I’ve consumed a TON of media over quarantine so far!
I thought about doing long, drawn-out reviews of everything I’ve watched/listened to/read, but I frankly don’t have the time or energy for that! So read on for paragraph-length reviews of every TV show that I’ve watched in quarantine so far – and look out for more posts in the coming weeks for more!
Continue reading “Quarantine Reviews: TV”My Animal Crossing journey began on December 24, 2002, when I received a GameCube for Christmas (packed in a beer box, hidden behind cans of beer, which I still maintain is one of my favorite gifts, ever). I remember plugging it in for the first time, hearing the disc spin, and stepping off the train into my snowy village for the very first time.
I don’t remember much about that first village – it was 18! years ago, after all. I remember people leaving comic books at each other’s houses, perhaps? The only memory that stands out is my one cranky pig villager, Boris, who was one of my least favorite villagers at first, but we grew to appreciate each other over time. (The opposite of real life! ha)
Since then, I dabbled in Wild World and City Folk, but neither of them grabbed my attention in the same way that the original did. Maybe it was where I was in my life – I had a lot more time to dedicate to video games at 10 years old than any point afterwards, really – or maybe they didn’t live up to the same initial hype. I stayed connected to the community through social media (read: memes), but didn’t itch to pay off my loans or complete my museum, like I did before.
When I heard that a new Animal Crossing game was coming out – on the day after my 27th birthday! – I was ecstatic! I finally had free time to dedicate to the game, and had purposely planned months in advance to celebrate my birthday by catching fish and expanding my house. Little did I know that it would be the only way for me to celebrate!
Since listening to the podcast Dissect, I’ve been making a greater effort to listen to new albums in their entirety.
The rise of MP3 players and music streaming apps have made it very easy to pick and choose which tracks to listen to. In my experience, this eventually turns into, “Oh, I like that artist! I mean, I know their singles! I’ve never actually tried listening to anything else!” This is not necessarily a bad thing – if an artist releases a new single, then chances are it’s a good song that they’re proud of, right? – but it definitely makes it easy to forget that they’ve worked hard on so many more songs. In many cases, artists work hard to make cohesive albums as a singular work of art (as Dissect taught me!), so I’ve recently come to feel that I should consume music the way that the artist intended.
This was especially apparent when I started going to more concerts where I only knew one or two songs – songs that I really liked, sure, but did I like that one song enough to drop money on a concert ticket and clear my entire night to see it live for four minutes? (Honestly, it varies.)
I’m definitely still a long way from the days of listening to CDs on my CD player – make sure you don’t tip it over or it might scratch the disc! – but I definitely like having more variety in my music listening!
Trisha Serquina 