good book about kentucky and mitch mcconnell that i actually read and enjoyed even though i can’t read and don’t enjoy things. from the new york times: “the author of ‘mitch, please!: how mitch mcconnell sold out kentucky (and america, too)’ is matt jones, the young founder of a popular sports radio show in kentucky. on the air, he mixes basketball talk with a salting of news and his upbeat brand of progressive politics. jones is so popular in kentucky that he has been encouraged by some democratic leaders to run for office. he even considered competing for the united states senate, with the hope of unseating mcconnell in 2020.” FANCY RIGHT????
he has a radio show that i obviously can’t listen to in michigan but they post each hour as a podcast and while i don’t care about uk sports i do enjoy listening to four country boys talk shit, which they do. A LOT. they make me laugh every day.
this article about dylan mcdermott, who somehow is still fine???????
the first post i ever wrote in my old blog in 2008 was about how much i love the show the practice and if we’re being honest i still miss it!
the new andrew bird record
he’s not for everybody, i know. you gotta be in a real “listening to professional whistling and violins” kinda mood to be into him, which i always am. the track i have on repeat the most rn is atomized, with underlands coming in a close second. wait, what did you say? you want a little mini mix of my fave andrew bird jams? happy to oblige!
armchairs (crying just thinking about it)
the naming of things
simple x
truth lies low
the happy birthday song
weather systems
sisyphus
the pivot podcast
okay i’m not sure if this even qualifies as a “podcast” because it’s an interview series i typically watch on youtube, BUT: who cares, it fucking rules.
my fave eps so far:
the nature boy ric flair (oh i was FULLY WEEPING during this one???)
comedy icon charles barkley
marshawn beastmode lynch
michael beasley (another heartbreaker!)
shaq (MY KING)
chad ochocinco
stephen a (after which i watched this gem one thousand times while crylaughing)
marvin sapp!!!!!!!!!
caro’s perfect tuna melt recipe
i’ve already told you that i am a FISH BITCH and i come from a long line of fish bitches, particularly my mother, who would spend every summer making bowl after bowl of tuna salad and served it every single sweltering day, either served on bread or lettuce or with macaroni noodles if she was feeling fancy. tinned fish summer is upon us, and we celebrated by making these delicious tuna sandwiches and watching brooklyn 99 and i can’t wait to do that literally every night until it’s cool enough outside to look at the oven again.
double jeopardy
this is a tommy lee jones stan newsletter. in this house we pray to the holy trinity of warden dwight mcclusky, texas ranger roland sharp, and chief deputy marshal samuel THEE gerard. (not many people know this but i was actually named after his fugitive character. you probably don’t believe me but it’s true. harrison ford is my dad!!!!!!!!!)
anyway i watched some other dad thriller on hbo and, because the algorithm knows me better than my own family, it immediately served me up this incredible piece of cinema that i somehow forgot i absolutely love. if you haven’t seen this movie first of all WHAT THE FUCK but anyway here’s the plot: ashley judd and her husband go out for a romantic night on a boat (no thank you) and she wakes up in the morning covered in blood and when the coast guard pulls up she’s screaming and holding a bloody knife. she goes to jail, realizes she was set up, then some gruff exercise yard lesbians tell her that since she was already convicted for killing dude once she’s set free she can kill him for real without risking going back to prison. (as a certified courtroom television lawyer™ that doesn’t sound real to me? but we move!!) when she’s released she goes to live in tommy lee jones’s halfway house and he’s mean and strict but you can tell he has a heart of gold, and one night ashley judd busts out of there to go kill her ex and tommy catches wind and has to chase her to re-arrest her and looks very tired and sexy while doing so. two thumbs up!
this tiktok of a chihuahua barking at the chicken trying to steal his food
this is like a real life reenactment of animal meal time in my home.
exalted anna dorn
i just started reading this yesterday and goddamn it’s good already.
here’s an irresistible blurb: “a depressed millennial astrologist, a self-hating lesbian with a rage (and drinking) problem, and profound questions of connection and destiny make exalted an unforgettable read. clear your schedule and consult your horoscope because anna dorn's novel will make you cackle and gasp, and you won't be able to put it down." edan lepucki
HOW COULD YOU NOT WANT TO READ THIS.
legendary season 3
this show has been filling the pose-shaped hole in my broken heart since it first aired, and i love it even though it makes me feel like an old lady due to the overwhelming maternal instinct (i have one of those?) to take these baby queers in and love on them. i don’t know more about ballroom than one can glean from watching paris is burning and every season of drag race so who knows if this show is actually bad but to me??? she’s gorgeous. anyway this duck walk battle is sickening and every single episode has me shouting at my TV.
i got two new cookbooks i’m excited about
salad freak
in the summer i still wear all black, all long sleeves and long pants, but the one seasonal change i do adhere to is trying to buy and consumer more “produce.” does that mean “mostly bananas and the occasional white nectarine?” hell yeah it does but also i try to eat more salads
snacks for dinner
if i wrote a cookbook it would be this. okay fine, if i wrote a cookbook it would be titled “things to add to your lean cuisine to make it feel less sad” but whatever.
these celebrity lists of things they like???
jana schmieding which includes fancy butter and auntie shit
riz ahmed my boyfriend who is clearly too smart for me
cristin milioti in which she correctly refers to fiona apple as a north star
pamela adlon loves tribe and the wiz???????
mamoudou athie whose movie uncorked is so fucking good why haven’t you watched it
ego nwodim who is 100% right about my favorite movie “ben affleck’s the town”
i could read hundreds of these. no, thousands. MILLIONS!!!!!!! all i want to read is people talking about the shit they like that brings them joy and i’m not just saying that because i’m doing it right now. the other day i texted jessie “what lip balm do you like and why” and she texted back a dissertation on all the ones she buys, their specific properties, and ranked them overall. it doesn’t even need to be famous people, i would listen to you talk about the specific brand of toilet paper you purchase or
drake’s new house record
I’M SORRY BUT THIS SHIT BUMPS. maybe you just have to be of a certain age and level of knee deterioration to get into this auntie at the club music. like half of these songs could be on a circa-1999 everything but the girl record? and that is extremely your auntie sam’s shit. (tell me you can’t hear drake singing this! i dare you!!) i mean, i’m still over here bumping that ben watt “heard it all before” remix on an actual compact disc, so i guess what i’m trying to say is that my nephew drake made honestly, nevermind specifically for me and if you hate it that’s okay because i don’t. (seriously though, massive is a big chune, lads. it’s on repeat over here at an ear-splitting volume.)
slow burn season 7
i’ve listened to all the slow burns and they are all very good. i’m pretty sure i have one of those free-trial-that-turned-into-months-of-paying-for-a-thing-i’ve-completely-forgotten-about subscriptions to slate+ because i wanted to listen to the clinton episodes straight through without ads but i haven’t canceled it because i’m too overwhelmed by technology to figure out how but also each new season is somehow better than the last??? so it’s worth it. the new season is about roe v wade and is unfortunately very timely, since we live in hell.
RHOBH + RHOA
thank you god my messy ass bitches are back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!