While we do love us some books, believe it not, we do have a life outside of reading. So to highlight our other pop culture interests, on the last Monday of each month, we each will highlight three other “happenings” from the last month. Big events on favorite TV shows, new movies we’ve watched, old movies we’ve “discovered,” etc. Pretty much whatever we found of particular interest outside of the book world during the last month. Share your own favorite things in the comments!
Serena’s Picks:
TV Show: “Top Chef: Wisconsin”
First of all, as a Minnesotan, I have to register my outrage that this show chose to film in Wisconsin instead of here. Look, Wisconsin is fine. But we have a much bigger metro area and thus a much bigger food scene and what the heck, “Top Chef??” Ok, now that that’s out of my system. It was still fun watching this season travel around many places I’ve been to in Wisconsin. The first half of the season started out with some rough cooking errors, but the cast was all great and I enjoyed this season of the show overall! I was particularly impressed with how well Kristen filled Padma’s shoes as the new host. Really loved her sometimes brutal reviews of some of the dishes!
Video Game: “Dragon Age: Inquisition”
I have vague memories of maybe including this one on this same list years and years ago. But as I never made it more than a few hours into the game, I think it’s worth listing again as now I’m actually, you know, making real progress on this game. Mostly my butt was kicked into gear because, after a 10-year wait, the next installment in this series is finally releasing later this fall. And there’s only so many times I can re-play “Baldur’s Gate 3.” Or is there…Either way, now that I’ve actually gotten further in this game, I’m really enjoying it. Is there perhaps too much supply gathering? Yes. But am I there mostly for the romance options anyways? Also, yes.
TV Show: “Clarkson’s Farm”
Yes, this is a reality TV show about farming. Even typing that out sounds boring. But, the “British-ness” of it all is probably the main appeal. It’s amazing how invested you find yourself in the ins and outs of sheep management, why a tractor can be TOO big, and the detailed mathematics of crop seeding. Fascinating stuff, huh? But, honestly, much of the fun is watching Clarkson stumble around in an area of work that he is unfamiliar with while his much younger farm hand becomes increasingly irate about his antics. If you want to watch a show that’s nothing like anything else, this one is a fun time.
Kate’s Picks
TV Show: “Cobra Kai”
There was a pretty long delay between the fifth season of “Cobra Kai” and the final sixth season, as the writers and SAG-AFTRA strikes last year delayed production for it (as it did for many shows). But the wait is finally over!!… Kind of!! I say kind of because “Cobra Kai’s final season has begun, in that it dropped the first five episodes this path month, with two more drops in the coming months. So we’re a third of the way through, and I have very few complaints. I’m just excited that the scrappy karate kids at Miyagi-Do/Eagle Fang are back and hoping to win the international Sekai Taikai karate tournament. I’ve even MORE excited that Johnny Lawrence is back on my screen, as I am still head over heels in love with his glam metal obsessed himbo self. Sure, it still falls back into some repetitive storytelling, but everyone is SO charming and it’s such an earnest show in so many ways I just have to love it.
Video Game: “Stardew Valley”
OKAY LOOK, I am fully aware that this is probably the third time I’ve posted about this game, but I fell back into “Stardew” a bit this month for a couple of reasons. One reason is that a friend of mine fell back into it and, being so easily influenced, I decided to give it another go as well. Another is that I had a pretty bad mental health episode at the end of June into early July, and I needed a nice and relaxing thing to take on as self care in my down time when things felt too much in the aftermath. And a final reason is that I decided that I wanted to try a new path for my character instead of the one I always take. So this time my farmer is romancing the town jock/himbo Alex instead of Goth weirdo Sebastian. And honestly, I can’t deny my love for a himbo. It’s been fun! And I now know the ins and outs and am getting a lot done at a quicker pace. And maybe that huge update will finally come to Switch soon? Maybe?
Film: “Twisters”
I am a huge fan of the original “Twister”, as I saw it in the theater and have loved it ever since. So I was amight skeptical when I found out that decades later they were making a standalone sequel. I mean, it’s hard to live up to the expectations from the original! But Terror Tuesday decided to do a field trip to go see “Twisters” (after watching the original of course), and it was actually pretty fun. Former Ph.D candidate in meteorology Kate has given up on chasing and studying tornados ever since tragedy completely turned her world upside down, but when she’s approached by old friend and former colleague Javi to come back into the field and help out his tech firm, she feels like she has to say yes. When they go to Oklahoma to try and gather data from an outbreak of tornados, they meet up with social media influencer Tyler, who uses tornados for clicks. It definitely doesn’t live up to the original, but it was an enjoyable night out to the movies. Worth seeing in on screen.
The Library Ladies 