Movies: None. Really need to get on that AFI list!

Television/Streaming: the recent episodes of Taskmaster New Zealand. It's a fun group. Also a couple of episodes of Buffy, season 3: "Revelations" and "Lovers Walk." I'm not completely sold on Faith at this point; sometimes she annoys me. I'm happy Spike is back. Is he a dick? Yes. But I do enjoy him as a character.

Books: I read Sing Unburied Sing by Jessmyn Ward for our DEI book club at work. Ward has been on my list for a while, and I can see why her books have won awards. The writing was really good, and I thought the atmosphere of the place/time was well-done (rural Mississippi). There is a LOT to unpack here about family, and the impacts of racism, and poverty, and drugs, and there might be a little TOO much going on in the plot and that muddies things a bit. The book is told in mulitple points of view, and while that can be well-done, you have to make sure the voices are distinct enough. JoJo, the young boy in this story, sounds a lot like his mother, Leonie, and that was confusing. There were some good elements here, though, and I'm sure we'll have a lot to discuss at book club.

I did not finish The Sirens by Emilia Hart for my other book club. I got about 20% in before I could not read anymore. The motivations of the main character did not make any sense to me and she did not seem relatable at all. That doesn't always have to be the case, but also, if you are going to make some weird choices, you have to find a way to explain why the character would do those. (For example, the main character here is a journalism student and loves investigating things; yet, when confronted with a situation where asking some questions would absolutely be the thing to do, she just . . . doesn't. She stays put and cleans the apartment instead. The fuck)?

I'm currently reading An Offer from a Gentleman by Julia Quinn, as we just finished the Bridgerton season it's based on. They have changed some things and these books are ridiculous but I wanted a little bit of fluffy stuff in between other books.

Video Games: Playing Bendy and the Ink Machine. It's been occasionally frustrating when I get lost, haha. I love the art style, though. And the "cartoony horror" is not that bad, a few jumpscares of creepy things.

Listening to: Moving on with the Rolling Stone Top 500 albums, I listened to Black Flag's Damaged, number 487 on the list. This album was number 340 on the 2012 list. Rolling Stone blurb:

MCA refused to release this album, denouncing it as “immoral” and “anti-parent.” High praise, but Black Flag lived up to it, defining L.A. hardcore punk with Greg Ginn’s violent guitar and the pissed-off scream of Henry Rollins, especially on “TV Party” and “Rise Above,” which came with the timeless smash-the-glass salvo “We are tired of your abuse/Try to stop is but it’s no use.” Punks still listen to Damaged, and parents still hate it.

This is not really my style of music. Most of these songs blended into each other for me, but I did like "TV Party" and I can see why this album is a seminal work for this genre.