Friday Fascinations - Live from Saturday

Gentle Reader,
     What a week, what a week!  Such craziness at work    and it turned out my stress over the first week of house hunting (which is my personal circle of hell) was all for naught because Jess & I found The One (where we can stay with Cherie and Erin) the Thursday of week one!!!

On the one hand, there goes my chance to rant blog about the Hellish exercise in dashing one's own hopes that is house hunting in the greater Provo-Orem area. On the other hand, one less week of stressing myself out more than I normally do/calling landlords at lunch/not actually eating lunch at lunch.

So I have a lot to be happy about now. I would have got to writing this last night, but all Jess and I wanted to do after work last night was sit, veg, and re-watch the masterpiece of TV that is Avatar: The Last Airbender whilst making sassy comments and the accidental pun "Aangsty."

With that, I present my semi-belated Friday Fascinations.

So, First of All, This Happened

Remember how last week I mentioned how much I love "All About that Bass" by Meghan Trainor? Well, it seems Buzzfeed loves it too, and YouTube is promoting the song! I fangirled a bit when I saw an ad for it pop up on a Vlogbrothers video, and I fangirled a lot when it popped up on Buzzfeed at the one work lunch that actually felt like a break this week.

I feel like such a trendsetter right now. 

John Green's Thoughts on Makeup

So, if any of you aren't subscribed to the Vlogbrothers Youtube channel I highly recommend it but this week John made this video about having his making his makeup done for many days in a row as a part of the press junket for The Fault in Our Stars and his recent appearance on The Colbert Report. 

Everything about this video is flawless, but I think my favorite part is John's first observation that makeup is enjoyable because "it feels good to touch your face gently and kindly." I think a lot of people who enjoy makeup (like myself, for although I'm nowhere near as good as Jess or any of the YouTube peeps who do proper makeup tutorials I do quite enjoy it) don't even realize that this part of it is present within our own enjoyment of applying makeup. Plus John makes some interesting points about makeup in general. 

Jess' Latest Creation

If you follow me on Instagram (that plug was less than subtle), you may have noticed that my friends and I are some pretty awesome cooks. That came in very handy on Friday night. Post-apartment-reservation, Jess and I were trying to answer the age-old question: how can we not go grocery shopping and still eat well today?

Because if you can stay in comfortable clothing and watch fantastic television after a trying, stressful week, why would you ever go to Smith's or Macey's instead?

Eventually, we remembered our gallon of frozen pumpkin puree, sitting in our freezer neat as you please, and using this recipe as a base, Jess came up with a curried chicken pumpkin soup that is total bliss. 

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day

This is, hands-down, one of the most under-rated movies and it needs more love. My sweet friend Bri showed it to me this past February after I fell in love with Lee Pace's voice. Last Thursday, we made our girls at movie night watch it and it was rather well-received as it should be. 

Guinevere Pettigrew (Frances McDormand), a penniless and chronically unemployed governess, is given a new chance when an act of bravery catapults her into the position of Social Secretary to aspiring actress Delysia Lafosse (Amy Adams). 

Any more would be spoilers. But it's a very visually beautiful film, warm and funny though it deals with poverty, love, heartbreak, and the precarious emotional climate in Britain on the brink of World War Two. It is probably in my top ten films I have ever seen, and I can only give it the highest recommendation. 

Well, at last my computer is cooled down enough to post this    what's fascinating you lately?

The Return of Friday Fascinations!

If any of you followed my old blog, you'll know that I started doing a thing (or trying to) where, every Friday, I'd go over some of my favorite things of the week. Well, that is one feature I have decided to carry over! I love talking about/sharing my latest obsessions. Who knows? Is it one of these you're looking for?

So, without further ado, let the re-debut of Friday Fascinations on this, my blog, begin!

Miss Me?

Of course every Sherlock fan who heard about this was freaking out. On the one hand, we get a special, so that's like 4 episodes in a season instead of three, or thirty percent more Sherlock this season! 

On the other hand, it doesn't start shooting until freaking 2015/next. year. 

As Jess so accurately put, well, Anglophile fan life: "I'm going to get gray hairs waiting for the BBC."

Benefit "they're real!" push-up liner

I bought this on a (somewhat splurge-y) whim at Ulta when Jess and I discovered we were low on our usual mutual fave to which she introduced me when we first met. 

Now, I still love/will continue to buy Avon glimmersticks. They are probably my favorite line of eyeliner I have ever owned. The only reason I even tried this other one in the first place is: 

1. Our local Avon store was closed until July 11 "due to illness." This is why we went to Ulta in the first place; Jess was completely out of her basic colors and I was nearly there. I can't leave the house without eyeliner. 

2. Utah summers are hot and unforgiving. And we have a wimpy A/C. And my face melts eyeliner like a nuclear core or some such frakkery.

That being said, this new Benefit eyeliner is seriously amazing, especially for hot summer mornings when I don't have a ton of time to do my eyeliner. 

I can do my eyeliner in one minute with this product, so I highly recommend it if:

• You're like me and you can't stand to leave the house without eyeliner
• (Again, like me) You find mornings difficult and have such a healthy relationship with your snooze button that you don't always give yourself enough time to get ready
• You love wing eyes/cat eyes!

"All About That Bass" by Meghan Trainor

I found this song while randomly scrolling Tumblr one night and it is my new favorite. Ms. Trainor has a pleasant voice, plus the song is peppy and upbeat. ALL THAT and it has such a body-positive message!

Favorite line? "Every Inch of you is Perfect From the Bottom to the Top"

What are y'all wild about lately? I'd love to hear/give it a try, so comment below!

Post-Independence Day: Thoughts from Barbecues and Freeways

So, yes, I have not blogged in almost a month, which is bad. But that's okay; it just took me longer to organize collections of my thoughts. The first collection is about Independence Day.

For those of you who don't know, probably the place to have the most fun on Independence Day, at least social-media-wise, is Tumblr. For one day, the only major fandom goings-on are Chris Evans as Steve Rogers/Captain America. Everything else is eagles, the American flag, firework gifs, and American Tumblr users being uncontrollably excited about Independence Day. Which, I have to admit, is weird coming from a site that is usually cynical about governments in general, but especially the paralyzing polarization that currently grips American politics. 

I wish I had taken a screenshot of this when it crossed my Tumblr dashboard while I waited for my American Flag manicure to dry. 

The post was something to the effect of a non-American Tumblr user complaining about how annoying American Tumblr users are on the Fourth of July every year. Which is true; we do, as a group of internet users, tend to let go of self-restraint on this day. But then another Tumblr user, an American one like me, said that our government is falling to pieces and nothing is being done, the economy is crappy, etc, etc; all normal woes about government, politics, and life that real Americans worry over every day. The point that this Tumblr user made was that Independence day is our day to be annoying, ignore the political bullcrap that's tearing a great system down, and just celebrate America like everything is fine. 

Everyone had to admit that it was a heartbreakingly true statement; both about the state of the country and our mad scramble to celebrate as though each firework was a Gatsby-like party blocking out our pain and disappointment like a nation, a generation, in postwar denial. I tried to forget it too, but as the day wore on and we eventually drove to my Aunt's house for the annual barbecue, it hung like a recurring, almost unnoticeable specter on the sidelines of a crowded, peopled ballroom. All the people I knew and loved best were there, but if I were alone or silent and turned my thoughts even an instant in the wrong direction, it was there. 

It probably didn't help that, earlier that afternoon, my father and I had been having a discussion about ISIS and other such threats America faces. He can handle thinking of such things with a detached realism of thought and then go on, making jokes and enjoying himself. It's a talent of accepting injustice, possible danger, and oblivion which I have always envied. After that discussion, I sat on the couch where I had napped so often as a teenager and thought for a good half an hour about progression, generalization, and what lies in store for the nation. 

Then I decided to try putting it out of my mind and enjoying Independence Day with my extended family.I decided that I didn't want my day ruined by maudlin thoughts about political I couldn't control at present, especially on that day of all days.

And it genuinely helped. Maybe that's because I have an awesome family, full of strong women who defy stereotypes in every way possible, strong, beautiful superwomen whom I only hope I come close to as a wife/mother/woman someday. Maybe it's because my family is full of worthy priesthood holders who actually earn that descriptor and defy the odds I see on the internet and in the modern world by being some of the most respectful, pro-women men this world has ever seen. Maybe it's because my wonderful Grandma rode up with us and in her I see a better person from a better time surviving and thriving in this one, and because she sees the best in every single one of us. Maybe it's because our usual family game of free-form soccer that just happens every year without an establishment is good for the soul (especially when all my male cousins appreciate non-athletic Lindsey Bree's decent goalie skills by dropping the name "Tim Howard.") as well as for the body. 

Our wonderful food probably doesn't hurt. 

After that, I packed up and drove back to Provo so I could spend some weekend time with my besties there before Cherie went back to her life as SOAR Counselor extraordinaire and we didn't see her again for a bit. 

As I was driving back south along I-15, Utah's main artery/freeway, there were Official City firework displays and neighborhood displays. The hills were alive with the sound of explosions, and as I sped along back to Provo, they didn't sound like the explosions of a nation covering up disappointment and fear. What I saw was genuine celebration. 

Granted, Utah has a high population density of Mormons like me, and as a people we tend to take the divine ordination of America as a land of Freedom pretty dang seriously.  

{That was just one quote I found in an article from LDS Living about it, but there are more. I made this one into this piece of art because there just weren't any quotes about this made into art on Pinterest. Weird. Thanks to Jessica Allen for helping those of us not fortunate enough to own fancy software.}

But as I eventually drove back into Provo and watched the fireworks go off above Carrie Underwood and the entire capacity of Lavell Edwards Stadium, I began to feel genuine hope that this country is not beyond hope. If, as I believe to be true, this nation has been divinely ordained as a place of freedom, then logically He who ordained it will not allow it to slip into anarchy and oblivion. 

That night, as Jess and I wrote and swirled our solitary sparkler in the air outside our Loft-house, I felt genuinely blessed to live in this silly little imperfect democracy. And as I went to bed last night, I couldn't help but recall one of the final lines from a vlogbrothers Thoughts From Places video where John Green is attacked by a D.C. park squirrel: "For better or worse, the U.S. is just getting started."