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Medallion Status - True Stories from Secret Rooms by John Hodgman

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This book was recommended to me by cannonballer @andtheIToldYouSos after I read Vacationland last year. It is Hodgman’s most recent book and I might like it even more. I think it is definitely funnier but overall a little less poignant. Vacationland, while funny, had kind of a running theme to it – the idea of sacrificing aspects of self for parenthood and other adulthood realizations. Medallion Status had more of a running joke about airline miles, which was not as emotionally involving but at the […]

That PC guy is funny!

Vacationland: True Stories from Painful Beaches by John Hodgman

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I like John Hodgman. I dig his quirky, off-beat humor. I LOVE his history of hobos video done in the style of Ken Burns documentary. After reading this book, I like him even more. In Vacationland, Hodgman talks about his life and his family and how and where he finds himself today. He is a little older than I am, so a great deal of the experiences, especially those with family are things that I am starting to face with my own family. One point […]

cbr12bingo – Happy!

Medallion Status: True Stories from Secret Rooms by John Hodgman

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“Hey, it’s John Hodgman!” John Hodgman used to spend a considerable amount of time on TV. He’s played, in his words, all sorts of “sexless weirds” in TV and commercials alike. He spent time on The Daily Show as, among other things, a deranged billionaire. He left his Daily Show role behind as Trump rose to power, as there is nothing funny anymore about criminally insane rich people.  He isn’t spending too much time on TV at the moment; it’s been years since he was the PC of […]

Surprisingly Serious Truths from a Seriously Silly Guy

Vacationland by John Hodgman

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John Hodgman is many things: Daily Show correspondent, a “PC”, podcast guest and host, internet judge, former literary agent, and generally droll New England weirdo. He wrote several books prior to  Vacationland, and all of those books were collections of “facts”. I say “facts”, as that is what he might say as well: Hodgman (with the help of Jonathan Coulton) created three full books of completely made-up facts that he presented as being VERY true. They are a weird delight, and sometimes they are correct, […]

“This is a book about me, at what I hope is the beginning of the second half of my life and not the brief, final tenth.”

Vacationland: True Stories from Painful Beaches by John Hodgman

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Hodgman’s essays are loosely threaded together by a common theme of travel/ vacationing but Vacationland is essentially a memoir about white, upper middle class male privilege. Hodgman acknowledges his privilege which makes this more entertaining than it could have been in someone hands. I listened to the audio-book which enhanced the experience. “Money cannot buy happiness, but it buys the conditions for happiness: time, occasional freedom from constant worry, a moment of breath to plan for the future, and the ability to be generous.” Hodgman grew up in […]



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