Yikes, Spikes!

1. Phone case. 2. Ring. 3. Glitter earrings. 4. Headband.

A little ladylike, yet a little edgy. Just how I like it!

Spectrum: Fuschia

1. Bear. 2. Bright locks. 3. Paper blossoms. 

This bear print by Kris Tate is absolutely epic, right? I've been hanging art on my walls all weekend, and this might have to find its way to my apartment. 

Friday Photo Find: Bella Kotak

1. Balloons. 2. Feathers.

There is a really cool lost-in-the-woods vibe going on in Bella Kotak's photostream. Makes me want to root around in the wooded area near my apartment. One summer I even found a stream & some frogs! 

Gettin' Foxy

1. Wood necklace. 2. Plushie bandits. 3. Pillow. 4. Brooch.

I seem to be on an animal kick lately. But these foxy accessories are too good to pass up. I have no idea what I'd do with a basket full of plushie fox bandits, but who cares?

Don't Sweat the Small Stuff

1. Original floral wallpaper image.

On occasion, I think things are a huge deal when they really aren't that important. So, as a reminder, I made myself an iPhone wallpaper. Guess what? You can download it!

Spectrum: Gray

1. Love seat. 2. Agate necklace. 3. Fab outfit.

It's been so bright, sunny, & hot this past week that I'm sort of wishing it was gray! But, alas, it's not. I'll have to stare at this collage instead & fondly dwell on sweater weather.

Spicy Tempeh Hot Wings

I've been trying to eat a little healthier these days. So, today, for the first time, I cooked tempeh!

Tempeh is basically a funky soy cake hailing from Indonesia that you can find next to the tofu at Whole Foods. It tastes nutty and is apparently pretty versatile. So I decided to make these tempeh hot wings from The Ordinary Vegetarian (served with an anchovy and kale side salad).

Oh man, these were good. And pretty darn easy to make.

Friday Photo Find: Parachutgirl

1. Untitled. 2. Untitled. 

There are a lot of hidden faces in parachutgirl's photostream. Kind of eerie as well as beautiful, don't you think?  

Cookies from Henteco

Hedgehog & raccoon.

These are so freaking adorable I don't think I could possibly eat them! Could you?

And don't worry, What I Want Wednesdays will be up on the blog later. I'm a little behind schedule, as I had to drink mango martinis & eat animal-style fries last night instead of tinkering with Photoshop.

Spectrum: Pink

1. Sparkle sky. 2. Pastel tresses. 3. Velvet bed frame. 4. Feather earrings.

Oh man, how I wish I had pastel hair. And that bed frame. Okay, I'll basically take everything.

Happy Monday, friends!

Weekend Wrap Up

Sundays are my calm days. I like to take care of everything I've put off: laundry, eating Greek yogurt & nectarines, painting portraits of bugs (what?!).

Of course, nothing ever goes according to plan. I ended up taking up taking dictation for my grandfather's editorial on the destructiveness of Brazil nut trees (baffling) for a rebel magazine he and his buddies started to protest the association that runs the old folks' home. (I swear, I couldn't make this stuff up.) Very relaxing indeed.

What unexpected stuff did you do this weekend?

Friday Photo Find: Julia Galdo

1. Untitled. 2. Untitled. 3. Untitled. 

Julia Galdo's photostream is full of awesome. I especially love these desert-y shots — they're super moody & gorgeous.

Happy Friday everyone! Doing anything particularly sweet this weekend?

What I Want Wednesday: Owls

1. Art. 2. Purse. 3. Ring. 4. Cake.

Okay, seriously, aren't owls awesome? I mean, check out these little dudes. I want one. But my cat would probably eat it (if she could catch it, which is unlikely). 

Speaking of eating, I really, really want that cake.

Historical Fiction Fix

I'll have you guys know, I'm an endless source of amusement at 6 a.m. Like, you've never seen anyone as grumpy & bleary-eyed & likely to erupt into a frenzy of half-formed curses as I. (Or at least, that's what I hear from the unfortunate person who had to drag me out of bed yesterday morning in time for a early morning conference call on prescription drug diversion prevention.)

I mean, obviously, I'd rather sleep in. And then wake up around noon to eat an entire platter of salt & pepper squid (favorite thing ever) from Seafood Town. Everyday. But then I'd be jobless & probably very unhealthy. 

So, instead, I'll continue brewing homemade chai tea lattes (saving money by not going to Starbucks: score!), working out like a psycho (I'm telling you, booty barre is the best workout ever), cuddling my cat, & watching crazy historical dramas. 

I've got a historical fiction addiction. I read books almost exclusively from that genre. I love movies & television programs set in far-flung epochs & locales. Here's where I've been getting my fix lately:

1. Borgia. 2. Tamra. 3. Enchantments.

1. Borgia: Faith and Fear. This is the French-German take on the lives of the Borgia clan. I haven't seen the Showtime series, The Borgias, but apparently this one is a lot more violent & risque (hard to believe, right?). My favorite character, by far, is the incredibly conniving but angel-faced Lucrezia Borgia, played by Isolda Dychauk. Isolda was born in Siberia & later moved to Berlin — & her accent is absolutely wild!

2. Tamra, the Island. I just started watching this Korean drama earlier this week & can't get enough! (Drama is probably the wrong word to use, since this is most definitely a comedy.) Tamra, the Island (탐나는도다), is set in the 1600s on what is now called Jeju Island. A shipwrecked Englishman is washed up on shore & rescued by inept abalone diver Beo-jin. Hijinks ensue, obviously. 

If you decide to watch this show, I'll warn you: give it the benefit of the doubt for the first 20 minutes. Tamra, the Island uses some truly awful computer generated imagery. When Beo-jin goes diving, it looks like she's swimming in a screen-saver from Windows 95. Also, the Englishman is inexplicably played by a French-born actor who speaks English with an extremely noticeable accent. However, if you can get past all that & accept this show for the wacky fun time it is, I promise you won't regret it!

3. Enchantments by Kathryn Harrison. This book follows the life of Masha, the daughter of famed Russian mystic Grigori Rasputin, after her father's murder. Masha is sent to live with the family of Tsar Nikolay at the imperial palace & is inevitably placed under house arrest with the royals by the Bolsheviks. The book is beautifully written (although, be warned, it jumps around at times as Masha spins tales for the sickly Romanov heir, Alyosha).

So, what have you been reading & watching lately?

Spectrum: Aqua

1. Backyard sanctuary. 2. Peach & aqua patterns. 3. Aqua chalcedony ring. 4. Sea foam skates.

Hello, friends! I'm trying to step up the blogging over here at Abdicate the Cube, but I'm easily distracted. You know how it is. (Plus, I'm over here teaching myself graphic design as I go, & everything seems to take so dang long!)

Anyway, this is a new weekly column idea called Spectrum. Hopefully I'll be more successful at collecting color inspiration than I have been at collecting cool stuff for What I Want Wednesdays. (Sigh.)

Happy Monday!

On Repeat

 

I swear, I listen to this at least ten times a day. Ane Brun is tops!

San Francisco & the High Seas

I know the grass is always greener on the other side, but in the case of San Francisco, the grass really is greener than Los Angeles' chaparral. 

I took a five day weekend & hit the road to visit my friend, Kirin, in Sausalito, Calif., a sleepy little waterside town across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Fran. Luckily, Kirin provided housing — a bunk on board the 82-foot sailboat for which she's a deck hand! Obviously, hilarity (& terrible marine toilet confusion) ensued. 

I discovered a few things on my NorCal adventure: 1. I shall never be a sailor (eight days without a shower, mast scaling & being cold & wet — yikes); 2. milk frothers are the best ever; 3. I could totally play with black sand & magnets all damn day; 4. swans are extremely large birds; 5. I really, really want to live in San Francisco! Like, So. Bad. 

San Francisco is ridiculously picturesque. The buildings are old & beautiful, their are a million types of functional public transportation (ever tried getting somewhere on a bus in Los Angeles? Good luck), & clam chowder comes in sourdough bread bowls. 

Unfortunately, living costs in San Fran are sky high, & even in my wildest dream scenario, I probably wouldn't be able to afford the microscopic apartment in a Victorian building that I'd want. I'd probably be living in a box on a sidewalk with a dude named Steve.

I did, however, meet a ballerina who received free room & board in the service quarters of a mansion in exchange for walking the mansion owners' dog. Umm, hello San Francisco mansion owners? I'm really good with dogs. & cats. & turtles! Errr, I could feed your fish? Mop your floors? Call me!

What I Want Wednesdays: Gnomes

1. Tiny terrarium gnomes. 2. Gnome & mushroom print. 3. Gnome baguette packaging. 4. Garden sign. 5. Jumbo knitted gnome.

Before they were tacky lawn ornaments, gnomes appeared in Renaissance literature as tiny spirits with a penchant for alchemy & the occult. Creepy, right?

Despite the ever-present freaky factor of gnomes, I find the little guys weirdly adorable. I mean, how can you not fall in love with Mochimochi Land's Jumbo Gnome?! Once my knitting skills are up to snuff (I'm still in my lumpy scarf phase) I hope to make one of these awesome dudes.

What I'm Watching: Bunheads

[Source.]

I was a full-blown Gilmore Girls devotee from Day One.

As part of an unreasonably large group of dorky college girls, I would fight for a spot on the nasty dorm sofa once a week to take in the antics of Rory & Lorelai all the way to the bitter end — of the series, that is.

Now, Gilmore Girls creator Amy Sherman-Palladino has a brand new show, which I can only hope will fill the gaping void left by the residents of Stars Hollow. The show is called Bunheads — which I found really confusing until someone pointed out that "bunheads" is ballerina slang. Who knew ballerinas even had slang?!

Bunheads gets off to a clunky start, but manages to save itself with a bevy of witty dialogue (Gilmore Girls style!) and intensely likeable characters. Thank God, because the pilot had me seriously worried.

It's probably just that I've been watching too many crime dramas & shows produced by Shonda Rhimes (please don't judge me), but when Bunheads' protagonist Michelle (played by Broadway actor Sutton Foster) decides to ditch her Vegas showgirl lifestyle by marrying her (supposedly sweet & well-meaning) patron Hubbell, I was certain she was going to get murdered. Or assaulted. Or locked in a freezer & thrown off a bridge.

I get where the writers were going with this. I do. Michelle's so burned out on Vegas & her shitty apartment that some dweeb who brings her flowers every week & recklessly proposes marriage seems like a great escape. But if working in the safety & security industry has taught me anything, it's that a guy who consistently ignores your boundaries, buys you unwanted gifts, & shows up to your work uninvited is a freaking stalker.

So yeah, I kind of had a problem with the pilot — that is, until (spoiler alert!) Hubbell is tragically killed in a car accident at the end of the episode. Thank God!

Apparently, though, I am the only person in the whole world (or at least according to the reviews on IMDB) who was happy about this. Everyone else was looking forward to "seeing their love grow." Good riddance to that. I mean, the guy brought her to his house — which is covered in weird clown paraphernalia by the way — where he lives with his mother. If they didn't kill him off, somebody would eventually have to write an episode about Hubbell's dark, scary past, in which he threw the bodies of his victims into the lake at the back of the property.

Anyway, besides all the weird Hubbell stuff, this show is totally adorbs. I absolutely love, love, love the teenage ballerinas who study under Michelle's mother-in-law Fanny (played by Gilmore Girls' veteran Kelly Bishop). I love the scenery (Paradise, Calif., is a mash-up of San Pedro & Hermosa Beach, which is awesome since I live in the area & can actively recognized locations). I love the wacky neighbors & the excessive single-gal drinking scenes (yes, I too decant wine on weekdays to cope with the crazy).

Basically, Amy Sherman-Palladino has gotten the show's only obstacle (Hubbell) out of the way. Therefore, I'm ready to commit my Monday nights to Bunheads.

Hello, Zen: A Visit to the El Dorado Nature Center

It seems like I can't catch a break these days. One minute, I think I'm going to eat salad, drink water, & get eight hours of sleep, the next I'm drunk in a noodle house receiving impromptu dance party invites. This is all totally wonderful until Monday morning rolls around, and I'm short on clean clothes & sanity. If you saw me in this state, screaming & running back and forth between a dresser and my bathroom mirror while a meditation CD blares (I keep hoping this will induce calmness), you'd think that maybe I needed to turn down a dance party invite or two also.

But, chances are, I'll be perpetually frazzled until I collapse from exhaustion. When that happens, I'll go to my new happy place: The El Dorado Nature Center.

If you live anywhere near Long Beach, Calif., I'm going to suggest you pack a picnic & get the heck over to this nature center now! I've gone twice in the past month (I'm trying to make up for nearly 25 years of not knowing it existed) & I'd gladly go again next weekend. For serious.

El Dorado is teeming with wildlife: turtles (sliders & soft-shelled), big mouth bass, mallard ducks, great blue herons, squirrels, rabbits, & so much more. Plus, most of this wildlife is not concerned by your presence at all (I figured this out as I was sharing a log — precariously perched over a stream, mind you — with a great blue heron.)

So, if you're looking for a place to zen out for a few hours, I gleefully recommend El Dorado!

Weekend Snapshots

Dance parties, yaki ramen, naps, gin & tonics, puppy bathes, & new shoes...these are what weekends are made of.

What I Want Wednesdays

[Source.]

I am seriously crushing on these archival prints from UnitedThread's shop on Etsy. I can totally picture them on the (currently bare) walls of my apartment.