Hello and Welcome to JGC blog!

To those who are not familiar with this series, the theme is to share the very best of all the things I find amusing, weird, helpful, comforting and beautiful in life.

Full disclaimer:  I may not do this every month, the number of my favorites may vary each month and it won’t always be the same items. For example instead of featuring a podcast, I might feature an audio-book I gleefully enjoyed or instead of featuring a TV show, I might feature a theater play. I can talk about food as well as self care products. It’s a melting pot of varieties but it’s always going to be honest.

May 2026 came real quick, don’t you think?

I feel like the last four months just went by in a blink of an eye. Hard months. Dark months. With constant horrible news, catastrophes and human ugliness.

So, in May, I want to share with you four things that comforted me, not just during April, but since the beginning of 2026.

The more time passed the harder life becomes. It’s important to find items, creations, arts, people and inspiration that allow us to express the negative and positive feelings we go through. So, without further ado, here are my recommendations:

Artist of the Month: Britton

I discovered Britton back in 2024 with the song “Burned“. It was during my time binging The show “Lucifer” so, of course, I fell in love with the song. I love the lyrics of the song, especially that part:

Lucifer loves taking many forms
Trustworthy eyes hide the devil horns
Preying on the weak got you feeling tough
Praying on my knees, have you had enough?
I held my hands in the air, you held a knife at my back
You always say that you care but actions speak louder than that
Broken promises
Broken point of view
Broken thoughts on
All that you put me through
All that aside
I kept trying with you
You crossed the line
Trying to break me too
Really nothing else left that I can say
Lie every time you look me in the face
Believing you is my biggest mistake
It’s about time
We break the ties
Set ’em ablaze

Britton writes love songs the same way someone bleeds from a wound, a wound inflicted by the most devastating heartbreak. She weaves words in a way that makes you feel the full impact of love relationships, especially the toxic and destructive ones. She wrote and sang songs for a long time and started her public journey as an artist four years ago, as far as I can tell.

I would describe her music style as “vulnerable Indie style”, with influences from country, electronic and alternative pop. There are so many songs of her that are impactful and beautiful as well as hits: “I won’t“, “If this is goodbye“, “DECLINED“…

But what really made me fall in love with her, as a singer and an artist, is “The Cycle” song.

I also discovered “The Cycle” back in 2024 too, when Britton started posting reels with snippet of the song. She sang the hook and I just… fell in love. I am not kidding you when I say that I recorded her longest reel about it and put it on repeat most days for hours. I only had the intro, verse and chorus, not the whole song, but I knew that when she would released it, it will be number one in my Spotify rotation. And I’m right. She released her full album, first EP at the beginning of the year: LOVING YOU ALMOST KILLED ME

I listen to “The Cycle” everyday and I have not yet find a new song I love more than this.

Years ago, I wrote an article about a challenge I invented: the Me, Myself and I Tracks Challenge: it’s simple, you have to list all the songs, tracks and compositions that truly represents who you are. When I’ll write an update for that article, I will add “The Cycle” to it.

“The Cycle” is a song that makes me emotional without a fault. For me, it’s about the infernal cycle of being unable to leave a relationship with someone that is destroying you. But for others, it can be about addiction, enmeshment, obsession… this song is so well-written that it strikes a cord for everyone that understand the pain of the other side of love. I’ll put my favorite part of the lyrics below and I hope you will go and listen to it:

But if I choose to stay
Guess I haven’t had enough
Almost killed me once before
And convinced me it was love
So if I make the trade
My life to keep you close
Maybe I’m the one to blame
Can’t say I didn’t know

Book of the Month: Primeval and Other Times, by Olga Tokarczuk

It took me about three pages to understand that this book was going to be something different.

I have read and reviewed “Primeval and Other Times” by Olga Tokarczuk, and I will be honest: I annotated nearly a third of it. I highlighted sentences. I drew brackets around whole paragraphs. I did the kind of thing you do when you feel something being said precisely right.

Olga Tokarczuk

“Primeval and Other Times” is a polish novel from 1998. It won the Nobel Prize for literature. It is set in a village called Antan, protected at its four entrances by four archangels and it spans almost a century, from the First World War to after the Second. I don’t want to spoil it too much for you, because it is so worth the read, but I can tell you it follows two families, angels, soldiers, children, old women, and the inner monologue of God himself.

All chapters are titled “The time of” followed by a name. “The time of Misia.” “The time of the drowned.” “The time of the guardian angel.” Each one is two or three pages. That is all. And that is enough. It’s the perfect book if you want to start reading again.

I actually recorded an 8 min video review for this book, that’s how much I loved it. The subtitles are in English and French, if you want to take a look.

@journalistgeoculturesoff

“Primeval and Other Times” / “Dieu, le temps, les hommes et les anges” JGC Blog – Full Video Review ✨📚 [EN] A Nobel Prize book with 2-page chapters. No more excuses. “Primeval and Other Times” by Olga Tokarczuk broke something open in me in the best possible way. Polish literature, almost a century of history, angels at the village gates, God playing with worlds, and characters you will carry long after the last page. If you stopped reading and want a reason to come back, this is it. Full review on YouTube. Link in bio. [FR] 🇫🇷 Un livre Nobel avec des chapitres de 2 pages. Plus d’excuses. “Dieu, le temps, les hommes et les anges” d’Olga Tokarczuk m’a bouleversee de la plus belle facon qui soit. Litterature polonaise, presque un siecle d’histoire, des anges aux portes du village, Dieu qui joue avec des mondes, et des personnages que vous porterez longtemps apres la derniere page. Si vous avez arrete de lire et cherchez une raison de reprendre, c’est celle-la. Review complete sur YouTube. Lien en bio. #OlgaTokarczuk #BookTok #recommendation #literaturetiktok #booktokfr

♬ original sound – Sabine F. | JGC Blog – Sabine F. | JGC Blog

I will say, however, to check the book warnings before you read it. The writing is raw and sardonic and sometimes violent and entirely impossible to put down. It asks real questions. Are the angels real? Is the metaphysical just another lens for grief? How do you write a century without losing anyone inside it?

I have a put the review video on youtube if you want to hear me talk about it for eight minutes in a horizontal format:

And a blog article is coming about the board game passage. It’s my favorite part of the book: there is a character in this book who plays a game that maps God creating eight worlds. I cannot stop thinking about it.

To sum-up, I recommend this book for people who like their literary fiction strange and deeply layered. People wanting to get back into reading, people who like mythology, theology, death and dark humor all pressed together into something unexpectedly beautiful.

Movie of the Month: The Drama

I went to “The Drama” with my friend, and I don’t want to make a full review about it because so many people already did a wonderful job of it. This movie is layered: every single one of the characters that judge Emma judges her for something (awful) she thought of doing and almost did, when she was a teenager, yet all those characters did do awful things and seem to get a complete pass for it because they rather focus on Emma’s confession…

There is so many things that can be analyse from this movie, but I don’t want to spoil it for you, I want you to watch it. Honestly, don’t listen to anyone’s opinion or public critics until you saw the movie yourself because it is actually a movie you, as a person, need to see, because you, as a person, will not have the same reaction as everyone else. It’s psychological, it’s funny, it’s infuriating, and it will make you question yourself about relationship, honestly, friendship, loyalty, forgiveness and love.

Just go see it. And if you did saw it, let me know what you thought about it, in the comments.

Food of the Month: Sabine Cissé’s Protein Pancakes

If you’re like me and recently went back to being active after an injury, like running, pilates or going back to the gym, and if you like breakfast, I want to share my pancakes recipe with you:

Sabine F. Cissé Pancakes Recipe
Sabine F. Cissé Pancakes Recipe

This was approved by my nutritionist by the way, so yay!

Ok, for one person, you will need:

  • one egg (if you are vegan, just remove it)
  • one pot of apple sauce (compote de pommes)
  • one pack of baking powder
  • tons of chocolate chips
  • one cup of protein powder from Bulk or the brand of your choice (the vanilla flavor is great for this recipe)
  • Two to three cups of grounded oats or plain oat.
  • Some agave sirup (add to your taste)

This is a very simple and quick recipe, you put all those ingredients in a blender (the wet ingredients first, then the powders and oats) and blend it all.

Heat a pan greased first with anything you want (butter or oil of any kind) and then lower the heat. Cook and flip the pancakes on low heat. They are nutritious and delicious and will keep you full until lunch, easily.

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There! This is my “Starting the Month With” May favorites! the first one in 2026. I hope you enjoyed this article and I hope to see y’all for the next post on this series! Stay safe and stay golden.


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