Now: January 2025
Mar 07
Happenings
This week has been pretty busy between work, home, and just life. I've been trying to adapt to meeting a lot of new people at work and though part of me enjoys it, I feel it's times like this where it's the hardest to truly mask. I tend to mask as a friendly lighthearted person that jokes and I feel I come across as fake. I truly am friendly and like humor, but on my own I am quiet. Sometimes I wonder if relishing stillness is to balance out the chaos that is my brain. It's a bit hard though becuase sometimes i get restless too. Like I am on lunch break for work as I type this, but part of me wants to move my body. Listen to obnoxious music and bake a cake or cook something delicious. But the end of the week is not too far thank goodness!
From my Shelves
Project finish the damn books I started™ is going swimmingly!!! Five books completed and 5 to go 😭😭😭😭 May I never do this again (I doubt it).
- The Highly Sensitive Person by Elaine Aron. It had good parts and some good insights but overall her solutions seem a bit out of touch and seem to come from a place of privilege. Like... "tell your ___ you are an HSP so they can accommodate your needs." GIRL, I can't get my husband to understand autism and honor it, how am I going to successfully convince people in this current cultural landscape to care? IDK I might be too cynical but asserting one's differences never worked for me in any setting so the advice fell flat.
- Super-Cannes by J.G. Ballard. I disliked this book. I understand that it was a satire of sorts but in this era felt more glorifying than castigating so a hard no for me. I'm just glad I finished it.
- Hum by Helen Phillips. I liked the beginning and end of this one but felt the middle was a touch stretched and very much into the mom ennui vibe which I associate to authors like Lauren Groff and which never truly resonated with me.
- The Birds & Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier. It was a really good collection and I adore her prose! Kiss Me Again, Stranger was the standout for me. But I enjoyed them all to an extent.
- The Grid by Gretchen Bakken. It was a good overview on the history, state of (as of writing), and speculation on possible solutions to modernize our power grids. I need to do more research on if any of the speculations came to pass, the current state of things, etc. but I learned a lot from the book and enjoyed it.
- Reading All About Love by bell hooks. I'm a bit more than halfway done and enjoying it still! I feel this book's message is even more urgent and relevant 26 years after its original publication.
On Repeat
Recently Baekhyun dropped a gorgeous song collab with Umi and El Capitxn called Do What You Do which I'm absolutely enamored with. Also, I adore Waves by Fiji Blue and Too Late by YAØ and me-mai
On My Needles (Hook)
I've continued my Daphne socks and they are quite close to finished! I think I shall tackle the cloud crochet blanket next as part of the finish all the things initiative :p
In patriarchal culture men are especially inclined to see love as something they should receive without expending effort. More often than not they do not want to do the work that love demands. When the practice of love invites us to enter a place of potential bliss that is at the same time a place of critical awakening and pain, many of us turn our backs on love.
– bell hooks (All About Love)
Mar 14
Happenings
I've been hunkered down this week, mostly focused on reading, work, my home. I feel a little restless. The days are warming and I feel an odd need to move more. Maybe it's just a reaction to this winter feeling colder and longer than last year? Though here the winters are fairly mild. I am excited though, to hear the birds as I type. Nature's stirring feels grounding to me. I haven't been sleeping all that great this week unfortunately and feel a bit weary every day. I'm a bit ill still, and my daughter is off this week, so it's probably a mix of the chaos and just not feeling 100%. But, as every office worker is apt to say, it is Friday! Or Friyay? :p I'm just excited to get away from the computer and live that analog life for two days. I'm seriously considering going screen free on Sundays, but I'm leery of my own good intentions so we shall see. Oh, last thing! I'm slightly obssesed with a YT channel I stumbled on yesterday. I swear his parody T-Pain song has been living rent free in my head all day! 🎶💖 IS IT MY FAULT / THAT CAPITALISM MAKES ALL THESE GIRLS SO FIIINE 💖🎶
From my Shelves
I finished and started a few more books this week:
- All About Love by bell hooks. I truly enjoyed this one and felt the message is just as relevant, if not more than when it was published. I feel that even though we relegate the concept of love the majority of time to the romantic realm, I agree with her that living a life that embraces love transcends the mere individual and how the way we approach love is reflective of modern culture. For me there's a lot tying in to what I read in The Agony of Eros, The Highly Sensitive Person, and a few others. Namely the archetypes of warrior/prophets and how as a society we tend to not keep more balance. With a warrior/patriarchal paradigm dominating we commdodified things we shouldn't have.
- Lavender Clouds: Comics about Neurodivergence and Mental Health by Bex Ollerton. I FELT SO SEEN WITH THIS ONE. I adored the art style too 🥰
- In the Beginning...Was the Command Line by Neal Stephenson. I've always been a huge nerd for tech history! I think part is that I was alive especially for the newer parts. So even though in some ways the book feels dated, that is exactly the charm of it. Plus, it's more accurate to see those facts from the era itself, as time distorts memory and the retelling of facts.
- The Burnout Society by Byung-Chul Han. I enjoyed this one a lot in general, though of course I feel there is space for nuance. This is my second book of his and that just seems the trend for me I guess? Like I tend to agree on his overarching message but feel like becuase the nature in it is making arguments for the points, sometimes nuance is lost and I enjoy doing thought exercices about them. But I do agree that we are now as a whole an achievment society and that causes more mental health issues. And you can see the achievement society in many ways. The fixation with health and tracking health to self optimize and how we self exploit ourselves.
- Reading How Charts Lie by Alberto Cairo. I design a data heavy app and felt this would be a good read! I'm about a quarter way through.
- Reading Between Two Fires by Christopher Buehlman.
On Repeat
I'm still on that chill indie R&B kick!
On My Needles (Hook)
I finished cloud blanket! Next finish Daphne socks. I also want to make some zonkin cloths out of some old clothes. I saw this video and thought they were gorgeous.
When a paradigm has come to provide an object of reflection, it often means that its demise is at hand.
– Byung-Chul Han (All About Love)