A beautifully shot video of the ocean, with a beautiful message. If you love what you do, even if you never get rich and famous, you’ll live a life you will enjoy remembering.
A beautifully shot video of the ocean, with a beautiful message. If you love what you do, even if you never get rich and famous, you’ll live a life you will enjoy remembering.
This last week was kind of a strange one, I just couldn’t muster up the energy to do anything, and I’ve been really tired. The long weekend helped a bit, especially since we got out of the Bay and went for a day trip to the Marin county coast, touring around Olema, Bolinas and Point Reyes. It was kind of cold to be out at the beach, but it was so nice to just be outside and to be surrounded by trees.
One of the things I noticed when I lived in Honolulu was that sometimes I would just get really grouchy and lethargic, without a real reason why. Then we would jump in the car and leave the city, head to North Shore or Lanikai for the day, and I would instantly feel better. Being surrounded by people and buildings and cars all the time is just not great for me, and sometimes I need to get away from all of those things and recharge.
We stopped for lunch at a cute little restaurant in Olema, did a bit of wandering around on the cliffs at Bolinas, and made our way to Limantour beach, which was gorgeous, but freezing. We finished off the day in Point Reyes, with a visit to the Cowgirl Creamery.
One of my really good friends is getting married in Toronto on my birthday, which is really exciting. I get to go back to Canada, hopefully see some snow and also gorge myself on Canadian treats( I’ve already been Googling the Toronto airport to find out where the Tim Horton’s are located, I wish I was kidding) and also celebrate the marriage of one of my favourite people.
I am also VERY excited, because the company I work for has an office in New York. Since we’re going to be on the East Coast anyways, we are going to be spending a week there, sight seeing, creeping around and visiting friends.
I’ve wanted to go to NY for most of my life so I’ll pack as much into those few days as possible, but one of the things I would love to do while we’re there is go see a Broadway play, especially The Book of Mormon.
Tickets for their shows in San Francisco were astronomical, I literally looked it up and started laughing, so hopefully it will be a little more reasonable there. Getting tickets to that show would be the best birthday present ever (hint, hint).
Speaking of birthday things, I found these bracelets on a random website a few months ago, and almost ordered a couple for myself because they are so pretty, but decided to hold off because I think they’d be a great birthday present, for when people ask me every year what I want, and every year I still can’t think of anything.
Also, this backpack would come in very handy in the next couple of months. Hopefully it’s like Mary Poppins’ bag and I can fit everything I’ll ever need in here, but somehow I doubt it.
And, as usual, almost anything from Brandy Melville. Merci beaucoup.
The first time I ever tried baked brie was about 5 years ago, my mom made a savoury one with onions and bell peppers and cooked it on the BBQ. It was life changing in the way that things sometimes are when they are completely foreign, but immediately make perfect sense the moment you are exposed to them.
Of course melty delicious cheese should be paired with thousands of different toppings and served on bits of crispy baguette. The world made sense again. Since then, it’s become kind of a go-to dish in our family, but we are always mixing it up and trying new recipes. This one was really delicious, and pretty easy, I substituted figs for pears since that’s what I had on hand.
After toasting the almonds, and sauteing the pears in the brown sugar and vanilla, place the fruit and nut mixture on top of a peeled wheel of brie, wrap in Pillsbury Crescent roll dough, and bake for about 45 minutes. You can serve it with baguette, apples, crackers, or just get right in there and eat it with a spoon. There is no judgement here.
I’ve had my eye on some MAC Ruby Woo for quite awhile now. I have a weird obsession with red lipstick, even though I usually buy it and only wear it once because I don’t like the way it looks on me, or it feels weird on, or something.
This colour is pretty much the perfect pin-up red so even though it was kind of expensive, after creep Googling it in the middle of the night for a few months, I decided to go for it. I also bought lip liner, which is apparently non-negotiable (who knew?) and really like the result.
It’s definitely red, it’s kind of like being kicked in the face by the colour, but hopefully in a good way. I also really like the way it feels on, usually when I wear lipstick I spend the whole day licking my teeth to make sure I don’t have any on there, or just keeping my mouth awkwardly still and try not to talk because it feels not so much like a mouth anymore and more like a decoration.
But this one actually doesn’t make my mouth feel weird, and so far hasn’t ended up on my teeth even once. Not to say that it has amazing staying power, I bought it on a ladies shopping trip, and then we went for drinks and split a massive plate of fries, and I probably thought I looked cute, but one trip to the washroom shut that down pretty quickly.
The colour had disappeared from everywhere expect the very outside of my lips and I looked full crazy, and possibly like a vampire. But you need to re-apply your lipstick after eating, that’s just what life is like, no matter how many 24-hour lip-stains promise you otherwise. Everybody’s got problems.
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| I started working on this painting a few weeks ago. It’s a self portrait. Clearly. |
Also, I almost neverrrrr take selfies, some people can do it and do it well, but I do not have those skills. I try everyone once in awhile just to make sure they are still really bad, but generally flipping through the gallery of resulting failures is so disheartening I can feel the will to live ebbing away.
When I got my lipstick, I had also just gotten my hair done, and was trying to send a picture to my husband. My phone sometimes makes weird .gif images if I take several similar pictures in a row, and this was the result. It makes me laugh so I decided to post it. Be kind.
Last Friday at work I happened to catch a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror and had a tiny panic attack at how crazy and straw-like my hair was looking.
I tend to go months without noticing or caring, and then one day a quick glance reveals how dire the situation really is and I need to get my hair done IMMEDIATELY and if I can’t find someone to do it, I’ll buy a box of black dye and get out my office scissors and do it myself.
Luckily I was able to get an appointment for the following day, and decided to go a bit darker again, as I’d had pretty light ombre for awhile. I also got my eyebrows done professionally for the first time in my life, it was pretty wonderful, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to go back.
I know my sisters will be excited as both of them have been known to drop helpful hints about my lopsided brows.
One of my favourite things about the salon, The Dollhouse in Brentwood, is the decor, it’s so whimsical and colourful, I always feel like Alice in Wonderland.
I’m trying to decide what I want to dress up as for Halloween, but so far I can’t come up with anything. I even tried doing word association to hopefully inspire a cool, completely never done before costume and in a flash of inspiration while looking out the window I screeched out, “OF COURSE! I WILL BE A TREE!”
So it’s clear that I’m going to have to take a different route to finding my costume. I saw this project the other day and have since been obsessed, even though it’s not even close to being the right season to plant more things, but then I started thinking, what if I covered MYSELF in gold leaf? Not my whole body, since there might be children present, but just gold leaf makeup.
I think it looks so gorgeous, and also kind of like you might have a contagious skin condition, so perfect for Halloween. The only problem is, it’s not really a costume, is it? When someone asks me what I’m supposed to be and I just say “Gold”, that might be odd. So now I’m trying to think of an actual costume I could make out of plastering my face with gold leaf.
So far I’ve come up with an Oscar, Goldmember, Queen Midas, or the sugar plum from the Nutcracker (although I’m not sure why since I feel like she would be white and silver?)
Here is my makeup inspiration so let’s see what I can come up with. Although hopefully with less gold dandruff.
Last Friday night we went to see Matt Nathanson at the Fox Theater in Oakland. The Fox is gorgeous, I love the enormous gold statues flanking the stage, and it also has 11 bars, so that’s beautiful as well.
It was also First Friday in downtown Oakland, I’ve been hearing about it for a long time but just hadn’t made it down to check it out. They close down a whole street in downtown Oakland and there are bands and food trucks and artists and vendors selling all kinds of things. There was a school bus full of vintage clothes, I had my eye on a faux fur vest when Derek unceremoniously dragged me away.
They had a bunch of old cars and really neat motorcycles, and I even saw a few rap battles, and I had an amazing tri-tip sandwich for supper. It was a really neat crowd and I’d definitely like to bring some people back there with us next time.
The concert was wonderful, Matt has been my favourite since the first time I heard Still, and if anything we are even closer now as he made every single person sing “I Want to Dance with Somebody” by Whitney Houston at the top of their lungs and he wouldn’t stop until everyone joined in, and also qualified a song where he talks about Jewish girls with “I’m a pervert, not a racist”.
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| Sitting on a sidewalk in Oakland eating supper, because I’m classy like that |
loveliness. 