Four Fun Things

This is pretty old, but my teenage kids LOVED “My So-Called Life” with Claire Danes before she was a big star. We were all sad when it ended.

The last thing I read for bookclub was Atmosphere – Taylor Jenkins Reed and I got absolutely SUCKED IN to that story. It’s not going to win any prizes I don’t think but man I enjoyed the vibe (the bookclub feedback was varied though)

I didn’t like The Bee Sting, but I’ve thought about it a lot since. Don’t get the buzz about The Correspondent at all, but I just finished The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller, and it’s great. Not a happy read, it’s quiet, cosy, sad, interesting and I see why it was shortlisted for The Booker Prize. Also was a big fan this year of The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vyong, Nesting by Roisin O’Donnel, Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks and The Burrow by Melanie Cheng (I like depressing books ha)

My 9 year old loves watching Superstore and The Good Place together.

The Bee Sting was fabulous – the ending! I,have read My Friends and The Correspondent. Both fabulous

The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart by Holly Ringland – I finished this two weeks ago and still have a book hangover!

My kids are a wide age range and we are relatively careful, but have enjoyed the Star Wars shows together (including Bad Batch, which is actually very moving). Now my 9 year old is enjoying Abbott Elementary with me whenever I have to fold laundry. For the most part it’s fine for him or goes over his head! We also love Young Sheldon, but my 7 and 9 year old aren’t allowed to watch the last two seasons yet. The Middle and All Creatures Great and Small have been on my list as potential family shows! My 13 year old daughter is the tricky one – she isn’t interested in much tv, but I’d love to share something with her. I tried showing her one of my favorites, Crash Landing On You, but she cringed too hard! 🤣

Shows- Last Man on Earth, The Good Place, Arrested Development

Our whole family (son 7, daughter 5, plus my husband and me) loves watching The Brady Bunch. And the outfits are SO KILLER!!

PLEASE introduce the boys to Fresh Prince of Bel Air. It might sound stupid but as a white girl from the suburbs of Dallas, it really helped me expand my understanding of what POC go through. Also it’s so damn funny. My brother and I watched it nonstop when we moved to CA. It’ll always have such great memories for me

You must must must read The Correspondent by Virginia Evans. Best book of the year for me!

My kids are 9, 7, and 3 and we like to watch Amazing Race together. We also finished Back to the Frontier on HBO Max, which was surprisingly good and featured diverse families with great historical context.

We started watching I Love Lucy with our kids. Our oldest is an 8 year old girl and she’s got a goofy humor that’s always reminded us of Lucille Ball. The kids (8,6, and 2) belly laugh through it! I love how the comedy, even in black and white still holds up today. Plus, I truly LOVE Lucy. It’s fun to watch together and answer questions about some of the things that aren’t relevant today.

Freaks and Geeks…

The Good Place was the best show to watch with my middle schoolers. So funny, so much to talk about, still contributing to inside jokes. I can always make her smile with MAXIMUM DERRICK when she’s grumpy! And on particularly bad days you can announce “THIS is the bad place!” We just finished Schitts Creek together, I missed it when it was first out. That was a great one. And now I’m introducing her to Ted Lasso! Such a great way to talk about relationships and friendships.

I’ve recently gotten into taskmaster!! All the episodes of the UK show are on YouTube and it’s so fun. I imagine kids would find it quite enjoyable. Comics doing silly things and talking about it!

I have recently discovered “Son of a Critch”, inspired loosely by famous Canadian comedian Mark Critch’s memoirs. It is such a rare comedy- heartwarming, funny, very entertaining and if you grew up in the 80’s, it is just such fun nostalgia. It has been a long time since I have enjoyed a show this much and frankly it has been a balm for the soul.

Schitt’s Creek is such a hilarious but also sweet and life affirming show. I highly recommend it! It also holds up so well to repeated viewings (I always notice something new each time).

I was looking forward to watching Gilmore Girls with my daughter but she’s only 8, i tried and 5 minutes into the first episode I realized she’s way too young for it , so saving that one up for early teens things we both enjoy are dani connor wildlife photograper videos , mary berrys country house secrets and her 86m2 all on youtube all wholesome and slow and interesting both for her and me also GBBO .

My kids and I (ages 9 & 11) are watching The Middle and loving it. I forgot how funny the Heck family is and it’s been so much fun to revisit them with my kids.

Any fellow big-feet-people have recs for Le Bon Shoppe style socks?? I’m an 11 and know one size fits all rarely works for me!

I’m probably late to the party on this, but I recently watched the episode of The Studio where it’s all meant to be shot in one take (is it called The Oner?) I was blown away! That is a single episode masterpiece! I watched it again the next night and made my kids watch it with me.

Not a series, but a nostalgic experience that both we and the kids (9, 7 and 5) enjoyed: watching the Parent Trap together! It was a little difficult for the youngest (we watched it in English with subtitles in their native language and he can’t read) but he did get the gist of it (and hopefully picked up some English along the way). When the kids were in bed, I heard him discuss how he would scare away a potential stepmother. (His dad and I are happily married; I wouldn’t recommend this movie if they actually have a stepmum).

My now-16-year-old and I always have a show that we watch at night. Brooklyn 99, of course, Modern Family, Parks and Rec, The Good Place, Superstore, Schitt’s Creek, Ted Lasso (some sex stuff in there), Ugly Betty, High Potential if you’re OK with some murder, and Dancing With the Stars even though it’s so cheesy. I really liked Andor even though I’m not a big Star Wars fan. Phew! Quite a list.

Recommended by COJ commenters, I’m reading the novel Wellness by Nathan Hill and wanting it to never end!!! Truly, marveling at his absolute craft on every page. My kids are younger but we’ve LOVED Taskmaster, and they came out with a Taskmaster Jr this past year!! Joanna, I strongly encourage you and the boys to watch and start with season 19. The cast includes Jason Mantzoukas, who you all will recognize as the actor who brought to life the role of Adrian Pimento aka Brooklyn99’s Rosa’s fiancé! 😍 You will not be disappointed.

1. I started a substack and it’s mostly just my friends that read it, but I enjoy having a reason to put my thoughts together 2. I don’t think kids can watch this, but Somebody Somewhere is so good 3. A friend brought Dubai Chocolate gelato — it’s got like phyllo or something in it and is so good 4. I teach children’s religious ed and last night I asked a new 4 year old what he’d like to pray for. He looked up at me doe eyed, confused. I said, “Could you thank God for 1 thing that you really like?” He smiled, and said, “My mom’s phone.”

I’m in the “The Bee Sting” hive (ha). I’ll never forget that family. It was one of those books where I was dying to talk about it when I finished it. I wish my bookclub read it but no, my bookclub picks books I don’t like. Sigh.

The other day my teenage daughter and I were looking for something to watch. We tried Friends, but she just hated the laugh track and couldn’t focus to get into it. We didn’t even get through the pilot. Then I thought of My So-Called Life — does anyone remember that?! I didn’t watch it at the time (1994, just like Friends), but I was impressed. I actually can’t believe it was on TV back then. It’s on Hulu (kind of grainy, but kind of adds to the vibe). My daughter cringed and laughed and said high school really has not changed, except the clothes. (Oh boy, have the clothes changed!)

West With Giraffes, by Lynda Rutledge, is my so-far top read of this year. It was published in 2021. It is a novel based on a true story set in Dust Bowl times (1938), of transporting two giraffes from the East Coast to the San Diego Zoo. The descriptive writing is one of the things that hooked me. Also, the discussion about animals in zoos and tourist traps and circuses was something that kept me reading. This was, for me, a very enriching book. I adored reading the descriptions of the sounds, movements, and reactions the two giraffes had during their journey out west. It is an uplifting novel with little violence.

Arrested Development. The 100. Flight of the concords.

Has anyone seen the show Etoile on Prime? It’s about the inner workings of a ballet company in NYC: very fun, dramatic, and inside baseball. Completely under the radar, even with actors like Charlotte Gainsbourg in it… needs serious love!

I just finished the novel, Dream State, by Eric Puchner, and loved it! Love triange, friendship, family, climate change, addiction, beautiful descriptions of a family lake house. It has it all!

Just Add Magic is a HUGE hit with my 11 yo daughter and even her 6 yo brother! I actually love it too!

I love that I can now reference Friends with my teens. It’s sweet to have those little family jokes❤️ Bob’s Burgers was another favorite for a while and of course Parks & Rec!

The Dog House on HBO Max is a delight!

I have a 26 yo with special needs who is very sensitive about what he watches. Recently we watched Stick & he loved it (He golfs for Special Olympics). I feel like we have watched every reality tv show- British, American, Canadian, Australian-that exists featuring a talent: GBBO,Great Pottery Throwdown, Glassblowing, Metalcrafting, Chainsaw carving, etc. Yes, we do other things besides watch tv ;) We’ve even been inspired to try new things after watching, ie pottery wheel throwing.

Watching Dexter with my 12 and 14 year old boys, it may not be 100% age appropriate, but they love it and I love cuddling with them on the couch ;)

The novel Angel Down blew me away unlike anything else I’ve ever read. It isn’t light reading, but it’s poetic and touching, and I hope someone here reads and loves it so we can swoon together!

I loved watching modern family with my teenager!

The Middle. Such an entertaining, underrated show.

After Caroline Donofrio raved about Heart the Lover by Lily King on her substack, The Magic Hour, I immediately downloaded it and started reading. Just like her, I finished it in a day. SO good.

The Amazing Race, GBBO, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Is It Cake, Family Matters, Lego Masters,

We’ve been all Bluey, all the time with my 5yo kid for a long time, but this month we just started watching Bertie Gregory’s National Geographic shows on Disney+ and are OBSESSED. The camera work, Bertie’s love for animals and enthusiasm for exploration, the cool ecosystems…unmatched!

In full disclosure, I DNF’d The Bee Sting, which is very rare for me. But I remember so clearly a line where the dad was inspection the house and it said something like “he was looking for all the places where the future could get it”. And wow, is that true about home ownership (and life). I think of that line at least once a week.

Those with older teenage girls (boys too maybe!) might like to watch Call The Midwife. The characters are so good and it’s an excellent way to see how women’s role in society has changed.

Rereading Spook by Mary Roach, because October, and she’s just always a hoot. The frequent little wry asides just brighten my outlook so much. Humanity is just nothing but good comedic material to Mary. In the best possible way.

My children are four and eight and are obsessed with Is It Cake?! The banter between contestants is funny, Mikey Day is weird and hilarious, and the anticipation is off the charts each time they bring out the cakes.

Loved watching Psych, Monk and Say Yes to the Dress and the Office when my girls were teens. Arthur and Wishbone were afternoon snack time staples when they were little. Now they have shows they both watch from afar and bond over that I don’t watch (like Real Housewives and The Bachelor) but I love to hear them talk about them together. We all still talk GBBO sometimes, love that show forever and always.

My 10 and 7 year old have no interest in shows about grown-ups so The Office, Parks & Rec, etc will have to wait. But they are absolutely cackling at the original Full House. And for kids shows, Gravity Falls has a lot of actually funny parts. Books – I am midway through and loving Ian McEwan’s new novel, What We Can Know.

Oh! Forgot the book part. I just devoured The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates. A friend recently said he’s our generation’s James Baldwin, and I think the comparison is apt. Spectacular prose, fearless thought.

Our family (ages 10-16, plus adults) have enjoyed Gravity Falls, The Owl House, and Skeleton Crew. We’ve also been working through The Muppet Show and Muppet movies. Most of our shared screen time is actually youtube videos. We share misc favorites and love watching Daily Dose of Internet together. Nothing brings everyone to the family room like hearing “Hello, this is YOUR daily dose of internet…” :)

Kindof an off-the-wall recc, but when my kids were teens, we watched the old, original Mission Impossible series! It was so much fun! The costumes and music are amazing, and the spy hi-jinks hold up. Except for one bizarre episode about bees. :P

Best book I’ve read lately was The Road to Tender Hearts by Annie Hartnett, closely followed by The Names by Florence Knapp. Read them back to back and felt so lucky to have landed on such incredible stories (sometimes I get back to back duds!). Also this spring and summer I read Claire Lombardo’s two novels: The Most Fun We Ever Had and Same As It Ever Was–both WAY too long, but still excellent (what can I say, I’m a sucker for family sagas and tales of maternal ambivalence!). TV with kids: my daughter is 9 and we are finally watching things other than Bluey (although I love Bluey)! We got really into The Amazing Race and then started watching old seasons of Survivor. The psychological/sociological element of it all is fascinating and leads to very good conversations! We also just started Lego Masters and I’m surprised how much we love it, since none of us are into Lego. It’s entertaining and soothing at the same time (similar to Great British Bake Off). Oh, and one really good kids show that is not talked about enough: Kiff on Disney+! It’s hilarious, quirky, and has a ton of songs that were so obviously influence by the pop punk of our teen years (if you’re in your early 40s like me!)

When my son was in middle school, we watched The Wonder Years. It was a fun rewatch for me and he really enjoyed it. So many life topics we could talk about after an episode.

My son is 12 and we are watching Squid Games together. I hate it but he loves it! We also love Is it Cake (much lighter than Squid Games). We also are reading Ungifted by Gordon Korman. I LOVE this author!! Highly recommend even if you are not a young adult. Lots of lessons for us adults in YA fiction.

My kids (8&11) and I watch Good Eats, an old Food Network show with Alton Brown, when we need to unwind. His food/science approach is so interesting, and it is so cute and campy, it feels like it was made for kids. It gets them trying new foods too!

We started watching Friends with our kids this summer. They’re 11, 13 and 14 and English is not their first language, so a few things sort of fly over their heads. And sometimes there’s a sex joke that they are just like “we don’t get it” and we’ll just say, “yeah, that’s a sex joke, you’re not supposed to get it yet”. But that is such a small part of it. It has been so much fun to watch it with them. Finally in the season of watching things that we all enjoy!

Loved The Bee Sting, though I’d prepare fellow readers to be prepared for an emotional gut punch! I also recommend the similarly sprawling but American epic, The Slip by Lucas Schaefer. Other faves from this year include the lighter Bring Down the House by Charlotte Runcie, Loved One by Aisha Muharrar, and Deep Cuts by Holly Brickley (which is being adapted for film starring Saoirse Ronan and Austin Butler)!

I’ve always been an avid reader, worked at my local library for 25+ years too. I have to say that people often have lofty reading lists. I guess if you only read a few books a year, choosing books that are important and deep might be a good goal. Immersing yourself in a dense and beautiful book will stay with you. If you want to be a daily reader though, some books that are purely for pleasure can be well written too. I’m talking mysteries, thrillers, romances. I saw all kinds of people, checking out books at the library. Sometimes people with the most challenging jobs and lives, would pick up their holds, and be so excited to be next for the latest of their favorite author, or series. An escapism read is like a mini vacation! I recently had surgery, and while recuperating read some of Katherine Center’s contemporary romances. Really feel good stuff, and so nicely written. A book that gets great reviews, and is very timely and entertaining is Jess Walters – So Far Gone. It takes place in rural Washington. Multi generations of a family haven’t spoken for years because of political and religious differences. Turns into a somewhat comic caper that has a whole cast of wonderfully written characters.

It seems like a lot of you are watching much more sophisticated/mature TV with your kids than I am watching with mine. I say that with absolutely zero judgement but most of the adult sitcoms mentioned would go right over my the heads of my elementary school kids and maybe even my middle schooler. When I was growing up there were tons of shows that were really geared towards families but, even with so much great TV these days, it seems like there aren’t as many true family shows. We love “All Creatures Great and Small” and Bake Off but I would love to find more shows that younger elementary kids can grasp and parents can still enjoy.

Both Canadian shows and both terrific. Son of Critch is so good and North of North is excellent. Both extremely well written and acted and so full of humanity and joy. Really recommend.

We have recently been watching Wednesday together with my 13-year old and it is delightful! A little scary, but as enjoyable for adults as kids!

I’m watching High Potential (starring Kaitlin Olson) with my 12 and 14 year old. It’s a good detective procedural (adapted from a French show!) we all like!

Friday Night Lights is an exciting family drama. Currently all 5 seasons are on Netflix. Terrific cast.

I just finished Regretting You by Colleen Hoover and it was sad, sweet, and sexy. A perfect rainy day read. I also read Hex by Jenni Fagan recently and I HIGHLY recommend it. Short, poetic, extremely aggravating but heartbreakingly necessary.

I love that photograph above your counter in the last image! Who is the artist? We loved Superstore – so hilarious and it tackles important issues like wage equality and maternity leave.

I’m another person who reads a lot of contemporary Irish lit and could not get through The Bee Sting. Reading all these comments about people who did or didn’t like it, I wanted to share that I once had the opportunity to interview Charles Bernstein, a major figure in 20th century poetry. He said he always encouraged students to think about if they liked a poem or not, and that it was fine either way and everyone should be empowered to make aesthetic judgements. It has nothing to do with being right or wrong. He compared it to liking food from one restaurant more than another. “That you could care about a poem as much as you care about your choice of hamburger is fundamental,” he said. I’ve always loved that.

I haven’t had a teenager in a long time – but when I did we watched Glee together. And Gilmore Girls. We loved both. For books – I’m rereading old Barbara Kingsolver – Animal Dreams now with The Bean Trees and Pigs in Heaven on my shelf. My husband and I both loved James and Matt Haig’s The Life Impossible

My daughter and I had the best time watching Derry Girls together. I’d find us laughing out loud and it reminded me of when my mom and I cackled watching Friends when it first aired. Now we are watching Abbott Elementary which is delightful.

Last night I finished reading Bel Canto. I wish it had been part of a book club as I terribly need to discuss it someone, anyone. Beautiful writing. The story with stay with me for ages. Family shows: My girls are 5 and 9 and we’ve gotten into Modern Family and they are delighted by it. As are we to rewatch it. Funny how much now I understand Clare now…