19 in 2019: Visit a Cat Cafe

Number three on my 19 in 2019 list was the needn’t to be explained “Visit a Cat Cafe!” I’ll go ahead and explain it anyway. I love animals. I like visiting animals at people’s homes or zoos or aquariums. I like looking at pictures of animals. The majority of my Instagram feed is made up of baby animal aggregators, zoos, Internet famous pets, and animal photographers. (The rest, if you are wondering, is crafty folks and hot people.) So, when this new trend of cat cafes started, I was ready. Somehow though, I managed not to make it to one in 2018 even though I really really wanted to. Even though some friends went to some without me! When I started thinking about my 19 in 2019 list, the cat cafe is one of the first activities that sprung to mind.

Present Participle List: January 2019

This was a busy, busy month at work. I worked a lot of overtime and then I got a yucky cold. So I waffled between working my butt off and being flat on my butt. Here are a few things that I got up to.

Watching:
Documentaries, lots of them.

Top Chef Kentucky: It’s been years since I watched a season of Top Chef, the show with the hottest judges in reality show history, Padma Lakshmi and Tom Colicchio. Nothing much has changed about the show and I prefer it that way. There are still the nice chefs and the cocky chefs and the nervous chefs and creative challenges in between in-show car and Whole Foods commercials.

Eating:
Shrimp and Grits: One of my 19 in 2019 goals this year is to cook new recipes. I subscribed to New York Times Cooking and cooked Shrimp and Grits with Garlicky Swiss Chard as my first two new recipes of the year. Then I ate grits again and again after that and at least another time after that.

Listening:

Radiolab episode: The Punchline Thanks to the recommendation by MJV, I checked out a hockey-based episode of RadioLab about the season when goon John Scott was elected to the NHL all-star game in a popular fan-fueled campaign. It could be an allegory of what happens when corporations try to use social media marketing without a complete understanding of how it works. It details the steps the NHL took to remove John Scott from the game and highlights their villainy. Sure, the NHL is run by jerks, but in this situation they go out of their way to be total dicks. I recommend this episode to sports fans and students of social media alike.

The Smiths
I read Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell, whose characters are big fans of the Smiths and I’ve been on a Smiths’ bender ever since. I’ve been listening to A Light That Never Goes Out a lot, probably an unhealthy amount.

Reading:

Upstairs at the White House: My Life with the First Ladies by J.B. West This intriguing book by J.B. West, who served as usher and then chief usher in the White House from FDR to Nixon is filled with awesome tidbits about the first families he served. There is nothing salacious here as West has such respect for each of the presidents and their families. The book covers so many behind-the-scenes looks at important moments in American history including the Kennedy assassination and the death of FDR in office.

Playing:
Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

A Way Out
A bartender at my favorite bar Best Buds Gaming Lounge recommended A Way Out to my friend D and I and then we spent the next many hours and beers playing it. It’s a cooperative prison-escape jaunt that feels more like playing through a movie then a game. Yeah, there are a lot of cutscenes but you also get to steal a truck from old people! This playable Choose Your Own Adventure is very entertaining.

That's what I was up to in January

19 in 2019: Play an RPG!

It's still January and I've crossed another 19 in 2019 off my list! Number 7: Play an RPG! is now complete. I've been interested in playing an RPG such as D&D for years and even created some Shadowrun characters with a friend back in college and I still hadn't managed to actually play a game.

On Black Friday, I saw a screaming deal for the Star Wars: Edge of the Empire beginner game. I figured Star Wars was a great place to start my RPGing adventure, since I'm familiar with and love the Universe already. The package came with a condensed rule book, an adventure book, maps, specialized dice, four pre-made characters and another adventure available for download online. Knowing I wouldn't be able to find anyone to play in December, I set it aside for examination this month.

19 in 2019: George C. Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary

I couldn’t let January 2019 pass without knocking at least one thing off my 19 in 2019 list, so on January 13, my friend R and I headed up to Canada to check out The George C. Reifel Migratory Bird Sanctuary. For just $5 admission, we checked #18 off the list!

After coworkers told me about the sanctuary years ago, I knew to expect a large number of birds when we arrived. What I didn’t realize is just how many species we would see. We saw:

8 Sick-Day Documentaries to Heal Your Cold (or help you take a nap)

I caught the mother of all colds last week and stayed home for a boring and lonely 3.5 days. Usually when I’m sick, I sleep a lot until the cold goes away. This set of symptoms was a different beast though and I didn’t manage to sleep much. I had a terrible headache that prevented me from reading, so watch TV I did. A lot. A whole lot.

Usually my sick day show watching consists of the Price is Right followed by some sort of nostalgic TV show like Magnum PI. Occasionally, I’ll watch a documentary or two. Since this sickness was some sort of extra sick, I decided to do some extra TV watching. So, I present to you: THE GREAT SICK DAY DOCUMENTARY FILM FEST OF 2019!!!

4 Reasons Why My TBR Pile Might Kill Me

It’s not hard to keep a TBR list. Anyone can make a Goodreads account and click the green “want to read” button or keep a handwritten list in their bullet journal. What takes a little more commitment and a lot more space is a physical TBR stack. This is where I find myself now, with a more than three-foot (Yes, I measured) pile of books taller than my nightstand next to my bed. With the paltry shelves of the actual furniture long full, I’ve expanded to the floor.

The Highest Peak of Book Mountain

My TBR stack was created by the following four-pronged fact attack and because of this it will mostly likely tumble over and bury me in a pile of unread books:

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse Review

I have never excelled at giving good movie or music recommendations. The problem is that I like too many things. It’s hard to give a helpful critique when I think many movies and music are “sssssooooooooo gooooooooddddd”.

Years ago, I told my friend Jonnie, while we were arguing about a band that I thought he should like, that he didn’t have an appreciation for enough pop culture. I said that if he had a sieve over his head that let in new music, the holes in his sieve would be too small to let anything through. He disagreed and yelled “YOU NEED SMALLER HOLES!” thereby letting the office know that the holes in my pop culture sieve were way too big and let in enough junk to drown me. Then he drew me the following cartoon.

The Dark Side of Choose Your Own Adventure

Do you ever have a tidal wave of memories that crash over you without warning from the recesses of your brain? This happened to me one recent Saturday morning when I had a distinct memories of a family road trip, stuck in the very back bench seat of my family’s silver 1986 Plymouth Voyager as we crossed the hot Eastern Washington desert, reading and rereading a box set of four Choose Your Own Adventure books. I remembered picking out the set at Costco and how special it seemed because my mom was buying me four books instead of just one.

Whatever caused my sudden and unstoppable need for a nostalgia-fueled afternoon of sifting through Choose Your Own Adventure books was now gnawing a small pit in my stomach. It was a thirst that needed to be quenched immediately. Time to track down some of these gems of my childhood!

 WARNING!!! 

The 7 Best Books I Read in 2018

In 2017 and 2018 I set a goal of reading or listening to 100 books or audiobooks. In 2017, I consumed 193 books mainly because I went on a huge children’s literature binge to combat my despair over Trump’s inauguration. That January and February, I went through loads and loads of story books and it was fun. It was a great antidote for the terrible news.

Last year, I ended up consuming 92 out of 100 books even though I started two book clubs and expected to easily meet my goal. I’m not unhappy that I didn’t meet my goal, just surprised. Last year was challenging for me, as I tried to balance the new commitment of spending time with my 92-year-old aunt who we moved from assisted living in California to a facility a few miles from my apartment. It was harder than I ever imagined. I spent a lot of time feeling sad and frustrated and that manifested in playing a lot of games on my phone and doing mindless internet scrolling.

I still read great books though and gave seven of them the coveted 5/5 rating on Goodreads. A mix of non-fiction and mostly YA fiction, they are, in no particular order:

19 in 2019!

Following the lead of Gretchen Rubin and Elizabeth Craft, cohosts of my favorite podcast Happier, I’m embarking on a list of 19 things I want to do in 2019.

1. Restart a blog! I miss reading all the blogs I read in the early aughts. I miss writing silly little posts about the silly things little things I love. To activate my writing muscles, I need to practice writing and I won’t write if I’m my only audience. Blogging gives me the illusion of other people reading it. In 2019, I will publish at least two blog posts each week.

2. Complete a Happiness Project! I’m a happy follower of the work of the aforementioned Gretchen Rubin. I love her podcast and her books especially, The Happiness Project. This year she is launching a yearlong course, The Happiness Project Experience and I’m going to actively participate in this class.

3. Visit a cat cafe! This one doesn’t really need explanation. I like cats. I like cafes. I'm going to go to one.