Consumables #50

I have done 50 of these mothereffers? That seems nuts.

In honor of the 50th Consumables post, I will write up something, well, pretty paltry this week. I don't know what I have even been doing lately, but it hasn't been very pop culturey, that's for damn sure. So fifty! Woo! Way to celebrate it with a flaccid post!


Books
The Leftovers, by Tom Perrotta
One day, 25% of the world population just disappears. It's like The Rapture, only people aren't all entirely sure it was actually The Rapture. People sort of don't know what to think. In the suburban town of Mapleton, we see the aftermath of this mass disappearance. People deal with it in a bunch of different ways, as evidenced by the main family at the center of the story: the dad does his best to buck up and move forward, sort of blindly. The mom makes grief the center of her life. The college age son dedicates his life to a self-help guru gone amok. The teen daughter shuts down and rebels. So basically, all things that people tend to do with loss, Rapture or no Rapture. Essentially it's about the ways we all abandon each other, physically and metaphorically. And sometimes it's about the ways that we don't.

In the TeeVee
I watch Dancing with the Stars in the following way. If there is a dance number where it is all professionals and no celebrities, I watch that part. If there are a few minutes of rehearsal footage I watch that. I watch about 15-20 seconds of each celebrity dance number, just to get the gist of it (or, as my friend's father likes to mispronounce: the jizz of it. And no, I am not making that up, he really says that and no one can get over their embarrassment to tell him that he's saying it wrong). I don't watch anything the judges say. I don't watch anything the hosts say. Every two hour episode takes me about 15 minutes to watch, my finger poised directly on the fast forward button all the while. And yet, I feel like I am pretty much getting the full experience of that show. It's like I am watching the au jus of the show, I guess.

Music
I keep having dreams about Chicago this week. The town, not the band. No offense, Peter Cetera.

That is all. Have a loverly weekend!


Slow Down Chicago, by Canasta