Yoohoo big summer blowout
Careful now because I am about to make ye shit yer pants. It is September on Sunday (tomorrow). Repeat. SEPTEMBER. In four months it will be 2025 my god I am….aghast. SOMEBODY fetch me my fainting couch.
How did we get here? I have been living in America a D E C A D E next year. I am extinct. This whole thing about time being perceived at an accelerating rate as you age makes sense until you spend one full day alone with a toddler and realise that every second is 100 years of solitude and one never-ending story only the dragon is a human child and she has opinions…..JUST KIDDING I love my life.
Since we are entering Autumn, back-to-school season is upon us and it’s Pumpkin Spice World all over again I have been trying to walk into September with an eye turned towards renewal. Following the seasons and cyclical nature of the life-death-life-death rhythm of the natural world means that this point in time is a stepping towards turning in, warmth, hibernating, and re-assessing the crunchy, sunburnt, youthful exuberance of the summer self. Buckle up loves it’s gonna be a good season.
Reads
Confession, I haven’t been doing a whole bunch of reading lately. Honestly, I ploughed through my Goodreads challenge in May/June and then these past two months have been really hard with experiencing toddlerhood awakening in my home and all the life developments. Just a bunch of rolling stones of stress coming down and crushing me from every angle leaving me a flat pancake person. At the end of each day, I just cannot continue humaning, my eyes will not co-operate to remain awake while reading words and I zone out.
I did, however, read this one fascinating article. I would say this is a conversation starter for sure, for those of you who have people who you can have discourse with who won’t respond with offense or defense if you hold an alternative or contrasting view to them.
Why We’re Turning Psychiatric Labels Into Identities by Manvir Singh, The New Yorker
I would greatly appreciate if any of you readers have any thoughts on the article for you to share them with me. It’s long, to warn you, but an extremely vital component of living in today’s world that we ought to be discussing and questioning at length. This culture of diagnosis has become bound up with politics, social status, identity, and mental health among many other layers of being. It has affected entire generations’ ability to build community and interpersonal connections across different age groups, ethnicities, economic strata. There is a lot to really gnash on in our minds about the consequence of the rise of self- and tiktok-diagnosis of mental illness (same also for neurodivergent conditions) in an almost fetishing way that creates such intensely consequential social rules between the person and the world around them. Where does this leave us?
Bants
Truly I have become besotted with a brilliant mind who I believe could very well be my best friend in an alternate timeline, and that is the witty and gifted Amanda Montell. Find her website Here and obsessively read/listen to everything she has done. She is a linguist, author, and social connoisseur of basically the entirety of the nonsense going on in my head all the time. She might just be the millennial queen. M’lady has a podcast called Magical Overthinkers that my daughter and I have been listening to every day to start our day because it helps me feel like I have friends over for coffee and breakfast each morning. (Fellow parents who spend the majority of your time with tiny humans you will get this need to have sane, grown-up voices in your day-to-day). I wrote a little mini-essay on the Paradox of Productivity. Look at me being oh-so productive with my blog this week.
adjusts tie smugly
If you are interested in doing some further mind-scrumbling on where the whole production-equals-self and self-is-worthless-unless-producing within globally defined parameters leads us, then have a wee auditory peek at one of Madam Montell’s podcasts I listened to this week. It set me to thinking so it did.
I feel like this section needs a nice weekly roundup of some fun reels, memes, and ‘online comedic short bits to make you giggle and/or feel seen and part of the greater collective human experience’. I have relationships in my life where we communicate purely in these little pieces of internet pie and those friends well we are on solid ground. So in an effort to validate why I am still not permanently off Instagram despite my many promises to do it, I am gonna share some good good content.
Eats
Everything But The Kitchen Sink Salad Dressing
Like the name? eh? Stoles it from Trader Joes so’s I did. Here’s a recipe of my own concoction and it was divinnnnnne spread upon anything that takes your fancy. ‘Salad dressing’ is such a sad term. Sounds a bit like them sad office worker boys who bring their little sad lettuce lunch to work with the dressing in a packet on the side and they squirt it all on there and close the lid and shake that thing like it’s a goddamn cocktail mixer. You know its just limp dick lettuce and oily vinagrette with maybe two cherry tomatoes and some favourless onion. This dressing will uplevel any sad salad.
Ok let me see if I can remember my ratios. Honestly I eyeballed it and used produce in my fridge that was less than alive but I figured sure I am blending it into a liquid so it’s probably alright.
Two giant fistfuls of spinach
Two giant fistfuls of arugula/rocket—> very important for more flavour
One bunch of roughly chopped parsley
One bunch of roughly chopped cilantro/coriander
Half an avocado
Pinch of salt
Eyeball how much garlic you like I use pre-minced garlic so just kinda spoonful out a dollop. (I KNOW I KNOW I AM THE WORST it’s convenient and cheap and I just do not have time to mince my own garlic brah considering how much we use….get all the way off my back ok cooking purists :P)
About 3/4-1 cup of greek yoghurt (full fat, none of this % fat shit that stuff is too watery). Again this is like your liquid part so if your blender is struggle bussing it then just dollop in some more.
Ground black pepper. Eyeball that shizz you know how much you like.
And let me think oh yes lemon juice. Hmm this is again one of those cooking senses that tells you how much you need. Basically you want to balance your acidity. So I start with a tablespoon to two maybe then blend to taste and add more if needed.
Blend until smooth. Jar her up and store in le fridge for 5-7 days.
I blended mine in two batches because I didn't want to destroy my blender. Look how yummy and sexy she is. Looks like a smoothie almost.
Ok, I have one more two-parter recipe for you because ooooh me oh my was she tasty and so easy and my baby gobbled up all the spicy fish which makes me happy.
I got this recipe off of my go to Pinch of Yum. I wasn’t sure how I would feel about doing a pulled salmon style taco but it was sweet and tangy and a little spicy. Mango and salmon are a rockstar pairing.
We added refried beans to ours because yum hello delicious and just gives it a little jujjjz (how do I spell this noise?) juuush? ANYway, it is made with coconut oil comes canned from Costco I will link it here for you American readers. Really good, affordable option for adding more protein into your diet that is not meat. Also had lots of corn salsa leftover for quinoa wraps the next day. So that’s a win.
Best value Costco Refried Beans-8 pack
Are ya ready kids for autumn? AY AY captain…