101 Things I Enjoyed in 2025

One thing I enjoyed after another

She’s here, #47 (imagine if she was the 47th president…)

Here we go again: the 101 things return for 2025, but all of them are different this time. Reader feedback was none too pleased with how Mets-positive last year’s edition turned out to be, and I can assure you this one will be an easier read for our Eastern PA residents. Down there you’ll find a loose assembly of my stream-of-consciousness year-end-list-y thoughts, with no overarching ranking (but a few particularly ranked sections). Thanks for coming; I’ll let the numbers take it away from here.

1. Dad’s Dog and Burger opening in Bloomfield (and going there nearly 10 times this year)

2. Seeing Wilco play for 3 hours at Heinz Hall with my dad, his first time

3. Specifically seeing Wilco play like six Sky Blue Sky songs I may never see them play again (“Walken” especially was on another level)

4. Within one week, flying to Seattle to see Nine Inch Nails at the Even Better 2k25 summit

5. On that flight, being introduced to the Alaska Air Top 10 Favorites, a baffling collection of movies prominently featured on their in-flight streaming service (I’ll write more about this soon)

6. Making pretty much everyone I saw over the next month try to figure out these movies in an elaborate guessing game

7. Completing the pilgrimage to Scarecrow Video with Elliott, spending 2 hours there to take it all in, and being lightly reprimanded by a Letterboxd power user while browsing

8. Properly dipping my toes into Hong Kong cinema, just before the dam burst for dozens of these movies to become available to own and stream in high quality, with some favorites being:

9. Once Upon a Time in China

10. The Killer

11. Pedicab Driver

12. Royal Warriors

13. Drug War

14. Tovember (watching like 7 of Johnnie To’s in a single month, another special shoutout to Breaking News and its bananas opening tracking shot)

15. One Battle After Another blowing past all expectations (that I had before the early raves poured in at least) in just about every conceivable way (70mm at AFI Silver)

16. The One Battle marketing campaign (me handling my non-football-related plans tonight)

17. Watching The Black Cat (1934) for the first time, which was quoted in the epigraph for Thomas Pynchon’s Shadow Ticket (haven’t read)

18. Other favorite first-watches of the year include: The Crowd

19. Boudu Saved From Drowning

20. Love Affair

21. Lots of Josef von Sternberg (Morocco, The Docks of New York, The Devil Is a Woman at the top of the heap)

22. Seeing Jodie Mack perform Dusty Stacks of Mom: The Poster Project live and on 16mm for Pittsburgh Sound + Image, among the more special cinematic outings of this year or any other

23. Jane Remover — Revengeseekerz // ♡

24. Dijon — Baby

25. Geese — Getting Killed

26. CMAT — Euro-Country: little VH1 You Oughta Know-y (neutral), lotta (very well-produced) sharp country-pop, little rafters-aiming rock (on one of the best songs of the year), little When the Pawn Hits… Fiona Apple. All in all, a total breakthrough

27. This Is Lorelei — Holo Boy: I was a pretty big skeptic of the last one and its rapturous praise, then eventually ate a little crow by year’s end and came to enjoy it a bit. Now I’ve swallowed that crow whole. Love this new/old batch

28. PinkPantheress — Fancy That

29. Real Lies — We Will Annihilate Our Enemies

30. Sharp Pins — Balloon Balloon Balloon

31. Ninajirachi — I Love My Computer

32. Golden Apples — Shooting Star

33. Aya — hexed!

34. Wednesday — Bleeds + the essay of the year

35. Panda Bear — Sinister Grift

36. Maria Somerville — Luster

37. Jay Som — Belong: I’m choosing to believe in Jimmy Eat World once again

38. Great Grandpa — Patience, Moonbeam

39. (That’s my top 15ish records of the year in rough order)

40. Green Book hype moments and aura videos (you 🫨think 🫨 you 🫨 can 🫨buy 🫨 me)

41. Avatar hype moments and aura videos including Varang and sexy Jake Sully fancams

42. Avatar: Fire and Ash not quite rising to top 10 of the year status, but probably making enough bank to secure 4+5 (and firmly putting the cultural impact question to bed)

43. Caught by the Tides

44. The Shrouds

45. The Mastermind

46. Watching Den of Thieves for the first time ahead of Pantera (which I think got a raw deal, is nearly its equal, and among the year’s best)

47. And a critical raw deal if there ever was one: Ms. Ella McCay, who overcame a hostile fictional press and smug derision from real-life culture writers (derogatory) who think the James L. Brooksian magic dried up after Broadcast News or As Good As It Gets (wrong)

48. The Phoenician Scheme

49. Several new lexicon moments from The Naked Gun: “begging for brown,” “the only things that were electric were eels, chairs, and Catherine Zeta-Jones in Chicago,” the Black Eyed Peas volley

50. Your being manipulated

51. Beyond fresh oysters at a wedding by the bay in St. Michaels

52. Fet-Fisk’s Rainbow Trout Filet (Like five years ago I’d have recoiled at the thought of eating seafood more than once in a year but here we are)

53. Chappell Roan’s “The Subway” (just showed up on the TV, easily her best post-album single in my eyes. A-list dream pop could be fun)

54. The Mets’ season ending without requiring more than 162 games

55. Byo ribs to a PNC Park rain delay game (9-2 Mets loss, part of the most lopsided 3-game series loss in franchise history)

56. Getting my grumpy face on TV via the Pirates’ local affiliate, witnessed only because my friend’s parents in CA had switched over to the broadcast when the Phillies were in a rain delay of their own

57. Unfortunately having to hand it to the Dodgers for providing the greatest game / Game 7 I’ve ever seen

58. Pounders / Dock Ellis baseball

59. Snowy hot tub for Hannah’s 30th bday

60. Wearing bald cap in hot tub and also trying to catch it with my head when dropped from the top of a loft

61. Berkeley Springs, WV bath house where George Washington once bathed (tiny bath he had)

    

62. Returning to hometown sandwich chain Isaac’s for the first time in a decade+ and being kind of blown away by how well it and the complimentary pickles held up

63. Going to the hometown Texas Roadhouse for my own bday (to a point, until it was too distressing to continue eating)

64. Going to Texas Roadhouse for a special mister’s bachelor party day and witnessing superhuman feats of eating (and more bodily distress). 65.5: went a third time within the calendar year on Jan. 2, which was incredibly satisfying and less distressing (get the Bone-In Ribeye and no appetizers besides rolls)

65. Coal Tubin’ in Johnstown, PA

66. Seeing 2 best friends get married

67. Not at this same wedding, but one with oysters mentioned above: “Green Light” reaching transcendent heights on the dance floor

68. Lorde opening with “Hammer” at her local Pgh show: you can’t deny the rush of a big pop arena entrance, and this one really was spontaneous and moving. That song also sounds like Delorean

69. For stretches of the year, consuming the big pop records in the car via Hannah’s phone (the highs of Mayhem and Man’s Best Friend sticking the most)

70. Lady Gaga “Abracadabra” music video debut at the Grammys brought to you by MasterCard

71. South Haven, MI sunsets and seeing Lake Michigan for the first time (I get it with lakes now)

72. Seeing a Weakest Link rerun where this guy kept trying to guess Eminem as an incorrect answer. First, for an Oscar-winning Martin Scorsese movie (he said 8 Mile instead of The Departed), then was asked to name the first billionaire rapper, muttered “not again,” and guessed Eminem (it was Jay-Z).

73. Swallow Falls State Park in MD

74. Sang Run State Park in MD (far less trafficked, nearly as picturesque and appealing as a hike, despite the million ticks Sesame and my parents’ dog picked up)

75. Getting a little crazy-fixated on an arcade Pac Man game in a way that can only happen in a vacation home

76. The Floor (more here)

77. Screaming at the sight of Bo Bice on The Floor, back with his classic mane (first time I’d seen him since he produced this headline, with much shorter hair: “’American Idol’ Finalist Bo Bice in Tears as He Claims ‘Racial Prejudice’ After Being Called ‘White Boy’ at Popeyes (People))

78. The Pitt: by far the best Pittsburgh-set or -filmed cultural product I can recall since living here. Hard to believe how good it is

79. The Rehearsal

80. The Traitors

81. The Traitors Ireland

82. Robby Hoffman: Wake Up

83. Pinball Perfection

84. Joyce Manor and Golden Apples together at Mr. Smalls (dream bill)

85. Hovvdy live x2

86. Being pretty casual about Superchunk for most of the past decade, but feeling totally won over by their Thunderbird show. Mac defies age and time

87. Addison Rae “Headphones On”

88. Though it came out mid-2024, Fine’s “Losing Tennessee” was my most played song of the last 365

89. The older records I came to love and induct into the personal canon: Big Star’s Third/Sister Lovers

90. The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society

91. Stevie Wonder’s Music of My Mind

92. Feels and Strawberry Jam (cheating more with these as I check in every few years, but only now do they threaten my all-timers)

93. Riding on a boat along our local rivers for the very first time with Three Rivers Waterkeeper for a work thing

94. Jack Bauer aka Kiefer Sutherland giving an interview about MLB Draft prospect Jack Bauer, named for the CTU agent

95. Miscellaneous uncs shoot poison on stage — it’s rare, but much like with One Battle, sometimes the most acclaimed thing really is the best of its year

96. Along these lines, Conan and Will Arnett blaming Jason Bateman for his parents’ deaths

97. Pipe rock theory

98. Huge backpack at L.L. Bean

99. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 remasters

100. Keeping a library copy of Balatro on the TV stand for most of the year, putting it in the console for an agonizing week until I finally beat 1-2 runs, then ejecting it from my house

101. Windup Cinema coming soon