🎥 Matilda the Musical (2022). I didn’t get to see this when it was in cinemas, but the film adaptation of Tim Minchin’s musical version of Matilda has now come to streaming. I had a couple of days’ R&R at my parents’ house earlier this week, and took advantage of an empty house and a big TV to watch this film I’d looked forward to so much. Just like when I read the 30th anniversary edition of the book back in 2018, I was hit again by how relatable I found Matilda - though I was much more horrified by her parents treated her in this version than I think I’d ever been before. One aspect that was a real treat for me was the landscapes in the film; it was predominantly filmed in location in the Chilterns, near where Roald Dahl lived, but also where I grew up.
📚 Once Upon A Time On Mars by Kate Greene. I didn’t have a ‘space phase’ as a kid but for the past few years have been making up for it with my choices of books and documentaries. Chris Hadfield’s An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth piqued my interest about ‘earth analogs’, exercises completed on solid ground (or under the water) to prepare astronauts and agencies for the challenges that might be encountered during space travel. Kate Greene, a journalist, was selected to take part in one of these, a period of four months in a geodesic structure in Hawaii, pretending it was on Mars. She didn’t come to write the book about it until a few years later, so we get the benefit of a longer-range reflection on the experience and how it has affected the rest of her life. I’d highly recommend this! (Bookshop.org | Amazon - affiliate links)
🎶 Speak Now (Taylor’s Version). Obviously. The video for I Can See You, one of the ‘From the Vault’ tracks, came out a day after the album, and it’s delightfully unhinged - and chock-full of Easter egg clues about 1989 (Taylor’s Version). I wasn’t yet a big Taylor Swift fan when Speak Now came out the first time around - it was 1989’s release while I was at uni that turned me into a Swiftie - so it’s been a real treat to discover this album as a whole piece of work.
ICYMI: Wednesday’s post for paid subscribers was the first edition of my ‘Book Concierge’ series, recommending upmarket fiction for Naomi. Sign up for your own recommendations here!
As I mentioned, I spent a couple of days at my parents’ house earlier this week. One day of working from their kitchen table, and one, blissfully schedule-free, day of annual leave. I realised as May turned to June that I had somehow only taken 3 days of holiday so far this year, so it was really no wonder that I was exhausted. At the same time, I was bookmarking things like Jade Angeles Fitton’s guest post on The Hyphen about logging out, and this Guardian piece on digital burnout. It’s perhaps a sign of how much pressure I put on myself to over-achieve, that when I typed ‘burnout’ into my podcast app, and one of the results was a German-language podcast, I thought “oh great, that’ll be a fab way to work on my German.”
I put too much pressure on myself. I always have. Call it oldest-daughter syndrome, or explain it with my star signs (Aquarius Sun, Sagittarius Moon, Taurus Rising, if you’re asking) if you like. All I know is that despite starting the year with a promise to be gentle to myself, I absolutely haven’t been.
So here I am, embarking on the second half of the year, with a promise to spend more time dilly-dallying, and expect less of myself.
Want to join me?
Speak soon,
Lily
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