Category: Nonfiction

It’s Monday and the only zombie I like is Jesus

And maybe Lazarus? Or that little girl who was “sleeping”? Happy day after Easter is my point. As well as Chag Sameach for Passover, which. I went to my first Seder on Friday. It was very unconventional but a super good time, so my friend said she still owes me a traditional one. Still! I can now officially say I have been to a Passover Seder, something I had not been able to say before.

In other news, I am on the hiring committee at work, and we did interviews for three days straight on Zoom last week. My brain is absolutely fried from reading applications and doing interviews while also trying to keep up with teaching my classes. Surprising no one, I am behind on everything and the most I can handle TV-wise is rewatching Psych (I’m currently making my way through the rest of season 3).

On Saturday, during tap class, the teacher told us that Dorrance Dance was in town, so I went to that, and it was phenomenal. I am always impressed by tappers (I am a low intermediate at best), but I was especially impressed by the one guy who tapped while turning. I am terrible at turning and cannot do it without getting dizzy, so the fact that this dude could do both at the same time blew my mind.

Also, not for nothing, but the artistic directer Michelle Dorrance won a MacArthur Genius Award.

They did not do this routine in the show, but this gives you a sense of how bananas talented and impressive these people and the show are:

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It’s Monday and I have given up

To wit, this exchange I had with a friend on Friday:

Me: I’m trying to get it together over here

Her: I’ve given up hope of ever getting it together

Me: I need to do this. I was almost to the gym before I realized I left my headphones at home which meant I had to do my workout in silence like some kind of animal–a dolphin perhaps? Or a gym rat
Then when I changed out of my swimsuit I discovered I left my bra at home.

text from image

Also, to continue last week’s trend, I got to two places early this past week only to wind up late because of parking. Again. So, yes, I have given up on ever getting ahead this month. You win these first three weeks, January. I’m just keeping my head above water and making a wave when I can here for the rest of the month now.

Still, I managed to finish two books this week:

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It’s Monday and I read 50 books last year

Therefore, I have decided to set my Goodreads goal for next year at 52 books. We’ll see how it goes. Also, watch this space for the traditional end of year book survey.

I hope everyone’s new year is off to a stellar start. Mine is not so much because I had an opportunity to swim with the manatees but skipped it because of ~lady problems~ and later had regrets and then I found out that I didn’t get accepted into the Everglades fellowship I wanted, which is a total bummer. Also, I think my daughter is mad at me.

That said, I had a great New Year’s Eve and Day as we took it totally easy. My daughter was able to spend the time with us because she didn’t have to work and because my friend’s mom is here, we partook of some Brazilian NYE traditions like making wishes on grapes, wearing white, and some other stuff I can’t remember right now. We also went and got cookies from Insomnia Cookies (new FL fave? Maybe). And then yesterday we watched My Cousin Vinny, which is always a good time.

So I guess technically my year is off to a good start, but today was a mixed bag.

Onto the weekly wrap-up.

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It’s Monday! And I’m doing a monthly reading wrap-up!

What does everyone think of the little prompts that WordPress has been so generously giving when you open the editor to write a new blog post? Today’s for me is “What’s your favorite cartoon?”

I had a good weekend which made this a good week. On Friday, I went to a for your consideration screening of Abbott Elementary with a friend of mine that included a Q&A with the cast and crew and that was followed up by a reception that turned into a dance party. On Saturday, I won the lottery so got two $25 tickets to see the touring production of The Book of Mormon, which was amazing. I didn’t know much about the show so didn’t know what to expect (except that it would include irreverent humor), and I loved it so much. Lots of great social commentary and it made fun of systems without making fun of people, if that makes any sense.

Anywheedle, as the blog post title says, it is Monday and instead of what I read last week, I’m telling you about what I read this past month since, you know, I only read three books and also posted the review of the book I finished this week in the underrated books post.

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#AMonthofFaves 2022: Underrated Books

I am going to use the same metric I used for this Top Ten Books with Fewer Than 2,000 Ratings on Goodreads post some years ago for today’s topic.

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It’s Monday! What are you reading?: Halfway Point Reading Wrap-Up

Hi.

I cannot believe I have not updated my blog since February. FEBRUARY. I thought for sure the last time had been in April. Clearly, I was very, very wrong. Also: this has been the longest year ever. I know because when prepping to write this post I came across a book I read in April of this year, and I could have sworn I read it last year. That’s all I’m saying.

A brief overview of things that happened since February:

  • I went to a taping of Ellen’s show (guest host)
  • I went to Mexico
  • I went to the LA Times Festival of Books
  • I went to Florida
  • I met one of my cousins for the first time
  • My daughter graduated from college
  • My daughter’s friend gave us COVID (mild cases; everyone was fine)
  • I went to Universal Studios Orlando
  • My chronic eye fatigue came back with a vengeance and brought its friend cybersickness along to play

The latter, as I’m sure you can imagine, contributed to me not updating my blog since I’ve been limiting my screen time.

I hope to talk more abut those later (especially Universal Studios, COVID, and chronic eye fatigue), but for this post, I want to highlight the five-star books I’ve read so far this year.

Onto the books!

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It’s Monday and I was very into spoofs this week

Spoof! Spoof! Spoof! Say it enough times and it doesn’t even feel like a word anymore.

Hello. Tomorrow, I go back into the classroom for the first time since the pandemic started. I’m thinking of putting this up on the board to welcome the students.

THE GOOD PLACE — “Everything Is Fine” Episode 101– Pictured: Kristen Bell as Eleanor — (Photo by: Justin Lubin/NBC)

Too on the nose?

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N is for Necessary Endings #AtoZChallenge #PandemicAlphabet

I know, I know. You’re thinking, “Akilah, seriously, a self-help book about ending things? How on earth could that be a comfort read?” And you’re right, mostly, but think of it this way: The pandemic has made a lot of things clear to us and sometimes those things are things (relationships, jobs, etc) we need to let go of but for some reason, we just can’t seem to. In Necessary Endings by Henry Cloud, he walks you through some steps and activities to help you figure out if you really need to let go of that thing or maybe stick in there just a little longer.

As I was looking through my Goodreads to find inspiration for N and landed on this title, it clicked that I should write about it. I was also inspired because I recently recommended the book to two friends of mine in two separate industries who were thinking of quitting their jobs but weren’t sure about it.

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Five Random Things, Two Random Books

I didn’t post last week because I didn’t finish any books and then about halfway through the week I was like, “Okay, but that has literally never stopped you before???” And I seriously don’t know what I was thinking but it was so ridiculous that I had to tell you all.

I mean, it’s certainly not like other stuff didn’t happen. So here’s a list because honestly my brain is kind of mush.

1. I finally got DDR–yes, Dance Dance Revolution–for my Xbox, so have been playing it almost every day. The thing about DDR is that the songs are the most important and the Xbox has the worst options for songs, I swear. They only have one DDR game with a good tracklist. All of the other ones have weird Japanese songs with NO BEAT. My daughter was watching me play, and I kept missing the arrows and she asked me “Does the pad not work?” and I was like, “No, these dumb songs have no beat.” The proof is that I did just fine on both “Dancing Machine” and “Conga.” So anyway, I need a PlayStation to get a version of the game with a better tracklist.

I look absolutely nothing like this while playing, btw.

I did, of course, buy the version with the good tracklist and have been crushing those songs, thank you very much. But only on basic because that’s just who I am.

2. My daughter went back to campus for spring semester. She’s doing well.

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Pools, Bees, Good Talk, and The Forty-Year-Old Version

I have taken advantage of the current heat wave to get in the pool the past two days. It has been glorious to do my regular workout before being restricted to not having a workout.

Yeah, I’m working on that.

Anyway, the pool was great! I also learned a lot. For one, I learned that the wireless headphones I got do not like when I get in the pool. They kept crapping out during my workout on Saturday, which is beyond frustrating because I use the music to keep time for my workout. Without the music, I wouldn’t know when to start or stop various parts of my workout and–more importantly–I would get bored and cut my workout short. So, the headphones not working is actually a super not great thing and not just because music is fun. The good news is that my headphones worked better on Sunday, and I honestly do not know what changed. I changed the placement of my phone, but I had done that on Saturday with no luck so, sigh. The headphones are a fickle beast. I’ll have to investigate better headphones for when the weather actually breaks because I cannot live this way.

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