The Honeybee Emeralds' Playlist+ underrated movies + pickles

Sep 12, 2021

May I recommend

The Honeybee Emeralds playlist.

Hiya, dinks! Andrew made me a Spotify playlist of excellent, Paris/France related music to go along with my novel, THE HONEYBEE EMERALDS. Add it to your playlists, suckers, it’s good!

If you don’t have access to Spotify, and just want to see what songs are on it, you can find the list as a Google Doc here.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT THIS PLAYLIST

Are there moany Frenchmen singing about love?

YES!

Is Josephine Baker featured on it?
YES!

Is there a song from the soundtrack to that Almost-Too-Whimsical smash hit, Amélie?
YES!

Does Ella Fitzgerald tell you how she feels about Paris, and in which season in particular?
You betcha!

Jacques Brel – Master Serie (1987, CD) - Discogs — Jacques Brel, one of Andrew’s faves, is featured on this playlist. When we were in Brussels we lived kinda close to the house where he was born (or maybe lived at some point?) Andrew would drag visitors to see the spot and gaze in wonder at the plaque.

Is Edith Piaf belting her lungs out?
Uh huh!

Are there accordions?
You KNOW it!

Did you sneak in a song unrelated to Paris, but which is relevant to the novel itself?
YES!

Did some ABBA get wedged in there?

But of course!

Did you also pop in some Beatles, Fred Astaire, Eartha Kitt and Jimmy Buffet?

You’ve GOT to have your Eartha!

Is there a song from the criminally underrated Rom Com, French Kiss, starring both the wonderful Kevin Kline and Meg Ryan at her full-adorability?
Obvs.

Do we meet CRTC required CanCon by including Les Cowboys Fringants?

Oui, monsieur!

Are you going to love it?
Honestly I am not sure… Some of the songs are a little weird and there is a LOT of accordion.

Did you listen? What did you think? Leave a comment below!

PROGRAMMING NOTE: No newsletter next week, as I will be cottaging with iffy wifi. See you back here on September 26th!

Underrated movies that are worth checking out?

Twenty-six brilliant movies that critics were wrong about.

I don’t think I’ve seen any of these, but I am intrigued by a few of them.

Ishtar (1987, directed by Elaine May)

Elaine May’s most recent film as a director was such a colossal flop that its name became synonymous with bad movies. Gary Larson, the Far Side cartoonist, once joked that it would be the only option at “Hell’s Video Store.” The criticism was largely undeserved. Ishtar is a complicated, messy work, but it was tarred by bad press about its reportedly egotistical stars, Warren Beatty and Dustin Hoffman, and its inflated budget.

What’s for dinner?

The Food Wars

I am super interested in nutrition, or at least how fallible and changeable nutrition “truths” are. There is so much moral judgement attached to what we eat and I think the truth is that nutrition science is not always entirely well-developed or reliable.

Aaron Carroll, a physician in Indiana and a columnist at The New York Times, argues that people spend far too much time worrying about eating the wrong things. ‘The “dangers” from these things are so very small that, if they bring you enough happiness, that likely outweighs the downsides,’ he said in 2018. ‘So much of our food discussions are moralising and fear-inducing. Food isn’t poison, and this is pretty much the healthiest people have even been in the history of mankind. Food isn’t killing us.’

Continuing the food theme: history of pickles

A Brief History of the pickle

Quite an interesting article all about the pickle. The Egyptians ate them! Shakespeare originated the phrase “in a pickle” - one that I use quite often!

When large numbers of Ashkenazi Jews immigrated from Eastern Europe to New York in the 19th and 20th centuries, they brought their pickle-making traditions with them. A classic kosher pickle is made with cucumbers fermented in a salt brine and flavored with garlic, dill, and spices.