Fri-Yay #16

I'm SUPER excited for Halloween. I don't think the neighborhood is doing trick-or-treating because of Covid. Which is perfectly safe and fine albeit a total bummer. We've got to blame someone, so I'll blame Mitch McConnell's decomposing hand. I don't like Mitch, but hopefully he's not really decomposing...in public. That would be rude.

I probably won't make any of these drinks but I want to. With this hurricane in range (which just means...anywhere from one mile to 500 miles) this week, I don't think I should risk it. Everything is kinda just misfiring and recovering. Anyways, some of these drinks look awesome - Town and Country's 36 Halloween Cocktails. 

Another random video I needed to save for some reason. But after watching it, I learned there are conspiracy theories (from the comments) that the Titanic was switched with the Olympic. Jesus Christ. 

Listening: 

My therapist wanted me to check out Brene Brown, so I've downloaded that but I haven't started. I'm currently catching up on the High Low podcast, which is a gab-sesh between Pandora Sykes and Dolly Alderton. My English friend loves them so she suggested it and I thought I'd give it a go. High/Low is about the high and low brow stories they talk about. It's going fairly well (I'm at the beginning...so like 2017) but it makes me think of my friend so I have lovely thoughts on it. They tend to keep an episode around an hour in length which is a good length of time. 

Reading:

Still going though all my articles I have saved. This one is from Sports Illustrated Longform and is about the I-5 Killer. I-5 stands for Interstate 5 and runs down the Pacific West Coast. The I-5 Killer is named Randall Woodfield and he was picked to play for the Green Bay Packers, the NFL team. I don't know much about football, it's fun to go to the games/tailgate but otherwise I make no effort. So I have no idea how much he played for them. He was convicted of murdering women and girls and sent to jail. He's thought to have murdered more people as well. It was an interesting article in many ways as I'd not heard of him or his victims. 

On a not-quite-lighter note but less murder focused, Texas Monthly has a longform about Vivian Stephens. Stephens is a prolific author who writes in the romance genre. Stephens was also an editor at Dell (Doubleday) and helped to shape the romance genre into a billion dollar industry. She also created the RWA aka the Romance Writers Association of America (you know, the one that had that bizarre blow up). If she wasn't the main person who founded it, she was there from the beginning and a leader therein. The RWA wanted her permission to name the big award after her (The Vivian, I believe) and she did grant them that grace. The article also talks about the romance publishing industry (it's huge and $$$) and the current events and racism aspects to publishing and romance publishing in general. 

Buying:

I had four of my shoes crap out on me. To be fair, three were in various stages of almost giving up for awhile and were rubbish really. They were from Primark and lasted a lot longer than my previous Primark shoes had but it's hard to survive multiple hurricane weather days. This last season did them in. I'm on the hunt for sturdy, semi-weather proof flats but also, sorta combat boots. 

My knee high lace up boots gave up the ghost (it's been a decade) so I started looking for lace up boots since I'm apparently partial. I have normal boots but I always reached for my lace up ones. They have thick soles and are easy to walk in. I've walked all over America and Europe in them. I eventually found some at Nordstrom so those are on the way. And then I got on Instagram and over a course of drunk shopping bought a pair of Birdies flats. They were expensive! I'm not mad at tipsy me as tipsy me likes pretty things. The ones I bought are the collection with Minted. They might just stay in my house or office on nice days because they're velvet. I loved the blue color but liked the design on the light gray/white (?) color so that's the one I bought. 

I'm slowly upgrading my wardrobe and finding my style. I think it's super frou-frou. Whatever, life's short and I might as well have fun. 

I also bought some Hocus Pocus Bath bombs via Etsy. It's from a new seller and I haven't tried them as of yet but I'm excited. I love Hocus Pocus and I love Halloween. It's my favorite holiday because it's a huge dress up, themed costume party. 

Watching:

I tried the new Perry Mason. It's very gritty and very film noir. I was not prepared for the full dongle that appeared (okay then). I loved the setting, the fashions, the cars. I thought it was interesting to make Perry Mason a detective. But I'm not cut out for violence on TV I don't think. I used to fast forward through the beginning of Criminal Minds episodes (where the crime is shown). So Perry Mason is too much for me to be honest. I did fast forward through all the episodes to follow along for the most part. Sister Alice is based on the real life Aimee Semple McPherson.