Month: February 2017

A Recipe for the Perfect Reading Spot

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Let’s have a quick chat about something very, very personal. No, not your true hair color or how often you actually eat the ice cream straight out of the carton. Something even more personal than that — your “reading spot.” I’ve always had a “spot,” from the horribly uncomfortable butterfly chair I had as a child to the less private but infinitely more comfortable couch I have now. Having a “spot” is a crucial part of being a bookworm. It’s a place that’s yours and yours alone, where you can settle into your next romance novel or mammoth biography and lose a few hours of time. It’s also a place that’s allowed to be messy because it’s your spot and you can leave whatever you want there. Or maybe that’s just my spot.. Regardless of where (or what) your spot is, there are a few key ingredients to making it the best spot in the whole house. And don’t feel bad if you don’t feel like inviting other people into your spot. Tell them to go get their own.

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Cookbooks You Need, ASAP

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Cooking is something that I’ve come to really enjoy as I get further and further into this “adulting” thing. Cooking my own food has definitely helped me expand my palate–and more importantly, my boyfriend’s palate. A recent win? Getting him on board the quinoa train. He’s now even more on board than I am, which I’ll count as a win because damn brown rice takes FOREVER to cook on the stove and I despise cleaning the microwavable rice cooker.

Now that’s not to say that all of my kitchen experiments end up in the “tasty” category, but most of them are, at the very least, edible. Except once when I tried to make creole-style red beans, ended up with weird bean soup and then SCORCHED the bottom of the soup pot trying to remedy the situation. That was a disaster that ended with Chinese take-out and a soup pot in the trash can. And a fair amount of tears because I don’t take failure well.

Thankfully, my cooking has improved since that fateful experience (though I haven’t touched a red bean since). And a huge part of my improvement can be attributed to an investment in pretty-much-fool-proof cookbooks from some of my favorite food bloggers. These cookbook authors/bloggers are HILARIOUS. I followed each of their blogs for a while before getting the real life cookbooks. I wasn’t disappointed at all and neither will you once you check out these three kick ass food tomes. Happy cooking!

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True Crime Podcasts, FTW

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I know I might have mentioned this around here once or twice (cough-twenty-times-cough), but I absolutely love a good murder mystery. A little suspense, a little action, a little “what the f***?!”… Who could resist? And, it turns out, I love true crime sagas just as much as the make believe ones. Specifically… True crime podcasts. Yes. Please.

Of course my first true crime podcast was Serial, because whose wasn’t? It was magic. And after Serial ended, there was a huge true crime void in my daily commute. So I searched for a new podcast to get me to and from work everyday and I came across You Must Remember This, which was in the middle of their season chronicling Charles Manson’s Hollywood. Let me tell you — it was fantastic.

Fast forward to today and I’ve got a potentially embarrassing number of unplayed true crime podcast episodes on my phone to get me through these brutal Chicago rush hours. But I wanted to give y’all a rundown of my three favorites because everyone needs a new-to-them podcast waiting in the wings. These should be yours.

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