Traveling is always a lot of fun but I forget a few things…

1. I don’t read much on long flights, I watch movies
2. My DVR will taunt me for the next month with ALL the shows I’m now behind on
3. Jet lag is the WORST

So, a trip to London this month was a blast and for my pop culture consumption it changed it up a bit. Here’s what I’ve been reading, watching and listening to this month…

Reading

I give up. I tried The Boy on the Bridge twice and can NOT for the life of me get into it. Maybe I’m zombied out, but maybe this book just isn’t happening for me. I cleaned up my bookshelves the other day and took a few to Powell’s and ended up finally buying The Hate You Give which I’m almost half way through and it’s wonderful. A full review next month, I promise.

I also caught up on comics in the glorious sunshine recently! Ms. Marvel continues to be a favorite series, and the latest installment with Kamala disappearing was pretty great. I was thrilled to learn she’s coming to the MCU!

I did read The Runaways by Rainbow Rowell on the flight. I loved the series on HULU so thought I’d try the comic and start with this popular YA author’s turn at the helm. It’s really fun but evidently you need to read the previous installments to know who some of these folks are. I’ll probably read more, but may go back and catch up on some of Brian K. Vaughns series first.

Listening

I picked up the new Leon Bridges album and it’s been on heavy rotation in my office lately. I also can’t stop listening to This is America by Childish Gambino.

In Podcast land I REALLY loved the Getting Curious with Jonathan Van Ness (of the new Queer Eye series) episode on my favorite topic – CULTS! It was great!

I also really enjoyed Bookish with Sonya Walger – her interview with Damon Lindelof was fantastic. The premiss of her podcast is to talk about the 5 books that most inspire you. I LOVE the concept and it’s a great way to learn more about people through their reading habits. I may finally read The Watchmen…

I finished up Trump Inc. this month and really enjoyed the series and the way it looked at Trump’s business interested here and abroad. I hope the series continues.

Watching

My post is late today because I stayed up late last night to watch the series finale of The Americans. It. Was. Perfect. I cried twice and I was on the edge of my seat the whole episode. I don’t want to spoil it but if you need to talk about the finale once you watch it feel free to reach out!

I watched a LOT of movies on the plane. On the flight there I finally watched Pitch Perfect 3 which was easily the least-best of the 3 but still fun and I’ll probably watch 50 more times but may not be able to recite every song like I can still do with the original.

I also finally watched Ant-Man which was incredibly enjoyable and now I can’t wait for Ant-Man and the Wasp this summer! On the flight back I caught Thor: Ragnarok which was great and super funny. Perfect timing to FINALLY go see Avengers: Infinity Wars which was fun but I didn’t love it EXCEPT I absolutely cheered VERY loudly (and alone) at the final post credit scene. I am SO EXCITED.

I also caught I, Tonya on the plane which I really liked – and an interesting story telling device. I FINALLY watched The Post as well. I loved it. With a newspaper background I was enthralled, and thanks to my age I didn’t know the Pentagon Papers story very well so it was fascinating! My husband and I just started The Fourth Estate on Showtime about the New York Times covering the current administration and it’s a nice newspaper follow up to The Post.

I saw Solo on opening night and it was very fun. I think I need to see it again – the theater was FREEZING and the family in front of us elected one family member to get up every 10 minutes, so I feel like a less distracted viewing may be a good thing. But a great origin story and some good twists!

Now that some series are wrapping up I can finally get caught up with Legion, Westworld, Billions and Homeland. I think I’ll skip Arrested Development for the rest of time. But the new (and final) season of Kimmy Schmidt should be a good weekend distraction! I’ve also been (mostly) keeping up on Colony which I continue to enjoy and like where it’s heading.

What have you been enjoying this month? What are you looking forward to this summer?

March Madness is back and I am miraculously in first place in my family bracket. For the moment (come ON Villanova!) I’m not a sports fan but for 3 weeks every March I am a HUGE college basketball fan. My friend Jen talks all the time about the importance of sports, and I agree that it’s great for networking and as a conversation starter. How’s your bracket doing? Besides March Madness I’m doing my best to stay up on my pop culture, here’s  a few of my recent favorites…

Reading

I finished Red Clocks and I LOVED it. I talked about it last month too but man was it fantastic…

I was super sad to hear that Kelly Thompson’s Hawkeye comic series was coming to a close. I finished it up last week when we had some sunshine and it did not disappoint. It was funny and snarky and action packed and I now think I’ll read every comic Kelly Thompson writes. You should check her out too!

A few months back I read about Misfit City a comic from the writer of 10 Things I Hate About You and Legally Blonde. Yup. I was delighted that the comic takes place in a fictional version of Astoria, Oregon and has some great pop culture and snark to it. Plus a dog! I can’t wait to see where volume 2 goes…

Listening

I downloaded Chris Stapleton’s From a Room: Volume 2 a few months ago (I think when he was on SNL) and realized I hadn’t downloaded Volume 1. I fixed that a few weeks ago and Chris Stapleton is back on heavy rotation around here.

As for podcasts, the usual political pod suspects are still there. The Late Night with Seth Meyers podcast live from SXSW with Amber Ruffin & Jenny Hagel interviewed by Joy Reid was FABULOUS and worth a listen. Also, if you missed the Bill Hader interview and loved his Stefan sketch on SNL, make sure to listen!

I’m also enjoying The Daily Show: Ears Edition as another political podcast spot with some great interviews. He had the Parkland students on right before the March for our Lives and it was great…

Watching

I started watching the Wild Wild Country documentary with my brother and sister in law when I was in Spokane this past weekend. It’s really fantastic. Fun fact – I went to high school in Bend and was involved with Young Life which is the organization that now owns the camp that was the Rajneesh Purim. I helped to clean up the camp and get it ready for kids when I was in high school so know the property pretty well. It is CRAZY to see it back in the early 80’s when it was Rajneesh Purim. It’s also a fantastic story about local politics, my other favorite hobby these days.

I saw Black Panther again with my husband who said it’s his favorite super hero movie now. I’d agree. I still haven’t seen A Wrinkle in Time (don’t worry, I’m more disappointed in myself than you are in me) but have tickets to see Ready Player One this weekend. I can’t WAIT!

I am LOVING this season of Jane the Virgin and while I don’t usually love a cancer scare story, they’ve handled it well I think. Brooklyn 99 has returned and it’s SO DANG GOOD. And I continue to love this season of UnREAL…

My very favorite show The Americans returns this week and I am so happy it’s back and so sad it’s the final season. But as I tweeted a week ago, I can’t WAIT for the reboot to see what the Jennings are up to in 2014…

I’m anxiously awaiting the arrival of my copy of A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundo thanks to Last Week Tonight’s fantastic story earlier this month.

The Olympics may have tried to dominate pop culture this month (how did I get away with not watching ANY curling?) but with a few plane trips I still found time to consume some great pop culture…

Reading

Red Clocks was my January Book of the Month selection and it’s FANTASTIC! I’m not quite finished  but hoping to do so in the next few days. I’m enjoying the storytelling style and not enjoying envisioning what a Mike Pence Presidency would mean for women…

I need to catch up on comics here soon – and was SO SAD to learn this weekend that Hawkeye will be ending it’s run in March. Thanks to social media I tweeted with local comic book author Kelly Thompson and it sounds like there’s more stories to come…

Listening

I picked up Trump, Inc from ProPublica a few weeks ago and it’s fascinating if you like politics as much as you know I do! My VERY favorite thing about the podcast is that the sponsor is a hair club for men type which almost feels like they’re trying to troll the president. The podcast itself is an investigative look into Trump’s business dealings and background. If you like putting ALL the insane pieces of the puzzle together, this will throw another jigsaw puzzle on top of what you’re already working with.

Congrats to Chris Hardwick of Nerdist fame for rebranding his podcast – ID10T! And I caught the first episode of Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard and it’s great! His first interview was with his wife (and one of my favorites) Kristen Bell – the bickering at the beginning was awesome.

Watching

Black Panther was everything I wanted it to be and more. It’s my favorite super hero movie and all around bad ass film. You need to see it if you haven’t yet. And if you haven’t yet, it sounds like you may be the only one…

A couple of years ago I read The Girl with All the Gifts and loved the book. I was excited to learn it would be a movie, but it had a really limited release. I was pleased to see it pop up on Amazon a couple of months ago and it’s great! The author also wrote the screenplay which made for a seamless transition and a great film!

In my attempt to see as few Oscar nominated films as possible, I finally watched Get Out last weekend and it’s AWESOME. Holy crap is it good. I don’t like horror films so I stayed away for a very long time. It has some horror elements but if that’s what’s keeping you away, don’t let it. Go watch it. It’s. Great.

The Good Place finished an AMAZING second season that took some giant twists and turns like only this show does. The finale even included Sam Malone…

I also really liked this (super dark) season of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. I didn’t expect the “twist” but it sure will be interesting to see what they do with the choices they’ve made this season. Also, some amazing music this season…

I finally binged One Mississippi, the Tig Notaro show on Amazon Prime and it was WONDERFUL! Go, watch it now. I promise you’ll love it. If not, that’s on you dude.

This season of Top Chef has been good not great, but we really love Carrie! Jane the Virgin is really fantastic right now, why aren’t you watching it?!? The George Clooney episode of My Next Guest Needs No Introduction was really interesting – I learned a lot about Amal Clooney (way more interesting, sorry George) and what it was like growing up in show biz. The pilot of AP Bio made me laugh a lot – I’m hopeful this is the trend for this much needed comedy. We’re also really liking Waco. I remember when The Branch Davidians event happened but I was in middle school so it’s great to re-watch and learn more about what was really going on.

iZombie, Good Girls and UnREAL all start this week and hopefully I’ll have lots of good things to say about them in the next couple of months.

What are you reading, watching and listening to lately that I should check out?