What I read, watched, saw, and did in the first half of 2019

Books I finished in 2019 so far:

• Vita Nostra by Marina & Sergey Dyachenko
• Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
• Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War by Mary Roach
• Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
• Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan
• My Brother by Jamaica Kincaid
• Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari

Books I did not finish:

• The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life by Mark Manson (clearly, I did not give a fuck)
• Birds of America by Lorrie Moore (on the verge of finishing it)

Although I'm 2 books behind in my reading goal for the year, it's been a good reading year so far. I really loved the first five books I read, it's a good genre mix (3 fiction, 3 nonfiction, 1 memoir), they're geographically varied (Russia, Korea/Japan, Singapore/China, Antigua, Osage land), and I've read as many books by female authors as by male. On the list for the near future are Goldfinch by Donna Tartt, How to Write an Autobiographical Novel (essays) by Alexander Chee, and Belgravia by Julian Fellowes.

NEW! Short Stories read:

My office has started a short story reading club. So far, I've read these:

• Dip in the Pool by Roald Dahl
• The Harvest by Amy Hempel
• Los Angeles by Ling Ma
• Comma by Hilary Mantel

Podcasts consumed:

• The West Wing Weekly (season 6)
• My Dad Wrote a Porno (season 1)

TV watched in 2019 so far:

• Veep (seasons 4-7)
• Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (season 6-present)
• The West Wing (season 6): rewatch, along with The West Wing Weekly podcast
• Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (season 4, part 2)
• Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (season 4 + special)
• American Crime Story: The Assassination of Gianni Versace (season 2)
• Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj (volume 2)
• Star Trek: Discovery (season 1)
• Secret City (season 1)
• Sex Education (season 1)
• Planet Earth (season 1)
• Russian Doll (season 1)
• Special (season 1)
• Dead to Me (season 1)
• The 2000s (CNN docuseries)
• When They See Us (limited series + Oprah interview)
• Angels in America (HBO limited series): rewatch with Cricket
• Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society: with Page & Popcorn
• The Lobster
• A Futile and Stupid Gesture
• Abducted in Plain Sight
• The Birdcage: for the 645348th time
• Brené Brown: The Call to Courage
• Wine Country
• Murder Mystery

Other series/movies attempted in 2019:

• The Magicians (end of season 1, beginning of season 2): I guess I have a love-hate relationship with this series, and I guess I'm in hate right now.
• Bonding (episodes 1-5): Was in the middle of a binge but then got taken away from it and never got back.
• Les Miserables (episodes 1-5): Just never got around to the 6th but I think I'll watch it right now.
• Umbrella Academy (episodes 1-4): It's fine. I may return to it eventually.
• Big Little Lies (episodes 1-2): Will revisit.
• Fleabag (episodes 1-2): Will revisit.
• The Newsroom (episodes 1-2): May revisit.
• Derry Girls (episode 1)
• Pose (episode 1)
• My Mad Fat Diary (episode 1): At Courtney's insistence; will revisit.
• Eighth Grade: Had to turn it off.

Movies seen (in the theater) in 2019 so far:

• The Favourite
• Booksmart

Live performances seen in 2019 so far:

• Torch Song at the Helen Hayes Theater, with NYMAAC
• White Noise at the Public, with Kathryn
• Gary at the Booth Theater, with Kathryn
• Hadestown at the Walter Kerr Theater, with NYMAAC
• Ain't No Mo at the Public, with Kathryn and Hillary
• Calenna Garbä in concert with QUO & LGBAC musicians at the Argentine Consulate
• Socrates at the Public, with Kathryn
• Merrily We Roll Along at Roundabout (Laura Pels)
• Hillary and Clinton at the Golden Theater, with NYMAAC
• Vanity's Vanities at Slate
• New York Public Radio: Live at the Brooklyn Bowl, with Josh
• New York Philharmonic in Prospect Park
• Much Ado About Nothing at the Delacorte, with Courtney and Richie
• The Skivvies: Live at the Brooklyn Brewery, with Sam & Álvaro

Exhibitions seen in 2019 so far:

• Harry Potter: A History of Magic at the New York Historical Society, with NYMAAC
• Unseen Oceans (exhibit) and Backyard Wilderness (movie) features at the American Museum of Natural History, with Cricket
• Escher: The Exhibition and Experience at Industry City, with Cricket
• Reich Richter Pärt at the Shed (and the Vessel), with Álvaro and Mark
• Tolkien: Maker of Middle Earth at the Morgan Library
• Love & Resistance: Stonewall50 at the New York Public Library

Other:

• Promoted to manager at work
• A relationship is brewing
• Joined the board of my co-op (oops)
• Stepped down from the Staff of QUO but back up to chair the artistic director search committee (oops again)
• Wrote my last few articles for Teaching Music magazine
• Played in 6 concerts with QUO and 3 with the LGBAC symphonic band, and marched in 8 events with the LGBAC marching band. Also participated in a recording session and played timpani in church on Easter.
• First physical and dental checkup in longer than I can remember
• B'nai Mitzvah: The Next Generation began with my cousin Samantha
• New board games discovered: Magic Maze, Seven Wonders, Secret Hitler
• Got a new phone: Samsung Galaxy S10e

The Big Book Post 2018: Addendum

For many years, I kept a spreadsheet of all the books I read so I could do fun things like track how many times I read the same author, keep a running to-read list, etc. When Goodreads came along, I continued to update the spreadsheet, but when my computer died and I moved all my stuff on to a portable hard drive, I stopped bothering with the spreadsheet because Goodreads does most of the stuff that it did without my even having to do much work. Granted, Goodreads doesn't get as nerdy as my spreadsheet got. There was one data-driven detail I wanted to put into my 2018 Big Book Post which would have required digging out the spreadsheet, but when I explored Goodreads a little more I found that the website does have the functionality I thought it lacked. So, I give you:

My 5 Most-Read Authors

• Jasper Fforde (9 books): Although I haven't read him since the most recent Thursday Next book in 2012, Fforde is the author I've read the most, thanks in no small part to the aforementioned 7-book series. I've also read Shades of Gray and The Big Over Easy.
• David Sedaris (8 books): Sedaris is the author by whom I've read the most standalone books, although one could consider his story collections a long series jumping back and forth through time. Reading Calypso last year bounced him out of a tie and now he stands firmly in second place.
• J.K. Rowling (7 books): You know the ones. I haven't read her in 12 years yet here she sits at #3.
• Sarah Vowell (6 books): My last Vowell was Lafayette in the Somewhat United States which I read in 2016. The only book of hers I haven't read (not counting books she only edited or contributed to) is Radio On.
• Margaret Atwood (6 books): I knew Atwood's name before I read her because of the Moxy Früvous song "My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors." The first book of hers I read was The Handmaid's Tale in 2007, now enjoying a resurgence in popularity thanks to Hulu TV series. My reading of Alias Grace last year bumped her up to a tie with Sarah Vowell.

Other authors I've read more than once:

• 5 books: Alison Weir, Augusten Burroughs, Mary Roach
• 4 books: Gregory Maguire, Neil Gaiman, Philippa Gregory
• 3 books: Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games trilogy), Dan Brown, Kazuo Ishiguro, James Hamilton-Paterson (Gerald Samper trilogy), Audrey Niffenegger, Piers Anthony (books 1-3 of the Incarnations of Immortality series), Haruki Murakami
• 2 books: Douglas Adams (books 1 and 2 of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series), George Saunders, Jodi Picoult, Lemony Snicket (books 1 and 2 of the Series of Unfortunate Events), Ellen DeGeneres, David Rakoff, Philip Pullman (books 1 and 2 of the His Dark Materials series), Michael Chabon, Mitch Albom, Kurt Vonnegut, Jenny Lawson

TV 2018

Watched since October 1st:

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend season 4 episodes 1-3
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel season 2
West World season 2 (minus the finale, with Cricket)
GLOW seasons 1 & 2
Upstairs Downstairs (2010) season 1
The Magicians season 1 episodes 9-13
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina season 1 episodes 1-11
The Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj volume 1
Lost in Space reboot season 1
The Romanoffs full series (8 episodes)
The Innocent Man full series (6 episodes)
Alias Grace full series (6 episodes)
CNN's The Nineties full series (8 episodes)
The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin
Ellen Degeneres: Relatable
The West Wing rewatch of season 5 episodes 17-22 and season 6 episodes 1-3 along with The West Wing Weekly podcast
American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson rewatch

And in the theater:
Mary Poppins Returns
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald

Check my Q1, Q2, and Q3 posts for the rest of the year.

I watched A LOT of good TV this year. Around October, I started to run out of beloved, time-tested, familiar series and scrambled around for new things to watch, and found a few interesting things, but most of the good stuff was in the first three quarters of the year. Possibly the best thing I watched this year was seasons 5 and 6 of The Americans, which has changed the way I feel about U2's "With or Without You." Season 3 of Fargo was yet another round of chilling and riveting storytelling for the great series. GLOW seasons 1 and 2 were a hilarious and smart delight. Black Mirror season 4 was very affecting and I am currently avoiding Bandersnatch. West World is hopelessly confusing, but I'm enjoying watching with with Cricket and her 3- or 4-times removed HBO login. I continue to love Call the Midwife which I caught up on this year (seasons 5-7) and I just remembered there's a Christmas episode waiting in my Apple TV somewhere. Also highlights of the year were season 2 of The Good Place, The Handmaid's Tale, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (one of these things is not like the others, well I guess none of them are like each other).

I watched an awful lot of Shameless (US, seasons 3-7), and I'm getting a little tired of it, so season 8 may not be in my future. On the other hand, I closed out the year with the spare season 1 episodes of The Magicians which I hadn't gotten to, thinking I'd just finish out the season and not look back, but the season finale cliffhanger may have other plans for me.

I did a fair amount of rewatching this year, driven by a combination of a lack of compelling options, specific cravings for certain old favorites, and, unaccountably, time on my hands (?). After finishing Alison Weir's The Lady in the Tower, I headed straight for Amazon Prime and watched the first two seasons of The Tudors. My craving ended with Anne's end, so I did not continue much into season 3. After that I still wanted more British accents, so I rewatched the entirety of Downton Abbey. I wanted to rewatch it again (re-rewatch it) after seeing the Downton Abbey exhibit over Labor Day weekend, but I stopped myself. Hulu knows me better than I know myself, so it threw The Mary Tyler Moore Show my way, but unfortunately only seasons 1-3, so no Sue-Ann Nivens and only the very beginnings of Georgette. Second-to-lastly, I know it sounds odd, but I really loved American Crime Story: The People v. O.J. Simpson, so I allowed myself to watch it again this year. I also continue to watch The West Wing along with the The West Wing Weekly Podcast (from the middle of season 4 to the beginning of season 6).

I have a pretty busy life (full-time job, freelance job, managing an orchestra, participation and leadership in other groups, family, friends, travel, etc) so it's always a surprise to look at this list at the end of the year and reflect on how much TV I manage to watch. The only explanation I can come up with is that I do most of my work, activities, and people-seeing outside of my house, and when I happen to be in my house, I pretty much just eat, watch TV, and sleep.

Happy new year!

The Big Book Post 2018

The books I have read them.

Books read this year, in order:

Jan: It's All Relative by A.J. Jacobs
Feb: The Lady in the Tower by Alison Weir
Mar: The Uncollected David Rakoff by David Rakoff, sort of
Mar: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Apr: The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan (took a break to read the Martian, finished in May)
May: The Martian by Andy Weir
Jun: Calypso by David Sedaris
Jun: The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
Jul: Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
Jul: The Secret History by Donna Tartt
Aug: Call Me By Your Name by André Aciman
Sep: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Sep: Less by Andrew Sean Greer
Oct: A Legacy by Sybille Bedford
Nov: On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder
Nov: New Erotica for Feminists by my friend Caitlin Kunkel, Brooke Preston, my friend Fiona Taylor, and Carrie Wittmer
Dec: Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
Dec: Some Very Interesting Cats Perhaps You Weren't Aware of by Doogie Horner

I achieved my 2018 reading goal of 18 books, and right in the nick of time. You'll perhaps notice (and forgive) that three of the last four books I read this year were very short. As the ceiling begins to come down you grab what you can and get out of there.

Goodreads would like you to know these facts about the books I read this year:

• On Tyranny was the shortest book (128 pages) and The Secret History was the longest (559)
• Of the books I read this year, The Martian was read by the most other Goodreads users (over 700,000) and also received the highest average rating (4.39 stars). The Uncollected David Rackoff was read by the fewest Goodreads users (277)

Less was by far my favorite book of the year. Lincoln in the Bardo was a close second, and definitely the most intriguing. I enjoyed A Wrinkle in Time the least, and that goes double for the film.

About the authors:

Of the 18 books I read this year, only 7 were written by women, but one of them was written by FOUR WOMEN (New Erotica for Feminists), making the author tally almost even (10 women, 11 men).

I read three books by authors who are deceased (Uncollected, A Wrinkle in Time, A Legacy). Of the living authors, Margaret Atwood (Alias Grace) is the oldest, as she usually is. I read no books by authors who are younger than I am (with the very possible exceptions of the youthful and timeless authors of New Erotica for Feminists, whose ages I did not deign to research). The youngest author whose age I was able to estimate (by looking up his high school graduation year on Facebook) is Doogie Horner (Some Very Interesting Cats Perhaps You Weren't Aware of), who is ostensibly one year older than me.

David Rakoff (Uncollected) and Margaret Atwood (Alias) were both born in Canada, Alison Weir (The Lady in the Tower) and Simon Winchester (The Professor and the Madman) are British, Sybille Bedford (A Legacy) was born in Germany, and André Aciman (Call Me by Your Name) was born in Egypt. 

This year I read my eighth book by David Sedaris (Calypso), my sixth by Margaret Atwood (Alias), my fifth by Alison Weir (Lady), my second by George Saunders (Lincoln), and my second by David Rakoff (Uncollected). This was the second time I picked up a book by A.J. Jacobs (It's All Relative), but the first time I finished it.

About the books:

Fiction: 11

3 historical novels (Lincoln, Legacy, Alias)

2 works of LGBT fiction (Call, Less)

2 humor books (Erotica, Cats)

1 plain old novel (The Secret History)

1 fantasy novel (Wrinkle)

1 sci-fi novel (The Martian)

1 novel in verse (Love, Dishonor, Marry Die, Cherish, Perish, in Uncollected)

Nonfiction: 8

5 memoirs/biographies (Relative, Lady, Uncollected, Calypso, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks)

3 books about history/politics (Lady, Madman, On Tyranny)

2 books about the life sciences (Henrietta, The Omnivore's Dilemma)

1 book about genealogy (Relative)

A Legacy and A Wrinkle in Time were the oldest books I read this year (published in 1956 and 1962 respectively). The oldest book I read by a living author was The Secret History (1992), followed by Alias Grace (1996) and The Professor and the Madman (1998). Everything else is from the new millennium, including two books published this year (Calypso, Erotica).

The books I read this year cover a lot of ground and also a lot of space. Less takes us from the Americas to Europe to Asia and back again. The Secret History is bicoastal but mostly in New England and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks drives around the Mid-Atlantic and the 20th century a bit. Lincoln in the Bardo is as grounded in mid-19th century Washington, DC as The Lady in the Tower and The Professor and the Madman are in London (16th and 19th centuries respectively). Call Me by Your Name lives in 1980s Italy until the epilogue. A Legacy travels around western Europe and Alias Grace goes from Belfast to several points on Lake Ontario., both in the 19th century. The Martian spends most of its time on Mars, predictably, in the near future, and A Wrinkle in Time goes wherever and whenever the hell Oprah wants.

A Wrinkle in Time is the only book I read this year that is part of a series, and I will not continue it.

Award Winners:

A Wrinkle in Time (Newbery Medal 1963)

The Omnivore's Dilemma (California Book Award for Nonfiction Gold 2006)

Lincoln in the Bardo (Man Booker Prize 2017)

Less (Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2018)

Movies and Book Clubs:

I read A Wrinkle in Time, The Martian, and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and watched the film adaptations, with the Page & Popcorn Book & Movie Club. I also went to see the movie of Ready Player One with them, having read the book in 2015. We will watch The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society this month, which I read in 2009. On my own, I read Call Me by Your Name and watched the movie with my friend Kate, and read Alias Grace and watched the Netflix six-part mini-series. I also watched the movie adaptation of The Glass Castle, which I read in 2005.

Where the books came from, and why I read them:

It was a gift: Relative and Lincoln (from my parents), Cats (from Holly, for no reason other than she knew I wanted it)

Bought it for book club: Wrinkle, Martian, Henrietta (I don't remember where I got these, but let's go ahead and say it was some combination of Books Are Magic and Community Bookstore since I know I shopped there this year)

Bought it in a bookstore, just because: Uncollected (Astoria Bookshop), Calypso (The Strand), Less (Three Lives & Company, on Mary's recommendation), Legacy (McNally Jackson, on Nicholas' recommendation), Alias (McNally Jackson)

Found at a church book sale: Madman

A friend loaned it to me ages ago and I finally decided to read it: Lady (Sara)

A friend loaned it to me recently and I read it in a timely fashion: Omnivore and Tyranny (Cricket), Call (Álvaro)

Took it from a coworker's giveaway pile: Secret

In support of my friend Fiona's book launch! Erotica (Wildfang)

Books that didn't:

I am careful not to admit on Goodreads that I'm reading a book until I know it's going to stick, so you won't find any evidence on the internet (except this blog post) of my having tried to read these books. Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann came highly recommended from various sources, but it just wasn't happening for me (I gave it a generous 100 pages before quitting). My friend Cricket was shocked when she met me at a restaurant and saw Ulysses by James Joyce sitting in front of me on the table. "Andrew, friends tell each other these things," she said to me. I knew it wasn't going to be my kind of book, but the plan was to read it very slowly with a group of coworkers (two of whom are Joyce scholars), meeting at various intervals to discuss and drink Irish beer and whiskey. I studiously read the first two chapters and joined them for the first meeting, but I didn't pick it back up after that and am now behind and will probably not catch up, alas.

2019:

Currently gleaming at me from my bookshelf are Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan which I picked out of a giveaway box in a friend's building, A Favourite of the Gods by Sybille Bedford which I got from McNally Jackson after finishing A Legacy also by Bedford, and three books I just got for Chanukah from my parents: Belgravia by Julian Fellowes, Pachinko by Min Jin Lee, and Vita Nostra by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko, the last of which I am currently reading. Calling to me from the basement, where I had to store most of my books due to a pest control issue earlier this year and haven't yet had the strength to go retrieve them, are Grunt by Mary Roach, Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty, American Nations by Colin Woodard, and many more sad, mistreated books that deserve to see the light of day.

Inspired by 2018's reads, I will probably read more Donna Tartt, and continue my path through the works of Margaret Atwood. I've taken a year off from Haruki Murakami, and two off from Kurt Vonnegut, so 2019 may be a return to them. Also, my 2017 reads were culturally and geographically varied in a way my 2018 reading year was not. I hope 2019 takes me outside my literary comfort zone (North America and the UK) more often.

Thanks for reading!

Shows 2018

Seen since October 1st:

On Broadway

• Lifespan of a Fact (with Kathryn)
• The Play That Goes Wrong (with Julie)
• To Kill a Mockingbird (with my mom, Louise, and most of NYMAAC)

Off-Broadway

• Mother of the Maid (with Kathryn and Hillary)
• Wild Goose Dreams (with Kathryn)
• Puffs (for the third time, in honor of Louise's visit, and Kate's finishing reading the HP series)

Off-Off-Broadway

• Squeaky Bicycle Fall Reading Lab: Sioux Falls (with Kathryn)

Also:

• Book launch party for Enough by Emily Easton
• Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevich: The Russian Avant-Garde in Vitebsk, 1918-1922 at the Jewish Museum (private guided tour by Jonah)

Check my Q1, Q2, and Q3 posts for the rest of the year. The best things I saw in 2018 were Sweeney Todd at the Barrow Street Theater and Gustav Klimt at Atelier des Lumieres.

Things I read, watched, saw, and did in Q3 2018

In July, August, and September 2018, I read:

• Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
• The Secret History by Donna Tartt
• Call Me By Your Name by André Aciman
• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
• Less by Andrew Sean Greer
• A very small amount of Ulysses by James Joyce

I watched:

• Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee season 10: Ellen DeGeneres, Kate McKinnon, Dana Carvey
• Shameless season 7
• Call the Midwife season 7
• Orange Is the New Black season 6
• The West Wing rewatch of season 5 episodes 7-16 along with the West Wing Weekly Podcast
• The Americans seasons 5-6
• Fargo season 3
• The Good Place season 2
• Queer Eye season 1
• West World season 1 (with Cricket)
• How to Get Away With Murder season 1 episodes 1-5
• Disenchantment season 1 episodes 1 and 2
• GLOW season 1 episodes 1 and 2
• Call Me By Your Name (with Kate)
• Coco
• Half of Jackie (on a plane, fell asleep)
• Star Wars: Episode VIII: The Last Jedi
• Thor: Ragnarok
• Vicky Christina Barcelona (on a plane, stayed awake for the whole thing)

I saw:

• Carousel at the Imperial Theater
• Twelfth Night at the Delacorte Theater (The Public Theater's Shakespeare in the Park)
• Girl From the North Country at the Public Theater
• Gustav Klimt at Atelier de Lumieres (Paris)
• Into the Woods in concert at the Laurie Beechman Theater
• Downton Abbey: The Exhibition
• Gotham Girls Roller Derby
• Gay Games 10 Gala Concert at Casino de Paris and Closing Ceremonies at the Gay Games Village

Also, I:

• Went to Paris, Normandy, and Antwerp! Performed at Stade Jean Bouin, Casino de Paris, Place de Bitche, Jardins du Palais Royal, and Jardins du Champs-Elysees as part of Gay Games 10
• Went to the Finger Lakes (Skaneateles, Ithaca, and Marathon)
• Went to Philly for a wedding (Kristin & Greg)
• Was visited by Laura & Beth, my sister Lauren, and Sara, and spent a day bookshopping with Mary
• Spent Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur with family
• Was photographed by Max Kristula-Green for a project
• Helped Cricket move
• Went on one (1) date
• Attended two housewarmings (Kathryn, Cam) and a birthday party (Christina)
• Marched in the Montclair, NJ Independence Day Parade
• Wrote 2 articles for my freelance job
• Posted 24 doodles and 3 tiny sinks on my Instagram and sold many things (mostly Long Island stickers) on my and Kathryn's Redbubble store

Things I read, watched, saw, and did in Q2 2018

In April, May, and June 2018, I read:

• The Martian by Andy Weir
• The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan
• Calypso by David Sedaris
• The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester

I watched:

• Shameless seasons 5 and 6
• Call the Midwife seasons 5 and 6
• Orphan Black season 5
• Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt season 4 part 1
• The Handmaid's Tale season 2
• The History of Comedy (CNN) all
• Queer Eye season 1 episodes 1 and 2
• The West Wing rewatch of season 4 episodes 21-23, season 5 episodes 1-6 along with The West Wing Weekly Podcast
• The Mary Tyler Moore Show rewatch of seasons 2 and 3
• Rhoda rewatch of season 1 episodes 1-5
• My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman: Tina Fey
• Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee: Jim Carrey, Jimmy Fallon, Sarah Jessica Parker
• John Mulaney: Kid Gorgeous
• Tig Notaro: Happy to Be Here
• Ali Wong: Hard Knock Wife
• Steve Martin and Martin Short: An Evening You Will Forget for the Rest of Your Life
• Hannah Gadsby: Nanette
• Set It Up
• The Martian

I saw:

• My Fair Lady at the Vivian Beaumont Theater (Lincoln Center)
• Hello Dolly (with Bernadette Peters) at the Shubert Theater
• Angels in America parts 1 and 2 at the Neil Simon Theater
• Boys in the Band at the Booth Theater
• Othello at the Delacorte Theater (The Public Theater's Shakespeare in the Park)
• Follies at Astoria Performing Arts Center
• In the Heights at the John W Engeman Theater in Northport, NY
• Peter Hujar: Speed of Life at the Morgan Library & Museum
• New York Philharmonic in Prospect Park
• Vanity's Vanities IV: Reverse Cowgirl at the Slipper Room
• James Adler in recital at the Yamaha Artist Services Piano Salon
• Choral Chameleon at the Irondale Center
• Ready Player One
• RBG
• Solo: A Star Wars Story

Also, I:

• Went on one (1) date
• Played 2 concerts with QUO and 1 with the LGBAC Symphonic Band
• Marched in 4 parades and played 2 other gigs with the LGBAC Marching Band
• Stepped down as QUO's president and became QUO's manager (which is the job I've been doing anyway)
• Wrote 2 articles for my freelance job
• Booked a trip to Paris for August and learned a very small amount of French on Duolingo
• Went to Woodstock/Saugerties with my family for Fathers Day
• Traveled to Baltimore, DC, Philly, and New Hope, PA with the band
• Was visited by friends Shay (and Quoia and their adorable son Justin), Adrienne, and Laura (with special guest Beth) in NYC
• Turned 38 and managed to get a bunch of gifts despite being 38
• Achieved the milestones of 13 years in NYC and 2 years at my job (these actually happened at the end of March but I forgot to mention them last quarter)
• Posted 18 doodles and 6 tiny sinks on Instagram, and sold a lot of stuff on my and Kathryn's redbubble store
• Won the Harry Potter and the Cursed Child lottery 0 times and lost a trillion times