Mid-week Links

It seems like every time I’ve been posting recently it’s been prefaced by an apology about my lack of consistency.  I’m here again and again with another excuse- you would think being homebound with a bad ankle would lead to more posting rather than less, but instead I’ve just generally been very off my game for the last week.  Thankfully I’m starting to shape up and am more or less ready to rejoin the land of the living/productive, which is good because we’ve got some family trips lined up which I would never for the life of me be missing.
But that does also mean I’m unlikely to be posting consistently for another week and a half.  The boondocks of PA doesn’t even have phone connection, much less WiFi.
See you on the other side!

In the meantime, I’ve amassed a hideous army of motley links from around the interwebs.

Why so many posts about Instagram?

• Intimidatingly stylish Insta-kids. I do not follow these small people but I do have to say that Jayde Robinson looks like the cutest thing ever.
• Is ‘personal taste’ being replaced by an algorithm?
• The Call Me By Your Name x Monet mashup you didn’t know you needed. Summer vibe.
• Some pretty art photos.

Peace and Acceptance:

• “It’s two years after Pulse and too little has changed.”
• On Polyamorous relationships.
• 7 LGBTQIA stories to celebrate Pride

On Films:

• The trouble with Hollywood’s gender flips: “These reboots require women to relive men’s stories instead of fashioning their own. And they’re subtly expected to fix these old films, to neutralize their sexism and infuse them with feminism, to rebuild them into good movies with good politics, too. They have to do everything the men did, except backwards and with ideals.”
• The Pop Culture Detective strikes again! The topic: Abduction as Romance.
• The Hate U Give. This looks pretty great.
• What is Cinemascore?

Miscellaneous:

• Real men smell like flowers.
• Testing the new Glossier cloud paints on different skin tones. Dawn looks pretty amazing on darker skin, IMO.
• My personal kama sutra.
• There’s a garden on top of Fenway (how did I miss this?!) and the truth about New Haven’s masked boombox man.

SaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSave

Listen to Why I’m Stressed

It occurred to me that today is a links day but guess what? I don’t have many links and I’m feeling stressed and over-stimulated, and I felt like writing a links post would be not an excellent thing for my brain.

So I want to do what I often do when I’m stressed and make a list of what’s bothering me.  It kind of helps.  Especially because when it comes down to it I’m kind of living my best life.  There’s nothing seriously wrong in any way whatsoever.

There are a few too many focuses and that’s a hard thing for me to handle because of who I am as a person.

So in the order in which they occur to me:

• We have three tests coming up in the next two weeks. For one I have to memorize approximately 100 synthetic molecules, their names, and the families they’re classified in. And recognize them by scent.  And review the 130 natural materials that will be trickily sprinkled in… For another I need to recognize something like 50 or 60 fine fragrances, with names and brands, and scent families.  I don’t even know what the other one is at this point. Maybe chemistry?
• There’s a French one coming up. Do I even have to take the French test? (My French is good enough that I’ve been told I don’t have to come to class).
• I finished my green beans but didn’t eat the broccoli I bought this week and I’m worried it will go bad.
• I need to go grocery shopping on Sunday and I’m slightly stressed about what recipes to shop for.
• In three weeks we have a field trip to Grasse for a few days to study the mimosa harvest. And most people (including me) are staying the extra weekend days. But that means I have some trip planning to do, and my last trip planning experience didn’t give me a huge amount of faith in my abilities.
• Speaking of trip planning, a week later is the start of our two week February break. I have no idea what is happening there.
• It’s hard to go back to working all day. I hate sitting so much and feeling so exhausted after. Smelling for 8 hours is actually really exhausting. I need more physical activity and stretching.
• I want to try a financier pastry but I don’t know what kind to buy. It looks like they come in almond, pistachio, and chocolate varieties.
• Speaking of which, what kind of bread should I get this week?
• Lol I need to find a summer internship.
• I discovered that Chipotles exist in Paris and I REALLY miss Mexican food so I’ve asked some friends to go with me tomorrow, which is kind of a worry for me. Just the planning and timing.
• Speaking of my plans tomorrow, there’s an exhibit at the Petit Palais that I have to get to (it closes Sunday) on the pastel art of Degas and Redon. Must make that happen.
• I left my favorite necklace and my iPod at home. I miss them.
• My grocery shopping? I need to get a jam but I’m torn between four types. (Figs or mirabelle or Reines Claudes or fruits rouges?)

I think that’s it! Stay posted for links (and hopefully sanity) tomorrow!

Links not Words

Look at me doing two posts two days in a row like I don’t currently have 134 raw materials to study and an illness to recover from! 😀

No excuses, I have reaped enough links from the inter webs now to share them and I’m missing sharing my thoughts more often, so I’m going to work on making time for this blog/diary/list compendium more of a priority.
For the children, you know.

• Pixar’s released a TEASER TRAILER FOR INCREDIBLES 2! I’ve been waiting so long. And I am so ready for destructive apocalyptic Jack Jack and stay-at-home Mr. Incredible. (And Edna Mode. Please, Edna Mode).
• One of my favorite makeup artists (Violette, check out her youtube channel) has released a trio of lip colors with Estee Lauder. I’m sorely tempted.
• A scholarly discussion of Rankin & Bass Christmas specials; the good, the bad, and the ugly. Finally convinced me to finally watch Jack Frost, which I had somehow missed during all of my childhood ABC Family’s 25 Days of Christmas. Here are some highlights.
• A program to help you find the word that’s just on the tip of your tongue.
• Guys, there’s a new horse movie coming out, Lean on Pete.
• The American Film Institute has released their list of top 10 films of 2017. It’s a pretty good list. I’ve seen 4/10 so far, time to get cracking.
• Yale’s released a new admissions video, “That’s Why I Toured Yale”, replacing cult icon “That’s Why I Chose Yale”. The weirdest thing? I recognize people in the video. (I see you at 9:26-9:33, ballroom team!)
• NPR’s guide to the best books of 2017. Be right back, adding about 20 to my list. have you read any?
• New York Times film critics on the best movie performances of 2017. So much agreement and so much anticipation for films I haven’t seen yet (like Ladybird, The Shape of Water, and Call Me By Your Name).
• The magic of big cities, an illustration.

Friday Links 10/6

I forgot to show you my October desktop last time!

• Ungrateful as the new ‘Uppity’, some thoughts from The New Yorker on African American civil rights protest and taking a knee.
• A love story on the train.
• Empathy for the Privileged: A YDN article that’s pissing me off.
• An interesting sociological study: Are you the big spoon or the little spoon?
• Pissed off by this Anorexia sweatshirt on Amazon.
• Definition of a meet-cute: NYPD horse meets French bulldog.
• Sam Heughan is hot.
• Getting in the Halloween spirit: What is the creepiest urban legend in your state? Honestly disappointed by MA. Not scary.
• Designing a water-marbled scarf. What a beautiful process.
• ALLLLL these films.

A Chronology of My Style Crushes

Before we get into the nitty gritty business of fashion icons, I want to relate a very disconcerting story.
I just caught my cat (Mirko, the boy one_ trying to smuggle a dead mouse in from the porch (in his mouth). So I grabbed him and carried him back out- but somehow between getting him from the kitchen to the porch he dropped the mouse. And now neither of us can find it. He’s looking a shard as I am. In fact, as I’m typing this he’s still wandering around somewhat bereft.

I can’t imagine that being a situation Grace Kelly ever had to deal with.
Segue.

Call them my sartorial inspiration, if you like.
The fact is, every period of my life and ‘stage of my style identity’ has had a different mascot connected to it.
Some more embarrassing than others.

My Big News

I hinted in my last post about having some very BIG IMPORTANT EXCITING news to reveal and that’s true- to an extent. In that it’s much BIGGER MORE IMPORTANT MORE EXCITING news if you’re me.

And that is that I’ve been accepted into IFF-ISIPCA’s 3-year MSc program in Scent Design and Creation.  Starting in late September I’ll be studying fragrance in Versailles, France.

Your Yale Happy Place

Today is my undergraduate graduation.
Due to a lack of sentimentality about the recent past, I’m not there.  While I was kind of anticipating doing some minor celebrating at home, Mom’s felt quite sick the past three days, so we’re going a lot of chilling around here.

I’ve never been one for celebrating milestones, and it’s not likely that I would suddenly become a big people person and want to hug and kiss everyone I hardly spent time with the past few years. But of course there will be people I miss very much. Many of them.

Friday Links 5/19

Hey my graduation is this weekend! (Except not really because I’m not going!).
Did you go to your graduation? Almost everyone I’ve talked to has been some combination of stunned or outraged to hear that I’m skipping it- which is a reaction that’s quite taken me by surprise.
Neither of my parents went to their graduations, so I think I just kind of grew up not thinking it was a big deal. My cousin Sean went to his graduation but sat with his family in the audience.  And I went to my high school one (but I was valedictorian *pats on back* so I kind of had to).  But there are so many things I’d rather do!
Namely: anything. Sitting around in a big group of people and listening to speeches just isn’t my thing and I know that makes me sound terribly unsentimental, except I’m also such a nostalgic person that I know that can’t be it.

Favorite Performances at Yale

One of the best things about university has been how everyone does ~something~. Everyone plays an instrument or sings (so. much. a cappella.) and some of my favorite moments have just been watching the people around me get together and do their thing.

So of course there are ballroom shows. But I don’t really get to watch those because I’m generally blinded by panic about having to go on myself.  But I did watch the Icebreaker show for potential members my freshman year.  I can even see me in the audience in the youtube videos (I’m so cute and young with stars in my eyes and an innocent heart 😛 ).

But ballroom shows or just one tiny thing that happens on campus (and also I’m contractually obliged to say they’re the best thing). But there’s so much else going on and wow, wouldn’t it be great to go to Yale and not have to do any classes or anything, but just kick back to take in the culture (and the parties and maybe audit a few bizarre and interesting classes).

And most of them are free of charge! And because I’m a cheapskate those are the ones I usually attend.

Yale Dining: Dying Vegan

(This is (/was) my dining hall. At least I can suffer surrounded by beautiful symbols of an elitist intellectual old boy culture 🙂 )

In honor of being DONE WITH UNIVERSITY (AAAHHHHH) I’m going to focus for maybe a week or so on college-related topics.  So the first one is going to be the best food served at Yale dining halls.

Now anyone who’s read a few posts here may have noticed that I am kind of vegan (nothing “kind of” about it) and really struggle with Yale’s dining system because, while they make promises about having a vegan entree at every meal, that is frequently not the case. And their idea of a vegan entree is frequently something along the lines of ‘rice’.

But sometimes they actually have quite good and edible options (and when that happens I bring discreet tupperware and load the fuck up like a camel at an oasis in the middle of a hot arid desert).