Content Consumed: Serena Williams and my weekend list
Happy Friday, y’all! Cheers to the three-day weekend.
In today’s Content Consumed, we’re chatting about…
🎾 America, drop what you’re doing for Serena
⭐️ My weekend list: Watching, listening, reading
🔥 Climate change and the Pacific Crest Trail
All eyes on Serena
Anyone still replaying that cute freakin’ video of Olympia cheering on her mama in the same beads and sparkly outfit that Serena Williams wore when she won her first U.S. Open in ‘99?
Serena plays again today at 4 p.m. PST in the third round of the U.S Open women’s singles at Arthur Ashe Stadium. She takes on Croatian-Australian (like me… we even look alike…) Ajla Tomljanović in what could be her last professional match ever as she’s due to retire after this tournament.
Like the Super Bowl, this is required viewing for America today. Think that’s an exagerration? I’d love to direct you to this moving piece from the NYT, asking Americans what Serena means to them. Her work and representation for race, gender, and body have greatly impacted people of all backgrounds.
My Weekend List
🎥 Watch
🏈 College football — Over the past seven or so years, I’ve become a true football fan. I think pausing Veep last night to watch the end of the West Virginia-Pitt game should prove that, right? It’s messy, boisterous, and it’s damn hard not to be romantic about “Mo Bamba” pumping through the speakers of a stadium full of blackout college kids.
💥 The Boys — We’re on Season 3, Episode 3, and every time I think the characters can’t get more insane and the scenes can’t get gorier, I’m proven wrong! It’s a great show, yep. Not for everyone, and I do have to close my eyes and hit my fiancé with a let me know when the scene’s over! about thrice an episode, but worth it.
🍀 Derry Girls—It’s almost over and I’m heartbroken. I have just a few days left on the VPN I purchased for Love Island UK purposes, so I need to finish the last two episodes of Derry Girls ASAP. It’s heartwarming and it’s hilarious, following a group of secondary school girls during Northern Ireland’s Troubles in the 90s.
🍺 Rewatch: Shameless—Blame The Bear. I needed to see more of Jeremy Allen White and I refuse to apologize for that. Shameless has an all-time cast, it’s fun, it’s spicy, and it’s depressing as hell. A beautiful combination, really. I still don’t know if I’ll make it past Season 8. That’s where I paused last time when it became significantly less funny and much more painful to watch.
🎧 Listen
🎬 Podcast: Fly on the Wall: Maya Rudolph—I recently discovered this podcast from Dana Carvey and David Spade, where the two SNL alums chat with other SNL folks about behind-the-scenes shenanigans. I was having a particularly bad day on Wednesday and tossed on their Maya Rudolph episode. What a breath of fresh air! Three very positive people, who know each other well as friends and colleagues, shooting the shit and reminiscing on old times. It just felt good.
🌹 Podcast: Celebrity Memoir Book Club: Selma Blair—An actress who has always eluded me is Selma Blair. I mostly knew her as the star of Cruel Intentions and somewhat-villain of Legally Blonde, and for having multiple sclerosis. Her memoir, covered by Claire and Ashley of the CMBC podcast, dives into her f*cked-up childhood that she refuses to believe was that bad, her denial (still) of her eating disorders, and her issues with alcoholism. It’s an interesting dive into the memoir of someone who still hasn’t fully worked out their traumas.
🍾 The Wolf of Wall Street soundtrack—I’ve been on the hunt for both wedding dancing songs and wake-me-the-hell-up morning songs. And this soundtrack? Full of ’em.
📚 Read
🐤 The Goldfinch—I know, I know, I’m very late to the game on this one. But my fiancé just finished it, said I would love it, and he was right as usual. I breezed through a couple of chapters last night and can’t wait to crack it open again.
🕊 Bird by Bird—Still working on this one. As I mentioned last time, books about writing are a great source of inspiration but I can barely get through a couple of pages without putting it down and opening Google Docs to write myself. So, it might take me a while to get through this one.
How climate change is impacting the PCT
My little brother plans to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from Mexico to Canada within the next two years. Could climate change alter those plans, like it has for many others?
’Tis the season. Hurricane Danielle just arrived. Heat waves are scorching the west and incinerating parts of California, like they did in Europe earlier this summer.
Now, wildfires are the biggest threat to the lives of PCT hikers on their ~5 month journey—in addition to the usual frozen wastelands, predatory animals, dry deserts, and isolation. Sketchy water cisterns at low levels are frequent now. Shade is less abundant throughout the trail. Soot and ash cause skin and lung infections. Weather, overall, is less predictable.
“It used to be a race against getting to Washington before the snow; now it’s that and fires,” one hiker said. Read the NYT piece here.
Interested in the PCT on an individual level? I recommend Wild by Cheryl Strayed. A beautifully written bestseller by a Portland native who I happened to get lunch with one time on the Stanford campus. (Not to flex.) It’s also now a movie starring Reese Witherspoon and Laura Dern.
And that’s all for today! I hope you all have a relaxing, refreshing long weekend. See you Tuesday!
Cheers,
Casey
