Entrants in the Philips-sponsored constrained cinema competition “Tell It Your Way” were restricted to six lines of dialogue: “What is that?,” “It’s a unicorn,” “Never seen one up close before,” “Beautiful,” “Get away, get away,” and “I’m sorry.”

This is the winning film.

sola frutas y vegetales

Today begins the three (or four, possibly) day cleanse. Don't worry, its not one of those crazy cayenne-pepper-and-lemon-juice deals. I'm only eating raw fruits and vegetables in an attempt to flush out toxins and other yucky things from my system.

This also isn't some sort of bizarre crash diet. Part of this is definitely just to see if I can do it...I'm very susceptible to challenges. Most of the stupid things I have done were the result of a dare. But this is like a personal challenge--can I only eat raw broccoli for four days? We'll see. 

So, here it goes. Wish me luck!

Ahh. I'm already craving bread. 

Listening to: spunky British music

Knock 'Em Out--Lily Allen

Merry Happy--Kate Nash 

I'm No Good--Amy Winehouse

Set Fire to the Rain--ADELE

After finally buckling down and finishing Things Fall Apart paper, I only have one pesky little exam until I am free of Gen. Ed. History! Hooray!
Elizabeth Gilbert wrote about this ability of the Italian people to find pleasure in doing nothing, la bel far niente, just relaxing. I can't bring myself to do nothing nothing but I've recently taken up reading out on my sunny deck. But today I didn't want to read something too substantial. 

So to celebrate my momentous achievement, I sat outside and read all the magazines that have been piling up on desk. I recently got fed up with all fashion magazines so I've been on the lookout for a replacement. I've always wished they would conglomerate all magazines and then you could select topics online that fit all your interests and a customized magazine would be sent to you. So then I could get my fix of travel articles or British soccer or news from Washington without having to buy fifteen different magazines.

Well, that hasn't happened yet, but I have found some winners. 

1. RELEVANT magazine. I had a couple friends who always read this and recommended it to me and thus far I've been really impressed. It is a Christian magazine yet it avoids that "we only report on explicitly Christian things" isolationist attitude. They have stories about bands, books, the state of the world, etc. 

2. TIME magazine. Its fairly slanted, but they have gorgeous photography and its a good capsule of whats going on in the world. The Economist is better, but...its summertime. I don't have the energy for that.

3. NYLON magazine. Technically a fashion magazine, but its their music issue, always great new bands. Also Florence Welch, of my dearly beloved Florence + the Machine, graces the cover this month.

4. Random catalogs from my mom's stack of mail. Dorm shopping!

5. Psychology Today. The cover caught my attention, since I'm a wee bit paranoid I'm a narcissist (and I often find myself romantically attached to them). Its a pop psych magazine, not a journal or anything, and they have interesting articles.

6. Us Weekly. Total guilty pleasure. I just like seeing what celebrities are up to. Really, I just like hearing about other people's lives (including my friends), like most of us. 

Oh, also, currently I'm working on having less of a materialism bent. That's why I'm reading loads of magazines. Yep.
Listening to:
The Gardner--The Tallest Man on Earth
King of Spain--The Tallest Man on Earth

{savannah}

Back from the weekend, still recovering from the absolutely insane heat 'n' humidity and mosquito bites. It was worth it though. Two days with two of my favorites in a beautiful little Southern town.

Agenda for Saturday:

Drive to Savannah (this involves mostly sleeping in the backseat on my part)

Walk around the squares, take way too many pictures, get heatstroke (not actually).

Me & Emilia (photo by Emily)
Have lunch, which consisted of the best fried green tomato sandwiches ever, at B. Matthews. That might sound odd if you've never lived in the South, but it's actually really good. Take my word for it.

Go to Tybee Beach. This was kind of a shock to all of us, we've been spoiled by uncrowded beaches. Our solution to the issue of loud people playing football all over the beach was to lie down in the shallow part of the tide and sleep. 

Dinner was at Jazz'd, a blues-jazz live music tapas bar. Definitely a good call. The band there that night played blues (they played Ain't No Sunshine!) and the restaurant had a really fun atmosophere. And the food was amazing. Proscuitto wrapped asparagus, chorizo empanadas, stuffed mushrooms, southern crab cakes, hummus, tapas lasagna, leek fritattas, and a black bean soup for my vegetarian Emilia.

{food photos credits to emily}

Strolling around City Market at night, getting matching necklaces because we're still fifth graders at heart, running into people from high school randomly, hotel sleepover with so. many. pillows.

Sunday Agenda:

Up early morning the next day to go tourist it up at Ft. Pulaski and the wildlife reserve (which is where the bulk of the mosquito tragedies happened).

Lunch at a burger joint with a menu more complex than NASA shuttle manuals.

Shopping and walking through Broughton St. 

And the absolute coolest store in the world: The Paris Market. 

Anything vintage, Parisian, or both can be found here. Its partly an antiques store, but not everything is ridiculously expensive. They play forties music and wrap up your purchases like presents. 

{photo creds to Emily}

Basically, this is want my house to look like. I could live in here. And I exercised a lot of self control by not buying lots of fabulous things. Just these. 

They had a trunk-ful of "vintage jewelry grab-bags". Just a little bag full of odds and ends of antique jewelry. So obviously I got one.
Also, a map of Paris. Kate, Mary, hopefully you like this since its going on our wall next year. 
After that, I picked up some pralines as souvenirs for the family back home and headed off. 

So, if you find yourself in Savannah, enjoy the restaurants and quiet streets, brace yourself for the humidity, try some sweet tea, and take lots of pictures.

Listening to (partially inspired by The Paris Market):

Quelqu'un M'a Dit--Carla Bruni

Le Temps Perdu--Carla Bruni

Ain't No Sunshine--Bill Withers

I'll Be Seeing You--Billie Holiday

decisions are best made before midnight

First off:

After thirty five days, hours spent with our fabulous insurance agent Angeline and even more hours spent with their hack-job "insurance company", several delays on the body work, and countless "not yet" responses to the Anderson family question of the summer "Is the car fixed yet?"...

MY CAR IS BACK.

We got the call last night, I decided this warranted some sort of little celebration. A celebration in the form of chocolate ganache cupcakes with sea salt caramel and chocolate frosting. 

These things take absolutely forever to make. Its one of those deals where you break out the baking sheet at around eight o' clock, figuring it'll be an hour, tops. Then you start reading the recipe (http://foodgawker.com/favorites/lca925/ , first recipe after the jump) which includes instructions like "pour in two shots of espresso" (this means, of course, you must make espresso), "make caramel" or "let frosting chill for two hours". And so at eleven, when everything's baked and made, it seems silly to have spent all that time and have the frosting look bad.

That's when the pastry bag comes out. Best thing my mom has ever bought me.

Fair warning, these things are addictive. And terrible. They are essentially a hodge-podge of things that are bad for you (coffee, butter, sugar) and things that are worse (heavy cream, caramel, vast quantities of chocolate) consolidated into one tiny cupcake. But since its all from scratch, its not processed (good!). So it all sort of evens out.
And they are by far the best cupcakes I've ever made/had. Even beating out NYC spring break three-quarter pound Oreo cupcakes.

Listening to: Rumour Has It, ADELE

{getting splendid post}

i love getting mail. when i was little i used to sit out after school and wait for the mail truck to come, hoping one of my pen pals had written me. i still write people letters, too. And postcards that take months to get halfway across the country. (What is up with the mail nowadays? I sent a letter to Israel--granted, fairly far--and it took four weeks to get there)

i also love surprises. and so it made my day yesterday to come home and find a package from my lovely friend Su, in which she had enclosed these cool tshirts she had gotten at her internship (i think). 

(I don't know what "The Send" is, though. Is it like...a gift? a "God"send? A demand? A band? I could just Google it, but I think I'm going to make up my own story.)

So, I was already pretty psyched about the whole getting-completely-unexpected-gifts in the mail. And then today, it happened AGAIN! 

My grandpa is a wonderful man in many respects, keeping track of dates and time is not one of them. I've gotten three "Happy sixteenth birthday!" cards from him. Usually what happens is whenever we're in Santa Barbara he'll just get us our birthday/Christmas/graduation presents there in one fell swoop. We didn't really do much shopping this trip, but I guess he remembered me pointing out this:

because it arrived in the mail today :) 

Other good things:

I'm going to Savannah this weekend with two beautiful amazing girls and it shall be wonderful.

Only two more days until I have another week off! (never have I been so grateful for out of state youth softball tournaments)

Sidebar: I didn't realize how many people read this...at all. One of my friends was telling me that like six people at her work read this, and I've never even met them! I was under the impression that about two people read this, because I think that's how many people 'follow' me. (However, you, dear reader, are welcome to 'follow'....it doesn't do anything fancy, I believe it just sends you an email when I post and also lets me know who's reading this. Plus then I can give you little shoutouts. Always fun.)

Listening to: Dream a Little Dream of Me--Cass Elliot

a lazy sunday

perfect weather (for the first all summer) + recovering from the first late late night I'd had in a while + hanging out with two amazing girls + reading up on the emerging GOP candidates because I am a dork + watching ridiculous TV shows + running + new music + finding out my car should be back by Thursday (fingers crossed) + lots of my little projects/long term plans coming together + great sermon in church today  = good weekend and the perfect cap to a wonderful two week vacation.

back to work tomorrow--hopefully it will go well and I will be able to come up with activities for the kiddos.

Listening to:

The Civil Wars. I've had their music for a while but I never got around to listening to them--they're fantastic. 

Also, I have this thing where I create playlists for very specific sub-genres of music. The songs have to fit a certain mood or have a feel to them that matches the others. I keep these four song playlists around for years with no change and then one day, bam!, I'll hear a song and go "Wow, that's absolutely perfect for my nordic lighthouse playlist!"

 One of my favorites I have christened "Bluesy Harmonica Put to Good Use". Most of the songs do have harmonica, but in general they're folksy-bluesy-alt rock songs with stomp to them that simultaneously remind me of Cold Mountain and taking a road trip through the Carolinas. And with my (re)discovery of the Civil Wars, there is a new addition! Fair warning, if you don't like the first track, you won't like the rest of 'em. 

Barton Hollow--The Civil Wars

Believer--Viva Voce

Follow Suit--Trent Dabbs

Wagon Wheel (cover)--Against Me

Complicated Shadows--Elvis Costello

Fault Line--Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

Done All Wrong--Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

The Civil Wars--Barton Hollow

anatomy of a costume

Alternately titled, what I did with my Thursday morning. As you all probably know, tonight is the motion picture event we've been waiting for--the U.S. midnight premiere of the last Harry Potter movie (unless you're super lucky and are currently in New Zealand cough *megan* cough and already saw it). And if you didn't know that, or are not a Rowling fan, just stop reading now. Because otherwise you will think I'm very strange.

As its the last movie, we're going all out and dressing up. I have decided to be Luna Lovegood because she's such a fun character and gives you lots of great costume options.

                  

Unfortunately, I do not have the time or patience to make a lion hat. But here is what I did do. 

My costume philosophy for established characters is somewhat akin to method acting. Yes, try and find whatever the book or movies had them wearing, but its perfectly acceptable to add something if it fits the character.

 Start with classic Ravenclaw uniform: black skirt, white button down, grey sweater, blue/silver tie:

Now, add a bunch of oddly patterned and assorted thing like scarves, knee socks, sneakers, giant purses. bonus points for wearing items in a fashion they were not intended for and/or not matching.

Next, add Luna-ish accesories. Lots of necklaces with pendants, that sort of thing.

The things the books mentioned were: necklaces made out of butterbeer corks, earrings made of radishes, copies of her father's magazine The Quibbler, and Spectrospecs.

For the final touches: Hair should be worn down and wavy, make it look as long as possible. If you want, stick flowers or something in it. Paint your nails an unusual color. Look spacey. 

Finished product:

And not to brag or anything, but I also turned my little brother into Professor Lupin and my sister into Hermione Granger. 

Also, a very merry happy birthday to my wonderful sister, who is officially of wizarding age today.

Birthday morning coffee cake.

Luna Lovegood inspired playlist:
I'm Not Calling You A Liar--Florence + the Machine
Eet--Regina Spektor
Possibility--Lykke Li
Starry Eyed--Ellie Goulding
Boy Lilikoi--Jonsi
Generator (Second Floor)--Freelance Whales
If You Can't Sleep--She & Him

I never really noticed how much I listen to music until recently. I got a comparatively late start; it was around junior year that I branched out from top forty. I blame this partly on the fact that my mother doesn't listen to music. At all. I didn't even realize our car had a radio until I started driving. One time, I asked her what music she listened to in high school (and she lived in California in the seventies--loads of music. Everywhere) and she said she didn't. And because of this, our house is silent. I was used to it when I lived here, but after the dorm experience its a little eerie that you can hear our grandfather clock tick all over the house.

                          

So now I'm constantly listening to music. When I sleep, when I cook, when I study, when I write, when I run--if I'm not actually talking to another person, my playlist-of-the-moment is playing. I've started making playlists of two or three songs that fit a really specific, self-invented genre. Also making playlists of whatever I was listening to all week--like a music time capsule of sorts. 

My 7/11 playlist:
Follow Suit--Trent Dabbs
Blinding--Florence + the Machine
Into the Fire--Thirteen Senses
Shuffle Your Feet--Black Rebel Motorcycle Club
Queen of (K)nots--Matt Nathanson
Blood Bank--Bon Iver
Skinny Love (cover)--Birdy

scones and (not) studying

Guess what, everyone? I have the week off! Yay! And there was much rejoicing in the land.

Unfortunately, I don't just get to slack off and sleep in. Although I do have lots of fun things planned. Long story short, I was supposed to spend the beginning of my summer on a study abroad program in Japan. And then, as I'm sure you're well aware, the country got hit with a massive earthquake that it still hasn't recovered from yet and the trip got cancelled. And although the impact on my life has been nowhere near to how awful losing your home, family, and livelihood would be (sidenote: Red Cross is still taking donations to help Japan, please give if you can), it did mess up my plans for the summer.  So I'm taking all the classes I was supposed to take in Japan online now. Or I'm supposed to be. I kind of forgot about it for the last three weeks. So today was supposed to be my major study/catch up day.

But studying in the summer is...awful. Even when its raining (guess we've officially hit every-single-afternoon-summer-thunderstorm season down here Georgia). Lots of procrastination occurred. Target runs. Unnecessary skyping. Reading other people's blogs. Thrift store-ing with my sister. Making birthday cards (not even for specific people, just general birthday cards). Wearing knee socks and sliding around my foyer. Setting up google+. I even cleaned my room. So after working really hard for fifteen wholes minutes I decided to give it up as a lost cause and made strawberry-almond scones and listened to She & Him instead.

Hey, there's always tomorrow.

Listening to: Into the Fire, Thirteen Senses

santa barbara

words cannot express how much i love santa barbara. in my mind, it is the perfect town. it even has perfect weather. and its a beach town curled up beneath the mountains, a town where the beach is always empty. when we were little, my grandpa told us that east beach's secret name was 'money beach'. we would go out  really early in the morning since that's when wreckage and treasure from ships would wash up. surprised but glad that no one else seemed to know about this magical stretch of real estate, we ran through the waves, picking up quarters that must have just rolled in. Years later, of course, we realized it was my grandpa throwing coins into the wind ahead of us, but that beach still feels magic to me. I feel completely at peace. Diving into the ice cold waves, I feel like I could spend forever here.

Listening to: my "California Dreamin'" playlist, of course!
California--Phantom Planet
California Girls--Beach Boys
California English--Vampire Weekend
Earthquakes & Sharks--Brandtson
Surfin' USA--Beach Boys
Dani California--Red Hot Chili Peppers
The Beach--All Time Low
Californication--Red Hot Chili Peppers
Mansard Roof--Vampire Weekend
Catch a Wave--Beach Boys
Miss California--Jack's Mannequin
California Dreamin' --Mamas and the Papas
Good Vibrations--Beach Boys