Hello everyone! Today I’m going to write about my hobbies and entertainment for the month.

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I have quite a lot so let’s get started!

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Books

I read four books this month, so now my total is seven out of twenty books for my Goodreads reading challenge. I’m still behind schedule but it looks like I’m on track to catch up! Here’s what I read this month and some thoughts on those books.

First, I read Wise Millennial by Peter Noble Darrow. I received this book free for review purposes and will leave that linked there if you’re interested! I gave the book four out of five stars as it was really fun to read and I could see how it would be useful if I’d just had it a few years ago!

I also read Girl, Wash Your Face by Rachel Hollis. Many of my friends had already read it and they seemed to enjoy it so I picked it up at the library to read it. Honestly, I didn’t really enjoy it although it did seem useful in a way. I gave it three out of five stars. It’s weird because it’s the same type of book as Darrow’s were she gives advice based on her experiences. However, I thought Darrow was more accepting of his mistakes and owned them while Hollis didn’t really seem to have forgiven herself or others yet and it made it a little awkward to read for me. Also, some of her advice seemed pretty bad too so that made it a little worse, although most of it was good.

Then I read a book my sister gave me Sisterhood illustrated by Sarah Cray. It’s a collection of quotes about sisters and close female friends and the illustrations are gorgeous! I gave it a four out of five stars because it was beautiful and a great gift idea although not very deep. I enjoyed it though and it was so sweet!

I finished the book Kingdom of Ash by Sarah J. Maas. It’s the final book of the Throne of Glass Series by Maas, which I’ve greatly enjoyed. I’m sad it’s over but it was a great ending. I gave the book a five out of five stars, as I think all books by Maas I’ve read have gotten because that’s how much I love them!

Movies

The first film I watched was Bohemian Rhapsody. I rarely watch films anymore but I had been wanting to see this one for awhile as I heard it was good. I really enjoyed it and have been listening to Queen music ever since! I highly recommend if you haven’t seen it already!

I rewatched the Taylor Swift Reputation tour on Netflix. I just felt one day like I needed background music as I cleaned so I put it on. It was great!

Also on Netflix I watched Iliza Shlesinger: Confirmed Kills. I’d previously watched her newer comedy special Elder Millennial so I knew I had to watch this one! It was also funny, especially the one where she was making fun of women who say they want to be mermaids (legit couldn’t stop laughing). The cool thing about this one was that it was filmed in Chicago, so that was pretty cool! Oh and the body glitter! It was great.

One that you know I saw because I reviewed it was the documentary on Netflix Knock Down the House. I really enjoyed it and I also recommend this one!

I also tried to watch A Tale of Two Kitchens on Netflix and while I thought the idea of it, showing how two restaurants operate and exploring the similarities and differences, it just didn’t really keep my attention. I did like that they were trying to show how they are different from the idea that kitchens are bad places though as they were showing how committed each was to their own city of San Francisco and Mexico City.

Lastly, I watched Gaga: Five Foot Two on Netflix as well. It was pretty cool although I wish I knew the songs Lady Gaga was creating so I’d better understand her process. Still I found this to be a very interesting look into her life as a musician.

TV Shows

I watched a few more episodes of Designated Survivor this month. I think I’d previously said I was in season two but no, I’m still at the end of season one. It just isn’t as good towards the end of the season and is really dragging so it feels like it’s been longer and it’s harder to get through. I’m sure it’s all leading up to a big season finale as it’s been all going well so far so we’ll see!

I watched the first episode of season three of Nailed It! where there are three bakers who compete to make a complicated project. That was the Marvel one with Felicia Day as the guest judge which I loved.

I also watched the first episode of a docuseries called Rotten on Netflix. It looks into the food industry and this episode was about honey and bees. I’m sure you’ve heard that bees are dying rapidly so the episode explored how suppliers try to meet the demand for honey, which is greater than what can be produced. Apparently there is a lot of honey that is mixed with fake honey and a lot of honey bee theft as well. It was a very interesting episode and I can’t wait to see more!

Musicals & Concerts

This month I saw Ariana Grande on her Sweetener World Tour and reviewed it for you already. I was there the second night she was in Chicago and apparently the world went crazy that she wore her hair down. I loved that she did that! Her hair looks really good down and my friend Erin, who saw her in Arizona, was actually mad that Ari had a high pony for her AZ concert and hair down for the one I attended. My manager at work was hilarious about it too. He was all “I didn’t realize she actually had that much hair” and I had to explain it’s still extensions. Then he got super annoyed and said “well CLEARLY I don’t know about THAT”, pointed to his bald head, and I just about died laughing.

Music

Like I said, I’ve been loving Queen lately! Some of my favorites have been “Radio Ga Ga”, “Another One Bites the Dust”, and “We are the Champions”.

Besides that, more Ari is my fave! I’ve really loved “Successful” a ton this month.

I have really gotten more excited about Taylor Swift’s new music. I think that “Me” has really grown on me, although nothing can make that whole “spelling is fun” part any better. I didn’t instantly love “You Need to Calm Down” but it was catchy and fun to listen to so I’m getting more used to it. I think I loved her Reputation album so much it’ll be hard to get used to Lover so quickly but I did preorder it anyway. She had four deluxe versions at Target and I picked the pink one (version 4). I love to have the CDs for my car so I can’t wait for it to come in!

YouTube

I’ve been loving videos from the channel “Mondragon Chiropractic” where it’s literally watching a chiropractor do adjustments. I don’t know why but it’s soooo relaxing!

I also started watching Meghan Rienks’ channel again. I used to watch her years ago but she was one of those youtubers that clung onto making content for an audience much younger than herself for way too long so I eventually unsubscribed. She seems to really have rebranded since then and it seems interesting! I was trying to get into her podcast but it’s one of those “advice” podcasts and I really don’t like those (I think Dear Hank and John is the only I have liked in that format) so I think I’ll just stick to her actual videos.

Oh! I adored Simone Giertz’s video “I Turned My Tesla Into A Pickup Truck”, where she quite literally cut apart a Tesla and turned it into a pickup truck (spoilers). Not only is her “Truckla” impressive to look at, but seeing the process and how much fun she had doing the project with her friends was hilarious! Also, the part at the beginning where she was giving herself a pep talk about how she’s an adult as well as the CEO and “totally allowed to buy a car” was totally something I would do so she’s really relatable!

Podcasts

I’ve been enjoying The Valleycast podcast with a bunch of YouTubers. The hosts are Lee Newton, Steve Zaragoza, Joe Bereta, and Elliott Morgan. I used to enjoy their videos on SourceFed back in the day so I’m glad I found them again! They also normally have a guest on their podcast to join them. They way they set it up was that all of them bring in different topics and they all talk about them, which can get real fun! Especially when Steve adds in sounds that annoy them all!

Video Games

Per usual, I’m playing Hogwarts Mystery! Ava Samwise mastered her patronus, which is a cheetah! I was disappointed it wasn’t a leopard but by the time I looked up the spoilers I had already answered the questions that determine what you get. I’m fully caught up in the story and I don’t want to spoil it but omg that Year 5 cursed vault though!!! Merula called Ava Samwise her friend which was a surprise, we haven’t made any headway in getting more friendship points with Hagrid, and most of the friendships are the same. I decided to abandon getting Badeea to level 10 for now (she’s level 9) and got Jae to level 9. I decided to start getting the rest up a few more levels so everyone is a bit higher than I think I need them. I’m trying to get Liz up a level (currently at 7) and then alternate between her, Diego, and Talbot until they’re all level 9 unless I see the story needing something higher from the others. I have noticed that usually the story will have me do those friendship activities with characters I’m already level 10 on so that doesn’t help and it’s just annoying! The new updates seem to be preparing for three new friends so I need to get going on that!

I started playing Wizards Unite, which is the Harry Potter version of Pokemon Go. Speaking of, I also play Pokemon Go still and I have gotten a few shiny Pokemon recently! Anyway, Wizards Unite isn’t super fun as I agree with a lot of reviews that it just doesn’t have the same pull that the “gotta catch em all” Pokemon game has.

Next, I finally completed the main story of Spider-Man! It was a lot of fun! I think I’m going to do a full game review on it so I won’t say much about it now. There are still a few things I want to do in the game such as get all the suits and upgrades as well as all the “secret photos” you can do so I plan to do that before I say I’m fully done with the game, although I likely won’t wait to do them before my review.

I also completed Rise of the Tomb Raider. I didn’t expect to finish it this month at all but after finishing Spider-Man I popped it in. I intended to try to back track and find the collectibles I hadn’t gotten yet or just try to get more upgrades but the issue is that before you finish the game there’s still enemies around so I decided to give up on that and just finish the game so I can do the collecting in piece later if I want. I will probably do a full review on the game next month so I’ll leave that there!

Since I finished those games and the only other game I owned for PS4 was Until Dawn, which I also finished. So I saw Far Cry 5 was on sale at Target and ordered it. I’ve wanted to play it for awhile so when it arrived I started to play it pretty quickly after. This is the one that takes place in Montana where you have to liberate Hope County from a cult called Eden’s Gate. I liberated Dutch’s island, which is the first portion of the game, and have started to head southwest into John’s territory towards Falls End. I got Boomer at Rae Rae’s farm and liberated the outpost near it so I am following the game suggestions for now.

Cooking

I signed up for a cooking thing at my library but I had such a long day that day at work and didn’t feel up to it. Unfortunately I didn’t end up going but hopefully I can go to the next one!

Active Life

Well, I started my ballet classes again! The same instructor was there so that was nice. She remembered me again as it is year 3 that I’ve been going. There were two people I recognized from last year, one mom of a dancer and one that is another teacher there. The rest of the people were new but they seem nice. The class is pretty full, there’s 12 people registered. Usually they all show up at first for a few weeks and by the end it’s 4 people left though so we’ll see how many make it all the way through.

Anyway, about the class. Boy, was I sore after the class! I just don’t use those muscles regularly! My instructor though said I was looking great and doing well so she asked if I was taking classes in between. I said no I just really love ballet so I practice on my own sometimes. It’s true! I’ll tendu and arabesque on my own a lot as well as just really focus in class. I still can’t really do chaine turns though, I suck at turns. However there was one person in class who takes ballet classes at two other locations and does like three classes a week and said she “just started doing those the other week”. I’m so confused why she just started learning them since they come up fairly quickly after you start but alright.

Creative Life

The first DIY of the month was the sumi-e and suminagashi Japanese Ink Techniques. We did Suminagashi first but everyone got really frustrated with it quickly because we were using rice paper. It was super thin so when everyone lifted it up right away and were rough with it then the paper would rip apart like crazy. I managed to make two because I stopped, lifted it up carefully, and then held it up while it dried carefully for a few minutes before setting it down to try. With sumi-e it was more like painting with one color but I decided to use up the colors I had already poured out for my suminagashi before giving up on that. I ended up with a red panda-hamster look a-like instead of a regular panda and then I made a fairy ballerina princess for fun. Overall, I had a good time!

The second DIY night was sculpting with air dry clay. It wasn’t the easiest to work with but it was pretty fun! I started trying to make a vase but it was apparent that the vase in the pictures given to us for ideas was one made on a wheel so it wasn’t going to work. Instead I made a little pot with a flower on top (a petal fell off in the drying process, sad face) and a leaf. I was thinking of hot gluing it all back together but I don’t really like it so I might just throw this one out.

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And so that’s what I’ve been up to with all my various hobbies! I think I need less hobbies soon since it’s hard to keep up with them all!

Thanks for reading!

Pamela

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