We hope you packed appropriately for this week’s picks.
LISTEN
Vacation songs
Undo one or two buttons of that shirt, kick off your shoes, and kick back to these easy living jams:
Jonas Brothers, “Vacation Eyes”
A Rachel & Joel honeymoon classic—you just can’t beat that bassline and those throwback s-s-s-summer time vibes.
House of the Future, “Vacation”
A lush electronic track from two friends of mine.
I need a vacation
From everything
And I want you to come with me
Vampire Weekend, “Holiday”
Holiday, oh, a holiday
And the best one of the year
Dozing off underneath my sheets
While I cover both my ears
Sounds nice.
Monster Rally, “Until The Sun Goes Down (feat. TOLEDO)”
Rallying up the troops for a vacation? Don’t forget to pack some Monster Rally.
Hayden, “On a Beach (feat. Feist)”
Another one of Rachel and I’s official songs. Best enjoyed with drink in hand under sunny skies after filing your tax return.
We’re on a beach, oh yeah we’re on a beach
We’re drinking income taxes and there’s sand at our feet
-JB
What are your desert island vacation records?
WATCH
Friendship & privilege in Four Seasons
Netflix’s Four Seasons delivers the goods. I mean, you can’t expect anything less with that cast. Tina Fey, Will Forte, Coleman Domingo, and Steve Carell (in and out) are the heavy-hitters here, but the new and lesser-known names (comedy and voice acting genius Kerri Kenney, Italian newcomer Marco Calvani, and Girls5eva member Erika Henningsen) effortlessly hold their own in the sharply written, perfectly paced two-season comedy series.
So my critiques here aren’t so much about the show as they are about the TV landscape in general. The show just happens to be a good example: its depictions of friendship and privilege are absurdly divorced from reality.
The friendship thing is more or less harmless. Yes, no one on earth travels or spends this much time with their friends. But we can say that about any TV friend group (Friends, anyone?). It’s a necessary fantasy for the show to work. And let’s face it: it’s nice. But in this show, it ends up highlighting the real problem I have—the money problem.
This one truly gets on my nerves. Especially right now, as the super rich intentionally widen the gap between them and us—not just making more money, but making sure we make less—the way this show takes everyone’s have-ness for granted feels exceptionally tone-deaf. The only key character resembling anything close to a have-not is Henningsen’s character Ginny (the young one), and her slightly lower placement on the class-scale is for the most part kept out of frame.
This, I think, is what you get when rich and famous people are the only ones with the resources to tell stories. It doesn’t stop the show from being funny or even moving at times. We can relate on an emotional level. It’s all the other stuff that keeps us off the resort grounds, looking in.
-AK
READ
Take a vacation into the kind future of A Psalm for the Wild-Built
Ok, I’m doing it again where I’m recommending a book when I’ve only just started reading it, but this one had me right from author Becky Chambers’ opening dedication:
For anybody who could use a break.
Yes, please! The opening chapters do not disappoint either, offering a cozy look at a wonderful near-future world that feels so achingly within reach, yet frustratingly not here yet. It’s a world where humans have limited their domain to only 50% of the planet (still not a fair ratio, Chambers notes, considering the thousands of species that are left to the other half, but a limit all the same), and this increased respect for nature is paired with a healthier approach to technology that focuses on its longevity and usefulness as a tool for the flourishing of society (there’s one appreciably cheeky little dig at our current tech consumerist culture where the main character Dex is describing their “pocket computer” as “a reliable device built to last a lifetime, as all computers were” [30]).
And if this book’s exploration of a thriving new world isn’t enough of a vacation for you as you inhabit this often hellish one, the main character of the book is themself also wanting to escape. Dex is a monk who hears the call of the crickets in the open spaces outside the main city:
The intense feeling of containment within the City became intolerable. Dex wanted to inhabit a place that spread not up but out (7).
We readers join them as they leave the city to pursue their new vocation of serving tea and comforts to folks in need of a friend in rural villages around the countryside. It’s not all sunshine and rose hips, but I’m enjoying the vacation into this new world so far and it’s inspiring me to re-think my work in this old one.
-JB
Our bags are packed, and we’re boarding our flight home. Next time, we’re doing our best Telemachus impressions to go searching for our culture’s
Yesss, Becky Chambers! Let me know if you want to borrow another of hers when you're done! I have something like six or seven?