Monday Memos // 50

This week is brought to you by the sentiments of packing up and moving from the place I have lived for roughly 25 years. It's beautiful and uncomfortable and so much more.

Listening:

"Drive" by R.E.M. The video makes me want to crowd surf. Best listened to cranked as loud as possible. Plus, the interlude in the middle—"Ollie, ollie / Ollie, ollie, ollie / Ollie, ollie, in come free, baby"—is really good for serenading my cat.

"Distance" by Emily King. "Even when I’m lonely / Happy knowing that your love is never far / When we are apart / Distance makes the heart"

"Blood On Me" by Sampha. I discovered this guy on Insecure and the album—Process—is great.

I also fell into an NPR Tiny Desk concert spiral (via looking up a Sampha video), and these were particularly entrancing: Angel Olsen, Dan Deacon, Big Thief, and Hozier.

Reading:

Confirm or Deny: Idris Elba. “The Wire” is the best TV show of all time. Confirm."

The Secret to Marriage Is Never Getting Married. "A year before I met Hans, a relative of his opened a credit card in his name and charged the better portion of another relative’s wedding. And then she forgot to pay the bill. For years. Forever, actually."

IT’S DECORATIVE GOURD SEASON, MOTHERFUCKERS. If you've never read this, it's a classic!

Always loving a love story. (image by Brian Rea via nytimes)

Craving:

I've eaten far too many cold, fudgy chocolate chip topped brownies in the last week or two. I call it stress/packing fuel/reward. I want another.

Also, I've had so many delightful breaded, crusted and carb-centric things lately: a Dutch baby with Florida oranges and thyme maple syrup (I've wanted to try a Dutch baby for ages—french toast meets pancake); pretzel-crusted tilapia (great in a taco); chicken tenders (sweet taste of childhood!); crusty, buttered, sourdough toast (they used to call me "Zoë Bread and Butter"); a warm cinnamony, flaxseed-topped muffin (because dessert, always). Hello, I am not afraid of gluten.

Proud of my friends for their new restaurant, Afternoon, which features these tasty things above.

Wearing:

Striped shirts. Black loafers. Purple vans. Unfortunately, still shorts (it's a hot October thus far).

Plus, for my aching knees and hip (always a sign that I'm due for new running shoes), I just got these Adidas—such a good color combo.

Flashy.

Watching:

As I move between excitement and terror, packing and crying, I am rewatching "Sex and the City." I can find something new to appreciate as I revisit the scenarios and characters. The cameos, too! Everyone was on that show. (Trivia: I once waited on "Stanford Blatch.")

I've been keeping up with season 2 of "Better Things." It's like "Louie" without Louis.

Carrie's Bowie shirt: yes!

Treasuring:

My emotions, as I pack up my life, are on a wild roller coaster ride. My eyes well up when I start to articulate certain things or hear certain songs or think of particular moments or drive down a country road. 

Adam JK is giving me life with these words from his new book, "Things Are What You Make of Them."

I'm soaking in the sun and sweat. I'm recognizing the trees and leaves. I'm savoring my best friends. As much as Florida can be a pile of trash, it can also be exquisite. My home.

More adamjk. He's brilliant.

Monday Memos // 47

Last week I was in Los Angeles, this week I'm in Irma... there is so much in the world and my mind swirling about, but the significance of this day does not escape me, either. 

(image by Bill Bragg via nytimes)

Listening:

"Up All Night" by The War On Drugs

"The Price Is Right" theme song. Look out for me on December 7th!

Reading:

PLEASE FORGIVE US AT BLUE APRON FOR THIS WEEK’S MEALS. WE’VE BEEN HAVING A TOUGH TIME LATELY by Lucy Huber

A list of really beautiful places in U.S. I'd be down to visit. Crossed one off the list last week when I experienced the Griffith Observatory.

"Franny and Zooey" by J.D. Salinger. I watched a movie yesterday—not good enough to mention—and this book played a large role. I've been meaning to read it book since... forever. I started it in middle school, because of my name and my fondness for "The Catcher in the Rye," but I think it was beyond me at age 12 or 13. I have it sitting on my shelf, just waiting.

The two works were published together as a book in 1961, having originally appeared in The New Yorker in 1955 and 1957 respectively.(image via newsstand)

Craving:

Last week I ate some incredible things. A cruffin from Mr. Holmes Bakehouse—flakey, buttery croissant muffin hybrid; I think ours was filled with chocolate rye cream (house-made rye bread infused cream finished with 64% chocolate). 

I want to eat all the things. (via latimes)

At Spitz, a mediterranean place, I had the Döner Basket, which is a salad and fries topped with tzatziki, feta, pepperoncinis, crispy garbanzos, a falafel ball, olives, fried pita strips, hummus, tomato, onion, green pepper, cucumber and chicken. I could eat it a thousand more times. 

Salvating. (image via Two Peas & Their Pod

I didn't mind waiting in a long line to try some Salt & Straw ice cream. Experienced a cone while walking to Venice beach. One scoop of Chocolate Gooey Brownie (the house-baked brownies have marshmallow fluff folded in to keep them extra gooey) and one scoop of Apples & Sidecar Doughnuts (chunks of Butter & Salt doughnuts soaked in a homemade glaze, then stirred into ice cream spiced with a touch of cinnamon and nutmeg, finishing with a swirl of homemade apple pie filling). Wow! 

There's so much more, but I cannot stop drooling. (image via latimes)

Wearing:

This past week I put an old pair of shoes to use: my black and grey Saucony Originals Bullets. 

Six years ago, in my brief stint living in San Francisco, I needed a pair of black shoes for a restaurant job. I remember going to store after store after store, with some unknown vision in my mind of what I wanted to find. I didn't have much money and I love shopping for shoes, so it was a great game and source of entertainment. Eventually I found these sneaks, they fit the bill, and have served me well for years. 

I got them at Shoe Biz, on one of my favorite streets: Valencia. It was nice to wear them all over the West Coast again.

Watching:

Things I'm looking forward to:

"Jerry Before Seinfeld." "On September 19, Netflix is airing Jerry Before Seinfeld, a comedy special about how the world’s richest comedian got his start."

"The Deuce." "The first collaboration between David Simon and George Pelecanos since Treme, The Deuce is set in 1970s New York City, when Times Square had more peep shows and porn theaters than Olive Gardens and Elmo impersonators. In the eight-episode series, James Franco plays twin brothers Vincent and Frankie Martino, a bartender and a gambler who get swept up in a mob plan to profit from the burgeoning sex industry. Maggie Gyllenhaal is Candy, a sex worker with bigger ambitions."

"I Love You, America" "Sarah Silverman’s new weekly topical show for Hulu is being billed as an honest attempt for the outspoken comedian to engage with “real” Americans whose opinions and beliefs are at odds with her own. The series’s co-executive producers include Will Ferrell and Adam McKay (Anchorman, The Big Short)."

Plus, "Broad City," "This Is Us" and most likely much, much more. Hi, I love television. (Here's a list of so many Fall shows.)

I don't actually spend all day and night watching tv, surprisingly. (images via HBO / ABC / Netflix / CBS / The Atlantic)

Treasuring:

Visiting Los Angeles for the first time. (The Price Is Right! The Comedy Store! My brother and sister-in-law and their beautiful home! The beaches! The foods! The wanders! The cool breezes! The desert! The views! The change! The city! The excitement! The adventure! The weirdness! The architecture! The friendship!)

Having so many thoughtful people surrounding me during this hurricane scare. I've heard from old friends and relatives. I've been offered places to stay nearby, on higher ground and way up north—for myself, my cat, and all my friends. I've been offered help boarding up windows, I've been offered all the snacks... The world isn't full of monsters, which is a relief.

This is how positive humanity makes me feel. (image via popmyeyes)

Monday Memos // 42

Listening:

"Are You With Me Now?" by Cate Le Bon (This one should be dedicated to all my ceramicist friends out there.)

"About Face" by Grizzly Bear (I'm on a Grizzly Bear kick due to the Instagram account of Busy Philipps.)

"Loving" by Land of Talk (I finally took a break from "This Time" to listen to another song off this album.)

Reading:

I won a slew of summer reading from Riverhead Books, so when I eventually finish "Swing Time," I'll have a nice selection to choose from.

I was instantly intrigued by the writeup of "Barbara The Slut and Other People." "'In Pearl and the Swiss Guy Fall in Love,' a woman realizes she much prefers the company of her pit bull—and herself—to the neurotic foreign fling who won’t decamp from her apartment... With heart, sass, and pitch-perfect characters, 'Barbara the Slut' is a head-turning debut from a writer with a limitless career before her."

I got that sweet tote, too. My literary tote collection is growing. (image via riverheadbooks Insta)

Craving:

Peanut butter and jelly (or fruits that make great jams).

I've been tearing through containers of freshly ground peanut butter. Spoonfuls! Forkfuls! Dipped berries and bananas! Then I made these peanut butter and jelly breakfast cookies and devoured the entire batch in three days.

I could be an NBA player with this craving. "They do a PB&J buffet before the games, but the variety of nut butters and Nutella, all kinds of jams and jellies, different kinds of bread — they do peanut butter and jelly shakes, peanut butter and jelly oatmeal, waffles." Yes please.

I'd like these next: Peanut Butter and Jelly Ice Cream Sandwiches, PB&J Waffle-Grilled Sandwich, Peanut Butter and Rhubarb Jelly Hot French Toast Sammie.

The french toast number. (via halfbakedharvest)

Wearing:

This week I pulled out some old Ked-like shoes I probably could've thrown away years ago, but the color + old sentiments keep them around. I fell down a rocky ravine in San Francisco in these. I moved all my belongings from Massachusetts and Maryland to Florida in these. They cost a few dollars from a place called Trader Fred's and they are just a perfect seafoam delight. 

I was bored sitting in a Super Cuts 4 years ago taking pictures of these shoes. 

Ravine fall dirt remains.

Watching:

"Game of Thrones." I think it's too soon to talk about, but I'm watching it. 

Excited for the return of "Insecure." If you haven't watched it, it's definitely worth it.

Issa Rae slays. (image via HBO)

Saw "Dunkirk." Visually and auditorially beautiful (Hans Zimmer used Nolan's pocket watch to create the clock ticking soundtracks in the film). The story is told in a very captivating manner—so much told through so few words (Tom Hardy has less than 10 lines in his screentime—I didn't even realize he was in this movie until one of the last scenes) and I enjoyed the constantly changing perspectives that intertwined. (I also didn't realize Harry Styles was one of the main characters until I went home and did some Googling; it wasn't distracting like having Ed Sheeran in the first episode of GoT.)

1,500 extras, a crane and a spitfire were used to recreate the miraculous evacuation of 338,000 allied troops. (image via warnerbros)

Wanting:

A (free) moving and cleaning crew. 

A foot massage. 

To win one of the endless giveaways I enter where there's an all-expense-paid trip for two.

What a feeling to have (image via maddy nye for designlovefest)

Monday Memos // 41

Listening:

"Trampoline" by EZTV

"Egyptian Reggae" by Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers

"I Live For You" by George Harrison

Reading:

I want to read the new David Sedaris book "Theft By Finding." I think it will really inspire and resonate with me due to my own years of obsessive journaling.

"For forty years, David Sedaris has kept a diary in which he records everything that captures his attention-overheard comments, salacious gossip, soap opera plot twists, secrets confided by total strangers. These observations are the source code for his finest work, and through them he has honed his cunning, surprising sentences.

Now, Sedaris shares his private writings with the world. Theft by Finding, the first of two volumes, is the story of how a drug-abusing dropout with a weakness for the International House of Pancakes and a chronic inability to hold down a real job became one of the funniest people on the planet." 

December 26, 1983 "This is my twenty-seventh birthday. I’ve been anticipating this age for a long time, thinking that when I reach it, I’ll make a big change. I seem old to me now." (image by Nicole Antonuccio via the AV Club)

Craving:

In no particular order or rank: dark chocolate, sweet potatoes, parsley, nutritional yeast flakes, jumbo cookies, scrambled eggs, and scoops of ice cream. 

Parsley illustration from Köhler’s Medicinal Plants, 1890. (image via PD Art)

I dream of Jeni's. (image via Goldbely)

Wearing:

Vintage Salvatore Ferragamo Vara flats.

For some reason I forgot I had these divine shoes, so I dusted them off this week. I lucked out in finding my pair in a thrift store about five years ago for a great deal. I was first drawn to the shoe by way of the blog Calivintage and her cool roof pictures. 

(image via calivintage)

Watching:

"Friends From College" on Netflix. 

In between the Twin Peaks and Handmaid's Tale intensities/works of art, there are times for lighthearted, comedic shows. I watched two episodes so far and enjoy the chemistry of actors. 

"A group of friends from Harvard, played by Keegan-Michael Key, Cobie Smulders, Annie Parisse, Nat Faxon, Fred Savage, and Jae Suh Park, are facing down their forties. With interwoven and oftentimes complicated relationships with one another, "Friends from College" is a comedic exploration of old friendships, former romantic entanglements and balancing adult life with nostalgia for the past."

I actually found the show via Billy Eichner's Instagram—I always want to see what tv he's doing. Fred Savage (left), Nat Faxon, Keegan-Michael Key, Cobie Smulders, Jae Suh Park, Billy Eichner, Annie Parisse (image via David Lee/Netflix)

I also rewatched the end of "True Detective" (season one, duh—blown away by the scenes, story, acting, sentiments...) and "Catch Me If You Can" (a young Leo and Tom Hanks duo is hard to beat, plus Christopher Walken—woohoo!).

My great grandfather "worked for Pan Am" when he was in the CIA. I wonder if there's any garb from that era floating around in some family storage? (image via YouTube)

Wanting:

In the latest installment of "I spend so many hours a week on Amazon and I can't get this _____ out of my head":

The Pandawell 8-pin Lighting Mobile Phone Fan, for quick, personal cooldown sessions.  

(image via The Strategist)

These key rings are nice looking, and my carabiner only completely closes some of the time now. 

(image via Amazon)

This Mara Hoffman Tie Front Dress looks like a great summer wardrobe piece (if only it wasn't $350 more than I'd like to spend).

(image via rent the runway)