Music: This isn’t a new find for me, but one of my favorite musicians right now is Ben Rector. He’s a brilliant American singer-songwriter that plays the piano and guitar in additional to his vocals. I would probably describe his genre as “wholesome pop-rock” — it’s feel-good music about love and life that is so dang catchy! I would highly recommend his most recent album, Magic (2018), and if you really like it, there’s a live version too, Magic: The Tour (2019), from his tour that I went to and LOVED. He puts on an amazing show and is pretty funny too. Other good songs include “Brand New” which has gotten pretty popular, “Forever Like That”, “Fear” and “The Men That Drive Me Places”, but really, you can’t go wrong with any of his albums.
Movie: This isn’t in theaters anymore, but I saw Rocketman over the summer and loved it! It tells the story of Elton John’s early life and the beginning of his amazing career. Taron Egerton, who plays him in the movie, is extremely talented and sings all of the songs in the movie himself. The visuals, acting, music and authenticity of the story were very impressive and entertaining to me — it’s definitely a movie I would watch again, especially because of how much I love Elton John’s music!
TV Show: My newest show that I love to binge-watch right now on Hulu is the NBC comedy, Community (2009-2015). I’m a sucker for NBC comedies anyway (Friends, Parks and Rec, The Office, Brooklyn 99, Superstore, The Good Place, etc.) but this one especially has an all-star cast of comedians that I’ve seen all over the place in movies, TV shows and other entertainment: Joel McHale, Alison Brie, Danny Pudi, Yvette Nicole Brown, Gillian Jacobs, Donald Glover, Jim Rash, Ken Jeong, John Oliver and Chevy Chase! It follows a study group of unlikely friends at a community college where chaos regularly ensues. It’s extremely creative, very funny and clever. I’m entertained by every episode and its oddities always make me laugh!
Podcast: I’m always looking for things to listen to in the car on the way to work, and I’ve been loving Father Mike Schmitz’ podcast with Ascension Presents (he also does them in video form on Facebook.)The episodes range from 4-9 minutes each and offer a priest’s insight about certain topics that relate to Catholicism and everyday life. I love learning things I didn’t know about my faith as well as hearing about things from a different perspective than mine. I definitely recommend this if you want to find a way to change up your prayer routine — praying doesn’t have to be a traditional “Dear God” kind of prayer all the time, it can be countless other things including learning more about your faith!
Things I’m Looking Forward To:
- Fall Break spent half at Beech Mountain with friends, and half at home with family!
- Carolina Awakening 12, Newman’s annual retreat (Register at uncnewman.org if you haven’t already)
- The Holidays — Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas are fast approaching and it’s one of my favorite times of year!
- More Hurricanes games — The Canes have started off the season strong, and I can’t wait to work more home games at PNC Arena! I may be biased, but Canes games are a whole new level of fun (which you should come see for yourselves)
Happy Fall!
Cara 🙂
Cara Siliakus 