10 Things: Lunaria, Lotion, Loops.
Suggestions on things to watch, read, look at, search for, think about, cook, and ponder this week.
One more list before a new year unspools! And a lot of good stuff is coming down the pike right now. The first three are free; behind the paywall is a recipe and a photo of my foot (!?! FIND OUT WHY!)
I was really excited about a movie version of the musical “Matilda,” just as I am excited about every movie musical ever. I did feel a little silly about being excited for it; Luke was more excited for the definitely cooler thing coming out the day before (“Glass Onion”), and he didn’t seem like he cared all that much about “Matilda.”
Well, guys, “Glass Onion” was GREAT. It was exactly what it was going to be, and it was, and was it ever. But I bet if you are going to watch a “Knives Out” sequel you’ve probably already watched it, and you probably already have an opinion. (By the way, if you’re wondering if you need to have seen “Knives Out” in order to enjoy “Glass Onion,” the answer is definitely no.) But maybe you’re not sure if you should watch “Matilda.” You’re wondering: DID LUKE LIKE “MATILDA”?! And reader, the answer is: HE LOVED IT. MORE THAN “GLASS ONION.” Two thumbs way, way up. He even posted about it on Facebook! I cried for the entire second half of this movie — and I’m incredibly familiar with the story. I read it aloud to a class within the last decade, and also, I’ve seen the 1996 adaptation way more times than I want to have seen it. This version is much darker and MUCH better.
So, I know we hate Roald Dahl, and WE SHOULD, and I AGREE, but he didn’t make this movie. The London Theatre People made this movie, and they did a remarkable job. 11/10. One of the best of the whole year.
(But skip it if you just fundamentally hate musicals, because it’s a really musical-y musical. ON THE OTHER HAND, maybe question your reasoning for hating musicals? Is it that you hate them, or that you thought you were supposed to hate them when you were younger and now you still think you hate them but really you just won’t let yourself marvel at amazing signing and dancing because the child in you has been hurt too many times?)
When Kat and I drove to the Vegan Craft Fair together a few weeks ago (where we ate TOO MANY DONUTS, which was JUST THE RIGHT AMOUNT OF DONUTS), there was a car in front of us with a bumper sticker that said:
Kat noticed the bumper sticker, and we agreed we should honk, so we honked, and the car thumbs upped at us, and we thumbs upped back at the car, and it was a truly beautiful, pure moment of car-on-car love.
It turned out, Kat had recently watched “The Mummy,” and they said it was pretty good, but sort of problematic, which they explained to me in excellent detail. And ultimately, this led to us talking about what we watched on TV, and Kat said that they actually didn’t watch MUCH TV, but they DID watch “South Side” on HBO. “Should I be watching ‘South Side’?” I wanted to know. “YES,” said Kat. So Luke and I started watching it two nights ago, and WHY HAVE WE BEEN SLEEPING ON THIS FOR SO LONG? It’s hard to describe how good and funny and smart it is. Kat, you have great taste. I’m so excited about continuing to watch this show that it’s made my whole life significantly better.
And actually, now that I’m recounting this, I’m realizing this conversation was actually totally unrelated to the bumper sticker. We saw the bumper sticker on the way TO the craft fair, and we talked about “South Side” on the way BACK FROM the craft fair. But I still thought you should know that there are people who understand nice, friend-making honks out there, and that car travel can be heartwarming.
“Cooking With Mushrooms” by Andrea Gentl.
I’m as surprised as you are when I announce that this beautiful cookbook was my favorite Christmas present of 2022. I really love “cookbook” as a genre; the book doesn’t even need to be good, it just needs to have passionate copy. I love someone explaining in a paragraph to me why they invented this specific Pad Thai recipe or that jam scone. I love that these memoir-type books full of mundane stories from people’s lives are also full of pictures of food. I can and will read a cookbook cover-to-cover in a single sitting. But not one that has meat. So my breadth is limited.
This book is written by a professional photographer, and as such, it’s unreasonably beautiful. We tried the recipe of lion’s mane mushroom tacos, and it delivered.
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