Things We Love

"I need a vacation so long that I forget all my passwords." -?Unknown

Good Sunday afternoon all and welcome to this edition (No. 61) of "With That Said" (WTS), a almost-weekly newsletter powered by your friends here at Supply Chain Now . We'd like to start with a big THANK YOU to the 23,581 subscribers to WTS. And we'd love to hear from you: tell us your favorite things about our newsletter; OR tell us things you'd like to see appear here. Feel free to reach out to Amanda Luton or Katherine H. and give us your feedback.

In today's unique edition of WTS, we are going to offer up a variety of recommendations from our team when it comes to content. Our team will be offering up their carefully-crafted recommendations in terms of what to read, watch and even listen to. So for any holiday travel that you might have coming up, perhaps you can put these suggestions to work right away!

So pour a hot cup of coffee and settle in. Today, we're drinking a delicious caramel-pecan blend of coffee from our friends at Wolferman's Bakery . Let's start our list of recommendations with a few books our team has loved this year. We also include a convenient hyperlink so that you can check them out for yourself.

THINGS WE LOVE TO READ

Katherine might be our most voracious reader; although that would be a highly-competitive superlative here at SCN where we have a bunch of book worms. She recommends:

• "The Creative Act" - take it here from Anne Lamott: "A gorgeous and inspiring work of art on creation, creativity, the work of the artist. It will gladden the hearts of writers and artists everywhere, and get them working again with a new sense of meaning and direction."
• "The Woman in Me" , a Britney Spears memoir (hey, we gonna keep it real!)
• "Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us" , a New York Times bestseller that shows how engaging in a variety of activities, such as painting, dancing, expressive writing, architecture, and more, is crucial for enriching our lives.

Greg White highly recommends "Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed or Fail" by Ray Dalio. Greg says: "It's long and heavy, but a fascinating and well-researched analysis of over 8,000 years of social, political and economic cycles; the predictability and inevitability of these cycles; and even insights into where in those cycles we are today. Better be a loooong drive."?

Amanda has read over 130 books in the last 2 years, which should earn her an entire Pizza Hut (little reference to the "Book-It" program back in the '80s). A couple of Amanda's favs:

• "Atonement" a national bestseller that is described as "A symphonic novel of love and war, childhood and class, guilt and forgiveness that provides all the satisfaction of a brilliant narrative and the provocation we have come to expect from the acclaimed?Booker Prize–winning, internationally bestselling author (Ian McEwan)."
• Mo News , "an award-winning news brand bringing audiences the latest in politics, business, international news and pop culture. Mo News offers audiences an interactive experience on Instagram and the latest headlines and analysis daily via newsletter and podcast." Check out the latest online edition here .

Tyler Ward has enjoyed "My Life In & Out of the Rough" , a book that shares all about the journey of PGA golfer John Daly. Tyler says the first chapter's title sets the tone for what to expect: "Too Much Ain't Enough".

Trisha Cordes got a lot out of "The 12 Week Year" , a New York Times bestseller that is described as "the guide to shortening your execution cycle down from one year to 12 weeks."

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THINGS WE LOVE TO LISTEN TO

We start this segment with a couple of Greg's recommendations, which are award-winning and immensely-popular productions from Jason Hoch :

• "In the Red Clay" a podcast about Billy Sunday Birt, who some say is the most dangerous man in Georgia history. Random events one cool spring day led to an unraveling of the truth behind this notorious character, including a few secrets from his journey. Some call "In the Red Clay" a wild adventure fueled by moonshine, murder & mayhem.
• "Gangster House" , which is the story of Michael Thevis, a former "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" by the FBI. This podcast series focuses on Thevis, who was the son of Greek immigrants and was living the American Dream in 1970s Atlanta. He had all the nice things, having built a highly successful business empire. But Thevis made many enemies on his climb up the ladder. "Gangster House" tells the unbelievable story of Mike Thevis, family man, and one of the most notorious criminals you’ve never heard of.
• NOTE: Jason Hoch launched a big new project this year in Wavland. Learn more here & stay tuned for big things to come. Scott Luton hosted Jason & Sean Kipe on a neat livestream interview in early 2023, focused on their expertise in content creation: check out replay .

A few other shows that our team members highly recommend:

• Amanda gives two thumbs up to "The Bakersfield Three" and "Heart Starts Pounding" . She also highly-recommends the combo of cooking & listening, which is one of Amanda's favorite daily activities.
• Katherine can't stop listening to these shows: "Two Hot Takes" , "Ologies" and "Shortwave" from NPR, which offers up "new discoveries, everyday mysteries, and the science behind the headlines — in just under 15 minutes."
• Clay Phillips , who is essentially our resident sports analyst here at SCN, always enjoys "Pardon My Take" , which reportedly offers up the "loudest and most correct sports takes in the history of the spoken word". That's quite a promise!
• Vicki White is a big fan of one of the classics: "Dr. Laura" , which has been on radio and streaming platforms for years. Scott remembers listening to Dr. Laura back in his college days, where he'd listen in the mornings as he worked part-time for a big Columbia, South Carolina law firm.

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THINGS WE LOVE TO WATCH

Finally here today on WTS, let's dive in to our team's recommendations for what to watch. We'll start with some widely-hailed masterpieces that you probably already know about:

• The Sopranos - some of our team members have watched all 6 seasons of this extraordinary show multiple times.
• Fargo - says Scott: "The 1996 movie was awesome, but the current TV series, now it its 5th season is simply incredible."
• Breaking Bad - DYK: this series racked up 58 Emmy nominations in its 5 season run, amongst countless other awards. It also spawned several other popular projects, such as "Better Call Saul".
• The Bear - a more modern hit that launched in 2022 and focuses on the trials and tribulations of a family-run sandwich shop in Chicago.
• Boardwalk Empire - set in Atlantic City, New Jersey in the 1920s, this hit series which premiered in 2010 could be Steve Buscemi's best project ever.

And now for some of the rest of our team's recommendations of must-see content (obligatory disclaimer: these are just a few of our favs):

• The Peripheral - this show comes highly-recommended by Kevin L. Jackson, CISSP?,CCSP? . It is a sci-fi series that centers around the adventures of one Flynne Fisher, a "woman trying to hold together the pieces of her broken family in a forgotten corner of tomorrow's America".
• The Fall of the House of Usher - a project on Netflix based on the work of Edgar Allen Poe gets two thumbs up from Joshua Miranda.
• In the need of some comic relief, Greg encourages you to check out YouTube and search for the work of these three comedians: Nate Bargatze ("hilarity without profanity"), Taylor Tomlinson and Matt Rife ("not for the kids").
• Speaking of comedy, Laura Lopez is a big fan of "Impractical Jokers" , a bit of a modern take on "Candid Camera".
• And here's some of the rest: Suits, Mindhunter, Wonka, Lessons in Chemistry, Shrinking, Rabbit Hole, Middleditch & Schwartz, Sabrina, Love Has Won and The Crown.
• Lastly, some of our team members admitted to a secret obsession with the reality series "90 Day Fiance", so if you can afford to lose a few brain cells, check it out!

ONE LAST THING: in this past week's "Good News" feature, Scott focuses on important perspective shared from a holiday movie classic. Give it a read here: https://bit.ly/3RVyyVz

#DoGood #GiveForward #BeTheChange #leadership #content #holidays