NOTW

This past weekend, one of my friends hosted a nail wrap party with Jamberry nail wraps. It was so much fun and they were so easy to use. I think it took about 5 minutes for me to do my two accent nails. I would have done more, but they were only samples and not enough of the same pattern to do all my nails. That’s ok, because I wanted to try out this new nail polish sent in the latest LaRitzy box!

The base was Deco Miami’s Petite Palm, which I really wished they shipped to Canada! The polishes are adorable! The dots were done by mixing two drops of Soulstice’s Kauai and a drop of a england’s Briar Rose.
The wrap and the colour ended up going so well together. I am so happy with the results and now I want more Jamberry wraps! They’re good for when I have lazy days 🙂

I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb

02.22.16

Some time last year I was in a reading rut, I didn’t want to read any of my books, nothing seemed interesting to me. I was telling the bff and she lent me this book. I put it on my bookshelf meaning to read it, but then it just ended up staying there as I got busy with everything involved with moving. I didn’t pick it up until recently and at first I was kind of like ok..and then I got to the end and it was so emotional. I really did not expect to be crying, but I was just sobbing.

Spoilers ahead!

The story centered around Dominick, the narrator, whose brother, Thomas, is Schizophrenic and his attempts to get his brother out of the mental hospital after an incident and into an assisted living placement. His story goes back and forth and back and forth from the present to the past. It was really interesting to see the relationship with his brother, that love/hate relationship he had with his twin. The relationships with his Ma, and with his stepfather, Ray and how that relationship evolved throughout their life.

• I loved my brother. I hated him. There was no solution to who he was. No getting back who he had been.
• control: that was the hot button that pushed me to my decision. Suddenly, that gel-haired surgeon was our stepfather and every bully and power broker that Thomas had ever suffered. You tell him, Thomas, I thought, you fight for your fucking rights!
• his need to be with his twin no matter who they had become or where their lives were after their mother’s death
• story of my life: acting like a hothead, especially when it came to Thomas
• realizing in hindsight that he wasted the last weeks he actually could have had with his brother. But that summer, he wanted to be his own person; now misses that his brother actually cared about him
• I couldn’t think of any profound farewells for my brother. How do you day goodbye to a polished box? To the half of yourself that about to be covered over with dirt? I’m sorry, Thomas. I was mean because I was jealous. I’m sorry.
• it was sad to read the way Ray treats his stepkids, and the way Dominick keeps waiting for his real dad to show as a child and even into adulthood
• Dominick’s recognizing that he was a bully
• Dominick realizing that he both loved and hated his ma for making him be the guard of Thomas his entire life
• Dominick finding out about Ray visiting him every day since his accident, his upset over Thomas’ sentencing
• his confronting of Ray, that he felt guilty because they had been a team that bullied Thomas together. That they were the one whom Thomas thought was after him, trying to kill him. That they were the CIA, Noreiga, etc.
• Ray: “you weren’t accusing me of anything that I hadn’t already accused myself of…I just never understand that kid. Me and him, we were like oil and water…”
• “Things get clearer when you’re older,” [Ray] said. “Of course, by then it’s too late.”

When he starts to talk to Dr. Patel, the therapist assigned to his brother’s case, she starts to realize that Dominick has a lot of anger and rage in him that needs to come out and convinces him to talk to her since she didn’t think she could save Thomas, but that she could still save Dominick. In his therapy sessions, he learns to confront his past, which includes delving into his relationship and failed marriage with Dessa, the death of their child, reading a manuscript written by his grandfather who had passed away before he was born to learn more about where he came from as his mother had never wanted to tell him.

• as if that [miscarriage] was the same thing as having her – seeing and holding and changing her and then losing her. A lot of people did that: prescribed pregnancy as the answer to our grief. People assumed the feel and sound and smell of her was disposable. Replaceable. As if all Dessa and I had to do was erase over our daughter like a videotape.
• his talking about his wife leaving him the entire time and you wonder why and the more you read, the more you realize that it was his fault; his getting vasectomy without consulting her after the death of their baby, refusing to talk to her or comfort her when she needed it.
• “Grief has no gender…” – Dr. Patel
• “If you look for fairness when it comes to schizophrenia, it will be a futile search. No patient or patient’s family deserves this affliction.” – Dr. Patel
• “…that the stream of memory, may lead you to the river of understanding. And understanding, in turn, may be a tributary to the river of forgivness” – Dr. Patel
• maybe that was the big cosmic joke: you could spend your whole life banging your head against the wall and all it boiled down to was fortune-cookie philosophy. Go with the flow.
• Domenick: “Fate’s test case, maybe. Schizophrenic brother, dead baby daughter, girlfriend who…But, hey, shit happens, right?” Dr. Patel: “It does, yes,” she agreed. “Sometimes irrespective of how we are conducting our lives, and sometimes not.”
• “You are limited, my friend, in what you can and cannot control, as are we all.” – Dr. Patel
• “Life is a river,” she repeated. “Only in the most literal sense are we born on the day we leave our mother’s womb. In the larger, truer sense, we are born of  the past – connected to its fluidity, both genetically and experientially.”
• “Yes, grieving was a painful process. Yes, one negotiated one’s losses through a series of steps. But one lived in the meantime. One accommodated the reality of death while living life.” – Dr. Patel

I really enjoyed a few of these other little things:

• when Ray gave their Ma the silent treatment and refused to give any money and she insisted that Dominick and Thomas be allowed to go to collage and he wanted them to go out and be a man, get a job, bring home money. That even though she was terrified, she actually went and got a job just so she could pay for her kids’ education was such an incredibly empowering moment.
• I was assisted by a kindly one-eyed libraian who gave me my beloved coverless dictionary, which the library was about to destroy. To destroy a book’s insides because of outside defect? sacrilege! – Dominico
• you could live through anything for fifteen minutes
• I am not a smart man, particularly, but one day, at long last, I stumbled from the dark of the woods of my own, and my family’s, and my country’s past, holding in my hands these truths: that love grow from the rich loam of forgiveness; that mongrels make good dogs; that the evidence of god exists in the roundness of things. This much, at least, I’ve figured out. I know this much is true.

The one part I could not deal with was the fact that Dominick basically rapes his girlfriend and she ends up forgiving him and then later marrying him anyway? WTF? She said no. I don’t care if she’s your girlfriend and you feel entitled to it. She said no and she was fighting you off, that says something. His trying to justify it and why it wasn’t rape was just infuriating to me. It made me really hate him as a character.

Overall, this novel was so wonderfully written. There were a few unexpected twists and turns in there with some of the other characters, I did not see them coming at all. And I love how the story kind of came full circle in the end.
I’m looking forward to borrowing the rest of his books from the bff and reading Wally Lamb’s other works.

QOTD – 03.29.16

I love this. I keep having people tell me that I’m too old to do this or too old to do that. Next time I’m going to respond with “I’m just living my life.”

New York 2016 – Day Two

Saturday was a good day in NYC. This is the second lesson that I learned: check the weather before you make any permanent plans!! I know weather can change, but rarely does it change that drastically that a forecasted sunny warm day becomes a cold and rainy one. I hadn’t checked the weather and made my plans and then bought all my tickets online so that I could skip the lines. So I ended up spending my morning at MOMA on a very gorgeous sunny warm day. But it was still nice because I went as soon as the doors opened so I wasn’t sharing the space with many people. Plus my interest lies in paintings, I don’t know if it’s because that’s where my discipline is, so I skipped all the sculptures and went straight to the top where all the paintings were. There were a few of them I was familiar with, and it was nice, like strolling and bumping into an old friend.

The one that I was most excited about though, was this one:I don’t know if I have mentioned this before, but Frida Kahlo is my idol, my hero, my everything. I have never had the opportunity to see any of her original paintings before and to stumble upon it so suddenly, I almost burst into tears. If I could have, I would have touched it. To touch the same strokes that she had made all those years ago. I felt like such a fan girl. I just couldn’t believe that I was really seeing a real painting and not something in one of my books or online. It was such an emotional experience. It took me awhile to compose myself.

There were many paintings and artists that I was unfamiliar with, and a few where I knew the name of the artist, but not the particular piece of work. There were a few where I enjoyed the paintings so much that I made a note of their name so I could go back research them later.

Next time I come back, I’ll have to check out the other stuff.

After MOMA, I walked over to Beyond Sushi, a vegan and vegetarian sushi place that I found through Instagram and everything looked so yummy. When I started planning my trip, I knew that I would have to make a stop here. Luckily, there was one right by MOMA, so it wasn’t out of the way. The only sad thing was that I wanted to try everything but you couldn’t mix and match. Each single order came with 8 rolls and I knew that there was no way that I could do 16 rolls, so I ordered the Mighty Mushroom with a miso soup.When I come back to NYC, I am definitely coming back here so I can eventually try them all! The Mighty Mushroom was so delicious; it was made with a 6 grain rice, a variety of mushrooms, and tofu. It was topped with micro arugula and I love that they made a mushroom teriyaki sauce for the sushi! I have never had tofu in my sushi before, but you barely even noticed it and the mushroom teriyaki was brilliantly made and yummy (I’m not a huge fan of weird sauces)!
The place was a lot smaller than I had thought, but not a lot of people seemed to be eating in, most came to order and took it to go.

On my way I saw a Trump protest that 1. made me laugh and 2. gave me hope for human kind that not everyone is supporting him.

I  did change my plans a little and spent the second part of my day reading in Central Park because it was so nice outside! No jackets needed, sunglasses on, bsb in my headphones. It was such a peaceful and beautiful day. I sat on the benches and read and people watched and had my cupcake from a cupcake atm. That’s right there is a CUPCAKE ATM somewhere in NYC!!!

I was so excited when I saw it and I HAD to stop and get a cupcake from the cupcake atm. The cupcake was (disappointingly) a little stale, but it was fun to get it and watch it making its way to me!

The last part of my day, was the reason why I came to NYC: Nick Carter at the Playstation Centre!! Nick had posted on Twitter that he was going to play here awhile ago and curious, I google mapped it and realized it was right in the middle of Times Square. Which made me miss NYC. Which made me really want to go. The planning, the price searches began. All my anxieties, all my fears, all the stress, were so worth it. The thing about Nick Carter is that he is so entertaining. I may not love his new album (sorry, Nick!), but when he is doing the songs live, he is so full of energy and so much fun to watch, that whatever song he does instantly becomes the best song ever and I’m rocking out and singing along with him. 

The best part of the concert was all the bsb songs he did and then he brought out Brian freaking Littrell! ARE YOU KIDDING ME? I was already freaking out and then Brian came bouncing out and then I really freaked the hell out! We all did. Honestly, it was one of the best concerts he’s ever done! I’ll try not to gush too too much and add too much pictures, there will be another post about this from the Toronto concert 🙂
I came out of the concert with the biggest grin on my face. With too much energy in me to just go back to the hotel and sleep,  I pumped up his new album while I wandered around Times Square. Best. Day. Ever. 🙂

More on day 3 later. You can read day 1 here if you missed it!

QOTD – 03.28.16

New York 2016 – Day One

Two weekends ago, I went on my first solo trip. Sure, it was to NYC and I have been there several times, but I was still so incredibly apprehensive. I have never gone anywhere on my own before and I usually depended on my travel companions to guide me to our destinations and back. I have never flown on my own before, I have never travelled on my own before. I thought that it would be so hard eating on my own, going out on my own.

This ended up being a really great experience and I feel like I wouldn’t mind going to NYC on my own again, but I’d still be hesitant to travel elsewhere on my own! I did learn something new from this though. Being my first solo trip and I am not the type that easily makes friends, I find it really awkward to strike up a conversation with a stranger. I mean, if someone talks to me, I’m not rude or going to be rude about it or anything. I just find the whole process…awkward. So I over planned my trip and in that way I was always on the move unless I was eating. Because of that, I killed my legs that are not used to that much walking.
Next time I’ll have to scale back on the things I wanted to do. But the fact that this was my first solo trip to NYC, it meant that I could do everything that I wanted to do without having to consider what other people wanted.

So of course my first time travelling on my own, I get sent to second inspection. I still don’t know why! I need to find out what their little codes mean. Though I feel like it was my fault and I jinxed myself cause the whole time I was in line waiting to talk to customs, I could see the secondary inspection area and it’s all closed doors and I was kind of giggly thinking about the show Border Security. And then I got sent in there. But the guy was really nice and asked me why I was there and I started giggling and responded with to see a concert. He asked me which one? I said Nick Carter!! And he said, what’s wrong with that? I said nothing, but every time I tell people they tend to make fun of me…Then he shook his head and let me go.

My first “day” in NYC, I didn’t land until 9pm-ish. It was so pretty watching the sunset over New York. But I was unfortunately on the wrong side or it got too dark for me to see the Statue of Liberty. The last time I flew in with my friends, we were able to see the Statue of Liberty as we were coming and that was cool.

I got a ride from one of the shuttle services and I thought I was going to die. There was no traffic and still the driver was just speeding in and out of lanes, scooting past cars and vans and I thought several times that we were going to hit something because the lanes seemed so narrow. Clearly, I have forgotten what driving around in NYC was like. But I got there in one piece and first stop was dinner because I was starving! I went to Sapporo the last time I was there and the ramen was delicious! It was close by to my hotel and I thought I’d go back because ramen is my comfort food AND I found out that they had a vegan miso ramen that I was pretty excited about.The only sucky thing was that there was no protein in there, it would have been really easy just to add a few pieces of tofu. But other than that, it was delicious.

After being fed, I walked around Times Square. There seemed to be a few new places since the last time I was there. Like the Sanrio store that had this Hello Kitty thing that turns into the bear (I don’t know the name). I could not stop laughing though because it was so creepy and it was like the Sanrio version of The Human Centipede.

But mostly I was just there to people watch. Times Square will always be one of my favourite places. Where else would you get to hear a cabbie yell at a lady for jay walking while honking really aggressively and yelling at her to “f*** his dick” to which she responded with “I would, but you don’t got one!”. Welcome to New York!

because I love the NYPD horses 🙂

More on day two later 🙂

 

 

 

 

QOTD – 03.25.16

Criminal Minds – A (Sad) Review

Major Spoilers.

I had no idea what was going on in the real world of CM. Usually, there are news and gossip about an actor leaving (like Michael Weatherly and NCIS) and that gives me time to prepare for that actor’s departure from the show, whether it’s a good goodbye or a death. I am prepared.

Well I was not prepared at all for this. I was watching Supernatural last night and I was going to watch it today after work. I went on Instagram during the day and then SOMEONE SPOILED IT THAT MORGAN DIED!!! WTF?!?!? My heart is so broken. I almost don’t want to watch this episode.

So on to the episode.

• I can’t handle all this bad stuff happening to Morgan!! Make it stop!!
• I love that the call goes out to Garcia and she’s the one who rallies the team. It’s always Garcia and that makes watching this even more heartbreaking
• Oh Morgan, don’t take your anger out on Garcia.
• enter Hotch with the tough love, taking Morgan off of the case
• I’m already in tears and we’re only 3 minutes in. This is not going to work
• I don’t know if I would be as emotional as this had I not gone into this episode thinking that Morgan is going to die
• everyone working on the case while Morgan was supposed to be recuperating when Hotch had told Morgan that he shouldn’t touch the case of the guys who had abducted and tortured him
• OMG it was the unsub who called Garcia – how freaking creepy
• I love the relationship between Reid and Morgan. He’s like the cooler older brother, always looking out for Reid. With Morgan gone, who is going to do that??
• Reid: “then believe this, our team loves you and we are not going to stop until we find whoever did this. But we can only do that with a completely dispassionate and unprejudice point of view.  Paternal instinct is a deadly bias that we just can’t risk. It’s for your protection Morgan, I swear.”
• JJ: [disobeying Hotch] “When someone hurts one of us…when someone hurts a baby…”
• MORGAN LET YOUR TEAM HELP YOU!!!!!!! Don’t do it alone!!
• waiiitttt does he not die???? omg!! This whole time…I can’t even
• Rossi: “I’ve learned in the short time I’ve had the privilige of being a dad, it heals wounds just being there for your kid. Like your dad wanted to be, I’m sure.”
• Morgan’s goodbyes are so hard to watch because you know that there was probably no acting involved. Morgan and Reid’s goodbye is going to be hard to watch knowing that Reid hates changes and goodbyes. Him and Garcia too will be hard to watch, she’s his baby girl
• Hank Spencer ❤
• Garcia: “You make me feel super brave” Morgan: “You make me feel safe.”
• that nod between Reid and Morgan at the end, his little way of telling Morgan that he’s going to be ok. Dying.
• “As a good friend of mine said, every ending is also a beginning, we just don’t know it at the time. I’d like to believe she’s right” – Morgan

Ok. So clearly I misread the Instagram that “Morgan’s gone” didn’t mean that he was dead, just that he has left the show. Look, the promo had a gun at Morgan’s head, it’s not like I was completely off base with my line of thinking. But my anxiety this entire day and time for NOTHING!!! I’m so glad that he’s not dead and had I watched this last night I probably would not have been bawling the entire time thinking this is the last time we’re going to get to see Morgan! But it was still a pretty emotional episode.

MGG did an incredible job directing this episode. I don’t know how he wasn’t sobbing the entire time. There’s something beautiful about MGG directing the episode that Shemar Moore’s character leaves the show.

So this episode was a lot less sad than I thought it would be. Thankfully!

QOTD – 02.24.16

 

Another Mini Lush Haul

I am the worst! I said I was going to refrain from overspending but then I go into Lush and all that goes out the window! To be fair, I needed to get the conditioner and I’m still searching for my perfect shampoo!This haul I got Honey I Washed my Hair Shampoo Bar cause it smelled so yummy. I left it in the paper bag on my bathroom counter and the next morning when I walked by the bathroom, I caught this giant whiff of honey flowery smell and was so confused until I realized it was the shampoo. I loved watching it foam up, I don’t know why it  should surprise me so much. It’s soap and that’s what soaps do. Unfortunately, this made my hair really oily and I ended up giving it to the bff who has fairly dry hair.
I need to find something to help with the fact that my hair is crazy falling out. I used to use Fructis Fall Fight which was the most amazing for helping with this problem. I have yet to find a cruelty free solution!

I also tried the Veganese conditioner. I LOVE THIS CONDITIONER! It smells so yummy with the lemon and it leaves my hair all smooth. It’s supposed to give volume to “fine haired folks” like me, but I haven’t really noticed my hair being more volumized.

I wanted a new lip balm, so I just randomly picked up None of Your Beeswax which is lemony vanilla scented and it’s also vegan, despite the name. Just a little bit of this lip balm and it coats your entire lip. I don’t know what it is but, since I have been sick, I’ve become obsessed with lemon smells.

The final thing that I got was the Wiccy Magic Muscles massage bar. I loved my first one so much that I thought I would get a second one to keep in the living room so that I don’t have to keep going back and forth from room to room just to moisturize my hands (yes, I am that lazy…). I also got the tin for this one since my other one got coated in cat hair when I had just left it in the paper bag it came with.
And in related news, the bff sent me this post about people having plants grow out of their drains! But since I don’t use this bar in my bathroom, or over the sink, I shouldn’t have this problem 🙂 http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/03/21/lush-wiccy-magic-muscles-massage-bar_n_9516178.html