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Patreon Newsletter #26: December 2021!
🕑 Added 2021-12-02 19:45:33 +0000 UTCFrom Adal:
This year is ZIPPING by. November maybe went quickest of all the months yet. Jemma and I had a wonderful time in Puerto Rico. We spent most of our time hiking the beaches (weirdly very treacherous beaches there) and got to sit in the ocean for a bit and soak up all the Jurrasic Park looking scenery. We had an incredible meal of mofongo at a place called Pena Blanca.
This Saturday (Noon CST) I have an online podcasting workshop if anyone has been looking to get into podcasting or workshop ideas for a show:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/podcasting-workshop-with-adal-rifai-tickets-206491330127
If you take the workshop I’ll also guest on your podcast! (Fools….I would have guested regardless!)
Not much else is going. My last day of teaching at UIC is tomorrow so it’ll be nice to be home more and continue to try and fix up the place and get this basement tiki bar going.
I started a new podcast with some friends and am trying to figure out the best/easiest way to distribute it. I’m in need of a logo and theme song if anyone out there is interested! Maybe reach out to me on social media and let me know your rates?
December should be exciting. Jemma and I are taking my mom on a trip to Charleston next week. I’ve never explored the city so looking forward to that and thank you to everyone who sent me recommendations! I’m also going to New Orleans for a day this Sunday as well as going to NYC mid-month with Jemma to see Hadestown for our 5th time! (I splurged on front row seats since it may be the last time we get to see some of the original cast members) We’re also going to see the new mounting of Company and a musical called Caroline or Change which is supposed to be great. AND I’ll be going to LA for a few days at the end of the month. So I’m pumped to be able to travel a bit and catch up with friends!
Oh! Jemma and I got a Peloton so we’re excited to start using that!
Here’s what media I consumed in November -
TV:
- Only Murders in the Building - so much better than I thought it would be. Very much worth checking out.
- The Wheel of Time - at time it looks like there budget was 400 millions and at times it looks like the budget was $40. I don’t think I like it but I’m curious enough to keep watching if for no other reason than figuring out if it’s worth reading the books.
- Drag SOS
- Hawkeye
- The Purina National Dog Show - always a delight to laugh at dog breeds I didn’t know existed
- Yellowstone Season 4
- Mayor of Kingstown
- The Beatles: Get Back
- Ken Burns: Baseball
- The Mind: Explained
- Dexter: New Blood
- Swap Shop
- Taste The Nation: Holiday Edition
- Tiger King Season 2
- Dark Side of the Ring
- Big Mouth Season 5
- Hard Knocks: In Season
Movies:
- Mandy
- Tick Tick Boom
- Eternals
- The Sparks Brothers
- Ghostbusters: Afterlife
- King Richard
- The Humans - my sister originated the Amy Schumer role in the theater production so we watched this together
- The Help
- South Park: Post COVID
- BasketBall
Other Stuffs:
- I got the new Mario Party: SuperStars on Switch and it’s a blast. Mario Party is Jemma’s favorite game and this is a mix of all the best games dating back to the Super NES version.
- I very much enjoyed the podcast Too Scary, Didn’t Watch w/ guest Dan Lippert with Dan talking about his experience filming the new Paranormal Activity movie. Great behind the scenes stories about his time on set.
- Atlas Obscura podcast had an episode on House on the Rock which is one of my favorite places on earth. Big fan.
- I went to two of the Big Grande live shows here in Chicago which was a real treat. Highly recommend seeing these dudes if they’re ever in your city. Also would love to team up and do a tour with them sometime. Backstage Drew told me about his somewhat recent appearance on QVC to promote his family’s candy business and I highly recommend everyone search that out to watch on YouTube.
- I went to CIC Theater to see my friends improvise in a show called FELT. It’s almost like an Avenue Q type puppet show. If you’re looking to see improv in Chicago I’d recommend you go to CIC! Let me know if you’re going and I might hop over there as well to see some shows and say hi!
- I had a board game night with Kelly and Emily Kardamis and we played two games I’d never played before: Medium and Photosynthesis! Both very enjoyable although admittedly with Photosynthesis I was flying blind for the first 30 minutes and kind of lucked into winning. If you ever hang out with Emily you must DEMAND her brown butter chocolate chip cookies. I was very upset with how good they were.
I guested on the following podcasts!
- Just Ghoul With It - talking about the movie Mandy!
- Crews Control
Please let me know what you’ve been enjoying so I can consume some new media!
Love,
Adal
7:17pm
From Shruump
I wus nuvver ded! Fuulled yew!
Lurv Shruump
From JPC:
Hey everyone!
December is my birthday month, so you know what that means: nothing. It means nothing. This is 33 though, which is the Farley/Belushi/Jesus year. Pretty cool!
As we move into Chicago winter, I'm watching a lot more tv and, I gotta say: it's all bad. And I kinda think it's not even trying to be good anymore? Well, anyway, enough about that. Instead of talking about the bad TV I've been watching, I thought this month I'd talk about some of the good podcasts I've been enjoying this year:
1. The 5-4 Podcast. My sister-in-law turned me on to this one and I devoured the back catalog in like 2 weeks. It's phenomenal. Three lawyers going through famous 5-4 Supreme Court cases and talking about why they (the cases & the justices) suck. If you aren't a judicial buff, you'll probably walk away from it learning about the law too, so that's a plus.
2. Blowback. Again, devoured the first 2 seasons (I think it used to be a Stitcher Premium exclusive but now it's free?) It's a history podcast that does deep dives on specific events. First season is the Iraq War and the second season is the Cuban Revolution. Just fantastic analysis that offers a different perspective than a lot of the corporate media framing of events (diplomatic way to phrase that).
3. Citations Needed. Y'all, if you aren't listening to this one, please do yourself a favor. I'll just drop their tagline (one of the best taglines in the business): Citations Needed is a podcast about the media, power, PR, and the history of bullshit. The show is incredibly well-researched and again, offers a very interesting perspective on current events.
4. TRASHFUTURE. Look, I know next to nothing about the happenings in the UK, but I just find this group supremely entertaining and I like broadening my media horizons. For instance, shit sucks over there too! Who would have thought! Even if you aren't British, I'd recommend giving this one a try.
5. QAnon Anonymous. I found this podcast at the beginning of the pandemic when I was dealing with some FAMILY ISSUES and I gotta say, it really helped. The three hosts have been tracking QAnon for a few years and they offer deep dives on movement, the grifters, and the horrible ways that conspiratorial thinking twist people's brains. Maybe you have a loved one that fell down the rabbit hole in the last few years. If so, this show could provide some context. Or, you may just enjoy listening to the most bat-shit wild things you've ever heard and cringe at how many people believe them to be 100% true.
Okay, those are my recommendations. My other recommendation is to be good to yourself and be good to those around you.
Much love and SEE YOU IN 2022!
Johnny Papa Cool
-JPC
Other News!:
- We are coming back to San Francisco Sketchfest! Our show is Sunday January 9, 2022 from 4:00pm - 5:30pm PST at the Gateway Theatre 215 Jackson Street, San Francisco, CA 94111 and you can get tickets here: https://www.heyriddleriddle.com/live
- This months holiday Review Crew will be for the movie The Princess Switch 3!
- For $8 RC tier patrons, we will be having a real live-stream this month! We think we have a way to stream our zoom on Youtube, so mark your calendars for Wednesday 12/15 at 7pm Central. We'll be doing a talk-back and our annual gift exchange!
- Starting Jan 1 2022 (technically Jan 2, the first Wednesday), we will be adding ad-free main feed episodes to the Patreon feed. These will be accessible for anyone at the Review Crew ($8) tier. This will be for all main feed episodes going forward but nothing in the back-catalog. They will most likely post a few hours after the regular main feed eps drop. If you are a current RC subscriber, you don't have to do anything, the eps will automatically be in your feed! Oh, and we usually do live show announcements in ad-slots on the main feed, so if you aren't listening to the main feed anymore, be sure to check the announcements channel in discord or patreon posts for future live-show announcements.
- We have 2 new designs in our merch store! An Animal Parade design and a PuzzBot design! Check them out here: https://www.teepublic.com/t-shirts?query=hey+riddle+riddle
As always let us know what YOU recommend in the comments below and if there’s anything you’d like to hear us do on a Patreon episode!
Love you all and thank you again for the support! We are perverts, bum ba dum dum dum dum dum.
Adal, Erin, Shruump & JPC
Comments
Naurmael
Hell yes I'm the same way with mine I want to talk about things so bad and I'm like oof is this a spoiler or will it not be addressed!
W
Thank you for your thoughtful reply--I realize I may have been too harsh in my comments, so I appreciate your input *and* how you put it! It really is interesting how we respond differently to different writing styles. And clearly there is something there if so many love the work! Wow, you put that about Le Guin so well--I've re-read it a few times already!
magikarma
I'm absolutely dying to have someone to talk about the tv adaptation with! My s/o hasn't read the books so I don't want to spoil anything for him. 🙊
magikarma
I totally understand if you couldn't get past Jordan's writing style! One of the many benefits Brandon Sanderson brought to completing the series was his ability to pare down what you know Jordan would have had a field day on. That being said, Jordan's verboseness makes me truly appreciate how much he put into the world. I often imagined him writing certain scenes and pulling the details out of them with care. It can be a lot to get through but it's comforting for those who really want to get lost in the world (and aren't put off by it). ALSO, the Earthsea cycle is fantastic and Le Guin has one of the most unique, charming and poignant writing styles. She can truly cut the the core of the emotion of a scene without ever truly having to get in the characters head and spell it out for us. Brilliant imagery and intentionality in subtleties.
Rachel
to my knowledge it's actually not from any ep, erin just started writing as shruump sometime this year in some newsletters, i assume if she was too busy to write up her own thing and it's just fun/funny/cute/etc lol
Brittany Nickerson
uuuugh, damn my terrible memory, which ep is this from?
Brittany Nickerson
Well, going off of what W said above, if you're looking for new media to consume Adal, in particular world building book series, may I recommend The Queen's Thief series? Easy reads that include political intrigue and a whole lot of sneakiness (on the part of the main character and the author). Thank you for your wonderful suggestions!
W
Fail: I went HAM yet didn't recommend anything, myself. I am a huge fan of Le Guin's Earthsea cycle. Experiencing how her writing changed over the course of the books (a good amount of years between the first 3 and last 3), and how the world of Earthsea broadened and deepened has been one of the great joys of my life. I favor the last 3 books for how one subtle inflection of her writing could paint an entire scene, but the first 3 build the foundation and have their own charms. Tenar is one of my favorite characters in fiction. I am biased since her writing has been formative for me, a part of my consciousness. I was not expecting to be as affected by her passing as I was.
W
No disrespect to those who like the books, since reading is awesome regardless of what you enjoy, but my wife and I could not *stand* Jordan's writing style. We found it clunky and it constantly took us out of the story (suspension of disbelief fail) with over-explain-y details. Sometimes they were redundant, sometimes you could detect how Jordan was trying to be clever, and sometimes they seemed to feel disconnected with the thing being described (aka metaphor fail). I'd report him for adjective abuse if I could. It's not purple prose because at least purple is pretty. That's a long way of saying it's ok if you try the books and don't like them. It's very much ok. Oh, and I appreciate the podcast recommendations, JPC!
Naurmael
Love these! Highly recommend The Wheel of Time book series it is my most reread series
Kae Winters
Adal you and Erin need to come to Risky Business while you're in LA! It's a very cool New Orleans vibe members only bar in Burbank. $10 membership (which gets you a free drink so basically pays for itself) and you have to be vaccinated to get in so it's one of the more chill places to hang. We also have like, three Tiki bars in the neighborhood if that blows your skirt up more.
Rachel
yes! they're so funny together!
SuMar
Did you know the guy from Stath let's Flats is the real life brother of Nadja from What We Do In the Shadows (TV series)?
J-Bru
Adal I would love to take your workshop but it falls during my friends 40th birthday party where I'm DMing a one shot for him, any chance you have access to some sort of time travel or cloning device so I can be in two places at once or that you will host another workshop in the future?
Rachel
also JPC if you want good comedy tv and haven't already seen them, the UK shows "ghosts" and "stath lets flats" are two of the best comedy shows out in a while!
Rachel
Shruump!!
Zuzanna Elvira
Yayyy, I always love your recommendations guys ❤
Hey Riddle Riddle
No need to update your RSS! Everything is all on one feed so if you upgrade, all the RC. eps will show in your feed but you’ll probably have to scroll to see them.
Real question - if we upgrade from one tier to another, do we have to update our RSS feed or does it update automatically?
Isaac Hanson
I just finished Arcane, league of legends is a toxic pit of toxicity but arcane is pretty great
All TV is bad. Thanks to JPC for acknowledging this.
