And sometimes this is breakfast. Talk about decadence, dearest Toasties!!!
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Tags: cocktail hour, nicole used to date a russian whose mom would make nicole sandwiches out of challah and butter and jam jars of smuggled caviar and she loved her very much and thinks of her often, open thread, the bartender, the bartender is living nicole’s dream
I LEAVE TOMORROW.
I fly to DC, where I will spend two days with my brother, who is getting his Master’s degree. I was uninvited from the official ceremony because my mother cannot stand to be around me when I am distancing myself from her, and since the entire family agrees that she is not able to just shut up and let that weekend be about celebrating my brother, I can’t go to the commencement. So I’m going a week early, and we’ll have fun anyway.
The two of us will likely get on a Skype call together for Mother’s Day. My mother has borderline personality disorder, and while I am not able to be around her right now I want to be able to do so in the future. I have this idea that eventually I will be able to not take her borderline accusations and criticisms personally, and recognize they are a disorder she cannot help. But I don’t have that mindset yet, and so the best I can do is not speak to her but stay in touch by calling on all the right holidays and sending her letters, so that she doesn’t feel abandoned, because being abandoned is Her Biggest Fear, and while I am angry with my mother right now I do not actually want her to suffer Her Biggest Fear.
So we’ll get on a Skype call for Mother’s Day, which means we will unavoidably talk about my going on this pilgrimage alone (I had successfully avoided this topic entirely before, but when I leave the following day, I am pretty sure it will come up), which she will hate, and we will likely fight, and I am going to suck that one up, because it is Mother’s Day and this is the level of involvement I decided I could stomach.
I am afraid of what she will say and how I will feel about it. Always before, whenever I wanted to do something that requires bravery – going somewhere alone, doing something no one does, trying out a new project without a strict set of instructions – she has said things that make me feel like I cannot be successful at them. That’s a sour note to leave on. And I’m already afraid that I’m not as brave as I always thought I was. That bravery existed in theory, I was always clamoring to do bigger and bigger things, but she stamped down on them and managed to get me to do a half-level of those things, every time, and I was stuck with this belief that I could be braver, if I didn’t feel obliged to make her love me.
I don’t feel obliged any more. And I guess I’m going to find out if I’m as brave as I thought. It’s always very hard to test something you think you know about yourself. I believe I can do this – I believe I can walk 1,200 miles, by myself, with everything I own on my back, through three countries where my grasp of the language is only so-so, and I am scared I will let myself down.
Tell me your stories about mothers, about adventures, about testing yourself. I want every story you have.
Traveling alone is one of my tests, and I’ve done it enough over the years to have realized that my real challenge is remembering that it’s not a failure if I’m not having FUN! at every moment. I tend to get lost and grumble at myself and wonder whether I’m missing the good stuff about wherever I’ve gone…but by cracky I get to do some fantastic weird things and decide whether it’s worth doing again and how I would do it differently. Mark Freuenfelder’s MAKE series points out admirably that failure is an essential part of success; so with adventures. (But go to Dolcezza in Dupont Circle while you’re here. Get the Valhrona and whatever seasonal sorbet sounds good. Go across Connecticut to the Board Room and play Jenga while drinking beer. Visit Lincoln in his memorial and Einstein across the street. Don’t worry if you think the chili dogs at Ben’s are overrated; try Eatonville or Marvin for better–albeit more expensive!–food. Bitch about the Red Line. Have fun.)
Thank you. This was really lovely. And I will absolutely use this as my Official DC Itinerary. ๐
This is such a good point! You don’t have to be having the perfect funtimes trip for the trip to have succeeded! (Note to self, do not forget this.)
Giving your mother only as much as she can handle is hard. Growing up with a mother who is sick is hard. But you did grow up and you are a very fine person. Look what you have accomplished already.
Please consider a new policy: tell mom only about past events. It might be easier on both you and mom.
I wish. The problem is, she asks. So I am stuck either lying to her or dealing with her reaction. Or, I guess, not telling anyone else in the family what I’m up to either. I can do it for smaller things – I’m not telling her I’m getting a tattoo – but big things like “I’m going to be out of the country for two months,” I have not yet figured out how to wrangle.
This is really hard. I am sorry you have to struggle like this. I’m sure you’re adding to your repertoire of responses to questions you don’t want to answer. My favorite is the non-answer followed swiftly by a change of subject to something the questioner never fails to talk about eagerly and at length.
Example: “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that. Thanks for asking. I’ve been meaning to ask you which glue gun you prefer for your scrapbooking.”
HA. Oh, that’s charming. I will try a variant on this strategy and let you know how it goes!
When I am in need of something to boost my bravery, I pull out a little carved jade pendant that my grandma gave me. I’d heard sometime long ago that there is a belief that jade carries something of the person who owned it, and while I’m not at all a superstitious person I find it really comforting and empowering to imagine that my (kick-ass, feisty, successful) grandma is influencing me. Just a thought.
That is a really sweet thought. I am bringing two rings from two different close friends, and my partner has been secretly crafting some kind of token for me to take with me, so I will be properly adorned with touchstones.
Firstly – I believe in you. You are prepared, you know what you are doing, and you are very, very brave. Good for you, Linette, seriously – inspirational. I can’t wait to hear about what you do and learn and see.
Bravery stories. Hmmm. I have a couple little ones – when I was fourteen, I went on a three-month exchange to France – the first time I’d been away from home that long, of course. It was HARD, and I did not fit in at my school there, and I missed my family, and my parents were (are) still together and my exchange partner’s weren’t so I’d never done the back-and-forth thing, and it was a huge culture shock. I would do it again, but I would wait till Little Rae was a little bit older. I learned a ton on that trip.
Mr. September (aka The Fellow) and I were friends/roommates/pining for each other but both dating other people before we got together, and he unexpectedly had to move out of our house and back home to another province because of health issues. I flailed around for three months without speaking to him and then ovaried up, started speaking to him again, watched as he broke up with his girlfriend, broke up with my boyfriend, flew to Vancouver on two weeks’ notice and told him he should probably move back and date me now that he’d gotten his act together.
Neither are as Huge as what you are doing, but I hope every story of little braveries helps you with your big bravery. <3
I love your stories. And you were VERY brave. Bravery isn’t always external. It takes courage to lay yourself out there like that.
I feel really lucky that my mom is pretty normal–but she’s annoyingly realist, to the extent that she usually tells me not to do big crazy things I want to do. When I got my own apartment for the first time, she didn’t think I was financially stable enough, and she worried about me going to Europe, etc. But at this point, it’s nice to know that I’m an adult. Officially. I’ve already done lots of things she didn’t approve of, and I didn’t die, so maybe I can keep doing things she doesn’t approve of.
And also, I’m sorry you’re dealing with this. I believe you can walk 1200 miles and it will be a grand adventure.
๐ I wish my mom was like your mom, too. She starts out like your mom, just normal-worried, but if she doesn’t get her way she flips out and starts screaming at me and saying terrible things. And yes, it is very nice to know you’re an adult and you can do whatever you want. I really wish my relationship with my mother could morph naturally as yours has, but it is really nice to hear nonetheless. It is sweet and charming and I am sure she is very proud of you, even if she was initially worrying.
Yeah–as batty as she drives me, I’m starting to appreciate her. And I think it’s wonderful that you are working so hard on your relationship with your mom. It’d be easier to just give up and cut her out, but you’re taking the braver/kinder path. Well done.
Yes! I traveled around the world (New Zealand, Australia, India, Chile, Peru) for six months, and I had to remind myself that my travels didn’t have to look like any specific thing. I didn’t have to come to any epiphany about my life. IOf course I did learn a lot, but that only became apparent later.
You sound extraordinarily brave to me. Not just for planning and taking such an amazing-sounding trip, but for identifying and maintaining the boundary/distance with your mom. That’s incredibly hard to decide to do, and even harder to ACTUALLY do.
You have all my respect and I have total faith in your ability to take this trip and have a WONDERFUL time on it. All my best wishes to you!
As for my own adventures, the summer between sophomore and junior years of college, my friend and I took a three-and-a-half week backpacking tour through the UK. Our motto was “DBAP” (“don’t be a p***y”) and indeed I did have to ignore my natural risk-averseness to do some things, like hike up a fucking mountain in Scotland and navigate London at night while drunk with my terrible map-reading skills. Now I even wish I’d done more (i.e. make a move on the hot Aussie boy I was crushing on)! The trip remains one of my proudest accomplishments. I hope the same turns out to be true of your trip.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. It’s really nice to hear people say they have faith in me. You sort of look to your mom for that faith, and if she can’t provide it . . . every little bit I get elsewhere is huge. Thank you, so much.
And I’m stealing your DBAP thing. I need a good rallying cry. ๐
I don’t even know you and I’m immensely proud of you. This is your life and your mother isn’t living it for you (although it sounds like she would like to). This is something I’m learning every day. My mother and yours sound very similar. I’m in my late 30s and I’m contemplating a drastic career change, but I can’t get my mother’s voice out of my head. If I ever have voiced a dream out loud my mother she would voice her opinions in a way that I would not follow-through and I’m left feeling deflated and defeated. I’ve realized it’s her feelings of inadequacy and envy that I was letting rule my life. The saying is true: I only have one life and I can’t live it for others. My only concern now is for my family – my husband and daughter. They are my only concern in moving forward with a career change. I keep telling her voice in my head to be quiet and to some extent it’s working.
You’ll have the time of your life!! Good luck and send us a postcard!!!!
I know just what you mean, and yes, it is insane how much we start being our own jailers. I’m proud of you for shaking free of this, and I’m grateful for your pride in me. Thank you.
That phrase about ‘how much we start being our own jailers’ — yes, yes, this. There is one of those mother’s in my life too, except not because we ended up just not talking to her any more. So I think you are really very amazing to find what you think you can do, and just do that, and see how it works.
First of all, I am sorry that you won’t be able to cheer your brother on at his commencement, but I’m so glad you’re getting to see him beforehand. My sister got her PhD a few months after my parents divorced, and they both insisted on being there, and it was really hard, and my sister and I stayed up til 4 am one night talking about how we were both so frustrated with both of them. So I understand family awkwardness around milestone events.
Second of all, you are so brave! You are going on a huge, life-changing adventure, and yes, you may be scared and sometimes it may get hard and lonely, but you are doing it! And you know now that you don’t need to feel responsible for your mother’s feelings/fears, and you can let her be an independent grown-up, and you can’t make her love you if she isn’t capable of it. (She does love you, somehow, through all the Terrible Stuff.)
I’ve had a fraught relationship with my mom for decades and spent 3 years in therapy figuring out how not to carry her shit around, and it’s still a work in progress. I’ve realized and come to terms with the fact that she isn’t the mom I needed growing up, and she’s not the mom I want now, but she’s what I’ve got. I know she wants to have a relationship with me, so we’re working it out. Sometimes it’s hard and awkward and I can’t even deal. But I’m committed.
Thinking of you and wishing you all the best. You are amazing, regardless of anything your mother might say.
Oh, hey, are you me? Me too, with the three years of therapy to get to the point where I realized I need distance right now if I’m going to have a hope of making something new happen in the future. Good for you for doing that – I know how hard it is, and I believe in your commitment.
Thank you for all the kind words. I’ll try to do us all proud. ๐
Thanks, because sometimes I have a hard time believing in it! My mom doesn’t have BPD, but she is very emotionally walled off and (I think) suffers from clinical depression but refuses to consider getting treatment beyond the occasional St. John’s Wort. But as I said, she is working hard to come out of her shell and connect, so I’m trying to put aside past hurts and meet her halfway.
I know you’ll be a great standard-bearer for Toasties everywhere. Where are you going?
I am walking from Canterbury to Rome, so that means about two days in the UK, three weeks in France, one week in Switzerland, and four weeks in Italy. I should really get some kind of Toast-pendant to put on my bag alongside the traditional pilgrim seashell.
I wrote something briefly about this downthread, but I deleted it because I actually think it fits better here.
Husband and I aren’t happy about the city where we live right now for a lot of reasons. He’s originally from New York, but his family moved away when he was a kid and he’s been dying to get back there ever since. He finally sold me on it (in fact, I’m even more enthusiastic than he is now) and we’d been applying for jobs for over a year and generally getting responses that we interviewed well, but they ended up choosing a local candidate.
So, then we started saving up to move without jobs. We have some savings to fall back on, and can indeed pay a full year’s rent, but if it doesn’t work out, we’ll have to start all over again. I’m not sure if I’m brave or just foolhardy if we go through with this, and I could really come to regret the decision, but I think I’d regret staying put more.
Now’s the point where we have to make a decision about what we’re doing: our current lease is up June 30, and if we don’t find a place in New York by the end of the month, we’ll have to find something here and then figure out what to do after that. We’ve looked at a few places earlier this week, and will go up again either once or twice next week (we’re only about two hours away) to look at more apartments.
Husband has been really panicking about the whole thing lately. Every time we pass by a nice restaurant, store, theatre, anywhere really, he talks about how this is what we could be doing with our time if we stayed put rather than being stressed out about finding jobs and living in a new place. But when I ask him if he wants to give up, he always tells me that he doesn’t; he’s just scared. That makes sense; I’m scared too.
Whenever I think about leaving, I get so frightened. What if it doesn’t work out? What if the people I know where I’d be going don’t like me when I’m around all the time? What if I miss the Northwest and can’t handle the summers or the snow and I fall apart?
But, I don’t like my job here. What if I loved my job there? What if I fell in love? What if I made new friends? What if I learned to be myself more and fell in love with what it means to be me? What if, even if I failed and had to move back, I still tried and that was worth something?
Of course I’m afraid. It’s frightening.
I’ve been asking myself most of these questions every day for the last six months. It’s hard. And I’m just not going to know these things unless I do something.
I spent most of my life nervously coasting to get by and a lack of effort and always giving into fear leads to a mediocre life at best. I’m better than that. So are you.
It is time for BRAVERIES. *high five* We can do it both!
Oh wow. I think you’re amazing. And I think it’s going to turn out wonderful – even if you don’t manage the jobs, I think you’ll be so glad you went. Thank you for this story.
I’m so touched by this that I’m actually crying at my desk right now. Most of the time when I think about the move, I feel about as far from amazing as one can be. Thank you for this support.
You are wonderful. I really think we don’t get enough support for the sort of ‘everyday’ bravery of falling in love or moving to a different place or changing jobs or whatever big changes we’re doing. They may be ordinary, but they are hard, and you deserve all the encouragement for being that brave. Lots of people are not that brave, and they stay in one place their whole life long and they regret it but still don’t change it. You are incredible. Remember that when it’s hard, that it is harder to regret your life. And when it’s good, remember that you did this – you made this happen because you were brave. How amazing is that?
I loved that your husband can say “no, I’m just scared.” It’s a surprisingly rare quality (in anyone, but especially men) to be able to admit that to yourself and others. Keeper.
My mother is manic-depressive (her preferred terminology) and she has been hospitalized 2x for mania (once in my lifetime, early 90s), and for most of my life she was my best friend, we were so close, etc. etc. Then I went to college, my parents’ marriage fell apart, and my mom’s mother died, and my mom went kind of nuts. But since it wasn’t full-blown mania, and because she’s very high-functioning, generally, only her very nearest and dearest could tell. As far as everybody else was concerned, she was great! She had a new boyfriend! Things were going so well!
. . .
This phase started in 2007ish, and sort of from then on, the mother I had always known and loved was sort of. . . gone. Like, the replacement outwardly presented as my mother, but she was actually and insidiously kind of a Snort. When I was wedding planning in 2010, I initially suggested to both of my parents that it might be easier if neither of them planned to bring dates to the wedding, since I’d not met either of their steadies at the time, wedding was out of town, much easier on politics, etc. They both said they thought that was a good idea. Then, with three months till the wedding, when my mom was proving totally useless in helping to plan (despite continuing to offer help), she told me that she couldn’t “get excited” about my wedding because her POS boyfriend wasn’t invited. And I seriously considered postponing the whole thing (and it was a whole big thing) because I couldn’t fathom getting married while she and I were so out of relationship. Woof.
Finally, I talked myself around to the position that if her body-snatched-ness was the new normal, I was going to have to learn how to have a full life even without her. And so, carefully and heart-brokenedly, I did figure it out. It felt like recovering from a terrible breakup and wondering if you’ll ever feel normal ever ever again. Turns out that as with failed partners, so with parents–you can get back to a sense of normal you. Although it took me a long long while.
As a happy-ending coda, my mom basically did come back from the body snatchers, more or less, but it was after about five years of low-grade mania and dissociation. She dumped the loser and stopped running around like an idiot; she once again regained the ability to have long, non-jumpy conversations. And she admitted that my sense of things hadn’t been wrong the whole time. And yes, that’s a nice resolution. But sort of the bigger thing for me was learning how to feel like a whole and independent person even without her. That part totally sucked, and required lots of yoga, wine, and crying. But now, having gone through it, I feel a little invincible, you know? Like, you can never hurt me again! And even though that’s probably not totally true, it does feel pretty good to have that sense of independence. Which it sounds like you have/are cultivating too! Even if painful.
Also, I am 100% positive that you absolutely can carry your world on your back for miles and miles and miles and it is going to be amazing!!!! Can’t wait to read all about it when the time comes!
Thank you for this story, and thank you for the hope that it will get better in the future. Right now, it’s still incredibly hard, but it helps so much to know that other people have managed to get through to the other side. I’ll let everyone know when the site goes up so you can follow along! (One more thing to get done before I go – but the design looks awesome, so it’s down to the coding. Computer genius housemate, do your duty.)
Scariest/hardest adventure I’ve ever had, and biggest test of myself: into MY OWN MIIIIIIIND. 10 silent meditation retreat. I thought I would fall apart, so many times, and wanted to run away, but I didn’t, I survived, and I’m so glad I did.
You can do this! It’s going to be great, and hard, and you’ll come out stronger and bigger and containing more multitudes.
Oh lordy. I am in awe. I am terrified of the inside of my own head, and I’m walking without an iPod or any other distractions, and eeeeeeeeee but I still get to talk to myself and practice my French and whatnot. I can’t imagine silent-retreating, at this point in my life! I am truly amazed at you. That is phenomenal.
Thanks for the encouragement! I will rock it as hard as one can rock with a massive backpack. ๐
Huuuuuuge excitement and best wishes on your trip, first of all. <3
My mom and I are very close, and she can be a bit clingy, so she still likes to bring this up as The Worst Phone Call Ever. When I was a junior in college I was diagnosed with depression, nearly melted down and left partway through fall semester… and then got my shit together and went off to study in England. The first time I’d ever traveled overseas by myself, the first time I’d been more than a couple hours’ drive from my parents’ house. And I had a wonderful time, but I wasn’t a hundred percent perfect. After spring break (which I splurged and spent in sunny wonderful Italy) I came back and called my mother transatlantically on a crappy phone card on the one land line, sobbing uncontrollably over the phone:
“It’s COLD and RAINING and THE SUN IS GONE and I’M READING TOO MUCH VIRGINIA WOOLF and EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE and I RAN OUT OF MONEY FOR FOOD!”
Now we just laugh about it, though. And I made it through the rest of the term (yes, with some parental help to buy groceries) and had amazing adventures and still consider it a high point of my life.
Coming back to this thread to talk about my mother.
I have a lot of trouble being around my mother as well because of her alcoholism and narcissistic tendencies. I do talk to her once a week, generally right when she gets home from work on one of my days off because I can catch her before she’s too far gone and we can have a semblance of a normal conversation. It’s a lot easier to set boundaries like this when you live 1,200 miles away from each other. Also, I try to keep the conversation light and never say anything that could possibly lead to her raging. (Really, I don’t have to talk at all; she usually cuts me off to tell me every detail of her week anyway, including how terrible everyone else in the family is.)
Some may remember me as the Toastie who asked about experiences with Al-Anon a couple weeks ago. I haven’t gone yet, but I am still going to try, as soon as I figure out the move.
I, like others in this thread, am still coming to terms with the fact that I didn’t receive the support that I needed from my mother as a child, and will not receive support as an adult either. I think the “half-level” that you mention is parallel to the “coasting” that I mentioned in another comment in this thread.
Anyway, the whole point of this ramble is that your ability to set and keep boundaries with your mother in this way is wonderful and inspiring. The “best you can do” is so great and I hope that I can get there too.
Just typing to tell you a stranger on the internet is rooting for you. I know you’ll get to Al-Anon when the timing is right. And I know you will be glad you did. Even if you don’t return, you’ll still be glad you went once. Meanwhile you deserve respect for parenting yourself. Good job, renmunch.
Thank you very much, RoseCamelia. I really appreciate this.
Oh man! My dad’s an NPD/BPD mix (like a dog, but meaner) and my mom is probably a covert narcissist. Honestly, it sounds like you’re trying for a version of low contact with her, which can work sometimes. One thing I might mention about BPD specifically, though, is that if someone with BPD really starts fearing abandonment, they will cut you off (possibly forever) before you do them. I don’t say this to scare you/depress you, but as a warning that your efforts still might not allow for relationship between the two of you.
Ugh, sorry, I have been trying to edit the comment forever, but it won’t let me. That came across as more pessimistic than I wanted. I think you’re making a good effort and doing what you can. You can’t of course control your mother’s behaviour, is all I wanted to say, and if the conversation is more difficult than you anticipate, it’s not your fault. I also wanted to add that undermining comments are a typical NPD/BPD parenting thing, a form of abuse designated to keep you weak. You will go on your adventure, and you’ll have a good time, and meet good folks. Godspeed!
I love your description “like a dog but meaner!” My late mother was an NPD/BPD mix, and my enabling-of-her father is a NPD/ASPD alcoholic mix, and they were/are hoarders. That BPD cutoff thing happened to me too.
I haven’t even read the replies yet, but I had to reply now because I can relate SO HARD. My mother, who is dead, had a borderline personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder combo (undiagnosed, but a diagnosis was impossible to obtain, due to the problem being with everybody else in the world, especially me, and not her, so if the shoe fits and I need to understand the behaviors that continue to affect me, there ya go….). And she was the same about any new initiative and new adventure. But this is what I’ve done, before and after she died, but mostly after because she died when I was 23:
*Lived in Turkey four times, mostly in a studying-abroad capacity.
*Gone to Kazakhstan twice, once for a month to do independent research for my senior thesis, once about ten years later to marry Monsieur Siniichulok, who is from there.
*Gotten a prestigious research fellowship to study in Finland for a year. Went there over the objections of Monsieur Siniichulok (we were not yet married at the time). Went there again as a Ph.D. student with Monsieur Siniichulok (it was a spectacular failure but at least I tried).
*Traveled to Stockholm and some Swedish islands by myself, just because. (I can read Swedish thanks to bilingual everything in Finland, but I can’t speak it.)
*Gone on tour with a singing group in Bulgaria.
*Left a well-paying, interesting, yet draining and abusive job TWICE.
*Dropped everything in Finland when it was clearly not working out, and moved to Canada with Monsieur Siniichulok.
*Now preparing to drop everything in Canada and move back to the U.S. with Monsieur Siniichulok.
*Had a baby even though I was scared of being like my parents (note: from the other side, I know I will not be a parent like my parents).
*Cut off connections with toxic relatives and my parents’ enabling friends who don’t treat me well.
*Left two relationships with personality-disordered people.
*Learned how to navigate the workplace environment despite my parents’ never being able to hold down a regular job and presenting it as the most terrifying and soul-sucking thing ever.
*Taught myself how to sew and knit despite early conditioning that I would suck at these things and not to bother trying (I do it well, too).
I didn’t always feel triumphant or happy when I was doing these things, and sometimes it was messy, but now that I write it out I can see that it’s pretty amazing for someone who was always taught that new things (especially things not approved by my mother) are scary, and was pressured to fail, and never try, and fulfill her parents’ expectations by living in a cardboard box under a bridge somewhere. I think what you’re about to do is amazing too.
Also, if you are ultimately never able to take your mother’s criticisms personally or be unaffected by them, that is OK too. We’re meant as human beings to have feelings, and feelings let us know what’s up.
Everybody is different, and has different relationships with their parents, PD’d and not, but my mother ended up pushing me away by essentially kicking me out of the house (this is on holidays and in the summer because I was in college) and into the arms of my older Narcissistic ex. When I stayed away and didn’t come back (because she kicked me out, but facts are so boring), this also triggered her Biggest Fear (abandonment), but it made me realize that I’m not responsible for not triggering that fear.
Also, my favorite restaurant in the entire world (THE ENTIRE WORLD) is a Burmese restaurant in Silver Spring named Mandalay. It’s accessible by Metro.
FRIDAY CAT THREAD
Bonny is not in my good books today because she is a clingy little shit who comes into the bed and meows into your ears until you wake up enough for purring in your face to be worthwhile. (and trust me, keeping the door clsoed, not an option. She gets even worse if you do that. We tried for three months and at the point jos was stalking the door with a squirty bottle and treating his relationship with her like a war was the point we gave in) ANd she did that every hour last night and wouldn’t stop, the little shit.
What does your cat do that irritates you?
And because I still love her, here is a picture of her being adorable and ridiculous.
And Anne judging her
(to post pictures, copy the Direct Image Link and past it in this code, like this: img src=”imagelinkhere”/ Only add < and > at the beginning and end)
An attempt to keep Munchie from going on top of the fridge while caulk was drying in the cupboard above:
PS: Didn’t work.
Current-cat-Kismet’s annoying thing: she eats photographs and shoes (anything leather).
Cat picture for today is my childhood companion, Charcoal, pictured here in the bloom of her youth (she lived to be 18). She was basically just fluff with eyes. She would play outside with me, and wait with me at the bus-stop everyday in elementary school (then she’d walk home and my mom would let her back inside). BFFs.
Diego has decided that 4:30 is snack time. He alerts me to this by licking my face and walking across my torso. Worse, Sadie has decided she likes the idea too and starts crying loudly in the hallway so I imagine the whole building waking up.
Yeah, Anne and Bonny try the early wake up call. It used to be 4 am, but due to circumstances, they’ve pushed it to 6.
Mine are also particularly obnoxious in the morning. They all have particular ways of annoying us until we get up and feed them.
Vegas bats at the window blinds which clack very loudly. We know he is doing this to get our attention because this is the only time he plays this game and he checks over his shoulder to see if we are looking at him yet. Once he starts, he will not stop until he gets fed. Sometimes, he starts at 4 am.
Luna likes to chew on things. Like the metal dresser handles. So we are woken by an alarming grinding noise. She also only does this when she feels we have been abed to long.
Oskar pokes me in the boob with his paw. And purrs. And gets his claws caught in my shirt.
The boys being cute:
I am also quite familiar with the 5 am drawer handle chew-a-thon.
Also, Munchie’s annoying thing is trying to get people to feed her after she’s already been fed. Generally, I get home from work first, which is when I feed her for the afternoon. She scarfs it all down, and then as soon as husband walks in the door (approximately 30-60 minutes later), she CRIES at him to feed her as if she hadn’t eaten all day.
Upsidedowncat!
And the true scale of how enormous Captain is. All curled up like that he spans from my hip to my shoulder!
They aren’t all that annoying, TBH. Worst when the days are getting longer and sunrise is suddenly a lot earlier, all winter they think sunrise is breakfast time and then suddenly within a month or so sunrise is at 5amโฆ They mostly know that the alarm clock going off is the sign of breakfast time but not always.
I very rarely do yoga. I returned to it recently after at least six months and found I was much stronger (thanks, gym membership!), but way more easily distracted and frustrated when the flow wasn’t moving fast enough on my podcast. So apparently patience is not my thing.
Which is bad, because Mid and Garrus are obsessed with taking up the entire mat.
When I do yoga at home, and I am struggling to get into downward dog, the cats come and do it beside me, effortlessly.
They have done this so often that I am pretty sure it’s deliberate.
Yeah, Mid does that, too! Garrus just either a) plops himself between my arms or b) starts chewing my hair as soon as I’m in cobra. (He’s the fat one.)
I don’t yoga, but due to back being fucked I do have core strength exercises to do daily. How many seconds extra is 4.5kg of cat sitting on your shoulders while planking worth, do we think?
Kitty Charlotte insists on sitting on me as often as possible. Or making biscuits on me, as often as possible. And she is quite possessive, though she has finally accepted my husband. This is her on me, glaring at him while he takes the picture.
Molly’s decided that gnawing on my phone charger is the best way to get me up in the morning. :-/
My cat likes to shit on the floor right next to her litter box occasionally. Not when it needs to be cleaned, not because the other cat has used it, not because she’s upset, but just because she damn well feels like it.
She also likes to chew on electrical cords and has ruined TVs, chargers, an orange extension cord, lots of musical equipment, and a couple of fans somehow without doing any damage to herself whatsoever.
My fat boy, Oscar is just like your Bonny. Thank goodness he’s 9 years old, has mellowed somewhat and now just meows for the first 15 minutes after I go to bed until he can lay down on my face. He used to meow all hours of the night and before the crack of dawn to wake me up to feed him since he knew he’d get fed in the morning after I woke up. Switching to an automatic feeder for breakfasts is the only reason husband let him live to see 9 because now Oscar crouches like a gargoyle in front of feeder for 90 minutes before the food drops as seen below:
Bram is Oscar’s brother and particularly enjoys knocking items off the kitchen table when he feels he’s not getting enough attention from us humans. Here he is plotting my demise for waking him up to take his picture:
What do these beautiful cats do to annoy me? They wait until my wife and I are asleep and then decide that is the appropriate time to run all over the apartment, as long as that path includes “across the bed where we are sleeping.” But that’s only in the winter. Now that it’s warm, and our AC hasn’t turned on yet, they’ve decided all they need to do is sleep with us all night putting out as much warmth as possible and making it unbearably hot.
But I love them and they’re amazing.
They are beautiful!
Kima fell asleep on my lap the other day, which almost never happens (she’s much more inclined to sit next to me rather than on me). However, her bad habit involves attempting to rip apart the blinds if I don’t leave them 6+ inches open (I can’t open them very much since my room faces the street). Her favorite time to do this is the time between 5-7 AM. It is both loud and the reason I may not get my security deposit back.
We have two black cats and, now, a 1 month old baby. Jack (the one with yellow eyes here) has decided the baby is his, and he is her guardian. He is very protective; he once bit me on the ankle while I was changing her diaper because she was crying. He sleeps under her bassinet and follows me into her room when I pick her up at night or put her back to bed. This has gotten him in trouble a few times because it’s dark, he’s black, and I can’t see him well enough to know that… I’ve trapped him in the nursery. Fortunately his loud mewling to be let out didn’t wake the baby up.
Clio mostly avoids the very loud baby that is stealing all of her attention and loves.
Sorry, TOO FUCKING CUTE, I cannot.
I don’t have a picture of this, because I’m always irritated and trying to do damage control when it happens, but when Baby Siniichulok is napping, Cat #1 starts pedaling nervously around him and squeaking loudly (he naps on my bed while I’m there because I can’t put him in the crib very easily due to back problems), and once I get her settled down (usually by getting her to pump on the stuffed animal Baby Siniichulok is snuggling–don’t worry, he only does that if I’m there), Cat #2 comes in with a ball in her mouth and starts burbling morosely around it in an “I would like to play but you never plaaay with me…Why don’t we ever plaaaaay” kind of way. I throw the ball for her (every damn day I might add), a few times and then she just sits there and waits as if to say, “I think it’s more fun if YOU chase the ball instead.” And burbles more when I don’t, while Baby Siniichulok stirs and threatens to wake up. They both love Baby Siniichulok, though, even if they think he has boundary problems.
I want to see this so bad! http://www.timeout.com/newyork/art/kara-walker-in…
Also if anyone wants to cross their fingers for me that’d be great! Things are happening…
Sending good thoughts your way!
Fingers crossed!! Once Things have Happened, do we get to find out what?
I will definitely tell you guys if things happen!
All crossed!
crossed and how!
Also, just read the Kara Walker thing and it looks awesome!! I first learned about her through the NYer profile, probably several years ago, and then I saw her exhibit in Cambridge and then she did a thing in partnership with Lincoln Center’s experimental theater, LCT3, and I think she is super cool and her work is pretty powerful. As a pretty run-of-the-mill white girl from the south, it also gives me lots to think about in a kind of uncomfortable way that I really like. So yes. Exhibit looks awesome.
I’d eat caviar right now.
Instead I’m on my second coffee and looking forward to leftover spag and meatballs for lunch. Anyone got good weekend/lunch/awesome plans?
I love you guys. (She says, having not yet had a cocktail – wait till I get going later…)
My best friend is down from Boston and we are having lunch at the cafe in my office building! It was, unfortunately, the only time we could grab together before she goes back…but still. At least this way I get to introduce her to their awesome lemon bars.
I don’t know that I’ve ever had a lemon bar. Is it kinda like the filling in a lemon meringue pie?
Sort of, but better. If we ever unite in person I will make some for you. The bottom is shortbread, and then the top is like the middle of a lemon meringue pie but a little thicker, and then sometimes on top of that there is a bit of powdered sugar.
Mouth filled up with spit. (Charming image).
RECIPE PLEASE. That sounds AMAZING.
Lemon bars are the best! I haven’t tried this recipe, but I trust smitten kitchen: http://smittenkitchen.com/blog/2008/01/lemon-bars…
Well there’s my project for the weekend ๐
Smitten Kitchen is ALWAYS good, and lemon bars have always seemed pretty simple – you just have to watch ’em like a hawk while they’re baking.
i loooove lemon bars they’re divine and every attempt I’ve made to make them at home has failed horribly so I’m convinced they are *MAGIC*
I have made strawberry lemon bars and they were everything you might hope they would be.
Do you think they would work gluten-free? If so, I am holding our future union-in-person even closer to my heart.
Yes, I have made them gluten-free and they are equally good if a bit crumbly.
I should get my mom’s gluten free recipes and send them to you ahhhhhhhh I think she might have even done lemon bars??
:O
Mmmm… lemon bars… *drools*
It’s my birthday and because it’s my birthday, we’re going to Olive Garden tonight and eating all of the breadsticks in the restaurant with alfredo dipping sauce. I am well aware that OG isn’t fancy or *whatever* but it’s basically my favorite place on earth. i am so pumped for OG i can’t even stand it.
oh also we’re buying a house today and moving on sunday. also karaoke saturday night.
BUSY weekend! Happy birthday! Karaoke is my favourite birthday activity haha.
Happy Birthday, and congrats on buying a house!
Happy birthday! I have a fondness for the Olive Garden that’s hard to describe, and I love the magic salad that they obviously rinse down with some combination of salt and some addictive substance otherwise unknown to humankind OH MAN I would eat the heck out of some breadsticks right now.
ahahahahahahaha I was so focused on Olive Garden breadsticks that I completely missed that YOU ARE BUYING A HOUSE. Congratulations!
My mom gave me a big gift card to Olive Garden because I love their breadsticks so much.
I love everything about the allocation of words in this comment and what that may imply about the relative importance of these events. Yea for breadsticks and birthdays!!
Toasties, have any of you ever been TERRIFIED of losing your job for no real reason? I can’t shake it. Please cure me.
I am in my first year on the job. Iโm doing something VERY different than planned and I get paid 2-3x what I expected to make. I was totally emotionally unprepared to end up in this world. Soโฆ. imposter syndrome, maybe?
I really feel like theyโre going to realize Iโm not worth what theyโre paying me, not least because my job is SUPER flexible. During our slow season, I have weeks and weeks where I have 20-30 hours of workโฆ And theyโre going to realize this and lay me off because what a GIANT WASTE OF MONEY I AM.
My work has improved in leaps and bounds in the last six months, clients rave about me, and all signs point to success BUT I CANโT SHAKE THE FEAR. I even started exerting more leadership so Iโll feel more empowered, and itโs kind of helping? In the moment I feel great for stepping up, but the minute I leave, the sneaky feeling of being a SECRET LOSER comes back.
Can anyone relate? Does this get better? Is this a sign that Iโm a big loser slacker and I need to try harder? Does this mean I hate my job? WHAT DOES IT MEAN HOLD ME
I also have imposter syndrome like whoa. I got into my dream organization way earlier in my career than I ever thought would be possible. This may not be relevant to you, biggest thing that has helped me calm the fuck down is being in a union.
I have had three productive performance reviews that I knew were going to happen well in advance and I get off my 18 month probation in a month and will no longer be an at-will employee which is a huge load off my mind. Unless I majorly fuck up, in ways that are described in my contract, my boss cannot come into my office and fire me on the spot. Ever.
If you don’t have a union, there might be some way to create predictability in your work like quarterly check-ins with your boss or meeting every six months with HR. And/or find a confidant at work who has been there a long time who can initiate you into The Way Things Are Done.
I’ve had periods where it has been barely noticeable, but I really don’t expect the imposter syndrome to go away. FOR ME. I’m an approval-seeking person who has jumped three tax brackets from my parents, ymmv.
The fact that I have a union is the main reason that I’m not actively shaking on most work days. I don’t know how the other 89% of the workforce does it.
My first month here my whole team got laid off. Only then did I realize that I was hired to replace all these nice people who’d been showing me the ropes.
I work at a Fortune 500 company. We undergo regular layoffs because of “changing market needs.”
Oddly enough, this part doesn’t freak me out that much. I’m the fresh young sprite with all the hot skills (age discrimination is so so real), highly desirable for the organization. I’m worried that I’m personally inept or useless, mostly.
Use the downtime in those 20-30 hour weeks to do some career work. Study up on a skill you want to add to your professional life. Take an online class. It will help those feelings.
Wow, that seems true and painfully obvious! I had a good professional development groove going for a couple months, but I cooled it when I became overwhelmingly focused on getting other parts of my life together. I definitely felt better when I was being more ambitious with my professional development.
Thanks, wise internet stranger!
Oh shhh! First, everyone has imposter syndrome, and I mean everyone. Especially women. Especially at the beginning of a career. Later you get stockholm syndrome (jk lol lol). I mean, I’m not in Fortune 500 stuff, but I feel like I’m in a bit of a culturally similar industry, and only 3 years in do I feel like I can do my job and add value. But actually, I’ve been adding value all along. Fake it til you make it, you glorious thing, it’s exactly what everyone else is doing. It’s just likely that people who planned to be where you are have more practice at faking it.
Also, save a bunch of those big $ so if your industry does turn out to be capricious, you’ve got some padding. Saving money never ever hurt you.
Fake it ’til you make it is real truth. I know it’s imposter syndrome, intellectually, but it really does help to hear that others deal with it too. Thanks!
I save like it’s an olympic sport, partly because Financial Savvy and partly because FEAR. At least I’ve got that covered.
I have a rare Friday off, so I’m going to spend all afternoon in the open thread without any pesky WORK to interrupt me.
ME TOO it is a glorious day
TOTES JEALZ. Back to my spreadsheet. *sigh*
Friends, who among us is graduating from somewhere this weekend or has a loved one who is? I’m going to the beach for my boyfriend’s sister’s graduation tomorrow, which is PRETTY COOL, because she got very sick in the middle of her junior year and had to spend a semester at home and is STILL graduating on time. (I am also hoping, selfishly, that in the in-between afternoon time when she’s hanging out with her friends and her family is waiting around, my boyfriend and I can go downtown and eat ice cream by the water.)
My (by-then) husband doesn’t have his grad ceremony until the middle of June, even though exams have been finished for two weeks already!
This isn’t this weekend, but SIL is graduating next Thursday, but also has a ceremony on Wednesday because she’s Phi Beta Kappa.
PBK FTW.
my twin graduated AND got her first teaching job (provided HR doesn’t screw up the hiring recommendation)!
YOU HAVE A TWIN that’s already great and double great that she graduated with a job!
I’m graduating law school in one week, because I am an idiot who thought that would be a good idea.
I think graduating still deserves a congratulations!
Thanks!
Seriously, congrats! Even if you’re not happy about the decision, you’ve still worked a ton to get to this point. I admire you a lot.
Thank you! I will feel just fine as soon as I get a job, but I’m going to whine about law school until then.
Congrats!!!! Also, FWIW, I actually kind of liked bar studying. Just do what BarBri says and have a nice summer. You don’t have to ace it, you just have to pass, and there really is a formula to follow for the essays that works just fine.
Anyway, congrats on graduation!!! And best of luck for the next steps!
Thanks! And I appreciate the bar advice, but I live in the last state that still has diploma privilege, so no bar for me, woo!
My step-brother’s graduating high school in two weeks, which will be the thirteenth graduation I’ve gone to in twelve years. I don’t know anyone who’s graduating next year, I don’t think, & I don’t know what I’ll do with myself. Maybe I’ll crash graduation at the high school by where I live.
My younger sister graduated from vet school last weekend. She’s wanted to be a vet since she was a little kid, so it was really amazing seeing her dream actually come true after years of hard work and study.
Vet school is HARD, congratulations to your sister!
decadence! i have been whittling down a block of cheese all week. just a big ol’ block of gruyere.
also i just wanted to brag that my team and i came in 2nd at a special literary trivia pub quiz night, and our team name (which i suggested) was sylvia & the psychoplaths.
BRILLIANT team name.
BRILLIANT cheese activity.
Love the cheese, love the team name, you are #winning this week!
I love everything about this.
Hi Toasties!
I’ve read The Toast since its inception but never made a comment account (even though reading Toast comments is fantastic), so I thought I’d say hi.
Also I have a question for you all: How do you make good friends when you’re A Grown Up?
Long story not-so-short (you don’t have to read it):
At 24 I’ve realised I have very few friends, and even fewer friends who actually – for want of a better term – ‘get me’. I have a few ‘work friends’ who are perfectly nice, but again, not exactly on the same wavelength: the other day I was talking about a website I found that I thought was really great at helping teach languages, and the response was ‘how does it monetise?’.
I don’t mind so much as I have a wonderful boyfriend who fulfils most of my social need, but when I look at the great group of friends he has – they share the same interests, find the same jokes funny etc. – I can’t help thinking that it would be nice to have that. So, how do you guys make good friends when you’re in the real world?
Hello!!! I love your name and welcome to commenting ๐
I wish I had a good answer for your question but I look forward to seeing what other people say!
I’ve met most of my friends through doing the stuff I like, and also websites and facebook communities for the stuff I like. Horses and music, mainly, I goto a lot of gigs, have made a lot of friends through that, and from horses and competing.
I decided when I was about 30 that I needed to learn how to make friends, so here is what has worked: I ask people out. If I meet someone at work, or at a random class I’m taking, or at someone ELSE’S social gathering, I try to ask them out to lunch or coffee or wine. It’s like dating, but it works really well.
If you don’t have places where you might meet people, that has to happen. What has worked for me are UU churches, and free or cheap continuing ed classes for things that interest/freak you out (anything from calligraphy to car repair).
I’m 40 now and have a pretty good group of friends.
I have met probably 75% of all the friends I’ve ever had on the internet. YOU MADE A COMMENT ACCOUNT YOU ARE OFF TO A GOOD START
Are there Toast meet ups in your area? If I wasn’t meeting my friend quota (wife + 1 non-wife friend is all I require), I would get to one of those, stat.
Do things! Join activities, classes, meet-up groups. Go to cool events. Encourage the friends you have to bring their friends when you hang out, or to invite you to big group things. They don’t get you, but maybe some people they know will. When you see someone a couple times and think you might click, friend them on facebook or get their number and invite them to go to a story reading or street fair or something where it’s more “company for a cool thing I want to do” and less “awkward friend-date”.
Captain Awkward has talked about this a lot. I highly encourage you to go through her archives.
Seconding the recommendation for Captain Awkward. I am still figuring this stuff out, but reading Captain Awkward has definitely helped me a lot.
(hey I like your name) (and your advice, that is good advice)
I think this was maybe written by me without my realizing it? I am also 24 with a great dude and pretty ok friends for the most part where are my besties?? Everyone moved away after college, it’s crazy. I have been worrying about making friends too, so my recent resolution is to get out there! I am talking to people at work more, I am going to Toast meetups (hey Boston peeps!), I am inviting people out for drinks even when I don’t necessarily feel like going, and I’m trying to have events at my (tiny) apartment whenever possible.
I guess the only way you and I differ is that my partner and I share most of the same friends, so a part of me definitely wants a few people who are “mine.”
I’m really curious about this too! I’m an extremely social person, but I’ve found [/irrationally fear] that all my “new,” post-college friends are more elevated acquaintances than anything. I’m a semi-recent grad, but I’m finding it’s a lot harder to maintain friendships, and turn them into the disgustingly close relationships I have with my college friends, when you’re not in that environment any more.
My advice? Be that person who makes plans, and follow up. I aim for every 3-5 weeks for friends** I don’t see regularly: a drink, a dinner, a weird event, and I always have a plan, though it’s malleable. That way, you’re always that friend with something cool to do!
**I’m also horrifically Type-A and basically keep a friend/social planner schedule in my head at all times.
I do the mental social schedule too. I am relieved to know I am not alone. Thank you for that.
I will second this. Also, text people! I like just message people and staying in touch — it builds strong friendships even if you’re not seeing each other more than once a month.
Of the good friends I’ve made recently, at least 50% are from either the Toast or the Hairpin (or people I’ve met through those people), and the remainder are either coworkers of mine or people who work at my grocery store.
I think the most important thing is to actively try to turn “we should get together sometime” into “I’ll be in [your neighborhood] running errands on Saturday, want to meet up for coffee?” or “I’m doing [activity you expressed interest in when we talked at boyfriend’s friend’s party] later this week, want to come?”
That is some excellent advice. I have gotten much better at screwing up my courage to say “Hey! You seem cool, I would like to be friends!” but am still working on “…so how about we do this specific activity?”
One of the things I have gradually come to realize in my own life is that the best friends aren’t necessarily the ones who get you. I have some great friends who are nothing like me, but who are wonderful human beings who love me anyway. I went through a period of time when I kept looking for people I had more in common with, but eventually faced up to the fact that I can be a little hard to deal with and maybe I didn’t want people like me around. This may not be true for you of course, but it has made me happier to let go of the search and appreciate what I have.
This is a solid point. I couldn’t be more different from my best friend- to the extent that people sometimes wonder why we are even friends in the first place, give our surface level differences. But when you find someone who accepts you for all your flaws and who loves you no matter what for who you are and who you also just have all kind of fun being around, stuff like “but but but they don’t even read for leisure! and hate x media thing I love!” seems much less important.
I think a lot of it is not being afraid to follow up / taking the initiative when you meet someone you think you connect with. And just doing things to meet people. I mean, it’s kind of like dating right? You meet someone at an event, you share an interest, you think–maybe I could be friends with this person!–and then usually, in my experience, nothing happens. To actually become friends someone–YOU–have to do something about it. Ask for that persons number. If you talk about a cool event coming up, ask the potential friend to go, and go! It may turn out after a couple ‘friend dates’ that you don’t click, and that’s that. But maybe you meet someone cool, and it works, and then you’ll have a new friend!
Ahhhh I’m so glad you asked this because I am contemplating moving to a place where I don’t know many people and it is terrifying because what if I am Alone Forever.
Bravest face!!
I am putting on my bravest face but I am having my SCAREDEST INSIDES
I moved to a place I knew no one a few months ago and I am definitely Pretty Alone but Not Completely Alone. It’s a nice place, but a lot different from the place I moved from which was also nice. I like my job, it wasn’t a disaster. If you want to move, have hope that other not-very-social people have moved and managed to meet people.
“not a disaster” this is a great goal for me I think
Have people set you up with friends in the new place! Not to brag (ok I’m going to brag), but I did this with two friends who both moved to the same far-away city about 6 months apart, and within a week they were going on hikes and getting coffee and posting on each other’s Facebook walls all the time. I felt like a friendship Cupid. Let your friends feel the same way!
Are you me? I don’t have much advice since I’m trying to find this out myself, but lately I’m trying to branch out a little more (taking classes, chatting with work people) and I feel like I’m getting a little better about it. Good luck!
I hold people down and MAKE them like me
Honestly, I don’t know! I think I met most of my friends because we went to the same parties, or were friends with people who went to the same parties. Norwich is a pretty small place, though, and if you have anything in common with ANYONE you will meet them at some point in the same shop. And we talk to strangers in these parts.
I’ve mostly met my newer friends through older friends who are much more outgoing than I am. But I need to make more friends and am trying to figure it out too. I’ve begun going to concerts and events by myself if I can’t find anyone to go with me but I’m not great at finding people to talk to once I’m there. Working on it! (Also, where do you live? Maybe you can find some potential IRL Toast friends on this thread?)
Great question. My last new friend was someone I met when I moved to this city (because we were alumni of the same program and met at one of their events) and then I’d see her around every now and then, and a couple years later we wound up joining the same gym. I think the first friendship-move was that she asked me if I wanted to go to a class at the gym together sometime. And that turned into post-gym coffee dates and now we are real friends! I think the key is, like a couple of other people have said, asking someone to do something specific.
Having roommates from Craigslist has helped me make friends, too. The roommates themselves have become friends (I know this doesn’t always work like that, but it’s great when it does) and I’ve met people through their friends.
The bulk of my social circle is friends from high school who I reconnected with when they moved to my city and people from my first job here.
Game of Thrones talk? Sansa. SANSA. You eat ALL the lemon cakes, girl. You deserve them.
Also, I booked my airbnb for Portland, Maine, in June! Any Toasties have Portland recs for me?
Do you like oysters? Go to Eventide and have some oysters and a Bloody Maria.
I do! I’ll add it to the list ๐
Two things relevant to my interest!
(1) I didn’t think the Craster-wife-revenge conclusion justified the skinimax-y group rape from last wk so the showrunners/ directors are still on my #DoBetter list. But SANSA/Alayne — girl you keep on surviving! Wish I could send her a Destiny’s Child mix tape.
(2) I went to Maine last year and it was amazing! Obviously eat lobster everywhere, but also there’s this place “Hot Suppa” that has an insane $1 oyster happy hour. It was the first time I’ve ever liked oysters and apparently they serve a local kind you can’t get anywhere else? There’s also an amazing bar Novare Res which has a โฆ coven? โฆ theme and the most extensive beer selection I’ve ever seen. We also had a great time taking the ferry to the residential island and walking around. Note: we went in April/May and it was still cold enough for long coats. Have fun!
1) I agree, but I am SO GLAD that women got to stab Karl and that they got to decide their own fate at the end. Like, Jon Snow, shut up, you don’t have to be everyone’s savior.
2) Thanks! I have a friend who lives there and is a big foodie (doodie? but he doesn’t cook), and I know he goes to Hot Suppa a lot, so I’ll have to check it out!
The misandrist commune of Craster’s “wives” made me so happy.
Hot Suppa is my favorite place for lunch, no question. Novare Res would be a good spot for a meet-up if there are other area Toasties who can make it to Portland: plenty of space, a big deck if the weather is good, a huuuuuuuge selection of beer and a smaller selection of other drinks (usually including a handful of interesting non-standard non-alcoholic choices), a small menu of delicious food.
Gelato Fiasco! It’s right on one of the main downtown streets, and it is some of the. best. gelato. in the world. One of my personal favorites was the “sweet resurgam” flavor.
I can never remember which is which, Gelato Fiasco and Gorgeous Gelato, but a friend and frequent guest brought me a tiny cooler of the best gelato I’ve ever had from one of them, including a seasonal peach flavor that knocked me loopy โ and I don’t even love peaches that much. It was just the essence of peach, so perfectly balanced and fragrant.
Have to chime in because Gorgeous Gelato is The Best, though it’s hard to go wrong with gelato. Also good: Bard Coffee.
My Tumblr tag for Game of Thrones stuff is “if you don’t like sansa i don’t like you.” That mindset has proven extremely effective in discovering who’s worth discussing the show with.
I was out one night after the Cersei/Jaime twincest rape episode and I definitely had a conversation about Game of Thrones where a friend and a friend of a friend both said “Sansa is so stupid, I bet/hope she gets raped by Littlefinger!” THEY ARE WOMEN. WTF. WTF
AHHH
and then I resolved to never talk to them again about Game of Thrones. In fact, that was also when I decided it was time to head home from the bar.
I am so irritated that all that deviation we did from the book seems to have been basically for a) gratuitous rape scenes and b) getting Jon Snow his dog back. All of that “Bran’s been captured and is at Craster’s Keep!” “Jon Snow is heading to Craster’s Keep!” “Things are happening at Craster’s Keep!” stuff seemed like it could have led to more than “No one acquired anything new in the way of knowledge or people (Mance knows nothing, Jon and Bran didn’t meet, the women even told the night’s watch to GTFO and they’ll find their own freaking way), but Bran and his friends let Ghost out of his cage, so there’s that.”
Also, is it just me or was this episode exceedingly dull? Even Oberyn was like, “Nah, I think I’ll just take a day off from sashaying around King’s Landing doing Interesting Things and instead sit here and write a poem.”
I was wondering how the whole scene was going to go over, but I actually thought it was fine (apart from the gratuitous rape – ugh, you’re right). I liked the use of Locke, and I think that scene even better shows how dangerous it is when Bran wargs into Hodor (since we don’t see his POV). I also am SO intrigued by Jojen’s vision of his hand burning. Does that mean Jojen paste is really just a crack theory?
I liked the KL scenes because we get to see Cersei attempting to get control over everything again. I mean, this was a filler episode, but I thought it’s one of the better filler episodes, especially compared to last season. Plus Sand Snakes mention!! SAND SNAKES. ALL EIGHT. And that “Everywhere they hurt little girls line.” Oof, Cersei.
Liked the Cersei centricity of this episode, and I found that little moment between her and Margaery DELIGHTFUL.
I think my absolute favorite bit about Cersei and Margaery is that each of them is 110% sure that they are the one that is being crafty and playing the other. It’s a great dynamic to watch.
Lena Headey is doing so much with that character. I mean, the writers are giving her more to do than was in the books at this point, but still. Great work.
Definitely! Cersei is so much more sympathetic to me now, and I really liked getting to know her character better this episode.
Kind of wondering about Jojen paste too, but I suppose that paste can be cooked, right? o_O
i also thought it was super dull! and i typically HATE that criticism of the show because usually I think the plot-y episodes are great. But honestly the last 2 episodes are one dull blur punctuated by UGH are you raping someone AGAIN? Notable exception for the crazy awesome Vale scenes.
Yes, same! I usually am the person being like BUT GUYS PLOT SETUP LEADS TO GLORIOUS PAYOFF, I just think that they’ve paced it excessively slowly since Joffrey’s wedding. Here’s hoping this weekend’s episode brings it back up.
SALT AND STRAW FOR ICE CREAM.
If you’re feeling super-indulgent you can take your ice cream two blocks down to Random Order, and get yourself some pie, and have salted caramel apple pie with, I don’t know, maybe blue cheese ice cream or whatever you’re in the mood for. Be happy forever.
I got really, really excited at the prospect of an ice cream place and a pie joint I hadn’t visited yet, but then I double-checked and OOPS wrong Portland. Just mentioning so this doesn’t go off on a Portland-OR-recs tangent, which won’t be as useful for meetapossum.
Augh, damn it, read too fast. Sorry!
Those places sound so great, and I especially like your pro-tip to buy ice cream, then go down the street to plunk it on some pie. I would not have thought of that and would instead have stood between the two choices forever, yearning for both until I turned into a pillar of salt.
I really cannot fathom any reason why a pie shop and an ice cream shop would exist within two blocks of each other if not to make such magic happen. Clearly that was the entire point of those business owners’ business plans.
Ironically, the same friend I am going to Maine with lived in Portland, OR, very recently, and he has been pressuring me to take a trip there, so recs for the other Portland will probably be welcome in the relatively near future ๐
Hot Suppa is my go-to choice, hands down. I can’t recommend specific dishes because I always always end up getting the Plate of Three (choice of three of their great sides) for lunch, and have only been once or twice for dinner, which is slightly gussied up. OH MAN HOT SUPPA, maybe I’ll go for lunch next week.
For a slightly posher dinner, I heartily recommend Caiola’s, which is only a few blocks walk from Hot Suppa, but down a quieter street. I also really like Sonny’s in the Old Port; they’re related to Local 188, a tapas/Spanish place on Congress near Hot Suppa which is also delightful, but I slightly prefer Sonny’s because DEEP FRIED AVOCADO.
If you’re comfortable disclosing the neighborhood of your airBNB, I can maybe target recs for your neighborhood. If not, no problem; Portland is very walkable/bus-able/cab-able, so location isn’t as crucial as it might be elsewhere.
When are you coming? If you have time for a meet-up, say the word; are there any other area Toasties who could make it to Portland?
Ooo, good choice of a place to visit! I am biased since I live here. ๐
Best place to relax in the sun and enjoy the views of ocean and people-watching, or take a walk along the ocean-side trail: Eastern Promenade (walkable from Commercial St, which is the harbor-front street you’ll inevitably be on at some point).
Ferry trip: Take the ferry to Peak’s Island. Turn left on the main street and walk a block and you can rent a bike on the honor system and ride around the island. But make sure you bring a flashlight and check out Battery Steele too – it’s creepy and awesome. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battery_Steele
Food: Eventide is highly seconded if you’re a seafood and/or oyster person. Cocktails are also top-notch there. Local 188 is my restaurant in portalnd, casual-but-nice, great drinks, very friendly, perfect food (I live and die for their gnocchi). Salvage BBQ for ridic cheap meats and super-casual picnic-table dining. Silly’s for quirky, casual, not-expensive food, and amazing brunch (with outdoor seating too). I could go on forever about food, so I’ll just stop now.
Drinks: If you’re a cocktail person, Hunt and Alpine Club is vital to your experience. Tell them Maureen-the-woman-who-won-the-Fernet-bicycle sent you. Also, get their popcorn for a snack, you won’t regret it. Also for cocktails: Armory Lounge at Portland Regency, Sonny’s, Grace. Novare Res for 9-million beer options, but there are a million beer options everywhere really.
Over-rated: J’s Oysters, DiMillo’s, Pepperclub (if you’re a vegetarian everything will say to go there. do not, it’s mediocre on its best day).
I’ll stop there!
This is most excellent news! If meetapossum wants to, y’know, let us meet a possum, I am down for a Portland meet-up; if not, we could have one of our own if you’re interested!
Wholeheartedly seconding Silly’s, especially if you have any dietary restrictions. They have a fun, delicious, extensive menu and are very conscientious both about food intolerances and about sustainable management. The backyard patio is great in good weather, and the cakes are towering.
I am sad to agree that The Pepperclub has not been a favorite place of mine for many years now (though in their heyday, they were both innovative and reliably excellent, perhaps my favorite place in town), but they’re also closing soon; the space got sold/rented out from under them.
So glad to see other Portland people here! I hope we can get together in person sometime, if you’re up for it.
This whole thread is extremely helpful — I’m now contemplating Maine for my summer vacation plans. Only I’ll most likely go in July or August rather than June. But I’m thinking about Portland and maybe Acadia National Park, so I’m writing down all the food and things-to-do suggestions!
aaaaaand maybe calling a meet-up, if you’re a meet-up sort of person?
Definitely, once I know when I’m going!
Other points of interest: the cryptozoology museum on Avon Street, right around the corner from The Green Hand bookstore, also well worth a visit. Across the street is The Fun Box Emporium, a cluttered join full of comic & gaming stuff.
If you/your companion like baseball, tickets to the Sea Dogs are cheap and the food is fun-not-great. It’s a much more laid-back experience than a game at Fenway, in part because it is so much less expensive.
If I’m reading you right, you’re in/near Portland’s West End, just a few blocks from Hot Suppa/Caiola’s/Local 188, and a pleasant walk from Hadlock Field where the Sea Dogs play.
I’m about to start a doughnut controversy. Are you ready? People rave about the wonders of The Holy Donut, the organic-fancypants doughnut place in town. I have had them and they are good indeed, and they align with all my social & political beliefs: sustainability, local ingredients when possible, treating everyday food as special.
But in my heart, I prefer the taste and texture of Tony’s Donuts, which makes no claims to eschew hydrogenated oil or of buying local, which makes no nods to sustainability, where cranky-looking curmudgeons sit glowering at newcomers, where the coffee is frankly dreadful (get coffee anywhere else), and where they charge you a nominal fee for your box. They just taste more like doughnuts to me.
I just added “cryptozoology museum” to my list with four exclamation points.
My main takeaway was:
“Comprised. Of“?!
Tywin, Cersei, you both should know better!
If you like massive, massive slices of cake, go to Becky’s diner on Commercial street. They open early at 4am to feed the fishermen who come back, so by that logic, when I drank a beer there at 11am, it was afternoon time for fishermen. But anyway, their wild blueberry cake is glorious and dense, and glorious, and their lobster rolls are simple, but big .
Also,I haven’t been there (I will not forgive myself for missing this when I was there last October), but you should go on a brewery tour at Allagash. Their beers are so beautiful, especially the Curieux. SIGH. Drink beers for me? Please?
YES. I have added all the breweries to my list. Allagash is one of my favorites.
ATTA GIRL!
That Benji moment between Bran and Jon at the end…..didn’t need those feels. Nope.
I GOOOOOOTTTTT MY JOOOOOOBBBBB!!!!!
As you may or may not remember, Toasties, my institution created a permanent position for the position I currently inhabit as a contractor, and even though the job application was only up for 6 days, and they didn’t actually advertise it, of course they got qualified applicants. Went through the interview process, etc., and then waited like a week and a half, seeing all of my coworkers and my bosses every day, and could not get even a little bit of a read on what the situation was.
Then Wednesday, I got called into my boss’s office, prepared to be FIRED, and instead she told me I got the job! And not only that, it’s a lot more money than I thought it would be!
Toasties, I just, no joke, got a 65% raise. SIXTY-FIVE PERCENT!
This is craziness I still can barely wrap my mind around. So psyched.
Holy cats, that is terrific! Congratulations!
FANTASTIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Congratulations!!!!!!
CONGRATS THAT IS THE BEST NEWS!
CONGRATS!
That’s FANTASTIC. Congrats!
Go you and your awesomeness! That raise is the best sort of astonishing. ๐
Bastardsnow is buying the next round! Congratulations!
That is amazing. Congratulations!
WOW. That is amazing! Congratulations!
thats freaking PHENOMENAL! GO BASTARDSNOW! congratulations!!!!!
Wow, wow, wow! So excited for you!
Hurrah!
Sixty-five percent is a ludicrous amount for a raise, in the best possible way. Way to go you!
Congratulations! That’s so awesome!!
You are amazing and that is great news! Congrats!!
I almost didn’t thumbs up this because it was at 65 exactly but that’s amazing and I’m excited for you so screw it!
Congratulations!!!
That comment started out awesome and just got better and better. CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!!
Decadence? I just ordered a wallet from Lord & Taylor, which has always seemed to me a fancy department store for fancy ladies. The wallet itself is Ralph Lauren, which is pretty fancy for me! (I could only bring myself to order it because it was on sale for 40% off, so maybe not quite as decadent?)
My query for my Toastie friends this week: is anyone else who commutes to work (esp. if you use public transit), like, super sweaty in the morning? Every morning, I shower, get half-dressed, finish getting ready for work, dry my hair, then get the rest of the way dressed. I walk to the bus stop and without fail, by the time I’m sitting on the bus, I am sweating to the point of having to try to discreetly dab it off my temples. WHY IS THIS?
I think I’m going to have to invest in an honest-to-God handkerchief to wipe my face like I’m some sort of confounded Victorian professional. A frazzled doctor or bemused lawyer.
Yes, and it’s to do with all the heat changes. My apartment is always super warm (because it’s directly above the furnace), outside might be chilly, I sweat very easily when walking/exercising, and then the bus and train are usually warmer as well. And then there’s the matter of dressing for my apartment versus the weather versus my usually freezing office. So my body flips out and has no idea what temperature it actually is. This is way worse in winter, of course.
Definitely get a handkerchief, and maybe reassess how many layers you’re wearing?
*raises hand* This may not be feasible for you, but I found that I was *significiantly* less sweaty if I showered the night before rather than in the morning. Not sure if it was the wet hair or the hair dryer or the general humidness from having a shower, but it made a big difference for me. (And involves doing less stuff in the morning, which means more sleeping ๐ )
Not at this time of year, but in the summer? DEFINITELY.
When it’s warm out and I need to dress professionally I just carry my suit jacket or cardigan until I get off the bus. I don’t care about looking professional on my commute, and it helps a bit.
I walk to work, which has directly contributed to my decision to stop even bothering with makeup. Stuff was just perspiring off. Some kind of handkerchief is probably an excellent plan.
Yeah, I don’t bother with any makeup until I’m at my desk, which probably isn’t super professional, but I do it before anyone else comes in, so…
I’m BOILING!
http://youtu.be/aHze0SqB5Zg
(This has been your mandatory Mitchell and Webb reference. Slighty NSFW if you don’t have headphones.)
I have very little actual help, I’m afraid, as I am perpetually in the same boat. Move back north? Otherwise, layers?
Oh, moving back north. IF ONLY!
Me! Always – even when it’s not “cold” out. There is nothing worse. In the summer I like to freeze water bottles and then take them on my commute and occasionally press against the sides of my face (I used to feel weird about looking like a fool, but I no longer care. I think I need a handkerchief too. I have also used cardigans in a pinch and/or random napkins I find in my purse in case of emergency.
When I was using public transit regularly I found that I would get sweaty in the mornings once it got anywhere above maybe 65 degrees outside, probably because I live in the Atlanta area and it’s just normal to be sweaty between April and October here, and also because I tend to be a fast walker and lots-of-stuff carrier, so I was probably just making myself sweat a lot anyway. I always ended up just going straight to the bathroom when I got into work and wiping my face off with a moistened paper towel and THEN applying the bare minimum makeup that I usually wear (this, of course, doesn’t work if you wear more makeup than ‘mascara and lip gloss,’ sadly).
It’s been a week since my 2nd interview and I’m still waiting to hear back! They said they’d let me know either way “next week” and now next week is almost over and NOTHING. I do know they haven’t contacted my references yet, which doesn’t bode well :(.
This week has been awful! Waiting is AWFUL. Also on Wednesday or something they called me, but my phone only rang FOR A SECOND before they apparently thought better of it? WHAT DOES THAT MEAN? I swear someone over there is having fun fucking around with sad, eager job candidates.
Bleeeeh.
๐ Sending you lots of good job vibes.
Nicole I want to hear more about this Russian mom because she sounds like a dream.
I’m imagining big-breasted, smothering hugs, but I think maybe I’m just thinking of my grandma?
she was amaaaaazing and my flight landed at MIDNIGHT and she broke out the sandwiches bc obviously I wanted to eat a pound of fish eggs on buttered challah and she was right
and she looooved you!!!
Friday! I’m either taking a verrry extended lunch break and going out for pho, or taking off early and eating pho then. So excited!!
I feel like you will appreciate this sentiment, which I would like to own on a t-shirt: https://twitter.com/primopreems/status/1830475090…
Are any Toasties in San Francisco interested in watching Eurovision tomorrow? The only place I can find that is showing it is Midnight Sun in the Castro. I would happily go there, but not as the only woman in the place (which I’ve tried before and felt like I was in the middle of Mean Girls except they were men).
Last night I had the pleasure of seeing The Naked I: Insides Out at the Seattle Transgender Film Festival. It was absolutely wonderful, and I cried, and being in a room full of people who were supportive of the stories being showcased made me feel so safe and supported. I have never had more people compliment my hair.
This morning I woke up and cried just thinking about opening up a bit more about my preferred gender expression to supportive, queer-positive, feminist friends I have. Some of it was that I was scared, and some of it was that I felt foolish for feeling scared.
I feel like I’m getting closer, and I’m happy about that.
Yay yay yay!
My good mood has turned cranky because my boss said that he’s trying to find a way to keep me on at our workplace once my contract ends (I’ve already been extended once, this would be a second and indefinite length extension). Which I do not want because I’m trying to find work in a tangentially related but different field. But additionally, the real crank-up-the-cranky factor is that I asked about a raise WEEKS ago and he has still not given me a definitive answer. It feels like I can’t keep asking about it because I’m turning into the naggy demanding lady. But if I’m so great and you want me to stay, why can’t you cough up a little more money?!
(BUT THEN I also feel stupid because it’s so hard to find a job and if I can’t find the type of work I’m looking for, I’m just shit outta luck and will regret not staying here. Ughhh.)
Can you bring the raise up once more and ask for a timeline about when he’ll have made a decision? I feel much less naggy when I’m able to ask, “When is a good time for me to follow up with you on this?” and then say, “You said I should check back in today about the raise request.”
The wk of TRUTH is upon me! BF finished his MBA last night! We are making to-go cup MIMOSAS to drink in the CA sunshine at the beach as the GODDESS commands for celebration! PLUS! In a few days I discover whether I got the job I interviewed for last wk that allows us to end 2 yrs of long distance AND whether I passed the bar! So. Let me know who to dedicate this lamb sacrifice to.
Ohmigod sending you so much positive energy. I hope EVERYTHING works out AWESOMELY.
By this time next week, I will have ceased to use this open comment thread as my personal pregnancy journal (sorry, y’all), because things will be all different. After 3 weeks and 5 days of hospital bedrest, they’re inducing labor on Sunday/Monday. Eeek! I’m nervous about the induction (I had a much less medicalized process in mind). I’m nervous about the health of the baby (still measuring small, but otherwise looks healthy based on all available evidence, but will be 6 weeks early, so that’s obviously not so ideal. . . ). I’m mourning the premature end of pregnancy. And I’m super nervous about figuring out how to manage what comes next (including at least a few weeks of NICU time). But I’m also starting to get excited. So. Yea!! So sorry for the all-about-me-ness of these posts, but I’m also so grateful for this online community for keeping me entertained and encouraged through the last few weeks. Many thanks, y’all. Looking forward to seeing you on the other side!!
(In terms of decadence, I’m also mourning the end of the time during which I can drink a milkshake everyday without ANY guilt, because calcium + fatten up the baby. BUT! Sushi next week! Woooo!!!)
Hey, you’ll still need calcium after the baby’s born! Especially if you breastfeed (don’t know how prematurity affects this), but either way. Baby’s been sucking your calcium out of your bones like a tiny vampire for months now. Clearly you need to build it back up.
Good luck with the induction! I’m sure everything will go fine and you’ll have a slightly small but healthy baby who will be out of the NICU soon and back home where you both can recover in comfort.
Vampire babyyyyy
Early congratulations to you!
Sending happy healthy labor thoughts your way! All will be well. And on that note, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Kadbd3tCqc, but it makes me cry, so be warned. (Good cry, not bad cry.)
Congratulations to you on your impending little person! Mr.BHam was born 10 weeks early, in the 80s, and he is a hale and hearty dude these days. Other than poor eyesight in one eye because one of his eyeball nerves didn’t develop all the way, he’s pretty much normal! I hope that your preemie comes out safe and sound.
P.S. I heartily second continuing to drink All the Milkshakes.
Good luck good luck! You have been a trouper. I hope we will get to hear about what your mini-person is like? (When you get a chance to breathe…)
Casting a “pro-milkshakes” vote, too.
First things first: you have not been “all about me,” and even if you were, that would be fiiiiiiiiiine. This is a big deal! You are allowed to be excited/focused on your exciting and sometimes difficult experience!
Now for the real stuff: Congratulations! So glad to hear everything looks good & healthy; I’m sure this was scary sometimes, and boring other times, and scary and boring plenty, which is a really awful combination. Sending you lots of good thoughts for the immediate future and the next months and years!
Congratulations! I hope you let us know how everything went next week (or the week after, etc., depending on how chaotic this next bit is).
Ooh, good luck and how exciting! Maybe the baby will be born on Mother’s Day! (Definitely agree that you need lots of milkshakes, still).
I am drinking a late-morning cocktail out of a coffee mug. Don’t judge me! I’ve been working 16-hour days for a few weeks now.and my in-laws are here. I love them, but they’re not much for the drink, so I’m sneaking one while they’re gone to Chinatown for lunch. Everyone wins in this situation.
One of the reasons that I am drinking is that I was grading papers late last night and got to this one woman’s paper. The paper topic was the students’ relationship with entrepreneurship. She talked at length about her passion for being an entrepreneur, her personal network, what type of business she’d like, what she’d be good at. And then she got to the part where I asked them to talk about their weaknesses and basically she doubted her ability to succeed in business because she doesn’t have a relaxed and pleasant face and people don’t see her as being happy.
And then I wanted to light everything on fire. I left what I thought was an encouraging note (and she obviously got and deserved a perfect score), but I don’t even know what to do with that.
Coffee mug cocktails sounds like something I would support. Please name something this. Band, bar, pop-up shop, etsy store, cockatoo, whatever.
I’m not judging you I’m envying you. I would kill for a cocktail right now.
she sounds like she needs to be introduced to that Bitchy Resting Face video! (if it’s the kind of environment where you could do that — which it might not be, alas).
Decadence news: going to London soon- going to have lobster eggs benedict. I cannot be stopped.
Sad news: I’m away this weekend and I’m going to miss Eurovision. WOE.
Lobster eggs benedict sounds amazing beyond words. SO decadent.
I found a Jewish deli in Calgary that does their eggs benedict on latkes; it is my favourite place now.
Latke eggs benedict is the best idea and I am totally stealing it. I think I’ll call it “eggs benjamin”.
Brilliant.
Eggs Cumberbatch!
Lobster Eggs Benny sounds like a dream.
I am rooting for the sparkly Finnish boys. Sadly my Eurovision boyfriend Conchita Wurst’s song is really really boring. I wanted to be rooting for him but it was not possible.
My Eurovision Friend has to work this evening so we can’t watch it together. V. sad, as getting hammered and insulting harmless entertainers just isn’t the same on my own; will have to make do with following the snarkier livetweeters.
Guys my friend K is dying from a basically untreatable kind of cancer. Itโs very sad. Weโre having a fundraiser for her tomorrow to help her raise money so her family can come from S. Africa to see her, and also so J can take some time off work to care for her. Her parents were 20th-century immigrants to there, her father from Germany and her mother from Portugal (she has family in Madeira, she has dark hair and eyes, which becomes important later). She has some amazing stories, I thought Iโd share two of them with you.
1. As a child in S. Africa, K would pray childlike prayers that God would help her better understand how racism felt from the viewpoint of its black victims. Years later, studying music in Vienna, she had an experience that felt like a granting of that prayer. She was riding the U-Bahn. A group of skinheads passed her and one casually shoved her to the floor. Shocked, she cried out, reflexively in English, โHow dare you!โ The skinhead whirled about. He reached out a hand to help her to her feet. โIโm sorry, maโam,โ he responded, also in English, โI thought you were a Turk.โ
2. K has quite an effect on people who meet her. J met K when J thought it might be interesting to take piano lessons and heard that K was a good teacher, so they set up a lesson. J was quite affected by meeting K, to the point that J probably shouldnโt have tried to drive home. Overwhelmed with emotion, J ended the drive with the car smashed into a pole. J had never been in love before, she hadnโt known how it would feel, she hadnโt known that she was gay. Years later, they drove to Iowa to get married.
this is beautiful. thank you for sharing your memories of K- a friend of mine was awarded his degree posthumously last night and I’ve been dwelling on the him today. She see like a truly remarkable person, and I’m so glad you’re in one another’s lives. Is there a website or anything where toasties could donate?
I’m so sorry that you’re going to be losing your friend. SHe sounds like a wonderful person.
If you ahve any kind of online fundraiser too, please link it so that those toasties who can afford to can donate.
Thank you for sharing your memories of K. <3
I’m so sorry you’re going through this. Your friend seems like an amazing person who lived the hell out of her life, and she has my admiration. Please tell us about the fundraiser – I’ll gladly donate.
Oh no. Your friend K sounds like a wonderful person, and I’m sorry to hear you’re going to lose her this way. Thank you for sharing <3
Nth-ing what others have said! This sounds like a terrible loss, not just for J and K’s family and yourself, but for the world. Wishing for peace for K and her family and friends like you. If there’s a donation page, I’m there.
Thanks to all for your kind words. K has been on my heart a lot, obviously, and I wanted to share these stories to express that in some way. Looks like there’s no on-line donation system, but if by chance any of you will be in Oak Park, Ill. tomorrow evening let me know and I’ll tell you how to drop by!
I will not be in Oak Park anytime soon, but that place is close to my heart and I wish I could be. I’m so sorry about your friend.
That is so very sad ๐ Thank you for sharing the stories about your friend, and I hope she can get some quality time in with her folks and J. She sounds like such an awesome person.
Does anyone live in Madison? I hate all my friends.
I live in Madison and would love another friend!
I do! Finding you now. I’m away for a lot of the summer but I always love meeting new people, and I’ll be back in August.
BOSTON TOASTIES HEY HEY
A few of us got together for some informal real-life meetups recently (it was lots of fun!) and so we made a google group to better organize/instigate future fun hangouts. Come join us: https://groups.google.com/forum/?hl=en#!forum/bos…
Yes woohoo! I’m moving to Boston in July. YOU WILL BE MY FRIENDS.
Yay! Welcome!
Yaaaaaaaaaaay!
Woooo! It says I need to apply. Do I present a severed head as an application fee, or just a picture of myself taking to the sea?
We’ll accept anyone…except Ronbledore deniers
I say teach the controversy
yeeeeees
Work has been too stressful for me to make good progress with my Moving Away plans and now I am feeling lazy.
I might go out for brunch tomorrow at the place that does Pomegranate Royales, because that sounds delicious and decadent and stress-relieving, no?
anyone game for a Femslash Friday open thread? TELL ME WHO YOU SHIP AND WHY
DO YOU WATCH FAIRYTALE? it is a stupid anime for 13-year olds, and I am ridiculously invested in it and have very in-depth, complex queer head-canons for everyone.
ANYWAY, I ship Erza (headcanon: Bisexual) with MiraJane (HeadCanon: Pansexual, Trans) pretty heavily.
More reasonable ships that other people will have actually heard of:
Gabrielle/Xena OBVIOUSLY
Faith/Buffy
Miranda/Jack (Mass Effect, and YES I KNOW OK)
i’m not much into anime but i like your complex queer head-canons very much!
Fairy Tail (as that is how it is actually spelled) is one of those silly animes where the villains fail because they Do Not Understand Friendship And Love, and where they never show blood and the ‘serious injuries’ are just smudges, and where everyone is overpowered to hell and back, especially Natsu.
And I have cried over it.
And I get very excited when the ‘we’re about to be awesome!’ music starts.
And there are 180 episodes, and I watched 170 of them in three months.
I HAVE A WORD DOCUMENT WITH MY QUEER HEADCANONS AND SHIPS FOR THIS SHOW, I AM 28.;
YES to Jack not being straight. I never bought that.
Jack is QUEER AS HELL and her relationship with Miranda has MORE than a touch of the ‘I hate you BUT I WANT YOU’ going on. It would be toxic, and awful, and so so bad, but I can’t help but see it.
Hey, any relationship involving Jack would be toxic and awful, right?
In the third game, I romanced Samantha, and it was the second most satisfying romantic relationship I’ve ever been a part of.
I assume that after Jack and Miranda hashed out their issues in the Citadel DLC they boned all night long.
ALL NIGHT.
THE CITADEL DLC IS THE BEST THING
I tried Fairy Tail and I didn’t hold my interest. (I’m about to post about Soul Eater Not, so please don’t take that as a snooty comment. I have no grounds on which to make snooty comments.)
Anyway, all I remember from Fairy Tail is that Lucy might think she’s straight but there is absolutely no way she’s straight.
Lucy is not straight. Straight and Lucy aren’t even on the same continent.
YES
bel and lix in the hour (because they are both badass, seriously sharp, groundbreaking ladies, and what was with all those scenes where lix would zip up bel’s dress or lend her stockings?? and aughhh, all of lix’s highwaisted trousers and bel’s amazing suit dresses and their desire to do whatever they want and fuck the rest.)
bliss and pash in whip it (i will never shut up about this because SERIOUSLY it would have made the most most most most sense ever and it would have been amazing)
NO REALLY BLISS AND PASH (i kind of ship ellen page/alia shawkat? like they are adorable together and i want them to be happy u kno)
seriously, i thought the movie was going there and then it introduced a totally incongruous idiot male love interest for bliss and it made NO SENSE. NO SENSE AT ALL.
PS is your name a reference to neko case? because goddamn, i love that lady so much i can’t stand it.
sure is! I am seeing her live for the first time this summer AND I CAN HARDLY WAIT
i’m jealous! you are going to have a fab fab fab time. i’ve seen her three times and every time it’s been an A++++ experience. her voice is transcendent, her band is awesome, her stage banter is golden, and her backup singer, kelly hogan, is an amazing lady with a weeping-inducing voice in her own right.
Love Kelly Hogan! “I Like to Keep Myself in Pain” is sort of a theme song of mine… She’s from Atlanta, and I’m in Athens, and I probably know people who know her personally, which both excites and intimidates me.
ahhh, that’s so cool! i’d live in mingled fear and hope that i would bump into her somewhere and run my mouth off about how great she is, haha.
We saw her last October and she was so great! You will have a wonderful time.
YES TO BOTH OF THESE SO HARD
(prompted because I found out, after dating for a year and a half, that my gf watches Once Upon a Time religiously and I am now ON A MISSION to convert her to the ways of SwanQueen, even though I could care less about the actual show)
YUP! Can’t stand actually watching the show (unless hella tipsy) but I will take to the sea in the good ship SwanQueen!
Watching SwanQueen shippers interact (mostly via Twitter) with the writers and seeing how this season has played out has made me wonder about the changing dynamics between fans and shows. This seems to have been the writers’ goal this season regarding the second most loved ship on the show:
1) UP THE SUBTEXT between Regina & Emma (Let me show you how to use your magic, baby…)
2) Rewrite a character (Mulan) as queer to sate fans
3) Introduce two Very Masculine Love Interests for Regina & Emma
4)??
5) Profit
SwanQueen is the BEST, and the fact that the writers aren’t taking better advantage of it bemuses me. I pretty much think of the show as bewilderingly popular fanfic, and prioritize fandom writings/interpretations as cannon.
Most of my ships are GAY GAY GAY.
GOOD GOOD GOOD.
OK, so:
Phil/Clint, Avengers (this has come up before; yes, I write fanfic.)
Tony/Steve, Avengers
Mycroft/Lestrade, Sherlock (this is all Nicole’s fault)
Draco/Harry, I’m not going to clarify
Jaime/Brienne, Game of Thrones
There are probably about a billion more but those are the important ones. Especially Phil and Clint.
Have you read Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl?
I just did a couple weeks ago! Loved it–didn’t have the heft of Eleanor & Park but I found Cath extremely relatable. It was a spot-on depiction of fandom. I’m following it up with Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch, which is a fun thing to compare it against; Hornby’s love of football is rooted in his own insecurities the same way Cath’s love of Simon and Baz is, but they express it in radically different ways.
…
I should maybe just write a piece about this.
PLEASE DO i loved your slash piece and I love rainbow rowell SO GUARANTEED SUCCESS
Ah, that wasn’t me but it was the best best best
also i just want to admit that fairly often, i watch shows or movies, notice the obvious dudely slash-leaning possibilities, and then think, “yessss but what if they were ladies, mmm?”
I usually just want to swap whatever straight pairs until everyone is gay. Well, mainly I just want Amy/Rosa to be a thing on Brooklyn 99, and I never want Jake Peralta to find love.
i admit i have a soft spot for jake with amy (he knows she’s a good brusher!) but ugh, rosa. what’s that bill hader quote from snl? “mark me down as scared AND horny”? rosa inspires that in me.
well, partially I think I’m projecting myself onto Amy, and partially Jake is SO misogynistic in the way he treats Amy sometimes, and they play it off as “caveman love” or whatever, but for a show that does so well in so many ways I would hate to see him implicitly rewarded for the shit he says
yeah, i have no patience for the bullshit “boys will be boys”/”pigtail-pulling” crap that peralta pulls from time to time, but i just want amy to schooooool him. he’s growing up! slowly!
amy and jake together would not be as bad as the minor lean towards rosa and boyle they’ve done lately, because i would hate that with the fire of a thousand suns. god, i hope that doesn’t happen.
Noooooooo to Rosa and Boyle. It’s so much more fun to have her torment the crap out of him.
The episode where Boyle is “dropping truthbombs” and says something about when Rosa goes out with him made me feel like the writers see that as an end game, and that is not cool. Boyle is great in other ways but his creepy behavior towards amazing Rosa should not be rewarded.
Rosa Diaz is like my primary “life goals or wife goals” right now. Whoo. *fans self*
lol I am literally in the middle of writing a rule 63 fic for my favorite het OTP so that it’s lesbians. SOMEDAY I’ll finish this. (it’s arthur/ariadne from inception if anyone cares! nobody does!)
I see a LOT of Arthur/Eames so this is much appreciated.
well, if I ever finish it I know who to link it to!
i care. i definitely care.
i mean, the three piece suits.
EXAAAAAAAAAAAACTLY.
I ship Sara and Cosima from Orphan Black and if that’s wrong I don’t wanna be right.
This is confusing and titillating.
basically everybody on Bomb Girls (Betty/Kate! Kate/Vera! Betty/Gladys! Betty/Reggie!)
MCU:
Pepper Potts/Maya Hansen
Darcy Lewis/Sif (does this exist? IT SHOULD!!!!)
Natasha Romanoff/basically any lady
comics:
Kitty Pryde/Illyana Rasputin (oh my god sorry illyana your name looks terrible without serifs) (illyana >>>>> ANY DUDE KITTY HAS EVER BEEN WITH IMO)
Carol Danvers/Jessica Drew
Kate Bishop/America Chavez (whither the story about these two and Kamala Khan hanging out at Jersey diners, am I going to have to write it myself)
Romanoff/Hill in MCU!
god i’m still so mad at how badly they wasted maya hansen. the character was awesome and rebecca hall is scorchingly attractive.
Betty/hugpunch
BOMB GIRLS UGH that movie though ๐
OH MY GOD I’M STILL SO MAD ABOUT IT. SOOOOOOOOOO MAAAAAAAAAAAAD. I don’t know whether to rewrite the ending in my head or just pretend it never happened.
carol and jess carol and jess carol and jessssssssssss
Does anyone watch the anime Soul Eater Not! ? Because this week’s episode was focused on Jackie’s enormous crush on Kim and I could not control myself. Oh my word, Jackie has a crush on Kim the size of the moon. The anime added a dream sequence WITH AN ALMOST-KISS to the start of the episode and that was when I realized I was doomed, that they were going to treat my emotions as playthings. And they did. And I loved it. Agh.
Check back on the mainpage for Mallory’s brand-new Jane Eyre Femslash!
I have immense feelings for Root/Shaw on Person of Interest. Obviously Shaw had some unrequited pining going on for Carter (like Shaw would offer to share her weapons with just anyone) too, but she and Root clearly just get each other on a completely unhealthy but immensely hot level.
Sometimes I secretly suspect that the writers have been flipping through my favorite type of fanfiction to get inspiration for their scenes together.
Moving tomorrow, and this is the packing week. It is also the month-end closing week at work. Everything seems to be getting done, but my cat is flipping out, and I’m beyond stressed out and tired.
I could use some stories of good moves that went as planned, if that is even a thing that happens.
Cats are THE WORST in a move. However, when I moved from Minneapolis to Philadelphia, Munchie was pretty good during the move itself. All she did was sit in her carrier (while the door was open so she could come out if she pleased) and sulked the whole way.
She reacted much worse when moving from one apartment in Philly to another one across town. I think she was expecting it to be as bad as the cross-country move?
When we helped our friend move, she hired a bunch of the high-school-age kids who work at the grocery store with her and we basically assembly-lined it, so even though we were moving a two-bedroom apartment with I shit you not 3,000 books that was barely packed because she’d gotten sick the night before & had to go to the emergency room, we got it done in about 7 hours and then had a barbecue in the sun, and it turned out to be actually a really good day.
Moving sympathies to you! I am just going to a new apartment in the same city (yours sounds bigger). If it helps, my previous cross-country moves (to NYC, to TX, to NYC again, back to TX) have all gone pretty okay. Like nothing was broken or lost, and it’s always stressful but I like to micromanage and have lists. My cat gets stressed too (about the boxes, about the lack of routine, etc) but she is excellent on airplanes/ an excellent traveler so that portion of our move has always been smooth. Sending soothing thoughts to you and your cat
I imagine the move is probably happening now, but I’ve had two moves very successful moves in recent history–once within the same city and once between states. In both cases, we had professionals to do the loading and unloading (a luxury WELL worth it, if in the budget, IMO), and nothing major broke or got lost, we didn’t get scammed, and it didn’t take forever to unload everything. Now, actually unpacking the boxes was a different story, but we were very pleased with the moving experience itself. Hope it goes great today!!!!!
I need to find a new roommate, so I’m reading craigslist responses and not wanting any of them in my apartment. This will be the fourth person in a year in that room [it’s not us! one went to live with his gf and two left to travel internationally]. Any Toasties want to live in Logan Square, Chicago? We have free laundry!
In much better news, there is a big awesome annual event happening at my old college this weekend, so a whole bunch of my friends from college are in town and I’m going to get to go hang out with them and make things and drink tonight. Very excited!
Omg I’m actually considering a move to Chicago. I *may* be interested.
I’m basically refusing to admit I’m depressed out of sheer bloody-mindedness at this point. wheeeeeeeeeeeee
I tried that. I imagine you don’t need anyone telling you it doesn’t help, so I won’t. But I hope things get better for you soon, no matter what you do to get there.
Thanks <3 I’m hoping it’s just stress and things will get better once we get past some deadlines.
Ugh, depression sucks. Do you have any idea what kind you have? I have minor depression which was only diagnosed 20 years into my life when I supplemented it with a major depressive episode. I definitely feel for you and want to support you!
I take medication now, and it makes a world of difference. Not to say that this is a good option for everyone, but often anti-depressants carry a bit of a stigma that is totally undeserved. I am down to talk about anything depression-related.
Minor to moderate clinical depression, as far as I remember. I take antidepressants (have tried going off and back on at various points) and I’m hoping this is just a bad patch, but the longer it goes the longer I have to consider that it might not be. Blargh. I don’t want to go through all the hassle of finding a therapist and having to make time for that! That requires effort! And time! And meeting new people and making phone calls! aaaargh.
Finding a therapist! This can be such a hell. Because it’s not just finding someone who you can afford or takes your insurance or that you can reasonably commute to and are taking new patients and works for your schedule, but also finding someone who will actually listen to you and not just make you feel shittier. So many people I’ve talked to can’t get past this step and end up in this hellish limbo. ๐
I hope nobody minds that I posted my happy comment first and then another not happy comment.
It sucks and it’s unfair that kids get sick. Screw cancer.
Screw cancer in the EAR. It needs to stay the eff away from children.
I’ve been quietly furious for months at this particular childhood cancer and now I’m going to be vocally furious at it.
I support Cancer-Anger 100000%
Too right.
Childhood cancer is so, so, cruel.
It took the hip, femur and knee of my friend (she’s 17), a talented dancer, and is now going to take her life. All cancer is brutal but childhood cancer twists the knife.
Envoyรฉ de m
I’m so sorry. The world is so unfair.
(is that the beginning of “sent from my [phone]” in french? you crack me up)
Ha! It is. Silly phone. I keep my phone in French because it helps me keep my French up if I see it constantly.
Envoyรฉ de m
My last Friday at work for a while, yayyyyy! I work 10-hour days all summer in exchange for Fridays off and I loooooooove it. If only they would let me do it year-round!
Also, got my Toast CD swap and THANK YOU lemonadefish! I hope the CD’s I sent you arrived and are useful for dancing with babies. <3
Any Toasties in Central Texas? I am smack dab in between Dallas and Austin, and man, some moots would be welcome.
I’m in College Station and willing to drive to meet you. I am that desperate for time with Toasties. I think you understand the culture I am awash in.
I am also willing to drive! And yes, yes I do understand. TOTALLY.
Maybe Austin? *hopeful*
I have a cousin in Austin, so yes: Austin. Let’s “talk” more via email: rcmcdowell at verizon dot net.
I’m in San Antonio. I’d be up for a Toastie meet up, you guys!
(I say, optimistically, as I don’t drive on highways regularly and have never driven my car out of the city…)
Maybe an Austin Toastie meetup? RoseCamelia is in College Station, I am in Waco, you are in San Antonio… Also Austin is awesome and I love it.
I am in Austin if you need help with setting this up. My email is eileen underscore urban at yahoo dot com. Would love to meet some fellow Toasties.
Yassss. Let’s Austin it, guys.
I’m in Austin! If there is a Toastie meet-up near here, I am in! Let me know.
I’m in Houston and would also be down for an Austin meetup! If this moves to email, please loop me in: elizablair42 at yahoo dot com.
I am in Austin! My email address for randomly posting on the internet is [email protected].
Lets have a thread about Moms of Exes You Liked Better than the Ex: GO!
My high school boyfriend’s mom was the greatest woman ever, to the point that when we broke up after two years (he cheated), she tore him a new one and told him I was too good for him and that he’d never find someone as great as me and basically all the things your best friend is supposed to say when shouting down an ex, not his own mother. When he and I were together I drove to school and picked him up on the way, and she would come out to the car if he wasn’t ready to go and hand me some breakfast and tell me to leave without him and she’d make him ride the bus.
This might sound like she was horrible to her son, she wasn’t. She was a total doting Jewish mother who loved her son like he was the greatest person ever to walk the earth, but apparently I was even more awesome.
Ohhh I still hope to run into my ex’s mom at the grocery store! I haven’t seen her since I broke up with her son four years ago, but she was the best. She didn’t speak hardly any English, so I always got to use my French with her, and she was so funny and sweet. She’d do things like drive me home on New Year’s Eve when I couldn’t get a cab and ask her son why he hadn’t bothered to reserve one, etc. She ran a bilingual dayhome and I would sometimes hang out with just her and the kids.
OMG I probably would have broken up with my ex much sooner if I didn’t LOVE his family. His parents paid for approximately half the cost for us to travel from the US to Brazil (where they were living for ex’s father’s job) for a week, no strings. It was amazing. His mom also threw terrific parties and gave thoughtful (sometimes almost extravagant) gifts for birthdays/Christmases.
Ex and I are on good terms (we just were NOT meant to be with each other) and I saw his mom at Ex’s wedding last fall. She had a floor-length evening gown on. (Wedding was black-tie-optional.) It was great.
My ex left me just before our 10th anniversary, in the throes of a settling-down panic as we had also just hit 30. For our anniversary present and joint 30th- presents, his mum had bought us a Galapagos cruise. She went with me instead of taking him or cancelling it, and it is testament to her awesomeness that I actually enjoyed it over 50% of the time and spent almost no time in hysterical tears because it was meant to be a celebration of my relationship with the man I thought I was spending the rest of my life with.
WOW. Just…wow to every part of that.
Well quite. On the other hand, I did get to go the Galapagos Islands which I am unlikely to be able to afford ever again.
And it is just about the most amazing place on earth.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/lebatihem/sets/7215…
Not related to any exes (haha) of mine, but my mom is still friendly with her ex-husband’s mother. The divorce was in the late 1970s, they live on different continents, and ex-MIL is probably in her late-80s or 90s by now (and unfortunately going blind), but they still send Christmas cards and try to call each other every year. She sounds like a wonderful lady, and I kind of love that they’ve kept in touch after all those years. ๐
I just wanted to share my finest moment from this past week.
BRAIN: “Okay hands, good job activating that new debit card. Now let’s cut up the old one.”
HANDS: “Sure thing, boss.”
BRAIN: “Now listen. They look exactly the same. So I need you to pay attention, and not accidentally cut up the new card instead of the old one. Don’t do that.”
HANDS: “Okay.”
*Hands go and cut up the new card.*
BRAIN: *Narrows eyes.*
I just laughingly said “Oh no!” out loud at my desk. This is terrible, but very hilariously told.
Haha, thanks. A *new* new card was easily ordered, so in the end it was ‘naught but material for a “I am a total idiot” story.
I have done the same thing!
*giggling*
A friend who I haven’t talked to in years got in touch with me this morning. We had a falling out in college and he proceeded to treat me really poorly, so I eventually stopped trying to repair things. He sent me a really heartfelt message saying he was sorry for the way he treated me, he misses me, and would love to get together if I’m up to it.
I want to give him a second chance. 4 years is a long time to grow/mature. Am I being naive?
I don’t think you are. BUT, I have beenr eading a lot of Captain Awkward lately, and as a result I think you should take things slow. Meeting up again doesn;t need to mean you;re friends again, and if at any point in the proceedings you decide that how he hurt you is too much for you to be friends with again, that’s OK.
Great advice – I think if anything it’ll be nice to see what he’s been up to, how he’s doing in life in general, etc. I think what happened can honestly be chalked up to immaturity, so it’ll be interesting to see if he’s grown up.
It sounds like a genuine apology, which is a good sign. And a lot of are dumb in college, and living in the real world can give people the opportunity to grow up. I say give him a second chance.
I would meet up with him, and give him a tentative second chance, but not jump right back into the same level of relationship that you had before.
Of course, if you start feeling like he’s treating you poorly again, end it right there.
Not naive if your expectations are realistic. He has matured enough to take responsibility and apologize. Accept that his maturity may need further development. Meet with him and see. But keep expectations low. And for goddess’ sake, do not see him again unless you genuinely want to.
This just happened to me!! Of course every situation is different, but my friend had a convincing apology and explanation, and I also think that given his particular circumstances, he really needed me to forgive him. (Which, as I’m basically over the hurt from our falling out, I would have said yes, it’s all ok, regardless of whether I wanted to be friends again.) I don’t think we will ever be as close as we were at the height of our old friendship, but we’ve hung out a few times and texted/gchatted a bit. I would say we are friendly but I’m not going out of my way to hang out all the time. It’s nice to have some closure and a happier ending than the way things were left before his apology. I say you should go ahead and give him a second chance, but with the expectation that things will be different and your friendship will probably not be the same as the good old days.
not naive. i had an incredibly close friendship totally fall apart during college. after a little over a year of silence and separation, we mutually apologized and tried things over again. i think the ticket was taking it slow. it took another year+ before we were really comfortable with each other again.
I need some advice from fashion Toasties!! I am looking for good places to buy eco-friendly and ethically made clothes that are actually stylish and don’t cost $600 for a dress. At the moment I really like Everlane, Given Goods, Nisolo, and basics from American Apparel. Any other suggestions?
I’m no fashion Toastie, but have you checked Etsy?
Ah! Good idea! I always think of that for crafts but it’s probably worth looking into for sweaters and stuff. Thanks!
If you don’t mind thrifting, second hand is eco-friendly and though the clothing is not necessarily ethically made, it’s a way to buy new duds without giving money directly to the unethical companies. Buffalo Exchange is a great chain second-hand store with locations all over.
Thanks! I think I have a Buffalo Exchange around here! I do my best with thrifting but sadly most of the clothes I find seem to not work out one way or another. Salvation Army has let me down!
I haven’t actually bought anything here, but I like browsing here: fashioningchange.com
Ohhhh this looks cool. Thanks!
I love One Mango Tree, but I feel like everything they make is juuuuust mildly inappropriate for my business casual workplace. They make great summery basics though.
Oooooo this website is preeeettty! Thanks!! Their things definitely look a little casual but that’s not a bad thing!
Fair warning – their sizing is weird. I’d definitely size up if you’re ever in doubt. It took me a bit of messing around with their size chart, my measurements, and returns/exchanges before I figured out what fits me there.
I INSTALLED LIGHTING IN MY CLOSET LAST WEEKEND!!!!!
It feels oddly decadent (“I must be able to SEE my gorgeous clothing, I’m not some sort of no-closet-having peasant.”), if utterly practical as well. I also removed the craptacular sliding door, and hung curtains.
Blue walls, wrought iron bed, fancy-ass fleur de lis patterned curtains, VANITY TABLE! (tiny old writing desk I got at Goodwill for $30) My room, she is becoming FANCY.
Why do closets come with doors? They should always be curtained – and well-lit.
In my case, closets must have doors to hang racks on either side for shoes and towels and my outfit for the next work day. This would probably not be necessary if my closet were actually BIG enough to hold the stuff INSIDE of it, though.
I read “lightning,” like you went all Zeus and hung some lightning in your closet. Decadent, indeed.
I’m really more of a hearth goddess than a lightning god, so it’s a nice warm glow.
In my first apartment, I also converted an old table (again, cheap thrift store find!) into a vanity table. Having a pretty place to set my makeup and hair things and getting to sit down while I got ready made me feel 1000% more like a glamorous movie star every morning.
I keep saying that now that I have grown up money with a grown up job, I should buy “real” furniture. But, nope, the things I find at thrift stores and garage sales tend to be fantastic.
So my friends are buying a house, and apparently one of the things they have to do to make it pass inspection is install closet doors? Which I do not understand, because closet doors are huge and ugly and always broken and curtains are so much better. Maybe it’s some kind of safety thing with kids?
I just wanted to share this: my sister got back from a marine/outdoor education program last weekend (she’s in college), which involved her helping to sail a 130-foot-ish ship for 6 weeks in the Pacific Ocean, and she told me that two separate crew members who were supervising the voyage pulled her aside near the end of the trip to told her what a great leader and team member she is, and how she should be a deckhand, and if she were ever interested she should give them a call.
My mind is alight with the possibilities for her future. Hate your boss? Quit and take to the sea. Bad breakup? Take to the sea. Friday afternoon and you’re dissatisfied with your life? FUCKIN’ TAKE TO THE SEA.
(Her stories also made me more realistic about my own prospects for sea-taking. A lot of vomiting and wearing the same underwear for 4 days in a row for my comfort level.)
As someone who’s job occasionally requires her to take to the sea I will confirm that it’s not always as wonderful as Mallory makes it sound. The vomiting and the close quarters mostly.
This is SO COOL!!!!
She should start a business where she rents our her boat and her sailing expertise to frustrated women who need an escape. Then we could pay her to sail us around for an hour or two. I often think that I need to take to the sea, but I’m not sure if I’m ready for the commitment of buying a oat or leaving my old life behind. A “Take to the Sea Cruise Line” would be the perfect means to test out that lifestyle.
A three day cruise and you’re only allowed one pair of unders. I like this idea.
I dated a man who sailed on the Hawaiian Chieftain. He made it sound pretty great, but I am pretty sure I would not be a good sailor.
A high school friend of mine is an artist and a naturalist. Her “main” job involves taking small groups out in a high-speed raft to experience the natural glories of Monterey Bay in CA. Thus she can take to the sea regularly, but avoid the vomiting and non-underwear changing downsides.
I actully used to work for that very program, and it was utterly fantastic. The students were stellar and the crew was the best group of people I have ever encountered in a single place. Vomit is a perfectly surmountable obstacle, and I loved the community that grew in close quarters. I would whole-heartedly recommend being their deckhand, though it doesn’t pay any bills it also has promotion potential. In conclusion, I have in my youth taken to the sea, and it was indeed all it was cracked up to be. I miss it. (But I also missed seing my own bed occasionally).
Could y’all suggest books that are pleasant, easy reads – good for commutes, when one can’t quite face Middlemarch?
Suggest lots, because I often cant’ quite face Middlemarch.
Do you have a favourite genre?
Hmmm. Not really? I really enjoyed Hild and Wolf Hall, I’ve just finished almost all of the Whimsy mysteries and the Vorkosigan saga, and I’m saving the rest of Laurie Colwin for periods of extreme sadness. I want books where women are people and the author is kind to their characters.
Well, after Wolf Hall there’s Bring Up the Bodies, of course!ย
I also just finished Pamela Ribon’s memoir called Notes to Boys and Other Things I Shouldn’t Share In Public, and really liked it.
Oooo. Thank you!
If you like the Vorkosigan, Bujold’s Chalion series is also very very good. It’s fantasy, not scifi though.
It’s actually how I got into the Vorkosigan saga; it’s so good! Side chat on my favorite bits.
1.) The Bastard is the child of the Mother, not the Father.
2.) The Daughter is in charge of law enforcement.
3.) Iselle, Betriz, Ista! All of the characters, ever, yes.
Yay another Bujold fan! Who also like Sayers! Wow. (We are reading Hild right now.)
But what to recommend? Nicola Griffith’s other work is lovely, but she is the opposite of kind to her characters.
If you are able to be a fan of problematic things, and have either a good library or the money to buy not-very-expensive used books online, I highly recommend Jane Duncan’s “My Friend X” series, which is from the 1950s and 1960s and written by someone who was born in 1910, so it is somewhat problematic, but it has tons of women, and is funny and she is kind to her characters while not being too sentimental, and Duncan as an author does try to be progressive, she is not awful, but her views on some things (race in particular) are on the center-progressive edge of her time rather than being actually reasonable. Anyway, if that very confused recommendation made any sense, I would start with “My Friend Muriel.”
Mary Renault? But she is not kind to her characters. Maybe Rumer Godden, although we have not read her yet.
Oh oh oh, have you read Jo Walton?
I have not! There are things to try! Thank you!
Walton has written a lot of very different things, most of which I like, but her alternate-history fascist-Britain series I hate with the fiery passion of ten thousand suns. So do not read those! But read The King’s Peace & The King’s Name for alternate-world Arthuriana grounded in good history with a female knight as narrator, and read Tooth and Claw for Victorian property intrigue done by dragons, and read Among Others for real-world magic and coming-of-age-with-books and read Lifelode (I haven’t yet but I am going to) for medieval domestic stories like LeGuin says the world needs. And read ‘What Makes this Book So Great’ for recommendations for lots and lots of other books.
I love Ista so much. And all of Paladin of Souls especially. And numbers 1 & 2 on your list.
Cold Comfort Farm!
Anything Stella Gibbons, really.
These are both excellent ideas!
Yes! Nightingale Wood is pretty slight, but Westwood if you can find it (I think it got republished a few years ago?) is gorgeous.
Fair Play and/or The Summer Book, both by Tove Jansson
YES TO TOVE JANSSON. <3<3<3 It’s a quick read, perfect for transit. (and WONDERFUL.)
(It being The Summer Book.)
Both of them, really!
Oh! That one is excellent! The awful purple umbrella that makes them look like the worst sort of summer people! The Venice carving, and all the secret carved creatures in the woods! The cat who will not be loved!
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
I liked that one! Especially the bit where he falls down the ladder.
I didn’t realize until today that “The Others” is set on nearby Jersey island – which is interesting and evocative, but I cannot think of two more different pieces of media.
If Hitchhikers Guide to The Galaxy set in a pseudo-medieval fantasy realm sounds appealing, check out the Discworld series of novels by Terry Pratchett. They are light enough to read in commute length increments, but sharp and satisfying enough to read all in one go over an afternoon.
We have an entire shelf devoted to Pratchett, because we love him so. Out of curiosity, if you’re trying to lure someone into Discworld, what’s your go-to introductory book? I say Small Gods, and the spouse says Monstrous Regiment – I think he might be right.
And what did you think of Nation? I have feelings about it, and I haven’t quite figured them out.
I just recently got into Discworld (a few months ago) so despite my fervent evangelizing and growing collection of Terry Pratchett quotes I can’t comment on the big picture yet, only Reaper Man and backwards. I’ve been reading them in publication order- those in The Know say that this is apparently not the way to go but I actually liked the first four novels, so thankfully I wasn’t too alienated.
As far as getting into Pratchett- a friend and I were talking about Good Omens and she was like “Hey so all your favorite parts of Good Omens are basically just stuff from Discworld” which was enough to make me check it out. I would say the book that really hooked me into the series was Sourcery- which might be a good place to start because it not only has nice introductions to Ankh-Morpok, Rincewind, The Wizards, The Librarian, etc. but also because it really shows that Pratchett isn’t just about fantasy trappings + jokes, he’s also a fantastic writer and storyteller. And humanist. And just, wow, I wish finals would just hurry up and get done because now I want to just curl up and work my way through the rest of the series….
My books for that kind of situation are the Modesty Blaise series by Peter O’Donnell, the Phryne Fisher series by Kerry Greenwood, Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin, and the Dorothy Sayers books (which I know practically off by heart).
Did Sayers write stuff other than Whimsy? I am reaching Whimsy saturation.
The other ones sound good! Except Maupin; I read Tales of the City when I was in high school, and was perpetually horrified at all the bad decisions people made. They sunbathed! They had unprotected sex! Maybe it’s better when I’m not getting D.A.R.E. propaganda every day. I should try again.
The bad decisions are part of the charm for me! i think the only non-Wimsey book Sayers did was called Documents in the Case. Which is still good, but it’s not one I reread a lot. I almost don’t need the actual books in front of me now though, I know them so well. Ngaio Marsh’s Inspector Alleyn is in a similar vein though, and there are about 30 of them. I don’t have quite as big a crush on him as I do Lord Peter, but it’s a fairly close run thing.
Rory Alleyn is amazing, and should be enjoyed at every opportunity.
I love Lord Peter, but he is definitely best taken in small doses.
Albert Campion (Margery Allingham mysteries), on the other hand, is best when you feast upon his adventures in large chunks and wish you could take him home with you.
I’ve never gotten on with Campion but I have a very high Wimsey threshold. I’d definitely swap those two in that F/M/K article.
oh also if you enjoy charming 1930s young adult books about delightful British children having gentle sailing adventures: the Swallows and Amazons series by Arthur Ransome
I do enjoy that. That sounds like a delightful thing.
They are properly delightful.
I’ve enjoyed The City of Dark Magic and The City of Lost Dreams, by Magnus Flyte (who is really 2 women authors). They are just meaty enough and just sexy enough and just fun enough and just…enough.
Do you like mysteries? The Flavia de Luce mysteries by Alan Bradley are also extremely entertaining and charming. As chock-full of English eccentrics as one could wish for.
I want these things. Thank you!
We talk about it on a different post here, but Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl was a really fun read. Eleanor & Park is great, too, but a lot heavier. If you have any interest in chick lit at all, Meg Cabot is my favorite brand of fluff. And I tend to read a LOT of Nick Hornby–his essays about the books he’s buying and reading are just the best, and he’s released four collections.
I _loved_ Fangirl. I was super awkward my first all of college, and the stuff about missing the explanations due to extreme anxiety and then not knowing how to dining commons for WEEKS struck home a bit.
The Princess Diaries are of course delightful, and Size 12 is fun and fluffy – is there anything else good I should try?
Nick Hornby reviews books: I would read this. I tend to think that the purpose of neurotic men is to obsess over music and literature, and not go about writing more books about what it’s like to be a neurotic man, but then I think my brother identified with About a Boy the way I did with Fangirl, so maybe I should judge less?
If you like mysteries, Agatha Christie mysteries are a great commute read. It’s fashionable to say she’s a terrible writer, but she can spin a yarn that keeps you going. She writes a world that never really existed, so if you read them as fantasy, they are way more believable.
If you don’t like mysteries, the books she wrote as Mary Westmacott are good novel/novels. They are *not* romances, they are dissections of human relations and interactions (no ‘boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy and girl find each other again’ in these books), and are not at all like her murder mysteries. ‘Absent in the Spring’ is my favorite–a woman winds up alone at a waystation in the desert, waiting for transportation. Minus any of her usual diversions, she winds up reviewing her life in a very chilling (to the reader) fashion.
“Absent in the Spring” is such a good picture of a narcissist from the inside that it almost made me throw up when I read it in high school. My mother, there, in a book! By her favourite author, even!
I love Agatha Christie and all the intricate bits of a murder mystery. Also I love Christie Time, and the entire genre of British literature that denies the existence of the world wars.
Ohhhhh well then, read Josephine Tey! She was writing books in 1950ish that clearly take place in an odd alternate world in which the wars never happened. ๐
And in the Christie vein: Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham (both fairly famous, someone else mentioned Marsh), Patricia Wentworth (she did Miss Marple before Christie, actually, in the ‘female detective who is very Edwardian and no one realises how sharp she is), and Nicholas Blake (more serious/class-aware 30s stuff but still murder mystery fun.)
I have been re-reading and renewing my appreciation for Josephine Tey lately. She writes pretty engrossing mysteries, and Inspector Grant would be swoon-worthy if I weren’t so preoccupied with Albert Campion.
It’s too bad she only wrote 6 or 7 mysteries, but all of them are terrific. The Daughter of Time introduced me to the Wars of the Roses. And I always have trouble re-reading Miss Pym Disposes because the description of the world of adolescent girls is too painful.
One of my go-to happy reads: I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith.
Dodie Smith’s other books are also interesting reads although I Capture the Castle is really the best by far.
I have heard good things, but haven’t read it! I will do so!
I really liked Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures, The Book Thief, The Memory of All That, and anything by Rebecca Solnit. I liked Adventures with Extremists, by Jon Ronson, Fire and War (two separate books) by Sebastian Junger, OHHHH THE RED ROSE CREW! About the first women’s national crew team in 1976. I like Willa Cather a lot too and if you’re into other Western writers, Timothy Egan and Claire Vaye Watkins are really great.
Man, I liked The Book Thief, but I wouldn’t call it a “pleasant easy read”. If I read that on a commute, I would cry all through teaching. Is the other stuff similar in tone?
Haha fair enough! I’m sorry – I rarely get emotionally wrapped up in books and I sometimes forget that other people have hearts that are not ice cold. The other stuff definitely isn’t! Laura Lamont is a fiction story about a girl leaving Wisconsin for Hollywood in the 30’s/40’s and The Memory of All That is a memior by Gene Kelly’s first wife, so if you’re into mid-century Hollywood those are both good reads. Rebecca Solnit can be sad, so stay away from her memiors and read her histories instead. Adventures with Extremists is interesting but could be rage-inducing, he follows around religious and racial extremists but he reports on it with good humor.
Sebastian Junger isn’t “pleasant” necessarily, but moreso because they’re exciting, not upsetting (well War is pretty upsetting, don’t read that one). Timothy Egan is mostly historical writing, which I enjoy, and if you read Claire Vaye Watkins’s book Battleborn just skip the first story. Other stories she wrote are sad but not upsetting, necessarily.
I was probably not the best person to reply to this thread, given what you were looking for, but I can’t ever help myself put my two cents in when someone wants book recommendations.
Kat, Incorrigible by Stephanie Burgis. A middle grade regency fantasy romp. 12 year old Kat decides to learn magic (very unladylike) to save her sister from a marriage of convenience. A fun fast read, with great characters and sibling relationships.
A Trifle Dead by Livia Day. A fun murder mystery with gossip, glitter and shot glass trifles.
The Agatha Raisin series by MC Beaton. Follows Agatha Raisin, who has sold her London PR agency and retired to the Cotswolds, as she negotiates village life and gets caught up in an improbable number of murder cases. There’s a little bit of continuity, but basically no need to read them in order.
Excellent! Thank you. I do love escaping marriages of convenience.
Book recs, and lots of ’em, you say? (*Aside* The fool! Little do they know what they have unleashed upon the world!*)
Some SFF:
Martha Wells! Her current series- starting with The Cloud Roads- is set in a world with oodles of different intelligent species (the protagonist’s species shapeshifts to a winged form); she also has a series- it starts with The Wizard Hunters- with portals between a world with industry and a university for magic, and a much more pastoral world where all magicians turn evil; and a standalone, Wheel of the Infinite, whose protag is a middle-aged priestess and traitor; and a bunch more, and all of them are so good.
Rosemary Kirstein’s Steerswoman series is amazing- the heroine is in an order of a wandering scientist-librarians trying to make sense of the world.
Elizabeth Bear’s Eternal Sky trilogy is very cool, the heroes are a deposed prince, a princess who’s chosen to abdicate and become a wizard, and a nomadic herds woman, in a sort-of-Mongol-steppes setting. Her earlier series are very good too.
Diane Duane has a very humane worldview in all her stuff- I probably like best Stealing The Elf-King’s Roses, a police procedural set in an alternative LA, and her very early all-polyamory-all-the-time Tale of The Five books.
If you like YA, recently I’ve really liked Andrea Host, Rachel Neumeier, L. Shelby (Jade Sea series), Shannon Hale, M.C.A. Hogarth, and Sherwood Smith. And Diana Wynne Jones *hearts for eyes*.
Mysteries:
Have you tried Patricia Wentworth? Flourished 1930s-50s. I think her Miss Silver owes a lot to Miss Marple; they’re a bit formulaic but very easy to read.
Margery Allingham I like very very nearly as much as Sayers; her series about Albert Campion does quite a fun thing where one book is thriller-style, and one is a country-house mystery, and one is a cozy, and so on.
Hazel Holt is modern rather than Golden Age. The heroine is a widowed writer in a small town; they’re cozies, I suppose, but not the twee end of cozy with recipes at the end (I mean, I like those too sometimes, but these are moreโฆ realistic?)
Charlotte Macleod is definitely at the humorous end of the cozy, and damn good with it. I prefer the Sarah Kelling ones (set among the Boston Brahmins) to the Peter Shandy ones (set in a small college town in Maine), but they’re both good.
Lindsay Davies’s Falco series, set in the early Roman Empire, are excellent for the first half-dozen and then go off a bit.
I think the Inspector Bones series by Staynes and Storey (sold in the US as by Susannah Stacey) are out of print, but you can probably get them second hand.
Otherwise: Flora Thompson’s Lark Rise series is a fictionalisation of her childhood in a small English village in about the 1890s. (It’s sort of elegiac, because she moved away to a town and the world changed around the countryfolk anyway, but it’s not sad.)
Colette has lots of awful things happen to her characters in her novels, but if you stick to the non-fiction and lightly fictionalised memoirs, it’s mostly lovely. Hugely vivid sensual descriptions of nature, loving memories of her mother, a picture of life as a travelling music-hall act in a vanished Franceโฆ try My Mother’s Garden or The Evening Star.
Helene Hanff. (That is all.)
Someone else who has heard of Wentworth, wow! I must try these other books because our tastes look pretty similar.
And much much love for the Steerswoman books, they are amazing, they are the only spec-fic *about the scentific method* I have ever read.
Excellent!
You might also like Ruth Dudley Edwards? Her first one was Corridors of Death- they’re about a civil servant who keeps ending up near murders. Again I think the first five or six are the best, but that’s partly because Edwards keeps giving a secondary character more and more page time and I find her a bit overwhelming, so YMMV.
What are some recent American mystery authors you like?
I love Martha Wells stuff, and love that she’s invested in diverse world-building (on her website she’s got a huge list of scifi/fantasy books that don’t fall into European-centric stories).
And on Diane Duane, my favorite will always be her Young Wizards series. Probably one of my favorite YA fantasy series ever.
My home is in boxes (I’m moving at the end of the month), my student workers have been sick/ on vacation so I’ve had a lot of 7am-7pm days. But things aren’t bad! Things are marginally okay. And I will make whiskey sours after work and catch up on GoT with my cat. There is still good in the world: The Good Wife is amazing, there was cake in the break-room and I ordered those ALA Avengers posters for the library.
I feel you. Moving is for sucks (see me upthread).
Whiskey sours sound lovely, I envy you the ability to drink from things that are not already packed.
Those ALA Avengers posters are amazing!!! Seriously considering buying them for my apartment…
I will never stop whimpering about the lack of Hawkeye in almost 100% of Avengers merchandise. GUYS, HE’S THE BEST.
He is! I just finished cross-stitching the naked Hawk-block
(my stitching,but I did not create the pattern- I can find the url for the pattern if anybody wants it)
You are a hero.
I know nothing about the Avengers but I know that this is WONDERFUL.
Instead of eating his breakfast this morning, my four-year-old hrew it in the trash. Then he lied to me about it. When I found it he feigned complete shock. The first time he lied to me, I told him the story of “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”, but I sugarcoated the ending. Not this time. Let him think that if he tries that with me again he just might get eaten by wolves.
The best thing about raising children is teaching them about the horrible fates that await them for making the mildest of transgressions.
Or at least, that’s what I imagine. I don’t have children for good reason.
He sounds like a dirtbag. ๐
My daughter is 4 1/2 and she is really going to town with the lying; we have had some quite fascinating conversations about her rationale behind it and the social skills it might be useful for and about eighty-seven other things. But it does not make it any less frustrating, especially because she gets this totally wicked grin right before she comes out with her blatant untruths.
Would you like to see a grainy cell phone video of my cat walking around on two legs like a person? yes. you would.
https://vimeo.com/94673161
It is only four seconds but she does not do it on command, only when I am ignoring her, to make me pay attention, so it is hard to capture. She walks all around the apartment like this when the fancy takes her.
If this does not make her internet famous like so many other less deserving cats then you are all fools.
I think if you created a Kickstarter to buy camera equipment to properly capture this you would probably make a million dollars and get a movie contract.
this feels dark and wrong and ominous and I need to see more, immediately
Taking a semi-spontaneous trip next week, and GUESS WHAT MODE OF TRANSPORTATION I AM USING TO GET THERE, MALLORY.
Hoping the experience of Watching America Pass Me By makes up for the laughable delays in this part of the country. I’d also hope to get there within four or five hours of the scheduled arrival time, but let’s not get greedy.
I’m reading My Boyfriend Barfed In My Handbag and let me tell you, the part where she recommends dry mopping your hardwood floors after damp mopping to get rid of water spots was an EPIPHANY. I feel like an imbecile for having overlooked the obvious for so long…but I can’t wait to go home and mop my floors today.
All the best cleaning advice makes me feel like an imbecile because it is so very obvious in retrospect, but I never ever would have thought of it on my own.
Oh, I’m so excited to read that!
Personal finance thread?
I succeeded in bringing my lunch to work every day for a second week! This was out of necessity because I have been really cash poor. Today I got paid + some reimbursements work owed me. I’m rich! But I’m not because all that money ‘belongs’ somewhere.
I’m sending pretty big chunks of money out the door to pay for:
-Plane ticket to a wedding (love you friends, please stop getting married)
-Plane ticket to PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND for August
-Significant donation to former student who is marching drum corps this summer. I wasn’t able to march corps in college because I couldn’t afford it, I’m very happy to be in the position to help another person out of that jam.
Really happy I am able to afford all of this in cash instead of putting it on a credit card – which is where I would have been about 2 years ago. What are you spending money on or not spending money on fellow Toasties?
Weddings, specifically traveling to them. And bachelor’s parties. I am spending so much on traveling for wedding-related purposes.
Yay, personal finance! It was my birthday this past week, so I splashed out a tiny bit and bought myself books and a beautiful hank of yarn. Still stayed within my budget though, which I’m reasonably proud of. I joined Mint a few months ago and I’ve been very happy with it; it’s really helped me track things better and set a solid budget. That said, of course, I was in the hospital for three days last month for appendicitis, and I’m anxiously waiting for those bills to show up. I’ve got pretty good health insurance /and/ a FSA, thank God, but that’s still a pile of cash- and if I spend the rest of my FSA on covering the hospital stay, I won’t have a reserve to cover doctor’s visits and blood draws and medication (I’ve got a couple of chronic conditions, so those are unavoidable and they mount up). Stupid unpredictable life. At least my appendix is gone now.
Happy Birthday! Getting appendicitis is one of the expensive scenarios that really scares me. I’m glad you have a plan in place to cover it. I hope it isn’t ridiculously expensive.
Mint! I need to log on again and categorize some stuff. The graphs are my favorite, especially the net income graph.
Thank you! I’ll be able to get through it fine, it just puts me further in debt that I’m working hard to get out of. >:( But I am healthy, which is the important part. I might just end up pushing back that major dental work by another year or two.
Oh, I also treated myself for my birthday and bought kind of a fancy pocketknife and I’m super excited about it.
Don’t take it on any planes while you’re traveling for those weddings. Happy Birthday!
I crumbled after a year or so of resisting and bought myself a 3DS, and also Animal Crossing to go with it. But now, I am of course severely tempted to buy all the 3DS games I didn’t before because I had no system to play them on. It doesn’t help that I can easily download demos now, I can play just far enough that I’m hooked enough to want to buy it right away! But that is the point.
So I have made a rule for myself, and that rule is that I can buy one more game this summer (realistic for me, I am not an obsessive gamer) for my trip to Boston in June/July. If anyone has any suggestions, I welcome them! (although I am leaning toward Fire Emblem: Awakening at this point).
I overindulged and bought some vidya games, nice craft beer, and new shoes all in the past weekend. I am living the life of decadent luxury! Though the new shoes might have been a need rather than a want, as my previous pair has some seriously visible holes.
Way to go! I spent a bunch of money updating my bed situation (actual decent sheets, comforter, pillows worth sleeping on). I’m trying to be a bit more responsible with food and booze spending, but it’s a way to deal with bad work situations, so… :/
I updated my bed situation early this year! New mattress, frame and sheets. No regrets, I love it so. I’ve been there on the food and booze. No good answers.
This month I have paid vet bills (elderly horse had some swollen bits which could have just been old-man circulation getting a bit rubbish like old people with swollen ankles, or could have been the start of heart failure, so I paid ยฃ60 for the vet to tell me he is an old man with swollen ankles), bought other horse a new blanket for next winter because they were on sale and her current one has started rubbing her, and several bits and pieces on Amazon before knowing I had to buy the aforementioned necessary things. Typical!
My last direct debit comes out today though, so I know that anything left in the account after the horse stuff has come out of it is mine to play with.
I am going to PEI in August too! It’s my first time. What are you planning to do there?
Decadence! The other day, I came home and started making dinner and only after I made the dressing for the avocado-cucumber salad did I notice that the avocado was just a little bit too firm to be ideal in a saladโฆ
โฆ so I dredged that fucker in panko, deep-fried it, and served us each one half filled with sweet miso dressing on a bed of paper-thin cucumbers. And then with every bite, I said a loud and unashamed “MMMMMMM” or “OH YEAH” or “this is good!”
Also unashamed: I am promoting my Mother’s Day film essay here at The Toast alllllllll over the place. It’s always surprising to me how hard it is to boldly promote my own work without any foot-shuffling or apology or diffidence, even though (shhhhh don’t tell) I’m beamingly proud of how it turned out, and especially the conclusion.
I ate quinoa for lunch yesterday and barley for dinner last night and my stomach has informed me that it is distinctly unhappy with this much fiber in so short a time. Blurp. I might have an all-toast dinner tonight.
On an unrelated topic, I’m going to San Diego next week! And it’s for work, so I’m getting put up in a fancy hotel and having my meals comped, aw yiss. Does anyone have recommendations for good restaurants in the downtown area (like around the convention center)?
Wellllll my first recommendation would be to get out of the Gaslamp District (aka the downtown area). It’s, you know, fine. But there’s just not very much that’s interesting there! If you’re OK with taking a short cab ride to some places, I would recommend:
-Monkey Paw in Golden Hill
-Urban Solace in North Park
-Hash House A Go Go in Hillcrest
-OB Noodle House in Ocean Beach
-Las Candelas on Coronado Island (which is a little gimmicky, but best views of any restaurant in town, in my opinion)
Thanks for the heads-up! I’ll look into those!
Oh my god Hash House I am still full from the last breakfast I got there 8 years ago they give you so much fucking food.
I had forgotten about that place completely!
Peoples familiar with St. Louis: we’re planning a weekend road trip to St. Louis and I would welcome suggestions of things to do while we’re there.
Constraints, interests: We have a toddler (19 months, eats pretty much anything and is generally well-behaved). We love food (local hole-in-the-wall >>>>>>> national chain, cocktails and beer, as well as walking and shopping. We’re thinking about Grant’s farm for the little guy. We’ll be staying downtown. We’re driving from Chicago and considering driving a stretch along the Mississippi as well.
Any suggestions would be welcome!
The big one is the City Museum. It’s a giant, trippy playground– imagine if a Chuck. E. Cheese was designed to please stoned adults. And if you’re driving down the Mississippi, stop in Hannibal and get the onion rings and root beer at the Mark Twain Dinette.
Thanks very much! As luck would have it, one of our best friends actually grew up in Hannibal (he even painted the picket fence at Mark Twain’s home as part of a restoration business that they had!), so I think we should make it part of the trip.
oh god I wanna do the City Museum so much!
Imo’s pizza A++++++++++++
Also, the zoo is amazing.
If you go to Grant’s Farm, go see the mama and baby Clydesdales–giant baby horses! They also have an extra fee tour where you can see behind the scenes with the Clydesdales, which is fun, but may be a bit long for a toddler, it’s like an hour and a half tour.
City Museum! yes, yes, yes. (someday, when I win the lottery, I’m going to buy one of the City Museum condos as a weekend getaway–)
Missouri Botanical Gardens.
the zoo.
it’s kind of out of the way, but The Fountain on Locust has great food and fantastic ice cream, and interesting cocktails.
Ted Drew’s Frozen Custard!
Mangia Italiano on Grand–there’s many good places to eat on South Grand.
Either of the Schlafly spots: Bottleworks or the Taproom. Good pub food and Schlafly products, including one or two on tap only brews that never go anywhere else.
Left Bank Books downtown. New and used books, adjacent cafe/winebar thing, cool local postcards.
All these suggestions are great! I second the Schlafly Taproom (which is downtown) good food and great beer. There is also 4 Hands brewery close to downtown. They make great beer too.
Our zoo is one of the best around and it is FREE! Our art museum and science museum are also free. Forest Park and Tower Grove park are both beautiful and worth a visit.
Local Harvest Cafe in the Tower Grove neighborhood is a good place for lunch if you are interested in locally sourced food. Imo’s pizza is definitely worth trying, but it can be an acquired taste. I prefer Pi pizza, which is my favorite.
The Delmar Loop is fun to stroll around for an afternoon; boutique shops and great restaurants. St. Louis has great food and beer. Hope you enjoy your visit!
My ladyfriendpartnerperson and I just bought a house. Your move, adulthood.
wOO!
Woo!
*adulthood leans back in its chair and coldly surveys the pieces on the board*
But seriously, congrats to you and ladyfriendpartnerperson!
Oh, yay! So fun, and so grown-upy!
For anyone following the SmrtCookie Tries to Buy a House Saga- I was under contract, the inspection was settled, and then the house didn’t appraise. And the sellers won’t agree to another appraisal so I’ve almost certainly lost the house. Which is why I was late to open thread, I had to go ugly cry in my car. Y’all, this sucks.
Oh no!! I remember losing the first house I put an offer on. I found out while I was in the car with my boss, so I couldn’t ugly cry. I feel you. It sucks.
Oh no, how frustrating! I’m sorry, what a disappointment.
Yesterday I had a minor professional meltdown triggered by my inability to schmooze. How do all of you fellow socially anxious people deal with schmoozing?
I had RSVP’d to an “informal meeting” at a private lounge. A working group I’ve been on for a while is merging with another group, so it was supposed to provide a way for us all to meet.
I suck at schmoozing. In formal meetings, I am stellar, but small talk? Well, I’m not dismal, but there is a high risk that people meeting me for the first time completely underestimate just how much I kick ass at my actual job. I wouldn’t have agreed to go at all, but I wanted to see the inside of this mysterious swanky lounge.
And I injured my foot last weekend, so on top of everything, I’m limping. So, I started to wonder if I should attend, since I’m already disadvantaged at this kind of event, not to mention hobbled and physically uncomfortable. I reached out to friends, none of whom apparently have experienced social anxiety. Everyone was all, “Go! No one cares if you limp! You are funny and brilliant and charming, I don’t believe you can’t do small talk!” Which made it even WORSE, because then I started to feel shame for being socially awkward.
Anyway, I finally got a chance to talk it out with my bf, who initially thought I should suck it up and go. When I explained that I didn’t want my first impression for these (decidedly very important) people to be awkward and uncomfortable, he immediately got it. Noone will notice if I wasn’t there, and I could make my first impression at a real meeting, where everyone will be all, “who is that eloquent, yet down-to-earth chick spouting amazing insightful ideas?”
So I sent a last-minute, apologetic but vague cancellation, went home and ordered pizza and played Skyrim and all is right with the world.
Ahhh! I know exactly what you’re talking about. I say good on you for doing what you needed to. I also tend to weigh those kinds of situations and tend to lean on the if you’re comfortable you’re probably going to come off better.
Exactly! It’s not that I COULDN’T do it, but why risk making a “meh” impression on someone when I know I can make a much better (and more accurate) impression on them later? I already have enough hurdles to overcome being a young-ish looking woman – why make it more difficult than it has to be?
Professional small talk is agonizing, I’m with you! Excellent choice!
It can be so agonizing. I can handle maybe 15 or 20 minutes, but this was a three hour event. Yikes.
Although a friend of mine from grad school, who is super poised and professional, gave me some great advice yesterday. She basically said that people think the point of these events is to stand around and talk, when really the best thing is to stand around and LISTEN. I was bowled over by how brilliant that was. It is totally going to change the way I prep for these events, for sure.
Yes, this! The strategy working the best for me, so far, is to prepare by making a list of questions, which I memorize but also tuck into my pocket. I schedule trips to the Ladies’ Room every 20 minutes as a reward/respite. I check my list and congratulate myself for the number of questions I was able to ask and the number of people I was able to listen to. Numbers. It’s a game, see? Then I go out and try to better my score.
THAT IS AMAZING. This is my new strategy.
My student staff assistant gave me advice yesterday. He said when he first came to university he was awful at small talk / professional interactions, so he would chose small moments each day to talk to strangers. Just like, a brief sentence to someone in the elevator. I thought it was an interesting way to challenge yourself to be more comfortable talking to people, they are strangers who will be gone in the next 30 seconds, so low pressure.
I had a boss tell me that, too! It is very good advice. I’ve actually gotten sort of okay at it, practicing on people at the store and such. It’s the prolonged discussions that get me. I can do fine at a social party, where you can always escape to get a drink/go to the bathroom/get a snack, but business events are still difficult.
I would have done exactly the same thing. Go wow them in your first meeting!
That’s it, time to get focused and serious with my artwork (Emily Carr ’93 alumni-woot!) because nothing else has worked out for me and honestly, in the words of Flannery O’Connor, it’s the only thing I’m good at.
SO…after slowly falling apart for the last 20+ years, I have a very small body of work (collages and mixed media) that I feverishly created in the last 2 months (the threat of a complete nervous breakdown turned out to be a wonderful motivator). I want to take a portion to a Nelson, B.C. based printer to create a series of art cards that I can then flog at farmer’s markets, gift shops, etc.
But I’m hampered with self-doubt and a crippling fear of “this is totally laughable and utter shit” and if I fail as an artist, then what little sense of self I have will just go “poof” and wink out and that scares me to death.
Where the fuck was I going with this?
Right…wish me luck, Toasties, I’m phoning the printer’s today and getting the ball rolling!
Oh, do it. Do it, be brave, just follow your little heart, it will be hard but you will also be so glad you did it.
Understand, I wouldn’t say this to just anyone who is “following their bliss” or whatnot, but if it has truly been in the back of your mind for years and it is only fear keeping you back, and people like your work, then GO FOR IT. It is not laughable, it is wonderful, and you are not the first person to make an honest-to-god living doing art, I promise.
Everyone tells stories about how bullshit it is to be an artist because, frankly, a lot of people who want to be artists really just want to do nothing all day and hang out with friends and maybe tap out a few lines on the typewriter twice a week. They’re not actually working hard at their art. And that’s probably 97% of artists, those people, which is why everyone says it’s unrealistic.
But if you take the 3% of people who work hard at their art? Those people are nearly ALL successful. Seriously, the success rate is ridiculous for people who actually work hard at improving and pitching their stuff and trying new ways to get their art in front of different people. You sound like you’re going to work hard, and you are good at what you do because you have worked hard, and I know of many artists just like you who succeeded wonderfully because they had those two qualities.
None of them are millionaires. But they all put food on the table and make their car payments and pay their rent solely with the proceeds from their art, and they are fully-functional people who are very happy in their lives. Go for it. I believe in you.
Oh gosh, you made me cry (in the best way!). Thanks for the encouraging and kind words!
Sent from my iPad
Good luck!
How did your debut big ride with the anxious horse go the other week?
Sorry for the late response, I was out at the farm! The ride was cancelled due to inclement weather so yay, more practice time with Big Red!
I’m going to New York this weekend! Where should I eat/what fun thing should I be doing? (Note: I’m going to be with my parents, so while they’re cool and everything, probably no burlesque shows.) Thanks!!
If the weather is nice, High Line Park in Chelsea, Central Park, and Brooklyn Bridge are all good, easily accessible destinations. Chelsea Market is pretty close to High Line and that’s super cool, too, plus it has a mini-flea market on site. If it’s not so amazing outside, the Museum of Natural History is quite wonderful. Plus, it’s pay at will and right near Central Park in case it warms up. This stuff’s all pretty touristy, I know, but that’s part of the fun of being here, and it’s not Times Square.
Walk a lot, eat many bagels, take advantage of Tickets Tickets [http://www.tdf.org/TDF_ServicePage.aspx?id=56] for discounted shows.
You guys, one of my office mates has a cough, and he’s a great coworker and a wonderful human being and a general delight and I swear to every god that has ever existed that I am going to strangle him.
Do it! I want to see you on the news! ๐
Maybe you could passive agressively leave a bag of cough drops on his desk.
ETA: This came off far less lighthearted than I intended. I am in a mood.
He just walked in with two giant bags of cough drops, the world is saved. (your comment sounded pretty lighthearted to me, although I am also in A Mood, so maybe we’re just on the same wavelength)
Would anybody like to be involved in a Toastie mix CD swap?
Just email me at figwiggin at gmail with your name/username, mailing address, whether you’re willing to ship internationally, and any info you’d like your swap partner to have (ie “make me a mixtape about Dirtbag Teens” or “I hate Eddie Vedder” etc.), and I’ll hook you up with a swap partner and you’ll get a cool mix CD from a cool Toastie in the mail!
Even if you think you’re not “good at mixtapes,” it’s a lot of fun!
My cousin’s first novel came out this week! It’s a Middle Grade fantasy story, and it’s unlike a lot of the typical offerings in that area, with a very reflective protagonist in a dreamlike fairy tale setting where many things are left unexplained (as opposed to an action-hero protagonist living in a dungeon master’s fantasy world where all the details are spelled out). It’s been well-received: Kristin Cashore and Franny Billingsley praised it highly, and it got starred reviews in The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books and in Publisher’s Weekly (also in Kirkus, but who cares about them).
I am super happy for my cousin, because this is what she’s wanted since we were little: she’s been writing stuff since she was old enough to write stuff. It is so surreal to hear her voice in the pages of a published novel that I hold in my hands, to read reviews of her work in big-name journals, etc. when it seems not that long ago that we were writing the scripts to puppet shows together.
Weird, weird, weird. tl;dr My genes are obviously awesome.
oooohhh. That book looks good, and I LOVE Franny Billingsley. Also, I love Seraphina, and the plot summary reminds me of that as well. My library does not appear to have it, but the ebook price is not bad, so I think I may purchase it.
Oooh, that looks really interesting! I’ll add to my list of books to buy!
Whoops, I meant Young Adult, not Middle Grade.
Wow, this looks great! My daughter loves fantasy YA in general and Serafina in particular, so I’ll be getting this for her soon. Very cool.
On behalf of my cousin, thanks!!
I should say that it is slow-paced compared to your average YA, and it leaves some conflicts unresolved. I think it’s like that for good reasons, and I also think it’s cool that it bucks a lot of current trends – but if it turns out not to be your daughter’s cup of tea, my cousin won’t take offense (especially because there’s no way she could know)!
For me, today, decadence means doing my best to finish all of today’ work by 1pm and catching up on The Toast posts for the rest of the day.
And tonight, I fly to Portland, OR for a dance competition tomorrow!
I have a friend who is driving me absolutely crazy with flakiness/disrespect for other people’s time this week. I like her enormously and would like to keep thinking of her as a friend, but in this one particular area she is just SO AGGRAVATINGLY RUDE. I don’t know, any of y’all have any tips on how to keep a flaky person as a friend when you are by nature an uptight schedule-following person?
My most effective (for my emotional health, at least) response is to remind myself that it’s not personal, it’s just how they are, and also to only invite them to things that they won’t ruin by not showing up. Meeting up at a bar with a bunch of friends? Yes. Going to lunch just the two of you? No, unless you genuinely wouldn’t mind having lunch by yourself.
As someone who has been a flaky friend, I promise that it is, truly, not personal. When I’ve ducked out of social commitments or left emails unanswered for months, it was because I did not have my act together, and not because I thought to myself, “Hm, what should I do today? How about… hurt my friends?”
A flaky friend is not a cool thing to be, and all flaky friends should actively strive to unflake themselves, and it is perfectly okay for you to not put up with your friends’ flakiness – but, on behalf of flakes everywhere, I maintain that we flake out on stuff not because we hate you, but because we are kind of a mess.
I have those friends. So aggravating. I tend to only invite those people to unstructured group things where it won’t ruin my night if they don’t show or are way late, or to always meet them at my house so I can watch netflix until they show up.
I’m not by nature super schedule-following, but I have some impressively flaky friends. I second the recommendation to invite them to group events where if they’re an hour late you’ll just be an hour further into funtimes with other people! It’s why I do parties at my house.
Oh, I hear you. I spent a lot of my youth living with/navigating around a person of unparalleled flakiness. I know it wasn’t personal, but it made me hate doing things with him; even on the rare occasions when he did show up on time, I spent the minutes or hours leading up to it in a swivet. So after a while, I changed how I socialized with him.
A few of my boundary-setting methods:
– Schedule events with them that will be fun and feasible even if they don’t show up. I stopped making plans that relied upon his promptness or even his presence. No more plans alone together unless I’d be just as happy doing them on my own. No more waiting around for him to show up and making myself late. No more carpooling/traveling together. No more buying two tickets; if he wants to go, he could buy his own ticket.
– during the initial trying-to-plan stuff overture, I started including a deadline. Along with any invitation, I would say “If I don’t hear from you by [whenever], I’ll assume you’re not coming.” That took the pressure off him to remember or reply, and took the anxiety out of it for me because I just assumed it was “No” unless he replied in time.
– I upped the spontaneous outings: “Hey, I had a hankering for ice cream, do you want to meet in 15 minutes?” or “I made pesto, wanna come over for dinner tonight?” or “I’m on my way to [movie], if you can make it, I’ll see you there.” My temper-preserving rule about not having one-on-one plans that he’d ruin by flaking dramatically reduced the amount of time we spent together; introducing more spur-of-the-moment outings made up for that, and he wouldn’t flake on something 15 minutes in the future.
This was my earliest conscious introduction to the idea that people are going to be whoever they are, that you can’t expect to change it, and that you can only change your own boundaries, whether that means never seeing them or deciding what circumstances make an ongoing relationship rewarding for you. It wasn’t a perfect solution, but it helped a lot.
Fantastic advice. I admit to zero patience. I will drop a friend after two flaky episodes. However, I have a family member who is flaky. I will never drop her because she is family. So, yes to all of your strategies. For family. And I salute your patience with flaky friends. You are a true friend.
Nah, I was a passive-aggressive jackass who wanted things her way and only her way, and who had several ploys to get that, but I’m not passing on any of those strategies here because they were unkind and made everyone miserable. (It was a long time ago; I think I’m kinder now, but I’m also more protective of my own happiness.)
I can sympathize with someone who drops a friend after one or two flaky episodes, because even knowing it’s not personal doesn’t make it sting less to be forgotten or blown off. I also know that I’ve been plenty flaky myself when life got complicated, so 1. I try to figure out if the person’s flakiness is circumstantial and fleeting or a bone-deep characteristic; 2. if I like someone, I try to fit them into my life in a way that’s comfortable for everyone.
I second everyone’s not advice not to schedule your life around them. I am chronically late, but if I make plans with you, I will keep them come hell or high water. I am also both a planner and usually the one who initiates plans. I have one friend who will initiate plans, flake, and then claim that it was all a big misunderstanding on your part or that she was waiting for more info from you. We live in different cities now, but she does it with Skyping. So after another episode of flakiness, I will agree to a time when I was already planning to be home and not busy vs. planning my day around our Skype date. When we lived in the same city, I would make plans with our more reliable friends first and then give her the details, or make backup plans if it was just the two of us hanging out.
With a friend who lives nearby (and who is just hyper and overcommits herself), I’ve started calling/texting the day I want to hang out and see what her plans are. If we meet up, it’s usually me joining in on her plans or her coming over. I also assume she’ll be about an hour later than she says to any event we attend together. It’s not perfect, but it keeps us more in sync.
Flakiness drives me crazy, but I’ll live with it as long as I think it’s just part of that person’s personality and not that they’re ditching me/our plans for anything better that comes along. The first is frustrating, the second hurts.
I have a friend like that. She used to drive me absolutely nuts, but I finally (somewhere down the line) learned to only invite her to events where her absence would not be a night-ruiner and to expect her not to show up. That way, when she DOES show up, it’s a nice surprise, and I’m not getting repeatedly disappointed because she ended up not coming.
This has also turned our friendship from one that used to be very close and tight to one that is more friendly-acquaintancey in nature, because I’m not the type of person who can rely on a complete flake to be a close confidante like that. But we’re in a place where we’re comfortable and the constant flakiness is no longer causing fights and angst between us, it’s just accepted as part of who she is.
So, on employee appreciation day at work this week I found out that 4 of my coworkers were getting promotions ahead of me.
See, I work for a government agency that has, for decades, hired staff on contractually, without benefits, when they should really be permanent. They’ve been trying to rectify this for a few years by slowly giving out reclassifications. But the higher ups are virtually silent about the hows, whens and whys of all of this and we get zero actual communication about what’s going on. I was due for my reclass this year, according to absolutely everyone and we all heard we were getting permission to do 6. So I have been waiting for good news for over a month.
On Monday one of my coworkers told me that she had been given the reclass along with 3 other people she knew of. But she had been told a month ago! Another one of my coworkers was told he wasn’t getting it this year. After hearing this, I flipped my shit and went to my boss. She didn’t know anything about it, and said she’d ask her boss, but she was somewhat reluctant to press for any information. I was left fuming for days, but finally on Wednesday, I found out that I wasn’t not getting reclassed, but I wasn’t getting reclassed right now. Which could mean that I get it in July or I have to wait until next year.
July isn’t sooooo bad, but I’m already so bitter about the way I’ve been treated at this place. When I was hired (rehired really, but it’s a long story) my boss told me that I would be hired on as an intern but in a few months I could get a contract. Nope. It took over a year and only as an afterthought when they got one for someone else. In that same time I was doing way more than I’d been hired to do. And since getting my contract I’ve been regularly planning strategies and writing policies for my organization. I’ve also been supervising interns and an actual fellow employee (hoo boy was that a clusterfuck, let’s not get into that!). Basically, I’m sick of this place and the constant mismanagement.
But! I’ve been working here for 7 years! I was basically an infant when I started. And I feel somewhat trapped. I have a graduate degree and years of experience, but because of our systems I don’t actually feel that qualified for other jobs. And I’m not even sure if I want to do them! I’ve made my own little kingdom at this place and I kind of like it. And I sort of wish I had just been told I wasn’t getting the promotion so I would feel really motivated to leave, but as it is I feel very torn.
And my husband works in the same field and just got a crazy promotion, which I am super excited about, but also super jealous of! Why can’t I have a competent workplace and be well-compensated too!?
/rant
Are you me? I’m a government contractor and my agency is starting to convert contractors to feds too. But the first person the pick? The woman who is never at work, has the lowest productivity possible, and has about the same level of expertise as I did as a freshman in college. Not that i’m bitter. (I’m totally bitter, fuck that.)
Uggggh I am so sorry this is happening to you.
What is it about your organization’s mismanagement that you feel leaves you unqualified for other jobs? You’ve managed projects, managed people (!), developed long term strategies, policies, and plans, have an advanced degree – all of that are skills you can translate to tons of other places! Don’t let the fact that your organization’s hiring and promoting policies suck hold you back from promoting yourself to other places, you are absolutely qualified for other positions.
It’s mostly what damngoodcoffee said below, but I do tend to get down on myself when I should look at all the stuff you just listed and be really proud of myself. So thank you! I need to try to keep all that in mind while job-hunting!
Oh yeah, and I’m back from Austria and Slovenia and I met ms_whatwhat and she was incredibly charming and I’m still kinda jetlagged but I’m at work anyway and woooooooooooo
aaaw ๐ It was lovely to meet you and I’m glad to see you made it in time for your super-early flight!
Welcome back!
The coworker I dislike has been away at a conference since Wednesday, and it is amazing. It is SO PEACEFUL in here, guys.
I don’t have to worry about her passive-aggressive digs at my boss, or her endless ramblings about whatever she’s not eating this week, or how horribly busy she is all the time. Just … silence.
That’s so lovely — the co-worker I can’t stand is also gone this week, and it’s been totally amazing.
The coworker I dislike and who is ALWAYS up in my business is going away for 2.5 weeks soon! I CANNOT WAIT!!!!!!!
That sounds AWESOME.
I don’t remember who revealed the magic of propagating succulents, about a month back, but whoever you are, I pour out my thanks. I have a whole ARMY of adorable baby succulents now, and that makes me obscenely happy.
can you c/p what the magic was?
It was this!
I just chopped off a bunch of my succulents’ little clusters of buds, let them callous over, then stuck them in more dirt and watered them lightly…and they grew new roots! Very exciting.
Sorry that I’m late to Open Thread this week! It was me.
My succulents are doing great too! I had two different kinds of succulents I was trying to propagate, and it’s interesting to see the differences between them. One definitely grows more quickly/propagates more readily than the other, but both kinds are now sprouting roots/tiny plants in pots on my back deck. It makes me ridiculously happy too! I’m glad I could help spread the magic.
I also found this site to be useful as well (and it has lots of gorgeous photos too): http://www.succulentsandsunshine.com/propagating-…
Anyone have good work advice on responding to a negative review? I just found out there have been complaints about my work. I’m torn because a) perhaps they should have mentioned those to me first instead of going to my manager? but b) I know I’ve been distracted lately and my productivity has suffered. Any advice on the best way to respond to this? Should I contact the people who made complaints and apologize/ask for more advice? Or should I just try to do better?
I’m frustrated (at myself as much as at them) because I’ve been here for three years and I’m making about 3% more than when I started. I want to be paid more and valued more but at the same time I feel like I don’t deserve it. Ugh.
I came very close to saying “well, I’ve been distracted because I’m pregnant” but restrained myself because I don’t really think that’s to blame so why contribute to negative stereotypes about pregnant women? Ugh. I’m upset. At them and myself.
They should have mentioned it to you, but they didn’t. If you feel that it’s more appropriate to respond to your manager about this, go to him/her & ask how you can improve. If you feel that it’s something you should address with the person, go to them and ask the same thing. Don’t apologize. If your productivity hasn’t been great, just say that you’re going to change that.
I TOTALLY understand being frustrated at yourself. Just resolve to do better. You got this.
I think it depends a little on who complained and how you interact with them. Like, are they senior to you and do they have influence over your pay/job/etc? Or are they the same level? Do they depend on you for certain parts of their work? If your performance directly impacts them, it couldn’t hurt to have a conversation about it. Don’t get defensive, but say that you understand what their complaint is and you’re trying to fix it, and encourage them to talk with you directly before going to your manager if they have further concerns.
But if they don’t really interface with you and they’re just complaining, screw ’em and just make sure your relationship with your boss doesn’t suffer.
I’d talk to my boss first and acknowledge the complaints/issues and then say what I was going to do to correct them (or ask what I should do to correct them, if that’s more appropriate for the situation). When managers have issues with your work, they want the issues to improve – it’s not personal (at least it doesn’t sound like it is here) and so an apology isn’t necessary, just an acknowledgement that you understand and are going to fix the problem.
Toasties, can we talk fitness? I’ve been reading over all the Feel the Burn posts, and trying to work on my strength/balance/endurance for roller derby. My husband is diabetic and working on losing weight. I’ve lost a bunch before (with some unhealthy patterns) and rebounded, and I’m really ambivalent about the whole idea for me. (I’m not thrilled with my body some days, but mostly we’re fine.) He’s all gung-ho about hiring a trainer, and I’m interested as well, but I’m really dubious that whoever we get through our gym is going to be all about weight loss for everyone, when what I want is thighs that could kill a man, no matter their size. I may be overthinking, but this is a somewhat difficult area for me.
Anyway. I did deadlifts for the first time in a long time last night, and OW.
Re: deadlifts. I considered briefly recommending to everyone doing deadlifts for the first time that they should move everything in their house to waist level or higher and get one of those helper bar thingies for the toilet because it’s almost astonishing how much and for how long your ass and hamstrings will hurt. (but I didn’t want to be a spoilsport, because they are one of if not the single best all-body weight-training exercise.
I think that is a really valid concern to have! I’ve lucked out by just going to a Crossfit and then rolling my way into decent coaches.
If I were to start up in another city, I would check out the Starting Strength Coaches Directory and seeing if anyone in your area comes up. Depending on your budget, where you are in the US, and how much you were initially thinking about paying a trainer, I would also consider just going to a Crossfit gym. Paleo/Zone gets knocked for a lot of things, but it can be really good with helping people manage things like blood sugar. Well coached squats will get you some killer thighs, and CF gyms (or other unconventional gyms) will have the extra equipment like bumper plates and women’s oly bars to help with progression and learning.
I spend a lot (most?) of my time overthinking What I’m Doing With My Body And Why! [fist bump] Your gym probably has a trainer who can get down with your desire to be Super Swole–maybe it would help to train separately from your husband, and with a different person, so you don’t get lumped in with his weight loss goals?
I’ve only had one trainer, but when I chose him it was because the gym manager recommended him to me based on my stated goals (yours, basically), and when he and I met for the first time we discussed it then too. Tell whoever you talk to at your gym what you just told us: you want to work on your strength, coordination, and endurance, and weight loss is not a priority. Look for someone who’s a bodybuilder.
I did deadlifts for the first time in forever on Wednesday. OW is right. And I struggled with 20lbs less than my personal best because I hadn’t done it in so long, boo.
I’m in a similar place re. weight loss, and I’ve had pretty good luck with trainers as long as I remember to lay out explicitly, in the goal-setting conversation when we start up, that weight loss is specifically NOT a goal for me. My instinct tends to be to just avoid the topic and list the goals I DO want to pursue, but if I do that, they tend to roll with the assumption that everyone on earth wants to lose weight. If you do decide to work with a trainer, that might be something to remember.
Thanks! I mean, I won’t be mad if I lose some weight, but it’d be almost beside the point.
100%. Being super upfront about YOUR goals is great, and a trainer who does not listen to your goals is garbage. I am always really clear that my goals are strength, and that I am happy with my body, and I was working with a guy this summer, randomly lost a couple of pounds, and he said: “You’ve lost a few pounds. Are you okay with that? I KNOW IT’S NOT ONE OF YOUR GOALS,” and I almost kissed him, I was so impressed.
Really, I just want you to come to Texas and show me how to do free weights with good form.
One of the biggest things I learned from derby friends is that the asymmetry involved in going only counterclockwise can be hard on your body and lead to injury, so it’s a good idea to mention that to a trainer and get some exercises that will help you balance out the left lean.
When you interview trainers, it is entirely legitimate–and helpful for the trainer!–for you to say, “My priority is [derby/biking/functional strength for hauling dead bodies], and I do not want to focus on [weight loss/getting a ‘perfect bikini body’/becoming a triathlete].” They may still need to weigh you or do other tests for their records, but you can tell them that you don’t want to know numbers. You can also tell them what kind of communication works for you, what exercises you don’t enjoy or find painful, and what your favorite things to do are. Trainers work FOR YOU; if a given trainer makes you feel bad or just doesn’t have the right personality, it is not wrong to say, “I don’t think we’d be compatible,” thank them for their time, and look for someone else.
That is a really good point about the left lean! I would not have thought about that, but duh, of course it makes a difference.
Yeah, part of my concern is that apparently they have to get your body fat percentage? Which, sure, whatever, but I don’t really want to know.
If I understand correctly, the hand-held body fat calculators that are common at most gyms aren’t very accurate anyway; I told the training manager he was welcome to take a measurement but that I didn’t want to know the number, because I’d get weird about it, and he nodded and just put the gadget away. I found it did help to think ahead of time about my goals and concerns, though, because it meant I was able to feel like an active partner in the conversation.
Good luck on the track!
I’ve been to trainers various times, but I’m no expert, but remember that they work for you, and not the other way around. I cannot imagine that it’s mandatory trainer canon to take your body fat percentage (considering nobody has ever done it to me, although they have talked weight and bmi).
I think it’s perfectly legitimate to go to a meeting and say “I want to work on X. I am not interested in discussing weight loss, and it’s not a goal for me, and I don’t ever want to talk about it. If you want to assess me, please do so on the measures that don’t involve weight. If this isn’t how you work and you are committed to talking about weight, fine I’ll find someone else.”
I recently had two free sessions at my gym, and never planned to sign up because they are so wildly expensive, but also felt vindicated when, after making a less forceful version of the above speech, the trainer a few days later was chirpily going through the program being like “you WILL lose weight on this” all chirpy like. Ok, dude, you didn’t listen to me, goodbye, thanks for the free tough workouts.
Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of. And also I sort of feel like I’m undermining my husband because he wants to lose weight and I’m not interested? Again, probably I am overthinking.
THIGHS THAT COULD KILL A MAN, NO MATTER THEIR SIZE. Yes this, please, forever. Good luck!
Like this:
I’m having one of those weekends where everyone I would hang out with is out of town at the same time. Is traveling on Mother’s Day a thing?
Anyway, It will be nice to schedule a bunch of errands and not worry that I might be derailed by a hangover, but I also get anxious when I know I’m going to be spending a lot of time alone. What do you guys do?
When I moved into my studio apartment, I thought I would lose that “my roommates are gone for the weekend I have ALL THE TIME AND SPACE TO MYSELF” high, but NOPE, I still love it. Taking a walk! Cooking a time-consuming and messy meal! Seeing a matinee alone! Reading AN ENTIRE BOOK IN ONE SITTING! Ugh, I am jealous of your weekend.
I just successfully defended my thesis!
much data
very master
so wow
Congratulations! Topic?
It’s on changing artist-audience relationships in the western art music tradition through the twentieth century, basically presenting a method of musical analysis that centres on the relationships present in performance.
This sounds fascinating! I love 20th century composers, and in fact wrote a grad school paper on composers under totalitarian regimes back in the Dark Ages when I was getting my masters in IR. And my husband is a musician. All this to say…awesome job!
So wow indeed!!
congrats!
gold star, champion
YAAAAAAAAY
Great job fellow oboe!! Your topic sounds interesting and relavent to current music issues ๐
Congrats!
WOOT! I hope you feel really, really smart!
Congratulations!!
I am huddled over my desk right now, super hungover. It’s Canadian Music Week right now in Toronto (bands till 4:00 AM all over the city), and I went out last night with people who do not have day jobs.
I’ve done nothing all day other and sob and sip this ginger ale.
It was totally worth it.
So much with the hangover today. I’m contemplating getting a cocktail with lunch just to ride through the rest of work. I don’t have a good reason like Canadian Music Week though. That sounds awesome.
I finally, finally have a Friday at work where I have three seconds to breathe and check in on the Cocktail Hour at a decent hour (as opposed to, like, Saturday evening) and there are already almost 400 comments. So social!
All I have this week are complaints: I am exhausted and hugely pregnant, but not so hugely that I’m done yet. My five-year-old is suddenly a kid who cries all the time and mutters “whatever” under his breath and this morning I accidentally taught him the word “motherfucker.” (By the way, the new Old 97’s album is great, but maybe not the best choice for driving with a five-year-old.) I have a bunch of writing stuff due by the end of the month and yet my brain cannot put two thoughts together in succession. I have to buy a bunch of baby-related crap. This fetus keeps headbutting my bladder. I keep forgetting to eat because no food anywhere ever sounds good (though the ramen/egg gruel thing I made last week was good, if gross). I really, really want a martini.
Please, air your complaints here, so I can feel bad about how very, very petty my whining is.
I am in the midst of my period, and feel all headache-y, and cramp-y (moreso than usual), and am in NO MOOD to be at work right now. Plus there’s all that blood coming out my vagina; I am not looking forward to teaching swimming lessons tomorrow. And the work I have to do right now (at a different place than my swim instructor/lifeguard job) is so very boring. so. so. so. boring. ugh. Also, I am a poor graduate student, which means I have no money, eat terribly, and live in a tiny one-room apartment with only a mini-fridge.
My five-year-old is suddenly a kid who cries all the time and mutters “whatever” under his breath and this morning I accidentally taught him the word “motherfucker.”
I’m really and truly sorry how loudly I barked out laughter at this sentence, honestly I am.
That album is amazing, but yeah. Perhaps not safe for children.
My research adviser just called to let me know that after four months of my working quite steadily on a document that we were both super excited about she’s reviewed my work so far and found that “there isn’t any THERE there.” I’m torn between feeling horrifically embarrassed for having accidentally sold snake oil for one and a half semesters, and feeling angry that this couldn’t….you know…have come to my attention sooner? Like less than a week before I’m supposed to submit this?? Either way, not great.
I am currently sitting in the food court in the building across the street from the building in which I work because I cannot stand to listen to my coworker snap her gum for the next four hours. I don’t know how she does it, but she makes a popping noise on every single closing of her jaws. And she can do this for the entire work day without taking a break. She can do it while talking, eating, and drinking coffee.
I am at the point where I am going to say something to my boss about how disruptive it is. He is not her boss, but we are part of the same department. I know I should say something to her about it, but I feel very uncomfortable about it because I am not in a supervisory capacity over her – we are at equal job ranks of different parts of the same department. Also, I am in my thirties and white while she is in her forties and black. Even though I know that she is driving me and my surrounding coworkers nuts, I still feel like I am guilty of perpetuating the cycle of trying to police the behavior of people of color? I don’t know. I know that I am at the point where if I do say something it is going to come out sounding rude. Ugh. Toasties, have you ever had to speak to someone about your coworkers’ behavior?
Have you asked her to not do it?
Oh, that sucks. Definitely don’t talk to your boss without talking to the coworker personally first. Supervisory capacity has nothing to do with it, you aren’t giving feedback or telling her what to do, you are asking a person in close proximity to stop doing something that bothers you. It’s totally reasonable to say: “hey coworker, you may not realize this, but the sound of your gum snapping really travels and it’s one of those little things that really gets to me after a while, you know? Is there any way you could try not to do it so much?”
That said, I would probably never feel comfortable enough to ask an older coworker to change a personal habit, so this is completely hypocritical advice.
Yeah, the fact that she’s older also has a LOT to do with it.
Start with something lighthearted. Though you will have to fake it, I know. “What kind of gum do you prefer? It’s very snappy.” Wait a day or two, then go to your supervisor. Ugh. It sounds like hell. I feel for you.
I had to speak to my (wonderful, awesome worker, great person in general) supervisee about his cologne that was sending his seatmates home with migraines. For him, the cologne was a cultural thing, and he is older than I am. And he is not white and I pass as white. I kind of botched it and offended him. But I’m not sure that there was any way not to offend him. But he got over it, and we continued to have a good working relationship. He also wore less cologne.
I’m having a birthday party next weekend, and 10 people have already said they’re coming! Plus several more who said they absolutely would come except they will be out of town. The past few years I haven’t felt like I had enough friends to justify a party, so this is very exciting for me.
What should I serve? So far I’m thinking sangria, mint juleps, lemon bars [just added from another thread], and bruschetta with goat cheese, roasted red pepper and basil. What are other good spring vegetarian snacks and drinks?
There’s a place here that does bruschetta topped with a fava bean puree and shards of parmesan that is amazing. I feel like the fava bean puree could easily be artichoke or pea or something if those aren’t available to you. Basically I’m just encouraging you to put somewhat garlicky starch on top of neutral flavored starch and add salty cheese.
Dark and stormies! Southsides! AN ASSORTMENT OF CHEESES
I did a tofu version of this chicken cashew basil pate once, and it was pretty good (you’d want to verify the Asiago was vegetarian, or use vegetarian parmesan, or not worry at all if that doesn’t bother you):
Chicken, Basil and Cashew Pate
3 T butter
Skinless boneless chicken breast halves- 10 oz, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1 T chopped garlic
1/3 c salted roasted cashews
1/3 c mayonnaise
1/2 c finely chopped onion
1/4 c grated Asiago chese
1/2 t hot pepper sauce
1/4 c chopped basil
Melt butter in skillet over medium high heat. Season chicken with salt and pepper. Add chicken and garlic to skillet and saute until chicken is cooked through. Stir in cashews. Remove from heat and let cool.
Transfer mixture to food processor. Add next 4 ingredients; process until smooth. Add chopped basil; process until just blended. Cover and chill at least 2 hours or overnight (can be made 2 days ahead).
To make vegetarian, I used super super firm tofu (if I were doing it again, I would place weights on the tofu and get as much water out as possible.)
Also, yes, more more more more cheese.
All cheese is vegetarian I don’t know what you are talking about lalalala
Also, this looks delicious.
High five on your birthday party! I’m also having one next weekend, and will be doing puff pastry snacks. Roll out the sheets, cut them into little squares, and top with things like pesto & cheese, sun-dried tomatoes & cheese, mushrooms & cheese (you may sense a theme here). You can bake them ahead of time then pop them in the oven to reheat for a few minutes when you’re ready to serve. Just remember to brace yourself properly for the onslaught of drooling party guests.
Brilliant!
These sound fantastic, and I’ll add a suggestion: I like to put a little chunk of brie and a tiiiiiny dab of red currant jelly on a piece puff pastry, top it with more pastry, seal it with egg wash (just a whole egg/egg yolk beaten w/a teaspoon of water), poke a little hole in top, and TA DA.
With puff pastry bites, I flash freeze them so they’re ready to pop into a hot oven: let them freeze, not touching on cookie sheets, them you can stack & store in freezer bags or Tupperware. When you’re ready to bake, get the oven good & preheated (so the pastry will puff properly) and bake the still-frozen pastries; do not thaw. A brush of egg wash (which also freezes nicely in a jar, and thaws if you just plunk the jar into warm water for a few minutes) makes them look glossy and professional, but that’s a frill.
As aqueousmedium suggests, I like to roll out frozen puff pastry quite a bit for little bites like this. It makes the dough and therefore the budget go further, it still puffs beautifully if less dramatically, and thinner pastry means you can really taste the filling.
Holy cow I am totally adding that to the list. Yum!
Now that I’m thinking about it, I bet this would be just as good (and 1/3 as fiddly) if you crammed squares/rounds of puff pastry into mini-muffin tins, plopped in the cheese & jelly, and skipped the egg wash.
I’ll try that next time. Last time was for a “Community”-watching marathon and I was so proud of creating this as a themed appetizer called Annie’s Boobs (a name which is only half as objectifying as it sounds to non-fans of the show; it’s a monkey named after Annie’s bosom, not Annie’s bosom itself): round, mounded, with one little pink dot in the center, and stuffed with brie. Geddit? Geddit? I’M NOT SORRY.
NOR SHOULD YOU BE.
Ahhhh, it’s 7:20 where I am, I have my feet up and a glass o’wine at my side because I don’t have to go to work this weekend! Friday is behaving like a Friday!
However, I am a lil’ bit poor now, because I just shelled out ยฃ1500 for my visa to remain in the UK, sooo…I’m glad I stocked up on wine and have a closet full of beer I’ve been brewing because my ass won’t be buying the hooch for a long time :/
Oh! And, I got another rejection today, from what had been my dream job for a long time, and you know what? I feel just fine about it! I’m actually relieved! It’s the 4th or 5th time I’ve applied to this museum, and over the span of those rejections, it’s made me realise that even if I did get a job there, it wouldn’t be sustainable on the salary I’d be getting. Without those rejections, it wouldn’t have made me think critically about what makes me happiest and what could be a sustainable thing for me to do. So maybe my evangelical friend (and friend of a friend, GOD) was right when she tossed that “rejection is protection” platitude my way a few months back.
Are there any Toasties out there who have been rejected a bunch or failed multiple times at something until you realised you could be A BOSS doing something else? How did you figure it out? I want your stories of success (and failure too).
WOW that’s expensive! My French visa only ran me about 70โฌ, I think. Enjoy your wine, and your weekend!
What the….what kind of visa was that? My German visas were never more than fifty euros.
I kind of want to tell you (in response to your other comment) about how I banged my head against a wall trying to move up in a certain career where opportunities are scarce and pay is bad, and how eventually I just had enough and did something totally different, but that story is not so interesting and also not over yet. But I can tell you that I just began to feel like if I tried any harder at this career, I’d begin doing serious psychological damage to myself so….when you reach that point….?
Ugh, why must UK visas be so damn expensive? A friend of mine shelled out for one a few months ago too and she was complaining about it. Sure, she considered the price more or less worth it since it meant she got to stay with her husband in their new house, but good lord, where does all that money go? The student visa I got in 2012 cost something like ยฃ400 and I know it can’t be that expensive to process them.
So I’m moving in a couple of weeks to start a new job, from Boston where I’m living with three people to my own place.
I was a little nervous about being alone in a strange city, but after I listening to my roommate’s boyfriend honk and hork his sinuses while noisily eating and peeing at 7 this morning, I CAN’T WAIT.
PEEING WITH THE DOOR OPEN AND WALKING AROUND NAKED AND BAKING THINGS WITHOUT BEING OBLIGATED TO SHARE THEM YESSSSSS
If you’re in any kind of communal building, watch out for window cleaners when you’re walking round naked. I have given window cleaners an eyeful on several occasions as I live in a second-floor apartment and never close the curtains in summer because nobody can see in unless they’re on ropes outside my actual window…
A wasp is trying VERY HARD to get into my office. D-:
I thought it WAS inside, because it’s hard to tell against the bright sky, and I was poised, sandal in hand, to thwack it (and then run away screaming, obviously) when I realized it is outside, so I climbed off my desk.
I had a wasp that kept sneaking into my apartment the other day through a tiny gap at the corner of my screen door. No big deal, I thought. I’ll just keep on letting him out until my landlord finally fixes the screen in a couple of days. Then I looked up at the metal frame between the screen door and the sliding glass door. Turns out, the reason the wasp kept coming to that spot was because it was building a nest there. Suddenly, its recurrent presence was a Much Bigger Deal. D-:
Poison wasp spray, stat! Ortho makes one I like. Soak the proto-nest with that spray can and no wasps will ever return.
The nest was really small when I spotted it, so I just took it down when the one wasp was away. Should I have sprayed it and left it up? I know nothing about wasps…
No, no, you did right. Soaking is for nests too large to trust them to be empty or too far out of reach for removal. You were brave and effective. Kudos.
My birthday was this week and it was… fun but kind of underwhelming? I’m throwing a big old party tonight though and I’m hoping it goes really well. Cocktails and crab and artichoke dip and chicken cashew basil pate and seven layer dip and homemade ice cream and fresh bread and meringues or macarons if I get it together (dunno what else to make with egg whites, but I have like eleven from making ice cream, so).
Happy birthday! All of those things sound delicious. Re: egg whites, if you are feeling adventurous there are a bunch of fancy cocktail recipes that use egg white foam. Not that there is anything wrong with meringues or macarons.
Or if you’re in place that has good fresh fruit or you want to pretend it’s summer and eat fruit anyways (not that I know anything about that) use the egg whites to make pavlova.
CO-SIGN. Meringues/pavlova is a snap to make if you have a mixer (and if it’s dry where you are; on humid days, they weep like wild), and not too hard even if you’re just using a whisk. Let them dry & cool completely in the turned-off oven and they’ll keep really well in an air-tight container. Then just macerate some berries (frozen are fine) in liqueur or lemon juice and a bit of sugar and BAM you have a gorgeous dessert that looks like a lot more trouble than it was.
I bought berries but then it turned out they were moldy even though I checked because apparently I checked poorly. I think I will avoid fruit.
THIS IS A GOOD POINT. I will do this.
My sister and I made macaroons for our other sister’s vbirthday last year and JESUS POLEDANCING CHRIST make meringues. Macaroons were so tedious to make.
Today I got to have a tour of the last operating double-decker/stacked vaudeville theatre in the world. My company is moving into the upstairs space in the fall. I just about peed my pants with joy. They’ve restored it to the way it looked in 1918 — it was designed to look like a botanical garden. Hand-painted beech leaves and lanterns on the ceiling, hand-painted vines and flowers up the walls, latticed balcony boxes, columns that look like tree trunks. Above the stage there’s a lit-from-within moon that is never ever turned off. Just the most beautiful space in the world. (For Torontonians: the Winter Garden above the Elgin Theatre.)
AND it’s my birthday. A very very VERY happy theatre nerd birthday to meeeeee.
Happy Birthday! That theatre sounds so cool!
That sounds INCREDIBLE. Happy birthday indeed!
Happy Birthday! That theater sounds like a dream.
In happier open thread news, I’m hosting a game night tomorrow! I haven’t hosted anything in a loooong time so i’m excited/nervous and rethinking what food to make. What are your favorite non-messy finger food-y snacks?
I just want you to know I’ve spent a long time trying to come up with an answer, but every snack I like is apparently just disgustingly messy once I thought about it – greasy or sticky or salty or oily or any combination thereof. So I’m going to go with “whatever snacks you can spear on a toothpick”.
Anything that involves cheese. Perhaps a tray with a few different types of cheese and crackers/bread, or an antepasta-type spread with some sliced meats and cheeses?
Pigs in a blanket! Super easy, and extremely delicious.
ofTrebond got some good suggestions downthread that you might check out!
In addition to those suggestions of puff pastry stuffed with whatever delicious things come handy and bruschettas of all sorts, I always make a great big cruditรฉ platter with some kind of dip. I know it sounds boring, and no one ever says “OH WHAT BEAUTIFUL VEGETABLES” but it also always, always gets picked clean if I make it with any care or attention. My favorite cruditรฉs include carrot coins (which I soak in ice water to crisp), sliced English or Persian cucumbers, halved grape tomatoes, blanched broccoli and green beans and asparagus, red peppers, and snap peas or snow peas. You can always add more unusual vegetables or pickled/preserved things like olives and marinated artichoke hearts.
Dips: again, I know it sounds boring, but hummus or a rosemary white bean dip always gets eaten first at our parties. Sometimes I do hummus and baba ghanoush, then add olives and cubes of feta to the platter along with pita bread.
I also make a simple onion dip: I caramelize (but really really caramelize, until they’re deep dark brown) onions, add a minced clove of garlic, then immediately splash in some sherry (white wine, vermouth, or even plain water would be fine here) and reduce it til the liquid is thick and sticky. Cool and stir it into Greek yogurt or home-strained regular plain yogurt with a squeeze of lemon juice and some zest. When you’re ready to serve, snip a handful of chives and stir those in, too. SO GOOD.
There’s always artichoke dip, hot or cold. This cold artichoke dip is incidentally vegan, uses almost exclusively shelf-stable ingredients, and is great with veggies or bread or crackers, and if you’re lucky enough to have some left, it’s great on a sandwich.
Pates and other sturdy dips that you can use a knife with! And bread! Tasty crackers are also a thing. Cookies are great too if you like sweet snacks!
Decadence: I washed my face with raw, organic honey last night and my skin feels amaaaaaazing. I think I’ll keep doing it, though I am a bit concerned about attracting bees (more than usual (they are already unusually attracted to me and it is terrible)).
Food on skin scares me. My anxiety goes into overdrive at the thought of feeding the bacteria. Glad your skin feels good, though. Let us know how it goes if you keep it up for a week. Maybe we can derail that one anxiety of mine.
I think there is real legit science out there that says honey slows the growth of some bacteria, if that makes you feel better.
Yes, that helps. Thanks. Now I can focus on the one thousand other anxieties. ๐
I’ve been doing honey mixed with castille soap for months and it’s going GREAT.
Yes! Definitely keep doing it! Honey is antibacterial and super moisturizing. Plus if you can find local raw honey you can support a community beekeeper!
So I just found out on Twitter that Community has been canceled and we should all be talking about how that’s bullshit even if no one is surprised: http://insidetv.ew.com/2014/05/09/community-cance…
Yeah, I would’ve much rather seen a Parks & Rec cancellation (feels like it’s at its natural end). I love Community, and thought it came back quite strongly.
I completely agree! Season 5 wasn’t the best, but I thought it was really building up towards something (Greendale’s origins), while Parks and Rec was stalling a lot in between Leslie getting recalled and her finally taking the federal job.
I also thought it came back strongly. Plus, with all of the jerking around that happened earlier in its run, I think that the show really deserved that second chance.
Sad!! Though also kind of crazy/amazing that we got 5 seasons of that show.
I am sorry to see it go, but not nearly as sorry as I would have predicted two years ago. This show appeared to be broadcast from inside my head; it could have been designed specifically to appeal to me. I identify with six of the seven main characters, and that never, ever happens. I know I’m nowhere near alone in that.
But after all the jerking around that show has suffered, the pipeline it had tapped into my heart got bashed pretty well out of existence; what had been a gush of easy, intense emotional access reduced to a trickle. It’s like getting back together after a cruel breakup: I never completely relaxed into the show again, and I don’t know that I ever would have. That’s on me, not the show, I know.
I will say that my scales-from-the-eyes moment occurred while listening to a commentary track for the fake clip-show episode. When I first watched that episode, I thought “Aha, what a witty way to upend the conventions of a clip-show while still embracing its schedule-saving and budget-reducing virtues! Just shoot around the edges of other schedules, sets, and costume changes, add on a few extra costume touches and details to the scenery, but end up with a whole new episode! Brilliant!”
And then Harmon started talking about how the clip-show episode was produced as a stand-alone piece โ which becomes obvious when you pay attention to all the backgrounds, but there’s no reason it had to be. He could have exploited the advantages available to the unusual construction of the episode, saved money and time, and made the producers & network happy, but instead he made a show that looks like it saves money but instead costs much, much more because it has many times more set, lighting, & costume changes than a regular episode.
And for the first time, my sympathies shifted ever so slightly to the network. I still think their reported behavior at the end of S3 is abominable, but I can understand why they aren’t eager to renew, no matter how vocal and devoted the fans are.
#darkesttimeline
I am so bummed out. I haven’t been this bummed out since Gilmore Girls ended.
Life is really good right now, you guys!
I had been feeling very down about myself and my general ability to do anything well – I was floundering while trying to hold our organization together by myself for 6 weeks while everyone else was abroad visiting our project site. BUT I kept everything from going down in flames! Then I got to visit our project site as well and meet all the incredible people we work with there, and remember all over again why I think what we do is really important.
THEN I got the fellowship I’d applied for last year (and thanks again to the Toasties who gave me interview advice and helped me step up my game!!), so now in just a few months I’ll be ~living internationally~ and working for a really really cool organization. Feeling incredibly lucky, and glorying in knowing I am a badass descendent of the Sun who fights for what she wants and has faith in her own skills. I’m not generally very good at feeling triumphant about my own accomplishments without trying to cut myself back down, so I’m holding on to this feeling with all I’ve got.
YAY!!!! Congratulations! Be super super proud of yourself, you’ve earned it.
Wow, that is all so exciting and YOU MADE IT HAPPEN. Congratulations!
Guys, I’ve already put this on Facebook and Twitter, but it’s so important that it needs to be here, too: I found a robot arm on the sidewalk during my lunch break.
what
I believe it is acceptable here to apply the “Finders, Keepers” rule.
Did you obtain it!?!?! BEST!
I didn’t take it, out of concerns for germs, but regretted my decision as soon as I told someone about it.
Unless you literally live on the MIT campus, I think I’m going to have to respond with D:
I live and work in Manhattan. A robot arm is only probably the strangest thing I’ve seen on my lunch break.
*insert Captain America joke here*
It has begun.
If today was a person I’d prolapse it’s colon with a power drill and roll it up like a garden hose. I’m in such a foul mood that I’d sign the Warsaw Pact all over again.
I’m with you. Let’s burn it down and take to the sea. Individually. I don’t want to inflict my mood on anyone else.
My coworker did something mildly irritating & I almost had a rage stroke. I would do unspeakable things for a drink right now.
I’m ditching out early and going directly to the bar to meet my best friend. Contemplating stopping at a bar on the way for a shot, because a whole 7 blocks without a drink might kill me.
My decadence this week is sushi dinner tonight with my family.
That is all I have to report this week. Have a good weekend, y’all!
Hi guys, I’ve got a boring job-hunting related question I’d love some advice on (also this is my first time posting to the OT! Whoo!) :
So a few days ago I got a call from this organization that I applied to and *really* want to work for, but they just asked me if the current job listed on my resume was paid or not. It is, and I told them so, and they said they would be in touch later. Then later I get an email from them saying that because funding for the position comes from a certain government program, I wasn’t eligible due to currently having a paid job (its a program aimed at increasing employment for people under 30). They did ask to keep my resume on file for the future.
BUT, I then looked into the details of that funding program, and I found that I was still eligible because of the way my current contract is structured. So I emailed them back explaining this. Its been two days and no response.
I’m wondering if maybe I should email back one more time just in case they missed the last message? I’m super frustrated because I really am qualified for this and they seem to like me a little. I imagine if I was a busy HR person I might just skip over reading an email from someone I already crossed off the list. Am I being crazy/desperate? Any thoughts?
Re-apply. Except for an explanation in your cover letter, make it look like a new application. That’ll get past the HR tendency to ignore a previously rejected candidate.
It doesn’t hurt to email again. If they missed your first email, no harm done. If they think, “Wow ANOTHER email,” STILL no harm done because you didn’t get an offer in the first place, ya dig?
This sounds like something that may be best explained over the phone – do you have a contact number for them?
Remember: people are busy. While I think your concern is valid, maybe they’ve been in a training for two days. Maybe an urgent project or deadline is approaching and they’re generally swamped.
I would call, if possible, on Monday, and if not possible, re-apply or email.
Ah thanks everyone! They ended up calling me before I had a chance to email. But good advice for next time!
Toasties, I could use some encouragement, if you’re up for it.
I just moved back home from the summer after my third year of college (hella, one year from adulthood), and despite having applied for thirteen different internships, I haven’t heard from any of them. I am hella bummed and stuck in a mostly-dull Texas town for the summer while my friends are mostly elsewhere, and I’m gonna start looking for jobs tomorrow. Any words of encouragement would be nice.
Also, any YA book recs to occupy my time? GIVE ME YA OR GIVE ME DEATH BECAUSE I DON’T THINK I’M SMART ENOUGH YET FOR THE GOLDFINCH AND OTHER GROWN-ASS NOVELS.
Cory Doctorow
Amy Spalding – The Reece Malcolm List and Ink Is Thicker Than Water
Rainbow Rowell – Fangirl and Eleanor and Park
E. Lockhart – The Boyfriend List series, but especially The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks
EXCELLENT RECS I’ve already read both the Rainbow Rowell ones but I’m looking at getting her other, non-YA novel, plus THE DISREPUTABLE HISTORY OF FRANKIE LANDAU-BANKS IS ONE OF MY TOP FIVE FAVE BOOKS EVER YAY. I’ll check out the others, thank you!
YA is so good. Sunshine by Robin McKinley? I recommend this book to everyone.
Sunshine is always a good recommendation.
“Faking Normal,” by Courtney Stevens, or “Dark Star” by Bethany Frenette. Love them both <3
Go for it! Looking for jobs is horrid and sucky so reward yourself a lot for making all the calls and filling in all the forms.
I’ll plagiarise my YA recs from a different thread: Sherwood Smith, Shannon Hale, Andrea Host, Rachel Neumeier, Diana Wynne Jones, L. Shelby- and add M.C.A. Hogarth, Robin Mckinley, Jessica Day Georgeโฆ
Decadence: Saint Harridan, a company that makes menswear-styled suits for women and trans men, is doing a pop-up shop in Brooklyn this weekend and I’m going! And the odds are high that I’ll splurge on a suit. My glamorous androgyny will be UNSTOPPABLE.
The most exciting thing going on in my life right now is working out. Because up until this last year, I didn’t. I played recreational sports in elementary, middle and high school, but running was pretty much the only type of “exercise” people around me did. And I hated it. With a fiery passion.
But for the past 15 months or so, I’ve been lifting weights, doing cross fit-y type workouts and rowing, and it’s been magical. Yesterday, I did 7 sets of 2 reps deadlifts at 225lbs. *225 LBS*
225 HIGH FIVES TO YOU. Seriously, way to conquer working out!
In Pittsburgh on Monday I had a $12 bourbon/cardamom/hibiscus/etc cocktail that blew my mind. It’s extremely rare for me to spring for cocktails at home but maybe it’s something I should consider budgeting for more often. (Thanks all for your Pittsburgh recs, we couldn’t get to many because we had really limited time, but made a list for next visit!!)
Also spent a bunch of money bringing American beer we can’t get here back into Canada, no regrets.
Speaking of: are any other Toasties on Untappd? You can find me under hbored if you’d like.
I was wondering what you guys ended up doing in Pittsburgh! I think I’ve had that exact cocktail. ๐
Thank you to everyone who wished my sister and her new baby well last week! My niece arrived last Friday evening and is doing very well, as are her parents. She looks like a squashy potato, but she’s got an excellent start when it comes to side-eyeing the stupid hairbows her parents put on her (no one put hairbows on the nephew, so why is it so crucial to put them on the niece?), so I’m quite confident that she’ll grow up most excellently.
Congratulations on the new niece, the squashy potato. You can nickname her Squashy Tater. Perfectly apt description of most of the newborns I’ve seen. Well put. And props to the kid for side-eyeing those stupid bows. A year ago I moved to a Texas college town and now get to see grown-ass women wearing hair bows as big as their faces. It seems very much in fashion here. Help me!
You guys. I have been having a really, really terrible week, none of which I should talk about under my real name on the internet. but if I log out I won’t know my password to log back in, so I’m not logging out. God forbid Firefox ever needs to reset my cookies for this account.
Decadence-wise: I have pulled the fresh pasta goat cheese ravioli from the freezer and I am cooking it, all by myself and for myself! But… I forgot to set the timer. Don’t kill me, please. I usually remember. ๐ (Though, now I have to keep trying half-cooked goat cheese pasta, which really isn’t so bad?)
If you open a private browser (ctrl shift P for firefox) you can comment anonymously or under different username and you’ll stay signed into your account in your regular browser. Of course, if you did that now and then talked about your problems, it’d be super obvious who it was, but I can totally delete this comment if you want and then NO ONE WILL KNOW. Anyway, I’m sorry your week was so awful and I hope next week is better!
So sorry about your terrible week. Suggestion for posting: use a different browser. I hate Internet Explorer, but I’d bet its already on your computer. Use it to post to The Toast about your troubles.
Decadence right now is having a sandwich which is bread (really yummy seed bread) and mayonnaise (just store bought mayonnaise but hmnnnnn why not make our own?) and chopped up sweet-hot peppers (those red South African ones, oh yummy peppers, I am sorry I cannot remember your name but I am on day 9 of being really ill and I cannot remember much of anything) and lots of avocado and then some sliced turkey just because protein is a good thing, although really it does not need it. They are delicious even when I am eating them while chasing around two little kids and coughing and cursing the need for antibiotics and wishing I could just sit down and watch Eurovision instead.
Once the antibiotics have done their grim work I will see about upping my level of decadence. ๐
Seconding mayonnaise and sweet-hots. Feel better soon.
To whoever’s still reading: just found this HuffPo link to an organization that has made some alternative Mother’s Day cards for PoC and gender-nonconforming folks! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kortney-ryan-ziegle…
Oh Toasties, I’m so proud of myself! I broke up with someone after it became clearer and clearer that they weren’t going to give me what I needed. Following a dramatic chase through a subway station we had an honest talk on the platform that I initiated, and it ended with a hug. Just a few months ago I would have passively waited around hoping feelings would develop on the other side. I feel affirmed! And a little bit sad, because I really liked this person. But I didn’t like them enough to put my own feelings on the back burner.
Plus I always beat him at arm wrestling anyway and I need someone who can keep up.
You’re right to be proud of yourself. Initiating, refusing passive role, realizing liking a person is not enough. Go you! So mature. Def hold out for someone who can keep up.
I love Lord Peter, but he is definitely best taken in small doses.
Albert Campion (Margery Allingham mysteries), on the other hand, is best when you feast upon his adventures in large chunks and wish you could take him home with you.
Rory Alleyn is amazing, and should be enjoyed at every opportunity.
I have been re-reading and renewing my appreciation for Josephine Tey lately. She writes pretty engrossing mysteries, and Inspector Grant would be swoon-worthy if I weren't so preoccupied with Albert Campion.
It's too bad she only wrote 6 or 7 mysteries, but all of them are terrific. The Daughter of Time introduced me to the Wars of the Roses. And I always have trouble re-reading Miss Pym Disposes because the description of the world of adolescent girls is too painful.
Yes, exactly! I've been on Synthroid for 25+ years, and have made it a habit to take it first thing when I wake up, before I take a shower and get ready for work. It also helps to have that boost in the early morning (especially since I can't have coffee/caffeine, *sob*)
Wow, this looks great! My daughter loves fantasy YA in general and Serafina in particular, so I'll be getting this for her soon. Very cool.
This sounds fascinating! I love 20th century composers, and in fact wrote a grad school paper on composers under totalitarian regimes back in the Dark Ages when I was getting my masters in IR. And my husband is a musician. All this to say…awesome job!
Actually, the government library experience I've had has pretty much always been that situation (with cataloging). I interned at a court library in NY that had no ILS, and the place I'm at now has a very small physical collection so we rarely even use our (crappy) ILS. This is all just to say if you're in government libraries not knowing cataloging might not be a drawback, so that's good. Even if you're applying for cataloging positions I think a lot of government libraries would be happy to have their systems revamped .:)
I wish I had paid more attention to metadata/tech services/preservation stuff in grad school. I was so focused on reference and the whole 'information detective' aspect of it and I wish I could go back and take some different classes. Although metadata's probably getting a bit of a bad rap in the wake of the NSA PRISM thing. Like in the general public no one knew what it was and now they do and they associate it with spying. ๐