Pilot

Originally published January 31, 2024

Good morning! 

So basically, I'm just here to have fun. I don't know what on earth I have to talk about, and honestly I don't care if anyone even reads this. I have no predetermined structure for this. I cannot stress enough that I'm literally here for fun!

So I'm going to try something for this first post, and then I might never do it again. Unless I love it, and then I might do it again. We'll see. I love the TikToks that are someone's "Weekly R.E.P.O.R.T." If you've never seen these videos, it's the person going through what they're reading, eating, playing, obsessing over, recommending, and treating themself to.

So here's my report. Enjoy. 

Reading
Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton. I've seen this book all over TikTok (are you sensing a theme yet that I spend too much time on TikTok?) and honestly I totally get it. I love the structure of it, just little stories and anecdotes, not cohesive chapters. And she throws recipes in there? You're kidding, that's so fun. The one thing that I always think about with memoirs, though, is how all of the dialogue is in quotation marks. Surely, you don't remember that those were the exact words that that person said. Is it just understood across the publishing industry that all memoirs are paraphrasing, but they still can use quotation marks? Regardless, I'm enjoying it. It's the second memoir I've ever read (the first being Beautiful Boy by David Sheff) and it's reaffirming that I really love them. I will, of course, be updating my Goodreads when I finish it, which will most likely be tonight. 

Emily and I pre-Impossible Burgers

Eating
I have been somewhat inspired recently with cooking. My biggest goal is to stop throwing together a five minute meal, and spend the extra fifteen or twenty minutes making something more exciting. My current food habits are keeping homemade tzatziki in the fridge at all times, meal prepping egg bites to reheat and have for breakfast each morning (I'm really trying to start my day with more protein), and Impossible Burgers. I will never eat one as good as the ones that Emily made for us in Brule, but I can sure try. 

Playing
It's my understanding that "playing" can really be anything you're doing for fun. In that case, I've recently been knitting and playing Animal Crossing. When it comes to the knitting, I am just having so much fun. It feels so cool to create something like that, and it's very relaxing to do. It's also crazy to think that knitted items are made from one giant string that's just looped strategically. Anyway, I'm currently working on a scarf for my lovely sister, and then I'll move on to some little kitchen towels, because everyone needs a good kitchen towel. 

As for the Animal Crossing, I was not raised in a video game household, so I'm a little out of my element. However, after repeatedly losing at Mario Kart on Emily's Wii, I decided to buy myself a Switch. And I'm having copious amounts of fun with it. I do have two issues, though. One, it is IMPOSSIBLE to get iron nuggets. You're telling me I have to spend 2000 Nook Miles to travel to another island just to hit some rocks? That's foul. And there is, at most, one rock on my island per day. How silly is that? My second gripe is that I am carrying this island on my back, and I don't get an ounce of recognition from Tom Nook. I'm out here building furniture for new residents, setting up the campsite, helping the lost guy on the beach, and what do I see for my efforts? Not a darn thing. I fear my resentment for Tom Nook is growing by the day. 

Obsessing Over
I can't get enough of the Lord of the Rings. I do need to admit that I haven't read the books. I read the Hobbit in 5th grade, but I feel like that doesn't count. Either way, my dad watched the movies (extended edition, obviously) constantly throughout my childhood. He would tell us to look away when the orcs were about to show up, and my sisters and I would turn around and watch the reflection of the TV in the glass of the fireplace. I think that's what makes the movies so perfect to me, the nostalgia mixed with the fact that they are extremely well made. They are visually stunning, the acting is great, the plot is so good, I really just don't have a bad thing to say. And the extended editions are so long that by the time you're done with them, you feel ready to go back and start the first one over again. So that's basically all that I've been watching (plus the occasional episode of New Girl). My favorite characters will probably not surprise you one bit. They are Sam, Aragorn, and Merry. However, I do love pretty much everyone.

Recommending
I'm recommending sleep. It is maybe one of the most basic joys of life, and it's so good for you in every way. I know that this is not revolutionary, but it's important. Most of the world is chronically sleep deprived. I've always been a huge fan of sleeping, but my sleep schedule was DESTROYED by working at Caribou Coffee for three years, most often on the opening shift. Now that it's been almost three years since I quit that job, I think it's beyond time for me to fix that. First of all, I'm a night owl, and no, I will not be fighting my biology and trying to become a morning person. However, I need to stop allowing myself to scroll through TikTok in bed until I physically cannot keep my eyes open. I have been a sleep snob since Thanksgiving, when my mom recommended that I read Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker. She was so right, it's a great book. I highly recommend that you read it, but if you don't want to, here's the gist: sleep is the secret ingredient to improving nearly everything in your life. Mental health, physical health, productivity, longevity, all of it. And I want to live happily and healthily forever, so I'm committed to consistently getting good sleep now. 

Treating Myself To
I'm treating myself to redecorating my apartment and hanging out with my cat. Look at her next to the little frog statue. They're twins, and that's everything to me. Anyway, I feel like for a while, I was coming home, ignoring my cat, running through all of the things that I had to do (cleaning, working out, etc.), and then falling asleep without really enjoying anything about my evening. I'm trying to shift my perspective about that chunk of time between work and sleep. I'm trying to use that time to get some chores done while not feeling like I have to tackle it all in one day. Once that's done, I'm trying to have fun decorating my apartment and switching things around, using it as a form of fun rather than something I feel like I have to do.

And my cat is, at the end of the day, a drama queen and a fiend for attention. I feel bad that I used to not really pet her or give her much attention until I was in bed and she was laying with me. She deserves better than that, and when I think about how lucky I am to have her, I'm like wow, let me give you all my love and affection. Because she's sweet, and adorable, and the best cat in the world, and I'm so lucky to have her. So I need to remember that it's a treat to hang out with her. 

That's All, Folks!
That was actually extremely fun. I will most definitely be doing this again. I love this whole blog thing for multiple reasons. First of all, it's so early-2000s, which I love. Second of all, it's so fun to just have like a little online diary, even if nobody ever reads it, it's about the fun I have writing it. Lastly, I think it's good for both my mental health to write about some things, and it'll be good for improving my writing skills. 

I want to end with my song recommendations because I didn't fit them into one of the previous categories. 

Moon in the Morning - Adam Melchor
Into My Arms - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
Modern Girl - Bleachers
I Used To Hate My Body But Now I Just Hate You - Fenne Lily

I could go on and on and on with songs, but I'll save some for the next post. 

Sayonara, Sammy!