Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

TV:

The rest of my Thursday night shows are all ending tomorrow.  I usually watch The Big Bang Theory and The Office live and then watch Grey’s Anatomy on Friday morning (which is generally the best part of my Friday) but now I’ll have to watch Grey’s and Big Bang Theory on Friday.  The Office has a one hour retrospective followed by the 9-10:15 series finale.  Last week’s episode was so great and really reminded me why I loved this series.  (Figures that they’re getting great again just in time to leave.)

I will miss my shows but this will also give me lots more time to read.  (See post below for reasons why this is a good thing.)

Books:

We are two weeks away from BEA and I am beyond excited! I have so many books that I want to get and 10 I would bite someone for and I just want to get to the part where I am there already.  So let’s get on that, okay?

I am still crazy behind on review books and while this is an excellent problem to have, it’s also keeping me away from books I’m desperate to read.  (Those include, but are not limited to, Clockwork Princess, The Obituary Writer, the last Across the Universe book and the new Jessi Kirby [Golden]. )  I am considering taking a review book vacation during BEA, but what I may do instead is just take a vacation from restricting myself to reading by release date.  Maybe while I’m on BEA vacation, I can also read some of the review books I’m most excited for, even if they’re farther ahead than I’d like (and many of those are books that you can read right now—books like The Program and Wedding Night and The Other Typist and Icons and The Lucy Variations and The Originals).  Although I may be pretty close to them by the time BEA starts anyway, since I’m about a month behind.  There are so many amazing books ahead for me, you guys!  I wish I had enough money so that I could do nothing but read.  That’d be awesome.

So what are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

TV:

LAST WEEK’S NASHVILLE.  That is all.

Books:

In three weeks, I will be heading to New York for BEA!  BEA officially begins on a Thursday and this year, I’m not doing the bloggercon, which is Wednesday (too expensive coupled with the fact that this year attendance doesn’t include entry to BEA, and the bloggercon was almost as expensive as a three-day pass to BEA).  This Friday, we get the full BEA schedule (I hope) and I am excited to see who else will be there.  And also nervous, because just the autographing tables schedule has required me to make some hard choices.  I’m sure this one will require hard choices, too.  Even harder, possibly, because I’ve already whittled it down so much.

So what are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

TV:

It’s May, which means most of my shows are about to end for the season (Parks and Recreation ends TOMORROW) and for some of them, I’m just excited to get a new episode.  (That would be you, Nashville!)  I’m still in love with Bates Motel, which is my favorite new show (and, with Nashville, the only two I stuck with).  But really, it’s been a great year for pretty much every show I’ve watched.  I do miss 30 Rock.

Books:

It’s May, which means BEA is THIS MONTH!  Yesterday, I talked about some survival tips and tomorrow, I will talk about the books I’m most hoping to get.  (The books I would bite someone for, as it were.)

I also recently read Z by Therese Anne Fowler, and I absolutely loved it.  If I haven’t successfully peer pressured you into buying it, please consider doing so.  Zelda Fitzgerald is such a fascinating woman, one who immediately became my imaginary BFF, and I really want to read more about her.  I’ve ordered an anthology of her writing, and while I don’t know when I’ll be able to read it, I can’t wait to get to it.

So what are you obsessed with this week?

BEA Survival Tips

This will be my fourth year attending BEA and so I thought it might be fun to talk about what to do in case you’re attending for the first time.  (And if not, try to go next year; it’s so fun!)

1)  COMFORTABLE SHOES.  Javits is huge and you will be on your feet for most of the day.  There are places to sit, but you’ll probably still be upright and moving for multiple hours and toting several books, as well.  Do all you can to help yourself out.

2)  Business cards!  Mine have my name (obviously), blog name and URL, address and Twitter and Facebook URLs, too.  Some people go back and forth over whether to include their address, but I feel like the less work publicists have to do, the more likely they are to help you. 

3)  Plan.  My BEA BFF Kathy and I have been planning for months now and since they’ve finally started releasing signing information, we have kicked that into overdrive.  Obviously not everybody is going to plan as thoroughly as we do, but it’s a good idea to have at least a basic idea of what you want to do each day (galleys you want; signings you must attend, etc.) so that you’re not running around completely overwhelmed.

4)  Accept the hard truth of BEA: you will not get everything you want.  This is where prioritizing comes into play.  This year, for example, Kendare Blake, Diana Peterfreund and Gretchen McNeil are all signing at more or less the same time.  And all are pretty likely to have ridiculous lines.  I will probably not be able to get all three, but I’m probably going to be able to get two. 

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

Books:

We’re now five weeks away from BEA!  I’m probably going to do a pre-BEA post sometime soon and that will include the books I’m most excited to get.  They’ve released part of the schedule and I am starting to plan.  But in five weeks (exactly!), I will be in New York and I am SO HAPPY.

Movies:

I got The Hobbit for my birthday from my goddaughter.  It’s her favorite movie and she wanted me to see it so we could talk about it.  I still haven’t seen it.  It’s become my Holy Grail, the idea of having the necessarily three hours to watch this movie.  (I am determined to get everything done over my weekend so that I can watch it Friday.  This WILL happen, A.!)

So what are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

Books:

I’m currently reading Double Feature by Owen King (review should be up tomorrow) and it’s the seriously the funniest book ever.  It’s also a book for people who love movies (and for people who love good books) so unless it falls apart hardcore in the final act, I endorse it wholeheartedly. 

TV:

I am so in love with Bates Motel.  I liked the pilot of Hannibal okay but I don’t know that I’m going to stick with it, primarily because of the guy they cast to play Hannibal.  He’s not really believable in the role for me, and I think it’s probably because he’s in a role that’s so completely identified with Anthony Hopkins, and this new guy (the one who was the villain in Casino Royale) is just no comparison).  And I am just not excited to watch it. And you compare that to Bates Motel, which I am always happy and eager to watch…well, no.  And I’m so behind with my reading that if I’m not excited to watch a show, I’m not going to keep it on my viewing schedule.  Which means that I am currently left with approximately five shows.  (And probably The Office, out of a sense of obligation.)  And most of them are probably almost over, anyway, right?  So after a few more weeks, it’ll just be Mad Men and then my beloved Breaking Bad comes back soon.

Also:

Did I mention BEA is coming soon?  That’s next month.

What are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

TV:

I am currently surrounded by a ton of great TV!  I watched the pilot of Hannibal and really loved it; Bates Motel is one of the most fun shows EVER and I am so addicted; Nashville is one of my favorite guilty pleasures and…wait, there was something else I wanted to discuss.  What was it?

Oh yeah.  MAD MEN IS BACK!  It’s one of the best shows on TV (potentially second only to Breaking Bad, although my decision of which of those shows is better centers around which one is airing at the time) and I have missed Don Draper and Peggy and Joan and Roger and everyone who isn’t Megan Draper.

Books:

BEA IS NEXT MONTH!  I cannot wait!  And the BEA people released a sneak peek at who will be autographing, which you can see here.  So now I just have to wait and see who will be signing in the booths and what the galley drops will be.  I’m hoping that Stephanie Perkins will be signing in the Penguin booth and that the upcoming Gayle Forman release will be there.  And if I could get my hands on the two upcoming Daisy Whitney books, that’d be fantastic too.

So what are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With—The Birthday Edition!

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

Life:

It’s my 33rd birthday!  This has been an awful year so far, a seriously horrible year and I am already ready for it to end because 2014 can only be better.

But even as I was insisting that no, I didn’t want to do anything for my birthday that didn’t involve me, Sam, pajamas, couch and books and movies, my friends were like, “No.  We are getting together for your birthday.”  So thank you, Julia and Philip for not letting me be (too) antisocial.  So I am happy to be going out to dinner and then getting back to Sam, couch, pop culture and pajamas. ;)  (Seriously, thank you; you are great friends and people.)

Books:

It’s April!  That means BEA is NEXT MONTH, people!  I’ve been doing a lot of chatting with Kathy (and it’s her birthday today, too!) and I think we’re both very much ready for the schedules to be released so that we can start planning in earnest.  Although the pre-planning has been fun, too.

So what are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

TV:

Bates Motel!  It premiered last week and this show is so weird and twisted and…well, FUN that I can’t wait to see where it goes next.  The only downside is that I’m not sure how long it will be able to last.  I mean, if you’ve seen Psycho, you know what’s going to happen to Norman and his mom.  But I’m still along for the ride.

Also, Nashville is back today!  I can’t wait.  :)

Books:

We are under two months away from BEA!  In fact, with next week’s Things I’m Obsessed With, I’ll be able to say that it’s next month!  (But that’s a little bit of a cheat because it’ll be barely April and BEA is at the end of May.  But still!  NEXT MONTH!)

I’m still in a review pit but there are some great books ahead.  This week’s book I can’t wait to get to?  Mystery of Mercy Close by Marian Keyes!  I came to her novels fairly late (about six years ago) and so I got to read all them them pretty much back to back.  And then a couple years ago, she released a new one. And now, FINALLY, we get a new one.  And it’s a Walsh Sisters book!

So what are you obsessed with this week?

Things I’m Obsessed With

Welcome to the latest Things I’m Obsessed With!

TV (sort of):

So last Wednesday, we learned that if fans raised $2 million, there’d be a Veronica Mars movie.  Which means that last Wednesday, we also learned that (a) there WOULD be a Veronica Mars movie and (b) that said movie broke Kickstarter records with how fast that money was raised.  I loved that show and I’m so excited that I get to spend more time with the characters.  I did contribute to the Kickstarter campaign, but nowhere near as much as I’d like to.  (Why can’t I win the lottery just once?)

Movies:

I saw Django Unchained and really, really liked it.  Now I want to see all the Quentin Tarantino movies.  I’ve seen a lot of them (Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs, obviously, plus this and Inglorious Basterds).  I’ve seen the first Kill Bill movie but want to rewatch that, along with the second one.  I also need to see Jackie Brown.  Jury’s out on Grindhouse.  (Is it worth seeing, does anyone know?)

Books:

Still in the reading pit.  It’s actually funny (in a panic-causing way) how many books I have to read between right now and November.

So what am I most excited for this week?

Six Years by Harlan Coben!  He’s one of my favorite authors and this one looks fantastic.  I probably won’t get to it until April (I seriously JUST started reading the March releases, and it’s late March now!) but it’s coming.

So what are you obsessed with this week?