Little Things, II

How I've been spending my week...

having tropical tea time 

This tea is one of my favorites: mango ceylon. It's just the perfect blend of black tea and fruit for me. And the cookies are coconut chocolate chip, which I made with coconut oil instead of butter. The oil imparts a yummy hint of coconut flavor and makes them slightly healthier.

reading Flowers Rediscovered

I have kind of a bad habit of 'collecting' hobbies, and one of my newest interests is in flower arranging. I really love the look of a natural, almost wild looking arrangement, which is not something you can find in most shops. This book has some lovely photos that I find very inspiring. I hope to maybe start growing a few varieties myself, but mostly I'm looking forward to summer farmer's markets so I can start surrounding myself with flowers (however poorly arranged they might end up).

watching the Oscar nominated short films

I went and saw the Oscar nominated short films with my friend K, and like every year I'm always very impressed with them. They're just like short stories--brief snap shots of a character's life, in which they must make a change, however minutely it might be. My favorite was Curfew, about a suicidal man who finds something to live for when asked to care for his niece. I also really liked Death of a Shadow, though both K and I were confused by certain bits. (K is one of my very few friends left in the area by the way, and I just found out that he got a job in the Bay, so I'm very happy for him but also feeling more lonely now than ever...)

adding to my stamp collection

They're mostly bunnies, as you can see. ^.^ I need to figure out a good way to store them though, because they keep getting ink all over everything!

walking to the mail box

This is the mail box across from my house. As you can see, I certainly live among the trees! Just one day after I took this a small snow storm hit, covering everything in white. I was feeling a bit under the weather, but I had to take advantage of the beautiful scenery and take a quiet stroll, camera in tow. When I get the film developed I'll share my snaps.

preparing for a book swap

This is for a swap on swap-bot.com--my first book swap! As a newbie I haven't been able to sign up for one yet, so I'm very excited. I'm way ahead of myself though, because the swap doesn't start for a while. I was just excited to wrap it up all nicely with string and cute stamps.

What have you been up to?

At the cinema: Warm Bodies

I read Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion last year on a ten hour flight from London to San Francisco. It started out quite good, then became just okay, and then ended a bit abrupt and a little too tidily for my taste. It certainly helped the time pass though. In a weird way, it's one of those books where I almost think it was meant to be a film; I mean, it is told from the prospective of a zombie, so you can imagine there are a few narrative difficulties there.

I went to the cinema and saw this by myself (because I actually really love going to the cinema by myself for some reason), and just as I suspected, I found the film version more enjoyable. Seeing the memories that R does when he's eating brains (brrrrains) was very effective, and because I'm a softie, I almost started tearing up because look at this sweet boy riding his bicycle in a meadow and he doesn't even know what's coming and what's going to happen to him and the light on his face and he's smiling and he's so happy... (this is what's it's like inside my brain). And I thought that both Nicholas Hoult and Teresa Palmer were well cast, and though this film does have a few silly sappy moments, they played it well so it wasn't any more silly or sappy than it needed to be. The CGI left something to be desired (not to mention the opening credit titles, which look like something from a youtube video), but ah well.

The audience I saw it with seemed to like it as well, laughing and awwing in turn, which probably made me enjoy the film even more. And I kept hearing exclamations of "He's so cute!" about zombie Hoult, because apparently the way he groans and staggers is adorable (it is), so there's always that.

The Pie-Maker and the Lonely Tourist

Chuck, you’re the only human being I’ve ever made alive again to stay.