In general, I use my blog as a record of the books I read and food I eat. However, given I love lists (it’s a sickness); I thought I would make a best of 2012 list (partially inspired by Jamie at The Perpetual Page Turner). I want to remember the music I loved, the movies I watched, and the books I read. Someday, I’ll look back on this list and likely make fun of myself and I am okay with that. I’ve never claimed to be cool.
I’ll at least start on topic.
Books:
- Favorite Contemporary: Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodrell
- Favorite Historical: Wilderness by Lance Weller
- Favorite overall: The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock
- Worst: A Sport and a Pastime by Jame Salter
- Guiltiest pleasure: The Downside Ghosts series – I mean he calls his girlfriend Chessiebomb, seriously. Good grief, but I love it.
Music (mostly 2012 releases):
- Stubborn Love by The Lumineers
- Little Vessels by The Lighthouse and The Whaler
- If I Ever Stray by Frank Turner
- Safe and Sound by Capital Cities
- Radioactive by Imagine Dragons
- Truth by Alexander
- Guiltiest pleasure: I actually love Maroon 5’s One More Night. Inexplicable. Not my usual style. Perhaps it’s the lyrics?
Movies:
- Your Sister’s Sister
- Moonrise Kingdom
- Argo
- Biggest surprise: I hated the new Wuthering Heights
- Worst: I actually sat through the entirety of Battleship. If Transformers was too nuanced for you, Battleship is your movie.
Television:
Beauty:
Food:
- Foccacia Pizza with Zucchini, Tomatoes, and Arugula
- Pumpkin Ravioli
- Tazo Vanilla Apricot White Tea (yeah, yeah, I know it’s a fruity tea, but it smells amazing)
Random:
- I have never listened to either a Justin Bieber or a One Direction song and I have no intention of changing that
- 2012 highlights. Travel: Ireland, Sweden, Iceland. Life: watching my baby brother graduate valedictorian from high school. Work: I am officially a field mentor for all of those cute, little university graduate students who I am about 2 minutes older than.
- I started this blog in July. Rough stats: 7,000 views (sad face), 778 valid comments, 1,278 spam comments.
- I also write for the National Examiner and reuse similar content with better results: 48,645 views
- Most popular post: by far Re-casting Stephen King’s The Stand
- Favorite post: A Sport and a Pastime
- Best search terms: Rory O’Connor Kick Boxing, Rory O’Connor Commodore (I don’t think y’all realize how popular the name Rory O’Connor is, google it, I’m the least successful of them all), Young French Girls in Movies (ummm…?), the vanilla thrilla vs the delicious destroyer (no less than 6 times),
I’d love any recommendations for anything. Books, Movies, Food. Something so abominably bad, it’s good. Please share.
flannel and folklore 
Dr. Who is awesome and Downtown! 🙂 Happy New Year!
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I just watched the Christmas special – fantastic. Happy New Year! And long live The Cure.
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I just did my best books of 2012 post, too 🙂
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It’s one of my favorite parts of the end of the year – making and reading all the lists!
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Wait a minute…you went to Iceland?!? You must share All The Details! 😀 It’s on my places I long to visit list.
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In short, it’s super cheap to go there if you’re close to an airport that uses Icelandair. Don’t eat the food (and I am an adventurous eater). The blue lagoon is a must. Having spent a fair amount of time studying languages/linguistics, Icelandic is like nothing I’ve ever seen before. So not exactly as short as I planned…
My ideal place to visit is New Zealand, unfortunately (at this time), I’m paid far too little to even be able to afford the airfare. And I’m afraid to drive on the left (and, frankly, driving in general nearly scares the pants off me).
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Wow, you went to some amazing places in 2012! Were they all in the same trip?
I spent the past weekend with my nephews playing hours upon hours of Just Dance 4 and my 6-yr old nephew must have danced to the Bieber song no less than 25 times. But he called him Justin Beaver so it was worth it, lol.
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They were two separate trips. Ireland in April/May and Iceland/Sweden in October. Both trips were excellent, Sweden was my favorite though. Everyone was so nice and Stockholm’s transportation system is the best I’ve ever been on!
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