Revisiting My Summer 2017 List

by Liz Heather in

LAST DAY OF SUMMER, GEEKS! Here’s what I had planned on doing this past summer & the realities of those expectations:

  1. Eat a Coney Island Red Hot from Feltman's.
    • Did it! And you know what? American hot dogs are gross. The only hot dogs I'll eat from here on out are the ones outside the Skydome or any Canadian Tire. Mainly 'cause they're grilled & not boiled, and those are amazing.
  2. Finally visit The Met Breuer and The Frick and The Cloisters since I've never been.
    • Went to all three! The Met Breuer was the most boring, followed by The Cloisters, followed by The Frick. The Frick was actually a pretty decent time, but not better than The Met.
  3. Ride bikes around the top half of Central Park since I've never seen any part above 79th street.
    • Nathan and I did this one on our anniversary last month and it was so much fun. That top half of the park felt like a completely different world, I loved it. The whole bike around the entire park took about an hour, too, which was way faster than I thought it'd take.
  4. Wear dark lipstick with all white outfits.
    • Damnit! I forgot about this one. Still a great idea, though. Maybe one day.
  5. Eat the whipped steak tartare at Employees Only.
    • You know what? I did eat it and BLEH. It was so average I could scream. I feel like they hand-make it front of you to make up for the fact that they know it's basic-tasting as hell.
  6. Go to the beach at least ten times.
    • I went seven times, but that's pretty impressive for me. So glad I went so much.
  7. Go swimming at least ten times.
    • Yikes, I went once. ONCE. That's appalling.
  8. Make an apple pie from scratch.
    • This one's happening this week, so I'm counting this one as completed I DON'T CARE it's practically done. 
  9. Take Baby Dog to a dog bar to meet other dogs.
    • Not even close. I tried one day, but it started raining and then we got comfortable at home.
  10. Lay out with the kids and look at the stars.
    • Ah man! I really wanted to do this one. Again, I'm doing this THIS WEEKEND. I vow.

Autumn's coming, baby, and I can't wait. The decorations go up October 1st for Thanksgiving/Halloween and the seasonal list shall be posted tomorrah.

2016 Resolutions Revisited

by Liz Heather in

I've purposely delayed writing this post, but since 2017 is officially well underway, there are no more excuses. I'll list my 2016 resolutions from last year below and then write alongside them how each went. 

1. Read at least two books per season.

  • Yeah, this didn't happen. Instead of reading eight books this year (two books x four seasons), I read a sum total of TWO books. Yikes. When I think back on why this happened, I really can't come up with any sound reasoning. This will be rectified this year.

2. Do pilates (or go to the gym) at least five times each month.

  • January - 6 times
  • February - 6 times
  • March - 8 times
  • April - 8 times
  • May - 4 times
  • June - 5 times
  • July - 1 time
  • August - 8 times
  • September - 6 times
  • October - 1 time
  • November - 6 times
  • December - 3 times

Okay, so I crushed this goal two thirds of the year. Yeah! And that means that I went to the gym 14.5% of the days this year (53 out of 365). Okay, that's not great since in 2015 I went 23.5% and in 2014 I went 37%, but still - it's not 0%. Not that there's anything wrong with 0%, but I would really like to get back up into my 2014 gym game.

3. Save 20% of every pay cheque from waitressing.

  • Totally done. I would tell you how much money that is, but it's gauche to talk about money.

4. Juice at least ten times a month.

  • January - 11 times
  • February - 4 times
  • March - 9 times
  • April - 2 times
  • May - 5 times
  • June - 12 times
  • July - 4 times
  • August - 5 times
  • September - 9 times
  • October - 1 time
  • November - 7 times
  • December - 10 times

I really said ten times a MONTH? Jesus. 2017 is definitely going to be about low expectations, Liz. LOW.

5. Go to an island with Nathan.

  • If Boston counts as an island, then did we ever!

6. Constantly buy flowers for the apartment and take photos of each arrangement.

  • This definitely happened and it was glorious.

7. At least once a month, go to a fancy-ass restaurant that you've never been to before.

  • January - Minetta Tavern & Bar Boulud
  • February - Stanton Social
  • March - Delmonico's & Peter Luger
  • April - Collage (in St. Augustine)
  • May - Beauty & Essex
  • June - nowhere!
  • July - Del Posto
  • August - The Lamb's Club & American Cut
  • September - nowhere!
  • October - Gramercy Tavern
  • November - nowhere!
  • December - Barberian's (in Toronto)

I love this resolution so hard. It's hard to pick a favourite of the year, but if I absolutely had to it would be Delmonico's. It'll definitely my to-go best steak place in the city now.

8. Get at least three haircuts this year.

  • Damnit! Only got two, one in January and one in September.

9. Wear all of the lipsticks. (I own twenty tubes of lipstick and I reserve them for... what?! I don't know. They gots to get WORN.)

  • I really did try to make an effort with this one.

All Fired Up by MAC

Sin by MAC

Freckletone by MAC

So Marilyn by Charlotte Tillbury

Bitch Perfect by Charlotte Tillbury

 

10. Sing in public again. 

  • Completely forgot about this one. Maybe on purpose.

All in all, 2016 was a pretty great year for me. I started the new year in Connecticut with Nathan, I began waitressing at a small French restaurant nearby, I went to the Westminster dog show, finally went to the planetarium, went to Florida three separate times (jesus, I just realized that), visited City Island in the Bronx, rode bikes around Governor's Island, cooked a lot of new things, went to the beach a ton, went to a lot of baseball games (one at Fenway Park), my mom came to visit me in New York, three of my close friends had babies, one got engaged and one got married, my brother came from Scotland for Thanksgiving, went on Central Park walks with Baby Dog - it was a pretty sweet year. 2017 resolutions coming soon!

Thanks for reading!

The Return!

by Liz Heather in

Hey! I realize it's been about five (yikes) months since a new post - and for that, I'm truly sorry. I want to say that a lot has been going on, but the real culprit was laziness. It's one of my worst qualities and it's so hard to change who you are.

In any case, I've decided to change the format a bit with this site. It's exhausting to do two posts every weekday and frankly I'm sick of having to stick to a schedule with things. (I hope you understand how hard it is for me to admit that since, for the past few years, I've stuck to a rather rigid schedule of how I run things on here.) But maybe I can change and be a little more flexible. I'm not saying this will be a permanent change, but for now it's the best that I can do. I'm hoping it'll inspire me to write more posts that I'm passionate about and less ones that are basically just filler. HOPING. 

And also? Thank you for continuing to gaze your sweet little eyes on this page and these words and for caring at all about what comes out of my mouth. I feel like the three of you who read this site don't realize how much I appreciate it.

Lastly, a lot has happened this week. Well, one major thing that has made a lot of people feel a lot of ways. Yesterday in particular was one of the darkest days I've ever experienced here and I'm not sure that I'm capable of expressing it accurately at the moment. I do know that we all need some kind of good in our lives right now, so that's what this week of posts will be centered around. Specifically things that are comforting to me and have lifted me up, even for a second. 

I hope you're okay with the new changes. Thanks for still reading, bud.

Spring in Central Park

by Liz Heather in ,

This is what Central Park looks like right now.

So when it looks like that, me and Baby Dog have to venture on over. And here's what happened.

She talks to other dogs! Do you know how rare that is? I'm thinking about making our visits a more regular thing since she really seemed to love it. 

Yeah, that's it. That's the whole post. I'm sorry, but it's a big deal that she'd speak to another dog! On with your day.