- White Russians
- knitted or crocheted berets
- revolving doors
- pumpkin-flavored anything
- good Bob Dylan covers
- guys in well-fitting suits, and not with white shirts
- stringed instruments
- Diet Coke
- Diet Cherry Coke
- sweet potato casserole with pecans instead of marshmallows
- a well-turned sentence
- proper grammar
- songs you can dance to
- curly hair, especially on men and small children
- giggly babies
- eating an apple while reading a book outside on a fall day
- the smell of libraries and bookstores
- driving with the windows down
- Central Texas sunsets
- congregational singing
- four-part a cappella harmony in a room with good acoustics
- butterflies
- all those blackbirds on telephone wires in autumn
- having my hair stroked when I’m upset
- hugs
- a really, really excellent sermon
- trees
- good prose
- good stories
- my friends’ laughter, when they’re all together
- candlelight Christmas Eve services
- Communion wine, even when it tastes awful
- pregnant ladies
- friendly dogs
- macaroni and cheese, in any incarnation
- hymnody
- cookbooks
- children’s literature
- the Tony Awards
- front-row seats in a theater
- that weird vibrating sensation you get in your chest when you’re at a concert and the bass is really heavy
- the Pivot questionnaire on Inside the Actors Studio
- birthday cards
- old movies
- new movies
- movie trailers
- So You Think You Can Dance
- spoken word poetry
- peonies!
- weddings
- string quartets
- eating lunch with a decent-sized group of people after church
- fluffy cats
- robins
- hot chocolate
- church coffee (even if it’s the kind that can double as paint thinner)
- tea with a lot of milk and sugar…
- iced tea with mint (yum)
- free bookmarks
- getting stuff in the mail
- handwritten letters
- scarves
- hats
- knitting/craft blogs
- holding hands with other people while praying, especially if at least one of those people is under the age of ten
- port
- that fun feeling when you’re just on the edge of being drunk, but not quite
- movies late at night with a friend
- magazines
- spinach calzones
- big thunderstorms
- snow
- receiving an unexpected gift
- pipe smoke
- Christmas music
- Russell Crowe
- humor of the absurd
- reading in the bathtub
- dancing
- the utter lack of traffic at 4 in the morning
- putting pen to paper
- guitar calluses
- post-work weariness—the good kind that comes with having done a good job
- “Hello, My Name Is” stickers
- sending things in the mail
- mix CDs
- trees changing colors in the fall
- chocolate pudding
- coffee ice cream
- green tea and honey
- panini that involve lots of cheese
- samba schools!
- discovering new music
- bhangra
- Harry Potter
- occasional swearing
- Jones Soda
- red shirts
- brown pants
- …that joke
- cream roses with the purple edges
- podcasts
- British accents of any kind
- Australian accents, too, actually
- peanut butter and chocolate
- barbecued brisket
- working with my hands
- long talks late at night with friends
- peanut butter and honey sandwiches
- markers
- Junkmail for Blankets (RIP)
- Paste samplers (RIP)
- Martha Stewart Living (RIP)
- Real Simple
- Blueprint (RIP)
- wedding magazines
- Anglican rosaries
- Waterdeep
- penny whistles
- old-school gospel music
- interconnected stories
- musicals
- long naps
- sign language
- Facebook wall posts
- helium voices
- Hobnobs (“oaty, nobbly biscuits”), dunked into tea
- the color of the water in Hawaii
- inside jokes
- allergy medication — not the thing itself, necessarily, but the result
- pancakes
- late nights at IHOP or Denny’s — somewhere that serves breakfast food and bad coffee
- church-league softball games
- knitting during movies or lectures
- watching other people knit or sew
- fingerless gloves
- church-lady hats
- potlucks
- being run over by small children after church
- holding babies
- watching other people play hacky sack
- the World Cup
- the Heidelberg Catechism (Christian, what is your only hope in life or in death?)
- Anglican/Episcopalian writers—C.S. Lewis, Madeleine L’Engle, Lauren Winner, J.I. Packer, Dr. Garrett, Fr. Thomas McKenzie, Fleming Rutledge
- Southern accents
- Nalgene bottles
- big glasses of water
- Jewish writers
- Southern writers
- black t-shirts and jeans
- double-pointed knitting needles
- random movie quotes in conversation
- that feeling you get after you cry, when you’ve finally gotten it all out
- giving unexpected gifts
- big groups of people singing their national anthem
- the Olympics opening ceremony
- biscuits and gravy
- Mediterranean food
- people’s photo albums on Facebook
- getting (positive) comments on anything I do online (shameless, I know)
- book lists
- getting off of a plane — that burst of fresh air
- bold colors
- those 99 cent watercolor trays
- stories that are told non-linearly, but that can still be pieced together coherently
- American history
- cool-looking bottles
- iambic pentameter
- doing scansion (I know, I know)
- long baths
- homemade pie
- bold graphics
- good design — I don’t have a designer’s eye, but I can appreciate it
- mid-century modern architecture
- Chuck Taylors
- crushed ice
- post-Thanksgiving turkey sandwiches
- “DON’T DO IT! SAVE YOURSELF!” *drumroll* “POKEMON!” *screams*
- the extra features on DVDs
- flaming red and orange leaves on trees in fall
- ridiculous hats
- the way my hands shake whenever I read poetry for other people
- “The Lord be with you.” “And also with you.” “Lift up your hearts!” “We lift them up to the Lord!” “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.” “It is right to give Him thanks and praise.”
- John Cusack
- mashed potatoes with the skins, and garlic
- the smell of clean laundry
- dark chocolate
- seed stitch
- little kids singing
- kids who know their theology because they know the catechisms
- watching other people get to know God
- button-down shirts
- a full bookshelf
- getting my passport stamped
- French toast (yum)
- cathedrals
- stained glass windows
- studying for finals with a big cup of coffee and friends
- sitting with other people while we’re all reading and being quiet, with the occasional outburst of laughter or outrage
- no-rules Scrabble (alcohol helps this a lot, actually)
- the smell of blown-out candles
- Pablo Neruda’s love sonnets
- new Knittys
- Tinkerbell
- Adam Pascal
- Ace of Cakes (Duff and Geof = the perfect comic and straight-man team)
- Good Eats
- Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
- Lost
- Angel
- Firefly
- Whose Line Is It Anyway?
- AngryAlien.com
- To Write Love On Her Arms t-shirts
- American Apparel shirts
- free samples of (almost) anything
- grocery shopping
- fantasy book series
- big fluffy clouds you can find shapes in
- ginger ale on airplanes
- glow in the dark stars
- words as graphic elements
- soccer fans (especially ones in other countries)
- turbinado sugar
- cotton skirts
- cleaning my room
- accordions
- salsa music
- the salsa at Del Pueblo (yum)
- the way my legs feel after they’ve been shaved and lotioned
- sleeping with a bandana or hat on when it’s cold outside
- sleeping at the wrong end of the bed as an insomnia remedy
- little kids doing funny things at weddings
- phone calls from people I haven’t heard from in a while
- caramel + salt
- the color of the sky in summer
- the full British weather treatment: grey skies, rain, wind, really cold—and me inside with a cup of tea and a book
- old men wearing great suits
- 1920s-1940s period clothing
- knee socks
- tiny Converse or Ugg boots or TOMS for babies
- wool peacoats
- notmartha.org
- adding new books to Library Thing
- Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
- Moulin Rouge!
- paper snowflakes (and the ensuing mess made in the process of cutting them out)
- homemade marshmallows
- songs in 5/4 time
- mash-ups
- the sweet mango chutney mayo at Pommes Frites in the East Village
- The Strand (18 miles of used/half-price books in Union Square)
- Bethesda Fountain, Central Park
- Morris dancing
- random instruments in rock songs—toy pianos, xylophones, accordions, bagpipes, hurdy-gurdys
- a big group of guys shouting together, that crazy deep-throated roar
- Roger Ebert’s movie reviews
- road trips with people that I’ve known for a while, but not very well
- plain yogurt, honey, and sliced bananas
- ^ that, but with clementine segments instead of bananas
- freestyle rap, beatboxing
- reading or reciting things out loud for other people
- solid preaching
- caramel macchiatos
- Honeycrisp apples
- winning a Sporcle quiz
- getting work done
- the promise of a new pack of blank CD-Rs
- the way Communion bread crumbles
- voting
- checking stuff off of my to-do list
- e-mails or phone calls from old friends
- the third verse of “Joy to the World”
- the fact that “Of the Father’s Love Begotten” doesn’t have a time signature
- “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, here goes—I mean Amen” (LOL) (a line in _Perelandra_)
- getting lost in a great story
- the way craft stores smell
- the scene in High Fidelity when Rob beats the snot out of Ian
- the singalong in the middle of Magnolia
- transcribing things (yes, I’m a nerd)
- cataloging stuff (did I mention I’m a nerd?)
- in movies, when someone’s just been shot or otherwise mortally wounded and is taking their time dying, and another character comes and holds them or holds their hand or leans over them while they’re dying. (E.g., Quantam of Solace, The Patriot, almost any time someone on the good side gets killed in Lord of the Rings, Les Miserables.) I don’t think this makes me happy so much as it’s what Ebert would call a moment of elevation.
- robots
- holding babies
- the smell of hot milk
- washing dishes (it’s kind of meditative)
- watching young people make music together—high school bands, orchestras, choirs. Love it. Even when they’re not great, but especially when they are.
- buttons
- used music stores
- people who are totally pop-culture illiterate (I need balance in my life)
- singing in languages other than English
- straw cowboy hats
- celebrity guest appearances on Sesame Street
- learning new songs at church
- stop-motion animation
- bow ties
- TED talks
- listening to other people talk
- William H. Macy
- Anne Hathaway
- Meryl Streep
- tearing the plastic off a new CD
- public transportation
- saving money
- documentaries
- that thing that guys do when they hug each other, when they smack each other on the back
- a well-timed “that’s what she said”
- a shower after a good workout
- making something I could’ve bought
- forgiveness
- reconciliation
- free wi-fi
- the rehearsal dinner and wedding in Rachel Getting Married
- helping do behind-the-scenes things
- laptops with long battery lives (yay Macs!)
- redeeming coins at those kiosks in grocery stores
- when the person I voted for wins
- cold water on a hot day
- digging under the covers when it’s cold or raining outside
- the fact that my father worked in telecom for more than 50 years, and yet still can’t figure out his iPhone
- ridiculous hashtags on Twitter
- sitars
- reggae music
- watching married couples show physical affection for each other during church, because it’s usually subtle (arm around the shoulder, holding hands, etc.) (also that people I know do not routinely make out during church)
- the fact that my mother loved Ready Made, among the most hipsterish magazines in the world
- street festivals
- sculptures made of scrap metal
- Italian sodas
- scones and coffee (or tea)
- the minerally smell potatoes have when they’re cooking
- twin busses passing each other
- the buzz the re-magnetizing machine made at the library I used to work for
- supporting local businesses
- Craig Ferguson (and the puppets) on the Late Late Show
- knowing that the bartenders at The Harp know Will Conrad by name
- “House of Guys”
- sitting around giving each other crap (in, you know, an affectionate way)
- skirts or dresses with cowboy boots
- adults getting baptized at paedobaptist churches
- rum and Cokes
- mimosas
- recommending books to people
- having books recommended to me
- Hill House — both the things that go on there and the house itself
- seeing eye/assistance dogs in public places
- The Dinner Party Download (podcast) (RIP)
- Christmas parties
- doing dishes
- portable speakers
- fascinators (these crazy headband-hat hybrids, which are amazing, especially for people with haircuts like I have)
- random trips in the middle of the night
- Pink Power Rangers (raspberry vodka + orange juice + grenadine + 7-Up)
- warm bath, cold beer, good book or magazine
- bicyclists who follow traffic laws (and thus don’t nearly get themselves run over by my car)
- the weird phenomenon of when you learn a word, and then suddenly you hear it everywhere; or you buy what you think is a weird model of car, and then you see other ones everywhere on the road
- Christmas/winter beers
- Christmas lights
- whale-spine cables
- when you’ve been holding hands with other people while you’re praying, and then they give your hand a little squeeze before letting go
- Method cleaning products/soap
- the guys on Car Talk
- Mo Rocca’s sputtering on Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!
- end of year “best of” lists
- the fact that being really hungry helps me pray better
- the fact that when churches use those little thimble cups in Communion, it looks like everyone’s doing shots (it’s probably horrible that this makes me happy, but oh well)
- getting new stuff in my RSS feeds (omg, remember RSS feeds?)
- my friend Steph’s general affection for Captain Morgan
- getting kid’s meals at Fuddrucker’s, because they’re cheaper, they’ll still fill you up, and it also means you get a cookie
- soup at Panera after church ($5!)
- looking at stuff on Etsy
- Matt Damon
- La Blogotheque videos—especially the one with Sufjan Stevens on the roof, Vampire Weekend in the van, and Arcade Fire crammed inside an elevator
- when different groups of my friends meet each other and end up liking one another
- pre- and post-church mingling
- the big group All Songs Considered shows (when Bob and Robin and Stephen and Ann and sometimes Carrie all sit around and play music and riff off one another)
- the game “come up with the most ridiculous but still plausible title for an academic article ever”
- the birds that sneak into the Whole Foods in downtown Austin
- the weird instinct that makes you know that someone is looking at you and makes you look back at them (seriously, it’s the weirdest thing); how adults are slightly weirded out by it but babies and really little kids aren't, so they'll just keep staring at you for ages
- the proliferation of fish sandwiches/fish whatever at fast food restaurants during Lent. Not that I’d ever eat these, because fast food fish sandwiches are kinda gross, but the fact that they are everywhere during Lent as a holdout for all the Catholics amuses me.
- singing notes that I know don’t sound good coming out of me, but doing so in the privacy of my own car
- Listography (how meta!)
- care packages from home
- sweet tea
- the fact that people will attempt to make alcohol out of almost anything, including sweet tea
- watching TV on DVD
- Whataburger honey butter chicken biscuits
- late night, driving home alone after drinking, and the inevitable epiphanies that ensue
- gin and tonics
- Sawyer’s nicknames on Lost
- Dexter
- the General Thanksgiving in the Book of Common Prayer
- the shoe squeaks during basketball games
- being able to teach myself something
- a clean apartment/house
- hiking (and the ensuing soreness afterwards)
- eating outside
- how excited soccer players get when they make a goal
- the Punch Brothers’ “buy our merch” moments during live shows
- the live in Rotterdam version of “Please”, with the “Sunday Bloody Sunday” drums on the bridge and Bono’s wailing
- actually making myself do creative things
- being able to do good things for people who’ve done good things for me
- cups of tea in the afternoon
- the fact that Matador Records’ catalog numbers all start with “Ole!”
- royal weddings
- meeting new people
- the fact that the smell of wood smoke will stick on your clothes for weeks
- stories from my coworkers that make me laugh for a good couple of minutes straight
- thinking through things with other people by talking them out
- Terriers
- “Trey with an E and ‘Graham’ like the cracker!”
- marching bands on the Macy’s parade
- turquoise nail polish
- eating ramen for breakfast
- Buy Nothing Day
- holiday craft fairs
- singing with other people
- getting three stars on a level on Angry Birds
- pardon my language, but Alison Leonhardt’s term “the great unfucking”
- the fact that my hands are tiny
- the New Zealand All-Blacks’ pre-game haka
- Johnny Cash’s cover of “Hurt”
- sugar cookies coated in colored sugar (best ever)
- the Race Street sandwich from Taylor in DC (prosciutto, ricotta, turkey, lettuce, tomato, onion, vinaigrette)
- green sauce
- Tiny Desk Concerts
- combat boots
- being brave
- finding weird connections between people (e.g., that I have one degree of separation from Brian Eno and two from David Byrne)
- watching my Gmail storage very slowly fill up
- reading other people’s favorited tweets
- getting retweeted
- “I see you running ‘round town with the girl I love, and I’m like…”
- other people’s good news
- the Punch Brothers’ covers of Radiohead songs
- the word “pimpompet”
- my friend Jake’s comment “GLORY” on a Facebook post of mine about homemade pumpkin donuts
- actually, also, those pumpkin donuts. those were delicious.
- weaving in ends
- Tumblr
- when Craig Ferguson has fellow Brits on his show (especially Ewan McGregor)
- the little dance breakdown at the end of competition episodes of So You Think You Can Dance
- the themed episodes of All Songs Considered
- big house parties
- Steph’s “NO HOP-ONS” bumper sticker
- interracial couples
- interracial adoptions
- hugs from my friend Emily Falls
- midnight premieres of movies
- bonfires on cold nights
- wacky hashtag games on Twitter
- Leah Burdeaux’s fistbumps
- the Lanier Theological Library (Houston, TX)
- “Put a bird on it!”
- harvest songs (e.g., “Don’t Carry It All”, “All Good Gifts”, “Bringing In the Sheaves”, etc.)
- listening to music while lying on the floor in the middle of the afternoon
- the “HELLO” fish on the vanWagners’ welcome mat
- the kind of evenings that give you good ab workouts because you’ve been laughing so hard
- “What are we doing tomorrow?” “The same thing we do every night. Try to take over the world.” “Bullshit! We are not!”
- olives
- Spaghatta Nadle!
- I care about this alot…
- getting to hear the people of my church singing together on the weeks I help lead the music
- bloopers during or after the credits of a movie or TV show
- baby showers that do not involve dumb games
- the Sunday Routine column in the New York Times
- giving my coworkers at Half-Price crap (and getting it right back from them)
- the big group numbers at the beginning of each episode of The Sing-Off
- coming up with stuff to put on this list
- side hugs from my friend Leon
- big house parties
- Doctor Who
- discovering the talents of people I know
- repetitive bridges in church music (but not repeating them too much)
- my tree necklace
- the bi-annual bird migration through Texas, when the grackles are thick in the trees and on the telephone wires
- whenever Scott Hoying (of Pentatonix) inserts a little “hey!” when he sings
- the key change for the chorus in Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes”
- Kevin Olusola’s beatboxing + cello playing
- Gungor
- The Brilliance
- Jeff Tweedy’s guitar solo in “At Least That’s What You Said”
- any Nels Cline guitar solo ever, but especially “Impossible Germany”
- Chris Thile’s crazy swaying whenever he’s really into his playing
- praying with other people
- Lara Bars
- Udi’s sandwich bread (actually, Udi’s anything)
- granola
- March 14 = Pi Day; May 4 = Star Wars Day, etc.
- my friend Chris’s mustache (and how much grief we gave him for it)
- Pulp Shakespeare
- the satisfying pop that coconuts make when you slice them in Fruit Ninja
- the “thwock” noise that Michael’s electric drums make when the drum sounds are off
- Meagan’s facial expressions/random flailing
- deleting stuff from my hard drive
- the tiny skull on my necklace with the feathers and beads
- face cleaning wipes
- the Kindle
- The Supervan
- good insurance claims adjusters
- the game “if you were a character from , who would you be?”
- filtered water from the fridge
- barbecue on Friday nights
- hearing people’s conversion stories
- when my bra and panties match (yep)
- the giant neon cross on the Presbyterian hospital on I-45 (RIP)
- the insane things my friend Ephrem does/says
- how much my community group loves Jesus and loves each other
- how weird and obsessive I can get about songs
- Vlogbrothers
- discovering when people that I like know and like each other
- Tervis cups
- my mom’s weird baseball obsession
- the church fathers
- pacifistic people in the Reformed tradition
- packing stuff at work
- when Idalia and I get into weirdness/giggling fits together
- figuring out a song on my own
- the way I feel after working out (endorphins!)
- the way the stretch of I-45 that goes through downtown Houston is uneven, so it dips like a sine wave
- sine waves
- SohCahToa (for remembering sine, cosine, and tangents in trigonometry—never mind that I’ve almost completely forgotten what their practical function is)
- Tom Hiddleston
- Benedict Cumberbatch
- Pope Francis—still not down with some of the finer points of Catholic theology, but I like him a lot
- early morning prayer on Tuesdays with Tiffany, Jessica, and Meagan
- Wits, an American Public Media show on NPR—it’s like what Prairie Home Companion would be like if it were hosted by a slightly anarchist librarian (RIP)
- using a French press to make tea
- my orange bracelet from Noonday Collective
- supporting businesses that make good stuff and also support good causes (e.g., Noonday Collective)
- John Green (and friends) doing Mental Floss List Shows (RIP)
- my big green polka dot bag
- secret Santas
- the 3-for-$10 rack at Willa Boutique (RIP)
- Much Ado About Nothing (favorite Shakespeare play)
- the random CAT equipment outside the office building on 290
- billboard on 290: “It’s called 290 because it takes 290 minutes to get home.”
- Pentatonix, “Run to You”
- freaking Steph out by sleeping with my head under a blanket
- the magical rainbow blanket at work and its power of camouflage
- my dinosaur finger puppets, a birthday present from the girls; I named them Eccleston, Tennant, and Smith, because of course
- Tom’s toothpaste and deodorant, because I’m a hippie
- the little booklets in the middle of Food Network Magazine
- thrift stores!
- Austin’s Launchpad goodness
- binding off knitting projects
- Jody’s floral handiworks
- Chris's videos of the crazy things Ephrem does
- snacks for dinner
- Sorted Food
- the shift in the light as summer transitions to autumn
- watching sports with folks
- Ace Pear
- Good Mythical Morning
- Jimmy Fallon's hashtag segments
- The Roots station on Pandora
- Teva sandals
- how excited Sampson was to see us on Tuesday mornings
- finding stuff I thought I had lost
- The dynamic between Caleb (Introvert Man) and Lori (Queen of the Extroverts)
- Pastors praying Psalm 19 before they preach: "May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts..."
- Project 4 Awesome
- Daniel Lanois, "The Maker"
- the "what's discouraging/what's encouraging" segment at the beginning of Kaleo staff meetings back in the day
- Sufjan Stevens, "Put the Lights on the Tree"
- text messages from friends during the week
- emoji
- reading other people's favorited tweets
- the secret Christ and Pop Culture members group on Facebook
- Caden Falls sucking his thumb
- The delightful awkward weirdness of my friendship with Chris Williams (and how we constantly lampshade it)
- drinking coffee in my car
- doing housework
- watching Kelly play with the cat
- finishing books
- John Mulaney's bit about the Salt and Pepper Diner
- the CaPC Runs FB group
- posting birth announcements on the Kaleo FB page, and how quickly they get liked (and how often)
- housesitting
- pizzicato strings
- Chandler Cat's very expressive ears
- when they cut to one of The Roots losing it at a joke on the Tonight Show
- the Phone Booth game on the Tonight Show
- Lin Miranda banging on the stage door to bring out the guest performers for #ham4ham (and the "hello hello hello!" at the beginning)
- that #yayhamlet t-shirts are actual official Hamilton merch
- t-shirt I own: "Javert has 24601 problems and Jean Valjean is all of them."
- the "REMUV HATE" and "BE SOMEBODY" graffiti on the railroad bridges over I-45 near downtown
- explaining Doctor Who to people and watching them slowly realize how crazy and weird it is
- same, but with Hamilton
- going to see live theater
- the anagram credits on Ask Me Another
- LMM's "Just you waaaiiiiiit" in the title track to Hamilton
- vanilla ice cream, chocolate syrup
- the jelly-like stuff that forms out of the juice from a rotisserie chicken after it's been in the fridge for a while (sounds gross, is actually delicious)
- the way dogs' noses move when they're smelling things
- the lightning round on Wits
- lightning rounds in general
- the Beastie Boys *blam* noise at the beginning of "The Schuyler Sisters"
- #ham4ham
- Leslie Odom, Jr., Daveed Diggs, and The Mighty Oak
- Jason Isbell (even though his music's kind of sad)
- Hannah and I fangirl-texting about Hamilton
- Hannah and I fangirl-texting about anything
- Chris Thile hosting Live From Here
- the musician birthday and song cover segments on Live From Here
- that waving thing Daveed Diggs does with his hands when he raps
- Design*Sponge
- Aaron Keyes, "Psalm 62"
- the FB live Q&As with the Hamilton cast
- LMM's good morning and good night tweets
- getting to 10,000 steps for the day
- raw honey's spreadable quality
- hangouts in the CaPC FB group
- not the circumstances, but commiserating with like-minded miserable people after the 2016 presidential election results came in
- the part of CG when "real" CG is over and we're all standing around talking
- the Enneagram
- constantly talking about the enneagram with Steph and Hannah
- when preachers get choked up while they're preaching--sign that it actually means something to them
- that thing where the person in the next lane wants to get into your lane and you want to get into theirs, so you just switch places
- a good counseling session (even if there's crying involved)
- Rube Goldberg machines (or Pythagoras switches, if you're Japanese)
- Chris Doss constantly noodling with his capos during band practice
- Sandra McCracken, "Trinity Song"
- the line in "Telephone Wire": "at the light, at the light, at the light, at the liiiiiiight"
- Ben Platt
- Guardians of the Galaxy (all three volumes)
- the "what's the best thing that happened to you this week?" segment on It's Been a Minute
- Sam Sanders (*heart eyes emoji*)
- the existence of the musical Puffs
- sidehugs from Dods and Paul (these have since evolved into normal hugs and I’m here for it)
- the task time hours when Jill and Loyd and Val (and occasionally Genova) and I are in the workroom and none of us are getting any work done because we're just screwing around and making each other laugh
- bitching about singlehood with the other unmarried folks in CaPC and on Twitter
- the itty bitty plastic cups you get salsa in at taquerias
- the practice of using the heart emoji that corresponds with one's favorite color
- the drum part in "Seven Mile Island"
- the whiteboard polls we did in the workroom when I worked for Harris County
- the fiddle "Come Thou Fount" that intros and outros the Redeemer Nashville podcast
- old men who show up at the gym to work out in khakis
- trailer reaction YouTube videos
- a subgenre of the above: Black folx reacting to the Black Panther trailers
- the How Ridiculous videos where they drop stuff off of the 45-meter-tall tower
- the satisfying "whoosh" noise that the especially heavy things make when dropped off of that 45-meter-tall tower
- Sleeping At Last's Enneagram songs
- "It's Alive With Brad" (especially the Binging With Babish crossover eps)
- going to TV Tropes immediately after consuming a piece of media
- the Two Bossy Dames newsletter
- the "take your card out" noise that the machines at Target make
- same, but at Trader Joe's
- getting stuff clean!
- the part in concerts when the band gets introduced, especially if they all get to have little solos afterwards
- the honeycrisp apple candles from Trader Joe's
- Sam Sanders's Aunt Betty
- the GIF of Chow Yun Fat giving the thumbs-up while eating something
- the episode of It's Been a Minute where Jenifer Lewis calls Aunt Betty at the end and Aunt Betty FREAKS OUT
- Nick David bouncing while he plays the bass or guitar
- SHOTS OUT THE GRAMMY
- when John recommends books on Vlogbrothers
- the Try Channel
- D'Arcy Carden's open-mouthed smiles
- Colleen McKnight shouting for joy during the third verse of Rejoice or any time we mention Jesus rising from the dead
- Ollie's wide-eyed facial expressions on Korean Englishman or JOLLY
- The b-roll on the top and tail of all of the Bon App test kitchen videos
- people cheersing their food during taste tests
- calling it "cheersing" instead of making a toast
- everyone cheering together for the home team at a sporting event
- practicing a song and nailing the harmony, especially if it's a difficult part to figure out from scratch
- calling either babies or elderly people "young man" or "young lady"
- the chaotic good bromance that is Sebastian Stan, Anthony Mackie, and Winston Duke
- Chris Evans ("...that is America's ass.")
- callbacks during No Such Thing As A Fish
- that the men in my parish are bros who hug
- the mail-opening episodes of JOLLY
- the UHD student who wears giant flower crowns every day
- the way Marc Evan Jackson says "I play Shaun" in the intro to the Good Place podcast
- Postmodern Jukebox covers
- getting to say hi to my regular quizzers
- when my friends show up at quiz
- candle wax dripping through your fingers during Silent Night at Christmas Eve services
- The Supper of the Lamb
- getting the email that tells me my library holds have come in
- going on weird sidebars/tangents with my discipleship intensive group
- doing deep/weird biblical interpretation with my discipleship intensive group
- connecting the dots between stuff in the Old and New Testaments
- telling people about resources they've never heard of that end up being useful to them
- dust caught in the bright beam of a light
- reading in bed
- "An (x) is a (definition of a similar-sounding word)." "No, you're thinking of (y). An (x) is..." etc., ad nauseum
- directors having an actor/group of actors they consistently work with (e.g., Bill Murray and Wes Anderson); Disney and Pixar’s “good luck charms” (Alan Tudyk and John Ratzenberger)
- the clever billboards at 610 and Airline
- the weird-ass recording of Shenandoah by Tom Waits and Keith Richards
- POPPADOMS OR BREAD?!
- The "Week of Outfits" feature on Cup of Jo
- a perfectly ripe avocado
- doing morning or evening prayer outside
- when people cheer for Jason Isbell's sobriety during "Cover Me Up"
- Editor-San playing Brett's lo-fi track whenever he has a brain fart
- when bands get the audience to sing specific parts during songs
- whenever Gabie's on JOLLY: "And this is JOLLIBEE!! *doot doo doo doo doo*" "I can add the sound effects later!"
- people's arty/cute face masks during COVID
- my old roommate's dog resting her head on my lap when she was needy
- The Mountain Goats, "This Year"
- the "have a good weekend" posts on Cup of Jo
- Getting Shit Done days
- when YouTubers reacting to Pentatonix hit That Part in one of the songs (all PTX songs have That Part) and their brains explode
- ^ that, but for the keyboard solo in "Lingus"
- the part of the "Wait For It" episode of the Song Exploder tv show where Alex Lacamoire and LMM are listening to the bridge--their non-verbal communication and their complete delight in it and in each other (19:45-20:13)
- Stephen Thompson's little laughing "ummmm"
- Sohla Al-Wayly's "I am about to do something" clap
- the thing of calling your parents' friends "uncle" and "aunt" (and being called "aunt" or "Ms. Amanda" by my friends' kids)
- talking to strangers while waiting in line
- the entire town of Marfa, TX
- the NYT's Tiny Love Stories column
- the benediction part of Your Other Brothers
- the blankets they use to cover and then unveil objects on The Repair Shop
- the disc golf folks in TC Jester Park (no matter the weather)
- reaction videos to That Part of season 2, episode 8 of The Mandalorian
- reaction videos to Those Parts of season 1, episode 6 of Squid Game
- Nadiya Hussein's outfits on her TV shows
- when people sing in the opposite end of their usual vocal register--i.e., tenors and sopranos sing in their lower range, basses and altos sing in their upper range
- those colorful striped Mexican/Central American blankets
- "LOOK OUT! It's only Films to Be Buried With!"
- giving people stuff I've made for them
- the homemade version of The Princess Bride that a bunch of celebrities did during COVID (I *really* need an official remake with Pedro Pascal or Diego Luna as Inigo, PLEASE)
- the way Brits pronounce the name Anthony, with a hard T
- the line "it took me four days to hitchhike from Saginaw" should not go as hard as it does, but it does
- eating dinner outside
- falling asleep to the YouTube channel menwiththepot (the only ASMR I can tolerate)
- Scottish people saying “murder” or "burglar" or "world"
- finishing a book
- the really specific texture that sweet potato starch noodles (daengmyeon) have
- coming up with a word or phrase to use as the theme of a year
- crossing things off of my to-do list
- the patina of use on all the brass doorknobs and crash bars in Fondren Library's basement
- hammer dulcimer
- turning off of Montrose onto Rice from the traffic circle and being thrust into a tunnel of trees like entering into Narnia
- the mini murals on utility boxes in Houston
- all the public art in Houston
- the high schooler series on Korean Englishman
- when the brass section gets to go hard in film scores and symphonies
- the smell of a freshly opened bag of coffee
- the first cup made from a freshly opened bag of coffee (the subsequent ones are never quite as good)
- the thing women do when we're complimented on our earrings and we reach up to touch them so we remember which ones we're wearing
- the post-church ritual all the little kids at my church have of literally running laps around the building
- jamaica agua fresca
- anything hibiscus-flavored
- whenever Barney and Guvna show up on a Korean Englishman channel
- lying in bed watching TikToks
- the specificity of words for siblings in Korean
- the scoring system for food on The Friendship Onion
- email newsletters
- getting to give money to folks
- getting to pay my bills
- having specific rituals for travel
- Pedro Pascal and Oscar Isaac's Wired Autocomplete Interview ("the grumpy eagle?! malo...")
- binding off a knitting project
- the extreme specificity of books found in an academic library
- short-sleeved button down shirts with interesting/quirky prints (especially when worn with shorts in the summer)
- stickers on water bottles
- bottle filler water fountains
- old houses turned into something else, like a coffee shop or a bookstore
- steel pan music
- museum gift shops
- doing the TikTok10 quiz every weekday morning (or whenever Miles decides to publish)
- fruit sandos
- Smitten Kitchen's strawberry cake
- when one of your joints pops after really feeling like it needed to get popped for a minute
- the collabs Target does with designers and artists (I don't think I've ever bought a product from one of these collabs, but I enjoy that they exist)
- Sam Sanders's intro to the Culturegeist section of Into It ("...I don't know, y'all!")
- the character Dr. Chef in Becky Chambers's Wayfarers series
- the guy in Snarky Puppy who has a wham bar on his synth (Bobby Sparks!)
- the seasonal $5-7 dollar mugs Target always has on an endcap
- the piano and drums in "Sinnerman" and their kinetic energy
- cinnamon sugar on almost anything sweet
- praise breaks (they are not my religious or cultural tradition but I appreciate the joy of them)
- what one guy on TikTok calls "little shoppy shops"--those local boutiques that carry slightly upscale but quirky stuff like Graza olive oil and Fishwife products
- playing jazz around the house on weekend mornings
- the dinosaur game that Chrome gives you when there's no internet
- the thing in some songs from musicals where it's like EVERYBODY SING THEIR MELODIES AT THE SAME TIME and the resulting harmonies from the polyphony is SO GOOD
- the Ironside siren: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOy6hqzfsAs (and similar)
- Luthen's monologue at the end of episode 1x10 of Andor, GOOD LORD
- the PopSugar reading challenge (even though I never actually do them)
- a good chunk of my friendship with Seth Hahne being based around the Tournament of Books
- Coke Freestyle machines
- "pain is no measure of his faithfulness/he withholds no good thing from us"
- campus bookstores
- crunchy sugar crystals on baked goods
- discussing the show we've just watched with Camille and Kaitlyn and Anna and occasionally the Arens while we're walking to our cars
- the specific American accent that comes out mostly in the words "program" and "restaurant" that I cannot reproduce in writing so you just have to trust me
- the dance sequences in Barbie
- Ryan Gosling's line reading of "SUBLIME!" in Barbie
- the fact that in July 2023 we collectively decided to make Barbenheimer a thing
- crunchy pretzels and room-temp butter (just trust me on this)
- the little "game over" guitar noise in Shofukan when they're transitioning out of the singing breakdown
- Whole Foods pizza
- sharpening a pencil
- finding money in a purse or jacket I haven't used for a while
- the music video for "Back On 74" by Jungle
- parking at the City Hall annex for shows at the Hobby Center
- putting on eyeliner
- taking off my makeup
- the Robot & Monk books
- Oak and Sparrow IG live nights on Mondays (and all the banter in the chat)
- tbe bridge to "Christ is Lower Still"
- the part of the "We Like It Here" documentary where they're playing the ridiculous coin game
- the "whoooaaa"s in "96,000"
- Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit doing a residency at the Ryman every October
- Andrew Garfield's "what. can. i. DOOOOOOOOOOO" in "30/90"
- Deep Blue Ink's animations
- the phrase "friend of the pod"
- singing the Doxology at Liturgy Collective (the harmony was _next level_)
- Brennan Lee Mulligan's epic monologues
- those weird tallboys of soda you get at random places like Dollar Tree or gas stations
- going to the symphony
- various banter during band practice and after church
- when you’re at the grocery store or Target or similar and you keep passing the same three or four folks taking the same route as you and you’re briefly extras in each other’s movies
- picking one person in an orchestra to focus on while listening (especially percussion)
- the triumvirate of free daily NYT games: the Mini, Wordle, and Connections
- the new addition, Strands
- “HOLD ON! HOLD ON! HER SISTER WAS A WITCH, RIGHT?!”
- Hannah and I constantly sending each other riffs on ^ that video
- @joshcarlosjosh's excellent riff on that video: https://twitter.com/joshcarlosjosh/status/1608503970917675010
- when people meet my family and it is no longer an abstraction that I am adopted
- Whole Foods cranberry ginger ale
- listening to a song and picking one instrument or vocal part to focus on
- finding stuff I'd given up on as lost forever
- the old-school Focus Features and MPAA rating card at the beginning of The Holdovers
- Chuck and Hailee's Friday night dinner videos on TikTok
- women with dad/uncle energy
- dudes who are absolute meatballs who would also drop everything to help you out
- people who are generally really wholesome except that they could also cuss the paint off a wall
- older people who've seen some crazy stuff and have the stories to prove it but are also really really cool and nice
- companionable silence
- listening to a whole album on my commute to and from work
- the tradition at the Oscars of the previous year's winners in the acting categories presenting those awards
- Twitter during events like award shows or the Super Bowl
- dogs taking their treats to some other part of the building to eat them
- adults re-enacting photos of themselves as kids
- seeing someone you know while you're both sitting in traffic (especially if you honk at each other to get each other's attention)
- the criterion "is it drugs?" from Rufi Thorpe's judgment in the 2024 ToB (frankly, her entire rubric is phenomenal)
- palomas
- related: "popcorn" in Spanish is "palomitas," little doves
- eating Italian pasta with chopsticks (especially ziti or penne, and threading a noodle onto a chopstick)
- the crosscut thick paper used for packing fragile things (instead of bubble wrap)
- paper plane cocktails
- that crackly noise you get when you vacuum over a particularly dirty part of the carpet
- H-E-B tortillas
- the other members of a band watching and admiring their colleague while they're going off during a solo
- essay collections written by poets
- random stickers on telephone poles, utility boxes, and the bollards/barriers by drive-throughs
- Cory Henry and Shaun Martin doing that hilarious floppy dance in the video for One Hope
- blurbs about the typeface in the back of books
oct 18 2014 ∞
dec 6 2024 +
