favourites

A few things that are making me happy right now:

This article from thought catalog. It's very true, if you can do good work and be confident in your own abilities, you can achieve the things you want to.

Also, this. Allie Brosh is a very talented blogger, and her blog Hyperbole and a Half has now been turned into a book. Hers is the first blog I ever read.  I'm really excited for her and I had really been wanting to read it but just hadn't gotten around to ordering it.

Then a few weeks ago I was in the Phoenix airport on the way home from Mazatlan and needed something to read. I always bring library books with me or download something onto my Kindle when I'm flying, but this time I had forgotten, so I decided to buy a book at the airport. I walked into the store, and there it was, the very first book I laid eyes on. I bought it immediately, funny how things work out like that. You can buy her book here.

David's Tea makes the most amazing tea I've ever had. It's a bit expensive, but where else can you get tea that tastes like Red Velvet Cake, Birthday Cake, or has little gold balls in it that dissolve and make your tea glittery?

And then this video. It's pretty hard to be sad when you're watching that. It's 24 straight hours of pure unadulterated joy and happiness.

favourites

A few things that are making me happy right now:

This book excerpt about Marilyn Monroe's personal effects. She was very un-materialistic, and very slender, apparently. I don't know why everything about her is so interesting, but I'm obsessed. It's easy to look at all of the glamorous images of her and forget that she was a real person, so I love learning more about what she was really like.

This: Bulletproof Weeks by Matt Nathanson. I can't stop listening to it.

When your husband goes to Mexico for a week and knows just what to bring you home as a present. Flavoured tequilas for shots, adding to coffee, and as a tequila maker once told me "putting on your kid's waffles before you send them off to school." Solid advice.

This amazing miracle in a bottle. I've tried a lot of frizz fighting serums in my day, and they usually leave you with that slicked back yet puffy look that is so equal parts chic and attractive. This one can go on wet or dry hair, and make your hair shiny and frizz-free, but never greasy. It is my new favourite product, we are best friends.

favourites

Here are a few things that are making me happy right now:

This article about living in Hawaii. Makes me happy/homesick.


My co-worker went to Italy for a few weeks and brought me back some truffle risotto. Amazing.

I love discovering news words like this one:

fernweh – (noun) a craving for travel; being homesick for a place you’ve never been.


Also, I have recently discovered this amazing spray that has actual magical powers. I've been kind of hating on my hair lately because no matter what I do it seems kind of dry and frizzy. I tried using WEN for a few months, and as always happens when I try to do nice things for my hair, it completely rebelled and looked worse than ever.

Apparently my hair is still 13 years old and only likes things that are mean to it. But I tried It's a 10 spray with Keratin last night, and my hair is soft, shiny and frizz free, and for the day after I wash my hair that is almost unheard of.

It usually takes at least two nights of me sleeping on/aggressively rubbing my head against my satin pillowcase to achieve this kind of sleek manageability. It's a bit expensive, but worth it if these are going to be the consistent results.

favourites

Here are a few things that are making me happy right now:

 I've been looking for a pair of black booties for a long time, one that is cute enough to wear out, but also has a low enough heel that I could wear them all day at work without wanting to fling myself off the roof. I found these ones from Asos a few weeks ago and I love them, they are comfy and cute, and there isn't a hint of fringe anywhere on or around them.

This might seem very obvious to every other person in the world, but I had an epiphany a few weeks ago. I have about 5 chiffon button up shirts that I love, and are perfect for work, but I never wear them, because they are really sheer. I've tried wearing tank tops underneath them, but it's hard to have two shirts tucked in, one of them is always rolling up and it's bulky.

Sometimes I'll see a woman on the street wearing a sheer white button up tucked into jeans without her whole bra showing and without looking like she is smuggling something under their shirt, and I think that she must be a wizard.

For years I've been seeing the cotton body suits at American Apparel and I always wondered "who is buying those?" and then last week I was like OF COURSE! Everyone but me is buying them! Anyways, I bought a couple, and my whole life is better already.

Semi-sweet chocolate chip cookies from Specialty's are a thing of beauty. I have to bodily restrain myself from going in to get one every time I walk past, but sometimes I can't resist, and then I thoroughly enjoy every warm chocolatey delicious morsel to the full capacity of my soul.

I hadn't been loving my makeup in quite a while, no matter what I seemed to do it always looked the same, and not very good in my opinion, so I had a little bit of a "me" day and splurged on some new makeup from Sephora.

I actually just went in to get eyeliner, but all of a sudden I was replacing almost every product I use.

The verdict so far: I love the Moonshadow eyeshadow pallet, the Tarte cheek stain is amazing, and the Kat von D Trooper eyeliner is life changing. Go buy it immediately. It goes on smoothly without the dragginess of a lot of liquid liners, and the color stays all day without budging.

I don't know that the beauty blender was an absolute necessity though, in essence I feel like I paid $20 for a sponge.

favourites

Here are a few things that are making me happy right now:

Surfing videos are one of my favourite things ever. I love watching the waves, and seeing someone gliding gracefully along one just relaxes me, instantly. Some of the best nights of sleep I've ever had are where I'm in a really air conditioned, dark room, with tons of covers, watching muted surf videos as I fall asleep. Try it, I promise you'll sleep like a baby.


Fiji Vignette 3/3 from Taj Burrow on Vimeo.

These nail polish strips from Essie. I saw them and wanted them immediately and then I left them sitting in my bathroom cabinet for two months because they seemed very tricksy to apply. A few weeks ago I had some extra free time (thanks BART strike) and tried them out.

They were actually not hard to apply at all, and they lasted a week before they starting chipping, I added a top coat as well. It's like having tiny little love letters on your nails.

And some calla lillies I picked up at the farmer's market. Treat yo self.

I'm re-reading the Virgin Suicides. Love this:

"The rest of her face-the pulpy lips, the blonde sideburn fuzz, the nose with its candy-pink translucent nostrils- registered dimly as the two blue eyes lifted him on a sea wave and held him suspended. 'She was the still point of the turning world' he told us, quoting Eliot, whose Collected Poems he had found on the shelf of the detoxification center.

For the eternity that Lux Lisbon looked at him, Trip Fontaine looked back, and the love he felt at that moment, truer than all the subsequent loves because it never had to survive real life, still plagued him even now in the desert, with his looks and health wasted."

I read somewhere that the best love affairs are the ones we never have, because the other person will always be perfect to us, never diminished or found to be flawed. This excerpt from the Virgin Suicides really reiterates that to me.

favourites

Things that are making me happy right now:

The Feminist Taylor Swift Twitter account. Check it out, seriously.

After my visit to the La Brea Tar Pits a few weeks ago, I rewatched My Girl 2. This song gets me, every. single. time. Sob.

This recipe for Lasagna Timpano from The Food in my Beard Blog. I didn't know foods like this actually existed, but it makes me so happy to know that this bold innovator is out there coming up with cheesy, fantastic ways for me to not fit into my jeans anymore.

And this, because let's be honest, I have an awkwardly persistent crush on Lana Del Ray, and it's not going anywhere.

favourites

Here are a few things that are making me happy right now:



He actually lives in San Francisco, and it's really through sheer force of will that I haven't stalked out his address and crept around in front of his house, but it's likely I won't be able to hold out forever.

We almost always ate lunch at home when I was in elementary school, and my mom wouldn't buy us any "junk food" for after school snacks, but every once in awhile she would break down and let us have dunkaroos. It was a dark day when they stopped making them, but yesterday I found this. I will be most likely be clearing my schedule this week in favour of eating mass quantities and then passing out in a sugar coma.

The best co-pilot a girl ever had. Cherries are my most favourite

I'm reading Women by Charles Bukowski, it's definitely not for everyone but I'd been hearing about him for so long that I decided to check it out. The book has a lot of graphic language and it kind of feels like he's trying to be shocking, but here are some lines that I liked:

"Glendoline presumed that the reader was as fascinated by her life as she was - which was a deadly mistake. The other deadly mistakes she had made were too numerous to mention."

"Few beautiful women were willing to indicate in public that they belonged to someone. I had known enough women to realize this. I accepted them for what they were, and love came hard and very seldom."

favourites

Here are some things that are making me happy right now:



Leonard Cohen Chelsea Hotel#2 cover by Lana Del Ray. Her voice, and his lyrics.

"I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel, you were famous, your heart was a legend you told me again you preferred handsome men, but for me you would make an exception"

"I don't mean to suggest that I loved you the best, I can't keep track of each fallen robin. I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel, that's all, I don't even think of you that often". 

Love.

Daffodils make the whole house smell delicious and brighten up the table.

my weekend uniform. I see ripped jeans in stores all the time for tons of money, these are perfectly ripped and broken in, and also free, aka stolen from my sister

This recipe for salmon. I was so excited about the delicious salmon I had in Aptos that I wanted to try to make some at home.  It was ridiculously easy, and seriously delicious.

I used olive oil instead of vegetable, and fresh squeezed lemon juice and black pepper instead of lemon pepper, and marinated it over night. We ate it with garlic mashed potatoes and broccoli, and it was an amazing supper.