In no particular order:

The Mandalorian. I love everything about this show: the music especially, with its appropriate Western style theme; the colors and settings; the 30 minute episodes; the return of puppets to the Star Wars universe, instead of CGI; the emotion among the characters; the surprise appearances; the fact that my whole family likes this show.
The iPad Pro keyboard. This totally transforms the iPad from a smudgy piece of glass into a wonderful laptop. My most used device in the house.
Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series. I started this series when it first came out decades ago, and fell off the Stephen King wagon while it was on hiatus. But now I’m back, and I enjoyed King’s wild, meta-journey on writing itself. The series can be uneven, but there are so many stand-out parts. Putting himself in the story was perfect, as was the ending. Hile, gunslingers everywhere!
Playing Gloomhaven. This board game set a new standard: independently produced through Kickstarter (by a PhD scientist who made a huge career change), enormous in scale and physical size, and filled with surprises. It’s a legacy game, meaning that the game has permanent changes to it by applying stickers to the board, discovering new treasures, and retiring characters. First opening the box and discovering the wonderful character boxes, and choosing a character based only on an icon, is really glorious. I have great memories of playing this with my son.
Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series. I had long heard about this, and a friend inspired me to dive into it. It’s an amazing work in scope, attention, and thoughtfulness. A long meditation on a broken world, on good versus evil, on time as cyclical and linear, and the awesome fear of prophecies coming true. I especially like the Children of the Light, who are a terrifying military force of intensely religious men: think Pharisees combined with Crusaders.
Stephen King’s Mr. Mercedes trilogy. In re-discovering Stephen King this year (which makes sense, because in a year of pandemic horrors the salve is imaginary horrors) I read his crime detective trilogy that begins with Mr. Mercedes. The protagonist and antagonist are terrific in them, as is the luminous Holly Gibney. The TV show is terrific as well, with a pitch-perfect cast.
The Bowflex C6 stationary bike. It’s not that getting on this bike is my favorite thing, but it’s an important thing, and I’m so glad I invested in it. This is the kind of purchase that can famously end up in the corner of your garage after a few weeks. But I have stuck with it, and am getting stronger and better at it. This bike is 70% cheaper than Peloton, you don’t need special shoes, and you can use your iPad as your screen. Win!
The Favorite Game Friday series on The Dice Tower YouTube channel. My fascination with this show is hard to explain. It has a “local access channel” feel to it, as amateur hosts briefly discuss their picks in board games. It’s fun to see regular hosts and new ones, people from around the world, and the consensus that can build around some games. There is great joy and humor with many of the families and hosts. When nerds love something, they love it deeply!
The board game Twilight Imperium IV. This game is hard to explain: imagine Risk as a space opera, but with an auctioneer. You want to grow your species, survive, and gain victory points along the way. The game changes gears when the central planet is conquered and players must debate and vote on edicts that will change the game. It’s an exhausting and brilliant game.
YouTube in general. How did I learn to fix some plumbing, replace a dishwasher part, learn about new board games and their rules, watch SNL clips, and watch documentaries on Aleister Crowley, the rise of fascism in Europe, Twilight Imperium? YouTube has become an integral part of our lives. I love that you can watch historical clips, amateur videos, how-to videos, you name it. I used YouTube nature videos for online church services for the prayer time, and use YouTube music for board gaming. It’s an essential part of our lives. Sadly, it’s also gotten really aggressive about playing ads.
Jacques Pépin YouTube videos. It’s so great to see Jacques cooking, even now at 85 years old. He combines a vast knowledge with an anti-snobbery element – he makes hummus with peanut butter, and uses toasted English muffins for his hamburger buns.
The TV show Succession on HBO. The sets, performances, and intelligence of this show are unbelievable. It is dark, funny, and illuminating to watch the petty power games of a powerful family that is agnostic in every way. They don’t care about politics, the news, hurting others, or kindness in any way, and only faintly do they ever care about love, shame, and guilt. It feels like a diagnosis of recent decades in its exploration of cable news channels, the super-wealthy, and shamelessness. That the story revolves around a clever father figure who must pass on his media power to one of his inept children is the icing on the cake, because you forget that it’s all the theater of the absurd.
Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain. This novel resists description: a coming of age story about a dreamy place and time where characters wrestle with sickness and health, love and death, war and peace, wealth and poverty, and Marxism and the Middle Ages. The main character Hans visits his cousin at a tuberculosis sanatorium and ends up staying for 7 years as a patient. It’s never clear whether Hans is really sick, or whether the sanatorium is a racket or not. Unforgettable characters and scenes populate the book: a dwarf waitress, Hans wrapped up on his balcony during his rest cure, the larger than life Pieter Mynheer Peeperkorn, Hans swooning over Clavdia, Hans’ obsession with his X-ray images, the lavishness of the sanatorium itself. Mann breaks the 4th wall at times, and the chapter titles are bizarre and humorous. I can only read it in chunks, but it sticks to my memory like few other books do.
The election of Joe Biden as United States President. Trump has been a disaster. He made politics into a game of entertainment, personality, destruction, and meanness. We are left with a tarnished global reputation, vital agencies (such as the CDC – the CDC!) in disarray, numerous convictions among the President’s inner circle, a tattered Coronavirus response, a Trumpian alternate reality machine, militias and white supremacist groups emboldened, and a swath of the electorate still deluded by Trump. The images of children in cages, a rusting and ineffective border wall, Roger Stone pardoned, cities on fire, George Floyd’s death, and people dying alone of COVID behind plastic – these are the images that will haunt us as this period recedes in time. The thing I return to is the ending of The Handmaid’s Tale, where the fearsome Gilead has become only a historical oddity of academic interest. This is an image of immense hope!
William Placher’s Callings. I adopted this book for my Vocations class, and found Placher’s selected readings and introductions very powerful and even-handed. He is a trustworthy guide, and the book was a success for (most of) the students and for me.
Apple’s Fitness+ program. Apple has nailed the sense of challenge, accomplishment, and comraderie in a virtual fitness class. The instructors, variety, and descriptions of how the exercise should feel, are what keep me coming back on a daily basis.

Kevin Taylor