Check in Thursdays: Week 52

Mira: I COMPLETELY FORGOT TO POST LAST WEEK!  Jenn gave up on waiting for me and posted anyway... Well this is the final week for 2012 and we'll have to decide if we want to continue to try to do a weekly post and, if so, what we want to post on...

Watching... Random old favorites with my cousins -- Up, Music & Lyrics, Love Actually... And in theaters -- Les Misérables. 

Reading... Random free Kindle books that are Christmas-y.

Listening... Pandora's Les Misérables station.  Have I ever mentioned that Les Mis is only my absolute favorite musical?

Jennifer:
Watching... Saw Anna Karenina in theaters last week, which was actually not what I expected. The sets and scene transitions were very unique and different. I liked it a lot though, even though it's just a really inherently depressing story. Planning to see Les Misérables this weekend!
Reading... Finished Gone Girl which was SO GOOD. A pageturner for sure, really suspenseful and surprising and just a tiny bit...frightening??
Listening... Finished up the audiobook of Heist Society, which I enjoyed but maybe didn't completely understand? Just wasn't paying attention for some important details probably. Anyway, it's completely implausible and silly but I liked the characters and I've already requested the second audiobook from the library.

Check in Thursdays: Week 51

Jennifer:
Watching... Decided to catch up on last season of Parenthood for some reason. Still a great show, just fell off my plate for awhile there.
Listening... Finished up the audiobook version of Bossypants by Tina Fey (read by Tina Fey) which was pretty awesome. It was almost too short! Moving onto Heist Society, probably a dumb young adult novel, which is really the best kind to listen to while running. Only 6 more weeks of marathon training...
Reading... Working on Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, which did actually grab me from the very beginning. Looking forward to having time to just sit down and dig in this weekend.

Check in Thursdays: Week 50

Jennifer:
Watching... Hoping to see The Hobbit sometime soon! I'm still a little perplexed by how they turned a slim children's book into a movie trilogy but I'm excited to delve back into Middle Earth.
Listening... Still Christmas music and stuff off of year-end best lists (including All Songs Considered's editor and listener picks).
Reading... Just started Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. I've heard so many good things about this book, hoping it lives up to the hype.

Mira:
Watching... the Knicks! Also, I am really excited about the movies this holiday season. :)
Listening... Nothing.
Reading... The Mark of Athena by Rick Riordan.  The third in the Heroes of Olympus series.  Probably the only author whose series I read as each book is published; usually I wait until a series is over before reading the books.

Check in Thursdays: Week 49

Jennifer:
Watching... Finishing up season 6 of Doctor Who and catching up with How I Met Your Mother.
Listening... Perusing all the year end best music lists. Frank Ocean topped almost every list and I'm surprised to find that I'm actually kind of drawn to his songs because I'm usually not at all into R&B. Check out "Thinkin Bout You".
Reading... A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel. One of my favorite books, adapted as a graphic novel. Loving it so far!

Mira: Oops, sorry for the late post!
Watching... Caught up on The Amazing Race, Glee, and How I Met Your Mother... Dropped The Mindy Project. 
Listening... Christmas music on the radio.
Reading... Nothing new!

Check in Thursdays: Week 48

Mira:
Watching... Saw a bunch of movies on the plane on the way home.  The one that I enjoyed the most: My Sister's Sister.  Emily Blunt is almost making my short list of favorite actresses.
Reading... Back home and continuing to read Code Name Verity.  Perhaps I'll even finish it sometime soon. :)
Listening... Nothing new. Still loving "Hey Ho" by The Lumineers, which is popping up in commercials and movie previews. :)

Jennifer:
Watching... Catching up on The Amazing Race, The Vampire Diaries, and Top Chef.
Reading... The Lost City of Z by David Grann.
Listening... Is it too early for Christmas music? Sufjan Stevens, the Charlie Brown Christmas album, etc. Also just started another audiobook, Bossypants by Tina Fey, read by Tina Fey!

Check in Thursdays: Week 47

Mira: 
Watching... Saw Skyfall in the theaters yesterday with Korean subtitles that I could mostly ignore except when I wasn't sure what was said. :)  Enjoyed it, but now it definitely makes me want to go back and rewatch the older 007 movies.  Also confused how Daniel Craig has within the span of a couple of years played "young Bond" and now "over the hill Bond."
Reading... So I'm traveling again, which means I spend lots of time reading on my Kindle.  As a result, I actually finished the 50 Shades series, which I surprisingly enjoyed more than I expected.  It took me quite a while to get into it (started book 1 in August and then put it aside because it wasn't keeping my attention), but by the end I was surprisingly interested in the layers of the main characters.  Definitely not high-quality lit or anything, but the author was at least good at keeping the character development going and consistent throughout the books, I think.  My only complaint was that there was one loose end at the end of the series (really tiny, and not integral to the storyline at all but enough to bother me).
Listening... Nothing!

Jennifer: Late again...sorry!
Watching... Keeping up with Ben & Kate and The Mindy Project, both of which I'm still enjoying. Also almost done with season 2 of Game of Thrones.
Reading... Nothing right now. Thinking about starting Anna Karenina again since I kinda want to watch the new Keira Knightley movie version.
Listening... Just old stuff on my iPod, mostly while running.

Check in Thursdays: Week 46

Mira: 
Watching... Covert Affairs has my full attention and I must say I'm actually excited about the season finale.  This season has been kind of bleh, though, because Annie going rogue has gotten pretty old.  The highlight of the season is the additional depth in Joan's character, and the complexities of her relationship with Arthur.
Listening... Nothing new. I constantly have "It's Time" by Imagine Dragons stuck in my head and it makes me happy to hear it as well.  Didn't realize until last week that it was the song in The Perks of Being a Wallflower preview/commercials, too. Somehow that made me like it more and makes me think of the essence of the movie, which I enjoyed, too.
Reading... Code Name Verity upon the recommendation of my friend. We're going on vacation tomorrow and I'm not going to take the library book with me, so it'll have to wait until I get back to get finished.

Jennifer: Eek, I'm out of town and I totally forgot to blog! My fault that this is late!
Watching... Decided to stick with Top Chef, and was kind of pleasantly surprised by the twist in this week's episode. CJ  and Josie are whatever, but I'm a secret Stefan fan...
Listening... Finished up the audiobook of Why We Broke Up. It's a high school romance so of course theses kids are dumb, but even I was kind of surprised at what a jerk the guy was. Bonus: an interview with the author at the end of the audiobook!
Reading... Finished The Art of Racing in the Rain at the airport waiting for our delayed flight. So sad but a quick and satisfying read.

Check in Thursdays: Week 45

Mira: 
Watching... The CW. Arrow is so good! Beauty and the Beast is not as good. Tried Emily Owens, M.D. and I'm still undecided on what I think of it.  Pretty sure that I'm ready to drop Beauty and the Beast.
Listening... to nothing new.  Just the same few songs I was obsessed with last week. :)
Reading... Picked up Code Name Verity, per a friend's recommendation. Hope it's good!

Jennifer:
Watching... New season of Top Chef? I'm not sure if I'm over this show yet or not.
Listening... Audiobook of Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler.
Reading... Re-reading The Little Prince. Not really anything else right now...

Check in Thursdays: Week 44

Jennifer:
Watching... Caught up with Bunheads, which I ended up liking quite a bit. Looking forward to it coming back this winter! Also starting up on the new season of Suburgatory.
Listening... Finished the audiobook version of How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr this morning, which I really loved. I listen while running and I was actually getting a little misty-eyed. Next audiobook on the docket is Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler.
Reading... Re-read The Great Gatsby, which I'm happy to report is still interesting. Dipping into The Art of Racing in the Rain when I have time.

Mira:
Watching... Caught up on Revenge and Covert Affairs, thanks to Hurricane/Tropical Storm Sandy.
Listening... "I Will Wait" by Mumford and Sons is growing on me.
Reading... nothing new!

Check in Thursdays: Week 43

Jennifer:
Watching... How am I already behind in TV? The only shows it seems I'm really keeping up with this season are The Amazing Race, Parks and Recreation, How I Met Your Mother, The Vampire Diaries, The Mindy Project, and Ben & Kate. My good intentions for others have not panned out. I am slowly finishing up Bunheads though, for some reason...
Listening... Potential marathon training has me running 4 days a week and the audiobook for How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr has been totally key in getting me through it. I'm actually kind of bummed that I'm getting near the end of the book.
Reading... Re-reading The Great Gatsby. Also getting back into The Art of Racing in the Rain.


Mira:
Watching... picked up Arrow this past week and we rather like it.  It's very much like Batman.
Listening... Obsessed with a song, and listening to it on repeat with 3 other songs: "Demons" by Imagine Dragons.
Reading... Catching up on episodes of Hart of Dixie and Vampire Diaries over recap websites like www.tvovermind.com.

Check in Thursdays: Week 42

Jennifer:
Watching... Rather liked Nashville, even though country music is so not my thing AT ALL. Connie Britton is of course amazing and there's a few different storylines to keep things interesting. The only problem--Hayden Panettiere is annoying, which makes her kind of perfect for the role but not any more watchable...
Listening... Ben Gibbard's solo album, Former Lives.
Reading... Finally finished A Clash of Kings! Yes, it took me almost a year to read, not because it wasn't good, but because it's just...dense? And like the first book, it doesn't really get going until the second half. Anyway, the book left me kind of depressed. I mean, you don't really read these kinds of epic fantasy series expecting a lot of happiness but man, George R. R. Martin is not afraid to kill off characters and completely change the game (no pun intended). How many books is this series supposed to be? Seven? Not sure if I'm going to dive right into the next one or take my time, considering it seems to take Martin like 5 years to write each book.

Mira:
Watching... Jenn and I saw The Perks of Being a Wallflower last Friday! I hadn't read the book but really enjoyed the movie.  She had read the book and liked the movie better, I think.
Listening... Bought The Lumineers' album, but haven't listened to all the songs yet.
Reading... nothing worth mentioning. :)

Check in Thursdays: Week 41

Mira:
Watching... Playoff baseball -- mostly the O's vs. Yankees series.  Really, it's the husband that's watching while I read on my Kindle...
Reading... What am I reading? Junk. Cuz when I read on my Kindle, that's all I read.
Listening... One of my favorite songs on the radio right now is "Ho Hey" by The Lumineers. Trying to decide if I like it enough to buy the CD on Amazon, though.

Jennifer:
Watching... New season of Amazing Race. Want to check out Nashville and Arrow and this PBS series Call the Midwife...maybe this weekend.
Reading... Same as it's been for weeks. Notes from a Small Island and A Clash of Kings. Also re-reading The Great Gatsby because it's been years and I don't remember it at all really.
Listening... Really enjoying my latest audiobook, How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr. It has a lot of cliched teenage stuff in it but is written really well.

Check in Thursdays: Week 40

Jennifer:
Watching... Surprisingly I really liked the pilot of Last Resort, even though the premise is rather preposterous. Andre Braugher is always amazing and there are some nice surprises in the cast, like Scott Speedman (Ben from Felicity!), Dichen Lachman (Sierra from Dollhouse), and Autumn Reeser. The story gets spread out among quite a lot of characters and settings but the pilot juggled them pretty well. I have no clue where this can all go but it was interesting enough for me to want to check it out again.
Listening... New Matt & Kim album! It's Alright and Let's Go among others. Also, starting a new audiobook: How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr.
Reading... Same as it's been for weeks now: A Clash of Kings and From a Small Island. I may abandon them for awhile to re-read A Tree Grows in Brooklyn for the umpteenth time though...an article at NPR gave me the itch!

Mira:
Watching... Excited that Revenge is back! I know it's super soapy, but it's just so... twisty and exciting and fun in all the right ways.
Listening... So I had been actively not posting about "Gangnam Style" by Psy, but now it's turning up on the local radio stations, too! And a surprisingly large number of my coworkers have no idea what it is -- internet sensation, tv sensation, iTunes chart sensation and all!
Reading... Finished the Condie books and trying to get myself to finish The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen.

Check in Thursdays: Week 39

Mira:

Watching... Surprisingly enjoyed The Mindy Project, and realized how much I don't particularly enjoy The New Girl. Not sure if I'll pick up The Mindy Project, but The New Girl is off my DVR record list. Also dropped Switched at Birth. 

Reading... Ally Condie's sequel to Matched, Crossed.  Finished Crossed in the past week and it was enjoyable so I'm reading the next in the series.  I think I mentioned them in a post weeks/months ago. :)

Listening... Not sure how I feel about the new Mumford & Son's single, "I Will Wait."  But I am interested in hearing the rest of the CD sometime soon...

Jennifer:
Watching... The Great Food Truck Race on Food Network. There always seems to be an Asian team that kicks butt. This season it's Seoul Sausage from LA. Finale this week.
Reading... Still working on Notes from a Small Island and STILL on A Clash of Kings. Why is this book taking me a year to read?
Listening... I started this audiobook, Chime, but it hasn't really been holding my attention...

Check in Thursdays: Week 38

Jennifer:
Watching... New fall TV is starting? Trying to make time to check out Revolution and The Mob Doctor.
Reading... Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson. I'd always wanted to read more of his books (loved A Walk in the Woods) and mentioned this to my boyfriend's roommate, who promptly ran to his room and fetched a copy of this for me. I'm a big Anglophile to begin with, so of course I'm loving it!

Mira:
Watching... Behind in a lot of TV right now, but currently catching up on Covert Affairs. This show belongs in the same category as Nikita for me; always surprising how much the storylines, crazy as they may be, keep me entertained!
Reading... Silly books on Netflix instead of the library books due in a week...

Both:
Listening... Seeing Street Corner Symphony (from The Sing-Off) live tonight!

Check in Thursdays: Week 37

Jennifer:
Watching... Catching up on So You Think You Can Dance. I'm rooting for Eliana and Chehon for the win, although I haven't really been that into this season. I think they did the best they could with the format change, but it was still a bit of a bummer. Fall TV is starting soon and I'm all discombobulated and totally unprepared -- I never really got around to catching up with various shows from last season! But hopefully this weekend I can get my TV schedule organized. I'm planning to downgrade my cable to the minimum and rely mostly on Hulu Plus in the near future though which may make things interesting.
Listening... PTX Volume 1 - Debut EP from Pentatonix!
Reading... Getting back into A Clash of Kings. Man, I haven't been to the library in weeks. It's bad.

Mira: [A day late because of me... apparently I remember Thursdays better when I'm traveling overseas!]
Watching... MasterChef! I don't think I've blogged about this show before, but my husband has been watching the season and I started off by listening to the episodes while reading and then slowly got drawn into the competition.  Premise is home cooks with no training or no professional kitchen experience competing for a chance to win a cookbook deal and $100K (presumably to open their own restaurants). My favorite was Christine Ha, a Vietnamese-American creative writing grad student who also happens to be blind. She was phenomenal and truly inspiring.
Listening... Still just Fun. cuz that's the only CD on my iPhone right now.
Reading... Have 4 library books but am not reading any of them. Oops.

Check in Thursdays: Week 36

Burkie (filling in for Jenn):
Watching... football!  college & pro!  go 'horn!  go ravens! 
Listening... lyle lovett's latest, "Release Me."  some good stuff on there.
Reading... still working on "As You Like It" for the book club (grins), and just picked up "The Beekeeper's Apprentice" by laurie king.  it looks like my kind of thing: a mystery, putting characters (Sherlock Holmes, in this instance) from other authors/eras into a different setting, and Holmes just happens to be a beekeeper in his retirement days, which is my intended post-retirement profession :)

Mira:
Watching... Caught up on So You Think You Can Dance! I really do like a lot of the dancers this season, but don't always love the numbers. I mean they're good numbers, just few of them really capture me. Maybe it's from watching so much of the show? I have no idea.
Listening... Bought Fun.'s full album Some Nights mostly because I really like their single "Some Nights".
Reading... Uh... Not too much since I've returned home. Need to finish As You Like It, though. :)

Check in Thursdays: Week 35

Jennifer:
Watching... The pilots for The Mindy Project and Ben & Kate are available for preview on Hulu. I really liked The Mindy Project - it wasn't super groundbreaking or anything but Mindy has a unique voice and I have high hopes. Also, random reality dance show A Chance to Dance in which the BalletBoyz (recently seen as judges on So You Think You Can Dance) are tasked by Nigel Lythgoe to form a dance company in 30 days and perform at the Dizzy Feet Gala.
Listening... Japandroids - Continuous Thunder. I'm not always one to pay attention to lyrics but this one really got me. Probably one of my favorite tracks this year so far.
Reading... Uh, A Clash of Kings here and there but really not much. This has been kind of bad year for reading.

Mira:
Watching... Been catching up with season 3 of Parenthood. It's interesting because for the most part I kind of hate where so many of the storylines are heading but watching the story unravel is pretty amazing. The characters and how they interact in a way that is so realistic; I muse at the end of each episode how surprising it is to me how much I love this show.
Listening... Still got my iPod but I am starting to get rid of my alarm mix. To switch it up, I've started listening to some random Korean pop music on my iPod.
Reading... The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen. This is the book that had some to do with Oprah and her book club, I think. Someone had mentioned it to me as being their favorite book ever. It's well written but in a kind of pretentious way and none of the characters are really likable. As a result, I'm having a difficult time getting into it. We will see what my final verdict is...

Check in Thursdays: Week 34

Jennifer:
Watching... The web series Dating Rules From My Future Self. Apparently my attention span and free time has decreased to the point where I can only watch 5 minute webisodes? The first season starred Shiri Appleby and the second season has Candice Accola (from The Vampire Diaries). Dumb but cute and fun.
Listening... I've mentioned Passion Pit multiple times but this week's obsession is It's Not My Fault, I'm Happy.
Reading... Chipping away at Swamplandia! and A Clash of Kings.

Mira:
Watching... What a coincidence; I was going to write about a web series this week, too! I'm also caught up on the one Jenn mentioned above and was looking into other web series and came across this one: The Lizzie Bennett Diaries. It's a mash up of videoblogs and other social media to provide a modern day reselling of Pride and Prejudice.
Listening... My iPod wakes me up every morning with the same playlist in the same order... "Little Talks" by Of Monsters and Men, "This Modern Love" by Bloc Party, "Honey Bee" by Blake Shelton, "The Shining" by Badly Drawn Boy, "The High Road" by Broken Bells, "Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae Jepsen.... Then I usually actually get up. Well, sometimes.
Reading... Rereading the Twilight series, embarrassingly enough. Mostly because I caved to curiosity and bought 50 Shades of Grey. A few chapters in and I couldn't shake the feeling that it was basically the same as Twilight but somehow less enjoyable. I felt like it had a distinctively British writing tone for a book set in the Seattle/Portland area and... I dunno. Not on that bandwagon. So, I decided to give the vampire series another try and am enjoying it much more. Halfway through book 3.

Check in Thursdays: Week 33

Mira:
Watching... Random movie recommendation, this week! Chalet Girl starring Felicity Jones (I don't actually recognize her from anything, but she's totally like a British Ellen Page in this movie) with Brooke Shields, Bill Nighy, Chuck Bass (or Ed Westwick), Sophia Bush, dorky guy from the tv version of 10 Things I Hate about You. This movie was basically a British Whip It (maybe its the Ellen Page similarity) on snowboard. Well, in some ways it is like Cutting Edge, too, but whatever, it was fun! I'm glad Netflix had it on streaming!
Listening... Stuck with what is on my iPod, but this week's nostalgic music: Stroke 9.
Reading... Random free books on my Kindle. Oh, and tv gossip like Ausiello on tvline.com. Oh, and As You Like It.

Jennifer:
Watching... Now that the Olympics are over, I'm back to So You Think You Can Dance and forever trying to catch up on last season's TV. I also finally watched The Dark Knight Rises, which I liked but didn't think was as good as the last one.
Listening... Metric - Youth Without Youth is getting radio play? Also, new song from Frightened Rabbit.
Reading... Started Swamplandia! byKaren Russell while I was at the beach this weekend.