Friday, November 21, 2014

What's making me happy this week, 11-21-14

I listen to a lot of podcasts while I do housework or commute, and one of my favorites is NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour. Which is just what it says on the tin--a small group of smart, interesting people with varying interests in pop culture talking movies, TV, books, comics, music, etc.

Each podcast closes with the panelists listing what's making them happy this week. The happy things are supposed to be something listeners could seek out themselves (the better to be made happy in turn), and they're not supposed to be self-promotion, though occasional exceptions are made on both counts.

Anyway, I like this feature so much I decided to copy it. So without further ado, here's the first edition of What's Making Susanna Happy This Week:

1) This bourbon chocolate pecan pie recipe, which I made for my day job's annual Thanksgiving potluck on Wednesday. It is AMAZING. Perfect balance of bourbon, chocolate, and pecan deliciousness. Coworkers of mine whose only prior experience of pecan pie was store-bought or restaurant claimed I have some kind of magic touch...which I don't. It's just a really good recipe, and not a difficult one if you have solid basic cooking skills. Pecan pie is SO much easier than buttermilk biscuits, poaching eggs, roasting large chunks of meat, or anything involving yeast, f'rex. So give it a try!


2) My new favorite TV show, Sleepy Hollow, had a wonderful, well-paced first season...and has been struggling a bit to recapture that magic in Season 2. It's not just me saying so, either--there have been all kinds of articles to that effect, including this, my favorite of the bunch. So why is it in my happy list for the week? Because Monday night's episode was brilliant, and brought back two characters who've been MIA most of the season (Jenny Mills and Frank Irving). I'm still dubious that the writers will ever convince me that I ought to root for Katrina to do anything other than die self-sacrificially or (preferably!) be revealed to have been Secretly Evil All Along, and I'm completely meh on Hawley, but I'm back to eagerly anticipating new episodes.

3) Sharing geek TV with my 10-year-old daughter. She's getting to the age where it's not always easy to connect, so I'm glad we have a shared love for everything from Doctor Who to My Little Pony. Today she was home from school recovering from a stomach bug and I was home from work taking care of her, so we watched the new episode of Legend of Korra, along with "The Sin Eater" from S1 of Sleepy Hollow. Since I binge-watched S1 in September and was already spoiled for such key events as the identity of the Horseman of War, it's fascinating to watch her watch and see if she'll figure it out before All Is Revealed. And while today's LoK suffered a bit by being a clip show--I understand Nickolodeon cut the budget at the last minute, and am I ever Not Happy with how they've mismanaged that show--it was again a pleasure to watch it with Miss Fraser and to laugh together at Varrick's antics.

So that's what's making me happy this week. How about you?

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