As is very apropos for the third week of October, this week’s delights are very fall based.

• It’s starting to look very fall like around here with a lot of pretty leaves. I feel like we don’t always get good color around here, but I feel like the leaves are holding up their end of the bargain this year.
• I like that the people in my neighborhood are super into decorative gourds on their stoops. I live in a neighborhood of rowhouses and you just walk around and it’s house after house with decorative gourds lined up the three or four stairs on their stoop leading into their house. I approve.
• I do like the large array of squash that I see, but I am particularly fond of the goose neck squash. It really does look like a goose! I did not buy one for myself because I have a very simple display of mini pumpkins that start small-ish on my bottom step and ascend just slightly larger to the top. I enjoy seeing them in other people’s displays though.
• It’s not true of all parts of Baltimore, but even though I live in the middle of a city it is very naturey around here. I don’t have to walk very far from my house to see lots of wildlife. The rich people neighborhood just to the north that I walk through every morning where people actually have yards has tons of wildlife. I see lots of bunnies, foxes, and most recently deer. Actually the deer freak me out a little because they are way too comfortable with people. These deer do not startle at all. They’ll be munching away in somebody’s yard and they don’t blink an eye when I have to walk very near them to get by. They are very cool to look at at though, and I’m not the one being annoyed by them eating all my vegetation.
• My friends had their annual Oktoberfest party this weekend. It’s always a good time, and we had great fall weather for it. Lots of German and fall inspired food plus fresh pressed apple cider that we put the kids to work making in the cider press my friend rents every year. A good time with good friends.
• Need a chair? This is a random game my husband and I play with each other. There are a surprising number of random chairs littered along roads and various other places. Whenever one of us sees one we ask the other need a chair? They are remodeling the space that was a movie theater in my neighborhood that closed at the beginning of COVID so another theater can move in. My husband walked by there yesterday and saw a bunch of the old chairs being tossed in a dumpster so he texted me a photo and asked need a chair? Despite telling him that I obviously did, he did not bring me back any movie theater chairs.

And now for your musical delights

• I continued to listen to the Spotify playlist I mentioned last week and reminded myself of the song “Be My Stars” by local Baltimore artist Cris Jacobs. I adore this song, and I was happy to hear it again.

• I heard the song “Strut” by Sheena Easton on the radio driving home from the Oktoberfest party. I could not tell you the last time I heard that song. It is very 80s sounding and I’m not sure that I like it as much as I once did, but I remember loving that song when I was a small child. It came out when I was only 6. We had some neighbors who lived next door with boys named Craig and Mike that were about my sister and my’s age who we used to play with. They moved after we had only been there a couple years, but I still have a distinct memory of hearing this song on a record at their house.

Maggie

As is tradition, once I find a tv show I really like it gets unceremoniously canceled. So that is to say there is only one season of Maggie on Hulu and there will only ever be one season. If you like lighthearted rom com type shows I still recommend you watch the episodes that do exist. The titular Maggie is an actual psychic who has stayed away from dating because she has always been able to see glimpses of problems in her relationships. She meets a guy who she finally thinks is the one, but then her visions seems to be telling her something else so she breaks it off and then he winds up living in the apartment beneath her with his fiance, a long time girlfriend he got back together with after Maggie breaks up with him. It’s a funny and sweet show with good characters. I’m sad that more people don’t seem to like these types of shows because I would love more lighthearted character based shows.

Five Days at Memorial

Five Days at Memorial is absolutely compelling misery porn. It details the five days that patients and staff spent at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina. It’s all completely depressing and reveling in terribleness. It’s also extremely watchable, especially the first five episodes that take place during those days in the hospital. The final three episodes focus on the investigation and trial of Dr. Anna Pou, who was accused of killing patients as the hospital was being evacuated. I didn’t like those episodes as much.

Junior Baking Show

Apparently for years there has been a kids version of the Great British Baking Show called Junior Baking Show, but we’ve never been given access to it in the United States until this, the sixth season. Netflix didn’t bother obtaining the rights to the previous five seasons. I’m curious if all the seasons were set up like this one or if this was structured differently due to COVID. They have 2 different heats with 8 kids each that last a week and then 4 bakers from each heat compete in the finals week. I generally found it enjoyable to watch though it’s not as good as the adult version. The age range is too big so there are vast differences in abilities between the kids, and some of the challenges seemed a bit too difficult for their skill level. I seriously wonder if the judges know how much food they ate off the floor. There was one kid who I think was 10 whose confidence I totally want to have. Every challenge his bakes looked terrible, but every time he was so proud of himself and convinced that the judges were going to love whatever he made.

Loot

Loot is an AppleTV+ show starring Maya Rudolph as a woman who inherits a vast fortune after getting divorced from her rich husband after he cheats on her. Up to this point she has just been enjoying being a rich woman of leisure but decides to actually get involved with a charity that bears her name much to the chagrin of the people who actually work there. It’s essentially workplace comedy. It’s decent enough.

Echoes

Echoes had a chance to be a good show, but it really wasn’t. It stars Michelle Monaghan as twins who switch places in each other’s lives every year on their birthday. There are lots of dark secrets in their past including how their sister wound up in a wheelchair when they were kids and how they might have been involved with a man dying in a fire when they were teenagers. Now one of the twins decides she wants out and tries to fake her death and run, but the other one steps back into her life and forces the other one to come back. The story constantly tries to switch who you’re supposed to think is the good twin and which is the bad one. I do actually really like Michelle Monaghan as an actress, but I’m also starting to wonder if she actually knows how to smile because I feel like she just plays all these really dour characters. They really did her no favors making her give one of the twins some heavy Southern accent that sounded super fake to try and help the audience differentiate between the twins. For a show that included so many actors that I like, the story was not great and ended in a very cliched way.

The Great

The Great is loosely based on Catherine the Great. It stars Elle Fanning as Catherine and Nicholas Hoult who does a great job as Peter the Great. For some reason it was not a show that I ever felt compelled to watch. We took an extremely long break in the middle of season one before eventually picking it back up again. I also fell asleep during many episodes, so I probably only really saw about 3/4 of the show because I never felt like I needed to go back and rewatch what I slept through. Despite all that I usually enjoyed watching the episodes when we actually thought to put it on and was actually awake during them.

Julie and the Phantoms

Julie and the Phantoms is another show that will only ever see one season. It is a young adult show about a boy band in the 90s who are killed just as they are about to make it big and the teenage girl trying to get over the death of her mother who can somehow see them. Magically when they’re performing together other people can see the ghosts as well, but only then. It was a sweet little show with some decently catchy music.

Boo, Bitch

I watched one episode of this show and then never felt compelled to watch another one until the day I had a colonoscopy and was just resting up until the anesthesia wore completely off and I binged the whole season. That was about what it was good for. It’s another teen show about a girl who dies but is a ghost because she needs to fulfill some destiny before she passes completely on. She now adjusts her life so that she can become popular and date the boy she had a crush on. She becomes completely insufferable in a way that isn’t really fun to watch, and then there is a twist at the end of the series that makes no sense looking back at everything that happened in the show before that.

Paper Girls

Paper Girls on Amazon is based off of a graphic novel of the same name. It involves 4 girls in the 1980s who are delivering papers on their bikes early in the morning the day after Halloween when they are chased by what they think are just people who were out causing trouble for the holiday, but then they wind up time traveling to the present day where they have to rely on adult versions of themselves to figure out how to get back to the past while also battling the people who made them time travel in the first place. It had its moments, but I slept through a lot of this and don’t really even know how it ended.

My friend and I bought tickets to see The Killers at Capital One Arena almost a year ago. I remember at the time still naively talking about surely, surely that COVID would be less rampant by now but also saying that if it was I might have just given up by then. One of those things is sort of true. Despite the way everyone else is acting, COVID is still running wild. I’m still being pretty cautious about it, but was apparently correct that I did finally decide to take a chance and make this my first real indoor concert with an N95 firmly planted on my face the entire time. (Technically my first indoor concert as Allison Russell at the Barns at Wolf Trap back in February, but that was 400 people seated, masks and vaccination required, and lengthy info on the venue website about the upgrades to their ventilation so I hardly feel like it counts.) There were more people in the crowd wearing masks than I anticipated, but I’d still estimate only about 10% of people were.

I really liked our seats and would definitely try and snag seats in that section for another concert at Capital One Arena. We were pretty far down in our section, so it almost felt like we were on the floor, but with actual seats and elevated so we could actually see over people. Also, I liked that I was sitting at the end of my row next to a railing overlooking the entrance to the concourse below where I got to watch the arena staff take out all the people on the floor who couldn’t handle themselves. Pace yourselves people and don’t guzzle down the giant cup of beer because then you’re just going to wind up getting wheeled out of the crowd just as the main act is taking the stage. There were multiple people that went down within the first two songs. Then there was a long stretch until the end when some guy was getting kicked out and fighting with the cops and his girlfriend was trying to get him to calm down and not punch the cop, so then he shoved her and it did not end well for him. Amazingly though my concert karma was good for a change and I did not have anyone around me being terrible. In fact even though the show was sold out the seats to the right of stayed empty as did the seats in front of us though once people were standing during The Killers set that space kind of filled in as people spread out.

There was never any indication anywhere that there was an opening act for this concert. I made a concerted effort to try and find out if there was one and who it was because I thought it was odd that there wasn’t. The info wasn’t anywhere. Not on the tickets, the Capital One Arena or Ticketmaster event listings, or The Killers’ website. So I was like maybe there really isn’t. Then some band that was decidedly not The Killers took the stage, so I was like I guess there is one. I just have no idea who it is. Two songs into the set the singer introduced himself and the three other people on stage all by their first names. I was like well this doesn’t help. Then he finally started playing some well known Smiths songs at the end of the set and I figured out that it was Johnny Marr. I was never super into the Smiths. I was always more of a Cure girl. If I know anything that Johnny Marr has done since the Smiths broke up I don’t really know that I do. Morrissey was the one who seemed to have a bigger career after they split. I was happy to get to hear “How Soon is Now?” live, which is a song I have always loved, and I’m happy to have done it without purposefully giving Morrissey any of money, though since he co-wrote he’s probably getting some tiny fraction of a cent from that performance.

I feel like I have a very interesting relationship with The Killers. I never considered myself a fan of The Killers even though I enjoyed their singles here and there. I really do not like the song “Mr. Brightside” and since that was their first big hit, for a long time I just wrote them off and thought I didn’t like them. Eventually I realized how many other songs of theirs I did like without even realizing that I knew them. Like I never actively chose to listen to a Killers album until Imploding the Mirage and Pressure Machine, which are departures from their earlier stuff, especially Pressure Machine which was one of my favorite albums of last year.

Realistically they should be touring that album, but it they are an arena rock band playing an arena and that album is decidedly not an arena rock album. I had looked ahead at some of the most recent set lists to figure out what we were going to hear. It was mostly the same set of their biggest hits with a couple of different songs from Pressure Machine rotating through. I was happy we got “Runaway Horses” in our set, though I wish the second song would have been something other than “Cody” because that one is not my favorite. Somehow the Anthem got them to play their 5 year anniversary show tomorrow night, so I’m going to be curious if they mix up the set list a lot more for that and do break out more of Pressure Machine, because that is a venue where they could do that.

As I said I have never really listened to any of The Killers older albums other than the singles that I heard on the radio and being out in the world, so I was a little surprised that there were only a couple of songs I didn’t know. I guess their hits really accumulated, and they bring the people what they want. As I said they pretty much played their singles with a couple of other songs thrown in. They brought Johnny Marr back out during the encore and covered the Smiths song, “You Just Haven’t Earned It Yet, Baby”. They of course finished the night off with “Mr. Brightside”, which I still don’t like but wasn’t surprised to hear as the final song of the show.

I’m usually not big on arena shows because I feel like it often becomes more about the spectacle of whatever they’ve done to keep the people in the rafters entertained rather than the music and the actual performance by the band. I did not feel that way with this show at all. Brandon Flowers is a consummate performer. There was plenty of the spectacle stuff with large video screens, laser lighting and other light show stuff, and three different rounds of confetti cannons that every time they set one off I said to my friend the arena staff that has to clean that up really hates you right now. However, I in no way felt like the show was relying on that. I felt like Brandon could have kept the crowd just as energized without any of that stuff. In fact there were some songs that didn’t really have much in the way of theatrical staging going on, so he proved my point. They are so very much an arena rock band I was trying to actually imagine them playing in small clubs like they must have done early in their career, and I have a hard time doing it because they are meant to be seen in an arena. I rarely if ever say that. I very much enjoyed watching them perform and the experience of dancing and singing along with the crowd. Now let’s hope I managed to not get COVID while I was doing it.

I’m not in the mood to write this post. The weather has been gross for days on end. Monday is starting off with a whole bunch of stuff at work that I don’t want to deal with and shouldn’t be my job except that we can’t hire anyone to actually do this job so it’s mine for the moment. It’s probably the perfect time to remind myself that there are better things in the world. The first couple are more contemplative than joyful, but I think they fit in what I’m trying to do here.

• As I mentioned in my New Music Friday post last week, the woman who has been the worship leader at my church passed away last week. There will be an actual viewing and a homegoing service for her next week, but our Sunday service this week was in honor of her. My church does not have an actual building. We rent space from other places, usually in Baltimore City Schools. Once COVID hit and the schools closed that obviously wasn’t possible, so we’ve been renting space at the Baltimore Museum of Industry. Between about Easter and mid-October we’ve rented space in their Pavilion the past few years. When the weather is nice you can’t beat meeting there with a view of the harbor. This weekend wasn’t nice. We’re still a few weeks away from our contract for the cold winter months moving back into Federal Hill Prep after many years elsewhere. So that is to say even though the weather was drizzly, windy, and chilly we still had to meet outside. Usually on those sorts of days the number of people attending in person drops drastically with a lot of people opting to view online from home. I’m 100% guilty of this. Despite the weather people showed up to celebrate Paula. The pavilion was fuller than it is on most Sundays, even the really nice ones. It was definitely the only reason I dragged myself out to church in person. I will never understand why someone with such a beautiful spirit and who dedicated her life to lifting other people up was taken so young while there are plenty of awful people just out there sowing division and hatred who live to a ripe old age. All I know is that Paula was apparently at peace with it, saying “all shall be well” to the very end. And all I can say is that it’s far better to spend your life in such a way that people are going to come out to sit in terrible weather conditions brought on by the remnants of a hurricane to celebrate the light you were in the world.
• Ed Yong’s writing about COVID has been a lifeline for me throughout this pandemic. He rightly won a Pulitzer Prize for Explanatory Journalism for his work. He’s done a lot of long form writing and gone in deep with people who are being unequally affected by the pandemic from health care workers, to immunocompromised people, to now people suffering from long COVID. His writing has made me feel seen at so many times where it felt like no one cared. I have so many of his stories saved to reread. He has expressed on Twitter how much of a mental toll doing the research and writing these stories has taken. This week he announced that he is taking a 6 month sabbatical to refresh and hopefully avoid burnout so that he can continue his work, something he recognizes is a real privilege to do. I am very much going to miss his writing, but I wish him the best and thank him for being a voice to people society wants to sweep aside because it’s easier, and his call for the United States to do better. His final article in The Atlantic this past week “The Pandemic’s Legacy is Already Clear” is a great encapsulation of all the work he’s done over the past three years.
• On my walk the other day I was stopped at an intersection waiting to cross the street, and there was a woman diagonally across from me also waiting and while doing so was really getting down to whatever she was listening to on her headphones. It amused me.
• We got dinner from Amicci’s, a restaurant in Baltimore’s Little Italy, on Thursday. Whenever we do that it also means that I get dessert from Vacarro’s, which is a delicious Italian pastry shop. I always get their chocolate vanilla Napolean. It was delicious as always.
• Back when the tv show Community was on they were often on the bubble of getting renewed. At some point in the one the later seasons a hashtag for #sixseasonsandamovie sprung up to get NBC to renew them. I don’t remember all the details about what seasons everything went down, but I know that against all odds with a final sixth season pickup by Yahoo! tv, I think. they made it to the six seasons part of that hashtag. Peacock announced this week that they would be fulfilling the movie part of it. I loved Community when it was first on. It did get not so great in some of the latter seasons. I’m honestly not sure how well it would hold up these days, so I have never rewatched it. I do appreciate that this random hashtag has come to fruition, and I probably will subscribe to Peacock for a month to watch it whenever it comes out.
• I discovered this week that the first two seasons of the Great British Baking Show never aired in the United States and that they are now currently streaming on the Roku Channel along with the remainder of the BBC version of the show with Mary Berry, Mel, and Sue. The first season is kind of crazy in that they literally move around the UK each episode and 2 people are eliminated each week. I guess that’s why they bake in a tent. They used to have to move the set, and then since it was already established they kept it even once they stayed put in one location. I miss Mel and Sue a lot. I can’t stand Matt as a host. I miss when the show was less schticky than it is now and the challenges were more about the baking than people being able to create elaborate works out of baked goods. I do think it was the right call to get rid of the history segments though and just focus on the bakers. If I was smart I would be saving these seasons to fill the GBBS void after the season that is currently airing is over, but apparently I am not smart.
• My friend and I went to see Our Town at Baltimore Center Stage this past weekend. We used to have season tickets before the pandemic, and had not renewed them since then. I had never seen Our Town before and it felt like a big hole in my theatre going life, so I asked if she wanted to go to that one show with me. I have nothing to compare it to, but it was an interesting production with the set and costumes all contemporary Baltimore life with a largely Black cast even though the setting is still Grover’s Corner, New Hampshire at the beginning of the 1900s. An interesting juxtaposition and I think something that speaks to commonality of human existence that I think is the whole point of the play. I also appreciated that Center Stage was still requiring people to mask. I was going to wear mine regardless, but it was nice that the entire audience was masked and not just me because masks work best when we’re all doing it.
• Rolling Stone recently did an article on the Top 100 TV Shows of all Time where they polled a bunch of critics and asked them to provide their to 50 and then calculated the responses. Apparently they got one very unusual ballot response, which is just a real joy to read.

When Rolling Stone polled dozens of showrunners, actors, and critics for our 100 best shows ever list, we got a very unusual ballot from BoJack Horseman creator Raphael Bob-Waksberg. I had many, many questions, and he was gracious enough to answer: https://t.co/AANrLfbwWf pic.twitter.com/jO4mJnT32Y

— Alan Sepinwall (@sepinwall) September 30, 2022

• The Netflix is a Joke Twitter account had a robot watch Cobra Kai and then write an episode of the show. This couple minute animated short version of an episode is both utterly ridiculous and entirely accurate.

We worked with @KeatonPatti to make a bot watch every episode of @CobraKaiSeries and then write its own episode of Cobra Kai. Here's what it came up with pic.twitter.com/YWeV7lnkOi

— Netflix Is A Joke (@NetflixIsAJoke) September 21, 2022

And now for your musical delights:

• I honestly don’t think I need to include the Lizzo/Library of Congress flute story because I’m pretty sure everyone in the world has seen it, but it made me and a lot of people happy this week so it must be mentioned.
• I spent some time this weekend livestreaming the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival. I takes place in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. I have friends that live in San Francisco. I should totally go visit them one year and go to this festival. For now, it’s nice that you can stream it for free. I watched Joy Oladakun, Allison Russell, Lucius, and Marcus Mumford. All of them were great and collaborated with other artists at the festival, which is one of my favorite things that happens at the Newport Folk Festival, so I was happy to see it happening here too.