Thursday Thoughts - I'm livin' life, do or die, what can I say

You're late. 

Farewell, faithful lipstick. Always have a backup of a favorite, of course. This is Bobbi Brown Crushed Lipstick in lilac, one of my staples

Lunch trips. I went to Bristol one day this week to peruse some antiques shops and walk along the river. I used to go there with Mom Mom when I was little, to Ballow's shoes. Lovely memories, and a lovely lunch outing.

Vats of veggie meat sauce. I made what amounted to 15 jars to freeze and share (the bigger one has six cups instead of three). 

Hurricane Ian. Good thoughts to the folks in FL and others in its path of destruction. Climate action now. These events are just going to continue to increase in power and devastation if we carry on as we are. 

Splitskies. Billy wanted to go in on my niece's birthday gift

Halloween is here. Thanks to MFD's decor. The dogs are not pleased that their barking window is occupied. 

Bathroom reno still happening. Still living in an entire construction zone with shit on every level. 

Bailed on the Dahmer show on Netflix. Too creepy for me.

Bruce is a big baby.

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Amen.

Fresh hair. Thanks Kristi! Love it as always.

Miscellaneous pics from the week the bottom right is actually my back window with that reflected in it

Happy birthday to my cousin Tyler today!

 
What appears beyond the hyphen in Thursday Thoughts titles is what I'm listening to when I'm starting this - this week is Gangsta's Paradise. RIP Coolio

Snippets of the Weekend 7.25.2022

Scary episode 1 of Stranger Things 4 has me out for the season. Four episodes of Euphoria season 1. Finished two books. DNF one book. Started another book. Paged through magazines for the first time in forever. 

Got a jump on weeds, laundry, and work Friday morning. Restorative, excellent massage and infrared treatment with Sarah at Blossom massage and Body work in Langhorne - check her out! Bad news: shore cleaning crew could not make Saturday. Good news: found a sub late in the day to save me a trip down to co-clean with MFD, who was doing turnover solo this week. 

Stayed inside to beat the heat wave temps.

Worked on my piles and small projects: cleaning this or that. Clearing the dining room table. Sorting and purging. Pantry clean out. Vacuuming. Errands. 

Lounging with dogs. Clean sheets. Face and eye masks. Coffee in silence. 30 year old t-shirts. 

Replacements found for: shore king quilts, dead Philly toaster my Pop found for us at a flea market over 10 years ago, 30 ounce tumblers.

Water, heavy on the lemons and limes. Tomatoes and burrata with balsamic glaze. Air fryer chicken thighs with steamed brussels sprouts. Macaroni salad with shrimp. PB&J cookies from Lou's Farm Market. Fresh local corn bought & put up to freeze for the winter.   

AND two naps. Safe because no one was in the house so I could wake up and be mean to the air.

In addition to snippets here, I've taken to doing weekending reels on Instagram if you are interested. 

TWTW - birthday weekend #2

Friday if you have to refer to your photos to see what you did that day…lol at lunch I went to the library spring book sale and grocery store. Guess which one was more fun? After work I did a beach walk, finished a book, and read another one until 1 am.

Saturday started with nails - tried Essie’s  new quick dry polish and didn’t love the application but I liked the polish grew on me as it wore. This is Essie Expressie Trick Clicque with a OPI Mylar Dreams pinky nail. After this scintillating nail appointment was finished, we went to a tour at the Harriet Tubman Museum in Cape May. It was an hour and it was good. If you are not someone who can pay attention in a group for an hour, this is not for you. The tours are guided at this time and by guided in basically one large room they mean we are going to tell you about Harriet's operations in Cape May. The guy giving the tour was very good. 

We were going to walk around the Washington Street Mall area after that, but there were a lot of people and no parking and I got annoyed very quickly so we headed out and had lunch at the Lobster House on the way out of town. 

Popped in to TJMaxx and Restore in CMCH on the way home, and lolled around on the couch for a while. We had dinner at Kessel’s because Instagram showed me ice cream over funnel cake fries, new this year so we had to try it. I started a new book and we watched a lot of episodes of Hacks. 

Sunday was a slow moving morning. I woke up with numbness in my arm from sleeping on something wrong and it is not going away so I'm calling on chiro and acupuncture this week. I did some sorting of shit up in the house, began the process of removing stuff prior to rental season, cleaned the kitchen, and MFD installed the no drill hand towel and toilet paper holder in the small bathroom. We went for a family beach walk and watched the remaining three episodes of Hacks. Scrounged for dinner and packed a bunch of stuff up, then watched three episodes of Yellowjackets. Hooo boy.

Heading back to Philly for some appointments this week. 

Hope you had a good weekend!

TWTW - the mid January celebration one

Friday I made a big ass pot of chili in the afternoon and knocked off work around 4 to drive to the south end of the island and walk down to the point. Wind was whipping but by the time I got down there I walked off the week and my mind was blank aside from what was before me. The moonrise was exceptional and I was just like how is this my life. A weird combination of things happened in this world for me to be at the shore on a Friday in January and while most of them sucked, I cannot hate this outcome. MFD arrived and we ate chili and cornbread piled with butter and relaxed. I painted my nails and read until about midnight.

Saturday I was on the road back to Philly by 8:15 and got two loads of laundry done before my brother picked me up. We headed to the city to celebrate Aubrey's birthday with her crew. I miss bumming around the city and seeing my favorites - art, murals, floors of Philly, City Hall at night. It was a bitterly cold, city wind tunnel in full effect fun day and I'm happy Philly restaurants & bars are requiring vaccine cards so I was more comfortable going. I had fun and drinks but not too many, and my Dad picked me up and drove me home because safety first. I ordered pizza and hit the hay early.

Sunday I was up, showered, and back to the shore by 10:30. MFD picked up lunch from Hooked on Breakfast, I started a new book, and we watched the entire first season and the two episodes of the second of The Righteous Gemstones. Talk about a dark riot this show is amazing. Leftovers for dinner, and I read until about 11 then lights out. It was a gray and wet day so a good day for a new show and a new book and new Barkbox toys. 

And again, I need more than two weekend days. No MLK day off (IG caption with thoughts here) and never have in my professional career. 

It looks like a gray-ish week ahead. Not into it. Since I was out this weekend I am staying home for five days just in case especially since I have something next weekend as well. That's what feels right to me right now, and it's doable with my schedule and ability to work from home. 

TWTW - the one with a good balance

Friday my motivation was scant but I struggled through. I painted my nails (Essie cashmere bathrobe, Essie no place like chrome, OPI Red), made salad and Aldi holiday shaped pizzas, and peaced the fuck out watching Great British Bake-off after a very fucking heavy news week while MFD put the Christmas stuff out.

Saturday MFD and I headed out for the day and it was so nice to be out in the world. We hit up Harriett’s Bookshop, had lunch at Martha Kensington, and stopped into a few places on Frankford Ave on the way back - Cake Life Bake Shop and Jeni’s ice cream. 

Harriett’s is black-woman owned, Martha’s requires vaccine cards and adds 20% to all checks so all employees are guaranteed $15, Cake Life is woman and trans-owned and has the freaking best slice of s’mores cake like I don’t Even like s’mores and I would bathe in the icing. I vibe with Jeni’s ownership. I voted freely with my wallet supporting small biz throughout the day and enjoyed being out and about in those areas of the city for the first time in a while.

We got into pajamas before 5 and camped out on the couches for the night. Dinner was the baked goods from Cake Life. We watched Beautiful Girls and The Big Chill then I read and fell asleep doing that and never left the couch. 

Sunday started at 4 then again at 8. I reorganized bookshelves, purged and moved shit around, did 383948 loads of laundry, finished a book, made up a casserole, threw an egg bake together, watched Yellowstone, and admired MFD's Friday night Christmassing handiwork outside.

I do love a mix of productivity, rest, and fun, the balance of which is hard for me to strike on a lot of weekends. 

Happy anniversary Dad & Carol, happy birthday to my uncle Billy on Saturday, happy birthday today Sara, and happy Monday to the rest of us. 

Thursday Thoughts - everybody has a reason to begin again

Embracing the weeks leading up to the winter solstice and getting hygge with it. Lights and candles to bring the light in when the outside does not provide. Reflection, intentions, sitting deep into the coming winter and myself.

Waiting for Billy Cat to destroy something. He is the cat version of the Grinch slinking himself around my decorations. Excuse the blurry shots, they are taken from video. But you get the drift. 

Loving seeing everyone's menorahs

Making my list and checking it twice. I have no fucking idea what I do and don't have for Christmas. 

Staying longer in Philly that I originally planned to when I came up yesterday. I will probably stay through Sunday morning to get some shit done that I put off every time I come back here. I'll be doing more of the back and forth through December while the temps make that possible. If we're to keep the shore house open, we need to be down there on the frozen days. 

Romping on the beach every day we're there. We love the warm days but we go on the cold days too.

Knowing who my most listened to will be before Spotify even wraps. One does not name their dog Bruce Springsteen without listening to a lot of Bruce Springsteen, you know? 

Raging over the comments by Roberts and Kavanaugh on the Mississippi abortion case. Like, don't talk to me raging. Not able to discuss raging. Go fuck yourself raging. Abortion on demand without apology or explanation and not anyone's business

Failing to see how this is a thing even though people are very much trying to make it a thing every time anyone says happy holidays on the internet. If I didn't see it in comments myself I wouldn't believe it because it is possibly the only thing stupider right now than let's go brandon said in a way that implies the rest of us don't know what it means which makes me laugh uncontrollably which is the opposite of what they want I think. Is Christmas not a fucking holiday? Why the fuck do you care if someone says happy holidays and you say Merry Christmas? The fake fragility and bravado for defending Christmas which needs no fucking defense makes me want to scream. Go away. Do things that actual Jesus would have done like care about the sick and poor people and love everyone. 

Digging this as far as processed shit goes

Entering Ben cold season. He follows the sun, I put the heat on for him, and he has an electric blanket which he shares with Mae and Cici. Constantly cold, constantly refusing to wear a jacket. 

Listening to Long Walk Home by Springsteen. A favorite. 

Watching Yellowstone. I caught up this week. I forgot what it's like to watch a show episode by episode. It sucks. It is still hard for me to wrap my head around Rip being Billy in Good Will Hunting.

Eating pork tenderloin and salad are on the menu for tonight. Maybe a veggie type of casserole tomorrow night. I need to see what I have.

Delighting in following DesignMom on Instagram, love her stories of renovating the Tall House. Big fan of Twitter by Design Mom on there too.

Identifying with this more than I'd like to

Needing to wash my hair

Reading A History of Wild Places. I mowed through a few netgalley books earlier this week when I was solo at the shore. I also have a new novel by Shelby to beta read! I have to print that out today.

Reminding us all via Blair Imani

What's new with you?

What appears beyond the hyphen in Thursday Thoughts titles is what I'm listening to when I'm starting this - this week is Long Walk Home by Springsteen