I’ve never seen a sexier sandwich in my whole life.
October 2021
June Jaunts 2020
Can someone just hit me in the face hard enough so that I wake up in 2021? As a favour to me? (Also I love that we’re all assuming that a new year means a completely fresh new slate and that none of the actions taken this year will affect the rest of our lives? It’s ridiculous, but it’s a type of logic that I can absolutely get on board with.) In any case, life is hell right now. Here’s what went on in hell this month.
I found a new streaming site for movies that is incredible.
My brother Gary made another gravy video (this time a Swiss Chalet one) and of course it’s perfect.
My Dad turned 97!
I started doing Ipsy bag reviews again. The best find from the bag this month: a REALHER lipstick. Just amazing quality and I need to look further into their other products.
I watched Get Me Roger Stone and the man seems like a needy psychopath.
I rewatched The Disaster Artist: still great.
I tried hard seltzer (not White Claw, it was a brand called HOOT) and it was very okay, I just don’t see the big deal? I think we all have low standards for things being good.
God, I miss Jon Stewart. I find myself just watching old segments from his show which are sadly still incredibly relevant.
I visited this coffee shop in Astoria called Coffee + Cake that’s so lovely. They make freshly baked goods each day and homemade ice cream and I’ll definitely return. This is their tomato & parmesan focaccia bread.
I started taking antihistamine eye drops for seasonal allergies and they’ve cured me completely. It’s insane. I love them.
I tried birthday cake Kit Kats because why wouldn’t I and of course they’re good. But they’re basically just… white Kit Kats… and that’s already a thing that exists… and look I’m not trying to hate on them, so I’ll keep my mouth shut about it from here on out.
If I became famous, the first thing I’d endorse would be Vicks (obviously), but the second thing? This dairy-free, almond milk yogurt DAH! Yes, the name is terrible. But the yogurt is heavenly. The madagascar vanilla will change you.
Finally made this ricotta jam jar with crostini and it was everything I wanted it to be and more.
I’ve been keeping a collection of photos taken of the city throughout the pandemic that are just gorgeous photos, here are a few.
I watched the Holy Chicken! documentary from the Super Size Me guy and it was okay. I did know a lot of those chicken facts already since we haven’t been eating meat these last few months, so it wasn’t anything revolutionary. And then after I watched it, I was reading about it and then came across all the gross behavior by the creator of the film and uggghhhh I wish I hadn’t watched and supported it now.
I tried this New Orleans cold brew and whoa. Good stuff. I don’t exactly know the difference between cold brew and coffee and it’s such a boring thing to look up, so… here we are.
Will forever love the food at The Thirsty Koala in Astoria. Thank you Katie, Greg & Irene for gifting us so much of their food this month! Truly so sweet of you.
Favourite tweets of the month.
New favourite Health-Ade kombucha flavour: passion fruit - tangerine. Absolutely unreal.
I bought a ton of underwear from Aerie since I don’t feel comfortable going into any stores or on the subway yet, and they’re actually pretty great quality (I’m sorry I didn’t get on this sooner, Marla.) The sizing is a little off in that one medium doesn’t fit like another medium, but once you figure it out, you’re good.
This girl. She’s still breaking my heart with these renditions.
How do I set my Google Alerts so that these types of stories are the only news stories I read?
I learned how to make vodka martinis at home, so what I’m trying to say is that I’m better than you now.
Truly don’t know how I feel about this news, but I think I have to support it, right? I wish we could just leave good things alone. Why must we always want more.
I watched The Joy Luck Club and here’s my takeaway: don’t have daughters. And also maybe don’t have mothers? It seems like everyone is a disappointment to every character in this movie. I was expecting to love it, so when that didn’t happen I was a little disappointed.
I watched Dan In Real Life (mainly because of Steve Carell who was way too good for this movie) and it suuuuucked. Hated Dane Cook. Hated the plot. Hated the whole white, rich, we-dance-as-a-family type aesthetic of the whole movie.
I watched the first season of You and a few episodes of the second season and uuuuuuuggggghhhhhh what a garbage show. I don’t need to see anyone romanticize some pathetic Gossip Girl loser who I feel no empathy for. It’s actually just so badly written and how on earth did someone green-light this trash. Here’s a good piece written about it.
Also watched a bunch of reruns of 3rd Rock From The Sun and what an underrated, great show. Wish I remembered it more.
I’ve been on a real Harrison Ford bender lately and I can’t see it stopping anytime soon. I watched Sabrina (which was okay, the best part was seeing him play a nerdish, unlovable character). I also watched Working Girl (which is really not a great movie, but it was only watchable for Ford). Also saw Air Force One and what a movie. How on earth have I never seen it before?? Such a fox. If you haven’t seen it before, I shall entice you with this one line:
Rainier cherries are in season now and while I don’t particularly love a cherry, these are delightful.
I’ve been sucking down these Saratoga Springs sparkling waters for days and there’s no turning back, they’re refreshing in a way I didn’t think existed. Just pure magic.
The only summer salad that’s worth a damn is this panzanella salad, but make sure you add fresh mozzarella to it.
I never thought I liked biscotti until a friend recently made it, so maybe I’m just into chocolate biscotti?
What a great idea (below):
If you’d like to hear the birds in NYC right now, get on over here.
I started watching Insecure but couldn’t really get into it, maybe I’ll give it more of a chance, maybe not. I feel like if you’re not hooked into a show within three episodes, it’s not gonna happen.
I rewatched Clueless and it’s really just a perfect movie. I could quote every line in this movie at one point in my life and I think I might still be able to. Still looking to emulate this perfect outfit one day.
Cannot stop making this broccoli pasta with Banza and the Beyond Meat sausage.
Absolutely haunted by this moving front page of the Times.
I finished watching Fuller House and I’ll never know why I wanted to, it’s such a corny/actually-bad show and yet I still watched. Thankfully it’s over forever.
Incase you’re looking for an alternative site to Amazon for buying books: Bookshop.org
I haven’t read a book in what feels like forever, so I finally finished Glennon Doyle’s Untamed and wrote about it.
Excited to one day see the new LaGuardia.
I went over what I did from my spring list that I made in March.
I naively made a list of what I’d like to do this summer.
It’s been a harder month than normal and I found myself watching The Land Before Time and uncontrollably weeping onto my yoga mat (I like to watch movies in the background when I’m working out). A kind of cry that comes around every decade or so where you can’t really breathe and you’re blinded my tears and everything is too much to handle. I know it’s a sad movie, but I think it was the movie and the combination of this month that made me react that way. In any case, I hope kids today still want to watch that movie. It’s a hard one, but it’s really still so good.
My grandmother Ma passed away this month and since travel is not allowed, it was especially difficult for this to happen now. I felt helpless being separated from most of my family so I wrote a bit about how it made me feel. I could talk about the greatness of this woman endlessly, how it’s insane that you could live in this day and age and not read or write and still enrich the lives of everyone you know, there’s no way to sum her up as a person. I’ll just miss her. Her voice, her endless encouragement, all of it.
Some things I’d like to do this month: I’d like to not sink into an unending pit of depression (that’d be great), I’d like to keep going on our nightly walks with Nathan, I’m likely going to buy these bike shorts as soon as they’re back in stock and you can’t stop me (I already have an outfit in mind, trust me it’s gonna look good), I was looking forward to movie theatres reopening (the Regal near our house specifically) but the date’s been pushed again to the end of July (which will likely get pushed again), and I’d really like to start and finish another book this month.
If you’ve got any interest in reading last month’s roundup, you can see what went down in May over here.
Summer List 2020
Well, welcome to summer.
The worst season in the worst year is suddenly upon us! Look at that! With everything a few weeks away from shutting down again (it’s happening, I can feel it), here’s what I’m going to try to do this season.
If I can make it to Canada in the next few months, I’d love to go see Tew Falls finally.
Go swimming at least twice. (Where? No idea.)
Try a Vietnamese iced coffee for the first time.
Eat the burger at L’Artusi.
Start planning San Francisco (and area) trip.
Other summer things I would’ve loved to do if the world was safe and normal: I would’ve gone to go see the installation on the rooftop at The Met, but I wouldn’t feel very comfortable being around that many people even if it does open, so next year it is. I wish carnivals were still happening this year, even small street ones, but that doesn’t seem likely. I am looking forward to summer tomatoes and corn, so that’s something. I’ve got to start planning my Halloween costume, too. Maybe this season won’t be a giant train wreck?
Swiss Chalet Gravy
Love these so much.
Spring List 2020 Revisited
So I’ll cut to the chase, I didn’t get a ton done off my spring list. Was that because of the collapse of the world around us and a pandemic that has no end in sight? Partly. But moreso I really couldn’t summon the energy to care about a lot this season.
Sit on my fire escape.
I didn’t do this. This was the easiest thing on the list and I couldn’t do it. I’m a little afraid to do it, I think. I keep thinking “the dumbest way to die would be falling off a fire escape” and that tends to make me put it off. I’ll try to face this fear soon.
Bake something spring inspired.
I baked so many things this spring: banana cake with coffee frosting, chocolate chip cookies, blueberry breakfast cookies and lemon ricotta cookies.
Rewatch my favourite Hitchcock movies.
Did it! Vertigo, Rear Window, Rope, The Birds, Dial M For Murder. Love ‘em.
Try some new hairstyles and new makeup routines.
DID NOT EVEN ATTEMPT. But I am thinking about making a big hair change, so stay tuned.
Watch at least ten things off of my To Be Watched list of movies and TV shows.
I think I did about five. It’s so hard for me not to just rewatch stuff I love. Taking a half point.
2.5 / 5 - disappointing, but not the worst I’ve ever done. Let’s see what I can get done in summer.
Hello, worstseasonoftheyear! Welcome to worstyearofallyears!
Untamed by Glennon Doyle - A Review
I got this book as a gift and knew nothing about the author or the book beforehand, and it was so good. I love it when you know nothing of an author or book and then can read it unbiased and with completely fresh eyes. Favourite parts ahead.
I love this line: “I have a son and two daughters, until they tell me otherwise.”
This line: “That day, I began returning to myself - when a kind woman revealed to me that being fully human is not about feeling happy, it’s about feeling everything” reminds me so much of this other paragraph that I’ll forever love.
“When a woman finally learns that pleasing the world is impossible, she becomes free to learn how to please herself.”
“I’ve seen what happens out in the world and inside our relationships when women stay numb, obedient, quiet, and small. Selfless women make for an efficient society but not a beautiful, true, or just one. When women lose themselves, the world loses its way. We do not need more selfless women. What we need right now is more women who have detoxed themselves so completely from the world’s expectations that they are full of nothing but themselves. What we need are women who are full of themselves. A woman who is full of herself knows and trusts herself enough to say and do what must be done. She lets the rest burn.”
I’m not sure if this part will have much meaning out of context, but I love it: “The Ache is not a flaw. The Ache is our meeting place. It’s the clubhouse of the brave. All the lovers are there. It is where you go alone to meet the world. The Ache is love. The Ache was never warning me: This ends, so leave. She was saying: This ends, so stay.”
“If you are uncomfortable - in deep pain, angry, yearning, confused - you don’t have a problem, you have a life. Being human is not hard because you’re doing it wrong, it’s hard because you’re doing it right. You will never change the fact that being human is hard, so you must change your idea that it was ever supposed to be easy.”
I’d never heard the term selah before and I love it. “Selah is found in the Hebrew Bible seventy-four times. Scholars believe that when it appears in the text, it is a direction to the reader to stop reading and be still for a moment, because the previous idea is important enough to consider deeply.”
Fully agree on the statement: “The woods are NOT for people.” I still don’t understand why this isn’t a universal opinion.
“We don’t control the turbulence or tragedy that happens to our families. The plot of our lives is largely out of our control. We decide only the response of the main character. We decide whether we will be the one who jumps ship or the one who stays and leads.”
“It must be so lonely to be a man. It must be so difficult to carry by yourself all the things we were meant to help each other carry.”
“Self-hatred is harder to unlearn than it is to learn. It is difficult for a woman to be healthy in a culture that is still so very sick. It is the ultimate victory for a woman to find a way to love herself and other women while existing in a world insisting that she has no right to.”
“Blessed are those brave enough to make things awkward, for they wake us up and move us forward.”
“Everything doesn’t have to be terrifying, after all. This is just life, and we are just people trying to figure each other out. Trying to figure ourselves out.”
“It is a blessing to know a free woman. Sometimes she will stop by and hold up a mirror for you. She will help you remember who you are.”
“We took wild sexuality - the mysterious undefinable ever-shifting flow between human beings - and we packaged it into sexual identities. It’s like water in a glass. Faith is water. Religion is a glass. Sexuality is water. Sexual identity is a glass. We created these glasses to try to contain uncontainable forces. Then we said to people: Pick a glass - straight or gay. So folks poured their wide, juicy selves into those narrow, arbitrary glasses because that was what was expected. Many lived lives of quiet desperation, slowly suffocating as they held their breath to fit inside.”
There isn’t a specific part that I can highlight, but the author really makes a great case for being with women. Women are just… better? In all ways?
“It’s not: I love you no matter which of my expectations you meet or don’t meet. It’s: My only expectation is that you become yourself. The more deeply I know you, the more beautiful you become to me.”
“Depression and anxiety are not feelings. Feelings return me to myself. Depression and anxiety are body snatchers that suck me out of myself so that I appear to be there but I’m really gone. Other people can still see me, but no one can feel me anymore - including me. For me, the tragedy of mental illness is not that I’m sad but that I’m not anything. Mental illness makes me miss my own life.”
“I have been conditioned to mistrust and dislike strong, confident, happy girls and women. We all have. Studies prove that the more powerful, successful, and happy a man becomes, the more people trust and like him. But the more powerful and happy a woman becomes, the less people like and trust her. We become people who say of confident women, “I don’t know, I can’t explain it - it’s just something about her. I just don’t like her. I can’t put my finger on why.” I can put my finger on why: It’s because our training is kicking in through our subconscious. Strong, happy, confident girls and women are breaking our culture’s implicit rule that girls should be self-doubting, reserved, timid, and apologetic. Girls who are bold enough to break those rules irk us. Their brazen defiance and refusal to follow directions make us want to put them back into their cage. Girls and women sense this. We want to be liked. We want to be trusted. So we downplay our strengths to avoid threatening anyone and invoking disdain. We do not mention our accomplishments. We temper, qualify, and discount our opinions. We walk without swagger, and we yield incessantly. We step out of the way. We say, “I feel like” instead of “I know.” We ask if our ideas make sense instead of assuming they do. We apologize for… everything. Conversations among brilliant women often devolve into competitions for who wins the trophy for hottest mess. We want to be respected, but we want to be loved and accepted even more.”
“Playing dumb, weak, and silly is a disservice to yourself and to the world. Every time you pretend to be less than you are, you steal permission from other women to exist fully. Don’t mistake modesty for humility. Modesty is a giggly lie. An act. A mask. A fake game. We have no time for it.”
“When I see a joyful, confident woman moving through the world with swagger, I’m going to forgive myself for my first reaction because it’s not my fault, it’s just my conditioning. First reaction: Who the hell does she think she is? Second reaction: She knows she’s a goddamn cheetah. Halle-fucking-lujah.”
And my most favourite few lines of the entire book: “If women trusted and claimed their desires, the world as we know it would crumble. Perhaps that is precisely what needs to happen so we can rebuild truer, more beautiful lives, relationships, families, and nations in their place. Maybe Eve was never meant to be our warning. Maybe she was meant to be our model. Own your wanting. Eat the apple. Let it burn.”
Oh and one last part. It’s perfect.
Honestly, it was such a good book. Everyone should read it.
(Thank you, Marla, for introducing me to it!)
Ipsy Bag June 2020
The items appear out of order in the video for some reason, I’ll try to not let that happen again!
Ma 1918-2020
My 101 year old grandmother Ma passed away yesterday. She had 13 children and lived with our family for pretty much my whole childhood, she’d spend the warmer Canadian months with us and then go back to Trinidad for the winter. She was my second mother and truthfully had the best life of anyone I know.
This woman gave me so much throughout my whole life and she never asked for one thing from anyone, it was always about what could she do for you. It’s a rare thing to get to live with one of your grandparents, and I know how lucky we were for that to be our reality.
We shared a bedroom for the first eight years of my life and she taught me how to pray. She made me rice and dahl when I came home for lunch everyday in elementary school and sat and watched The Flintstones with me. When I was moody as hell as a teenager, she somehow looked through that and was still always on my side no matter what. Every time she cooked it, she made enough kurma candy for the entire neighborhood. She made better dhalpuri roti than any West Indian shop. I’d never heard anyone call a man a bitch until I heard her mutter it under her breath about Stefano on Days of Our Lives which made her laugh when she saw my eyes open wide at hearing her. When I wanted to move to New York and so many people told me it was a bad idea, she told me to do whatever I wanted because I can do things that other people are afraid to. She started wearing the perfume that I love, Miracle by Lancome, because she said she wanted to smell like me when I wasn’t around. She would hold my hand and refuse to let go. When Jasmine died, she promised that she’d watch her when she got to heaven so I never had to worry about her again.
She impacted everyone she met and it’s impossible to sum up this great woman’s life. I wish I could be with her one last time, but I feel her with me. I can hear her laugh. I can feel her presence. I hate that we’ve lost someone so genuinely full of life, but I’m so thankful that she’ll be apart of us forever.
I know you’re in the heavens above, I love you so much, Ma.
May Misery 2020
How is it June? Imagine that this year is just a nightmare that we’re all simultaneously having? I should use this space to be uplifting, but hope is exhausting at the current moment. All I can tell you are the things that either brought me joy or displeasure from the last month. That’s all I can do at the moment. And that’s definitely a privilege right now, I understand. I feel helpless, hopeless and like nothing is going in the right direction. This is a terrible intro, so let’s just get into all the meaningless trash that I did last month.
My brother Gary made this great video on how to make KFC gravy and you might think I’m biased, but he’s just so fun to watch. Love it so much.
I rewatched two Alfred Hitchcock movies: Rope (still such a great motive, one of his best) and Rear Window (which is average as hell, the idea of the story is so much better than the execution of the movie). Also, it made me really laugh hearing Nathan say, “If you can’t kill your wife, whose wife CAN you kill?“
Are you aware that they’re still making new flavours of M&Ms? I tried the fudge brownie flavour and I gotta say, they just taste like regular ass M&Ms.
I had completely forgotten about this amazing ricotta toast (thank you, Marla) recipe that I loved from years ago. Everyone should make it. It sounds like such a boring recipe, but it’s incredible. Of course it’s from Ina.
A great article about apologizing.
We keep making these chickpea pitas and likely won’t stop.
Months ago I bought this white poncho on sale for basically nothing because I thought this was my year of travel. Yeah. Great purchase.
I watched the Michelle Obama documentary, Becoming, and it’s obviously inspiring and great. Love the woman.
I’ve mentioned before how walnuts in pesto are way tastier than pine nuts, right? Cheaper, too. In any case, I can’t stop making this walnut pesto.
I watched the first season of Awkwafina is Nora From Queens and it’s SUCH A GOOD SHOW. Every single character is great. Perfect show.
I made this banana cake again, mostly because of that damn frosting. Even if you’re just making a regular cake, you should do it with this coffee cream cheese frosting.
Every morning for the past few weeks, I’ve been making this iced coffee protein shake (below). It might be the only thing I look forward to at this point in time. (It tastes pretty similar to a Tim Horton’s Iced Capp, just less sugary.)
I only wear one perfume (Miracle by Lancome), but I’m almost completely out of it (and won’t repurchase anytime soon since these are not the times to be buying luxurious items) so I’ve been wearing Fresh Cream by Philosophy that I got as a gift last year and I kind of love it. It makes me smell like a cake.
I’m still making these halloumi hummus bowls for lunch, but I’ve amended the recipe slightly by adding chopped basil instead of oregano and slicing up the halloumi incredibly thin since I think it tastes better when it’s crispy and thin.
Some movies that I’ve rewatched: Dazed & Confused (a forever favourite, I love a movie where the plot happens over the course of one day), Crazy Rich Asians (still fantastic, although I truly hate the bride character or actress playing her, I can’t decide), I Know What You Did Last Summer (still holds up, solid movie), I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (not a great sequel at ALL, but I do love the idea of a killer on vacation), and Back To The Future (this might be the perfect movie, the script is amazing, everything is so fun, the music is epic, I also love the fact that the writers Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale will never allow a remake or reboot during their lifetimes).
I got this cropped sweatshirt from Nordstrom that I wear approximately six days a week.
In love with this new Jackbox game that I’ve been playing with my family on Sundays: Mad Verse City.
The peony blossom candle from Trader Joe’s smells beautiful.
The Body Shop gives you a free product worth $10 on your birthday month, so I got their tea tree body wash and I love it. What the hell did I do before tea tree?
Just learned: grating garlic is so much tastier than chopping garlic. Thank you, Bon Appetit!
I made this kung pao cauliflower and it was good as a side dish but definitely not as a main. Cauliflower as a main dish will always be offensive to me.
I watched Stephen King’s Graveyard Shift and absolutely hated it. Terrible movie. What kind of accent is that guy supposed to have???
I bought a cuticle cutter since the nail salons are still closed and I figured how hard could it be to use? Turns out: very hard. No idea how to use it on myself or anyone else for that matter.
I have been making these kale quesadillas for lunch and they’re so tasty. I just use whatever cheese I have, basil and white wine vinegar instead of champagne vinegar. Also, I omit the corn because frozen corn is always trash. Super simple recipe, too.
I watched two episodes of the Epstein documentary on Netflix and had assault nightmares that night so I thought maybe I don’t need to finish all the episodes. I’m not including the link here for it because I truly don’t think anyone needs to see it.
My friend Dusty made this great short film.
I argued with Nathan at least twice this month on camera. (And about 400 times in real life? Again, no link for that.)
My six year old nephew is beyond adorable in this video about the lockdown.
I bought these Steve Madden sandals for $22 when they were on sale the other day and I had a gift card, and I’m in love.
Forgot how good these black bean muffins are. Such a nice little snack. Ignore the fact that they sound disgusting.
Excited to hear that Tuca & Bertie are coming back for another season! (Thank you Harmeet for turning me onto this great show!)
We’ve been eating the Beyond Meat hamburger patties and they’re phenomenal. We’ve been putting this McCormick gravy on top of them and and I’ll add these pickled red onions too and wow. Heavenly. Never would’ve thought I could be into a homemade pickled onion. Growth!
This is wild and slightly horrifying.
Super interesting piece about the NYPD.
Favourite tweets from the month:
Some things that I’d like to do this month: I promise that I will finally review the last two monthly Ipsy bags, I really want to make these salted thyme chocolate chip cookies, I want to make this midnight pasta that I heard about from Mindy Kaling, I want to read at least two books this month, I’m dying to make this ricotta jam jar, and I don’t know, maybe June won’t be a complete shitshow. Also, don’t forget about Father’s Day on the 21st. Just a reminder. If you’ve got any interest in reading last month’s roundup, you can see what went down in April over here.
And it’d be weird not to mention this at all right now, but there are so many awful and horrendous things going on, you know this. I completely support Black Lives Matter and it’s insane that there’s any kind of divide about whether you do or you don’t. It makes me sick that saying something as simple as “black people are human beings” could ever be considered complicated or political, but I guess here we are. I have no magical words to offer and I wish I did. I have no quote that’ll make everything make sense because nothing right now makes any sense. People are not being treated like human beings and it’s disgusting, it’s that simple. I don’t know what’s ahead of us, but for fuck’s sake I hope it’s better than where we’re at right now.