TED Talk Tuesday

Being an insufferable stress-head, I found  this one very interesting!

TED Talk Tuesday

Moving time

Guess who is moving in with her boyfriend? Yep, this idiot. In a ‘that happened quicker than anticipated’ moment, we found a place we both loved a couple of weeks ago and now we’re moving this weekend.

Flat hunting in Wellington is a nightmare and I’d had a tentative agreement with my current landlord that we’d wait for one of the flats he’s busy refurbishing. But he couldn’t give me a date when it would be finished and it made me anxious, so I kept looking for places anyway. We went to see a townhouse, not thinking for a moment we’d get it and then next minute, we’re signing a lease. I don’t even know.

The last week has been a whirlwind of admin and paperwork. Getting everything set up, sorting utilities and vans, scrounging boxes from work, moving the bf’s stuff out of his place as his tenancy ended, and sorting end of tenancy stuff with my lovely landlord. Fuck, I am exhausted. But I’m thoroughly looking forward to moving in to the new place. I have loved the 2 and a bit years in my flat, it’s gorgeous and it suited me perfectly. It’s just a little more space is needed with two people, especially since friends/family visit fairly regularly. Also, it means we have a place that’s ours, rather than mine, so we’re on more equal footing.

But you know what I’d like? A registry. I have contributed to so many wedding registries and baby showers over the years, and no doubt will continue to do so in the future. I have no intention of ever having a massive wedding or having a baby, and it seems grossly unfair that I’ll never have a chance to create a registry and get some shiz, yo.

All the packing and making lists of things that need to be acquired or replaced made me think about this. Would it be terribly bitchy to just create one and send it to my family and friends? My mum says yes. It’s selfish. But life is expensive! And I like nice things! Damn it.

So in lieu of it being socially acceptable to have a “cohabiting for the first time” registry even though that’s exactly what the traditional point of the wedding registry was, I’m just going to make a list of things I want here scratch the itch…

• A new dining set, preferably this one because we both like the colour
• A nice new set of sheets, and a duvet set
• Harry Potter House posters (or travel posters)
• Harry Potter Trivial Pursuit
• Settlers of Catan
• A sofa bed
• A nice new woollen throw of some kind
• One of those over-the-sink cutting boards
• Nerdy candles/melts so the house smells delightful

Sigh. This is why we can’t have nice things.

Feb Fallout

Books:

Another three books checked off this month, with a fourth almost finished. The first was ‘The Rest of Us Just Live Here‘ by Patrick Ness. I found it generally enjoyable and easy to read, polishing it off in two burst.I enjoyed the idea of being disaster adjacent, of kids just minding their own business while shit goes down around them. Following this, I finally got round to reading ‘The Cuckoo’s Calling‘ by Robert Galbraith. I  grew up on Nancy Drew books and loved reading mysteries, and this book reminded me why. Thoroughly enjoyed getting to know the characters and I liked that the ending wasn’t really drawn out over multiple chapters. I also read ‘On the Jellicoe Road‘ by Melina Marchetta. I have a friend who always raves about it and I’d read two Marchetta books in high school, so I figured I’d give it a go. It completely destroyed me. I’m not even joking. There were tears. Very Australian, with moments that felt supernatural  and genuinely made me uneasy, and just all-round heartbreaking. Finally, I’m almost finished with ‘Rewire: Change your brain‘ by Richard O’Connor which is fascinating from a psychological point of view, but not really that helpful in a general ‘give me some tips, I need to stop doing this shit’ sense.

Music:

I’ve really been enjoying the return of the Mack. I’m not apologising.

Movies:

Got a lot done this month because my work wife and I were trying to see as many Oscar nominated flicks as we could before the awards.

Jackie: The film takes place immediately following JFK’s assassination and I found it pretty harrowing to see it from Jackie’s perspective. I cannot imagine being in that situation, or how I would act. It felt more realistic to me than a traditional biopic, more psychologically real. Much like the glamour of the Kennedys, the film could easily have fallen into the trap of superficiality, but it maintained a balance and dignity that never felt forced. Like most biopics, I had to resist the urge to google a thousand things while watching it but overall, I thought it was a good little film and Natalie Portman did a phenomenal job of not only capturing Jackie’s mannerisms and quirks, but also capturing a real sense of emotion. The outfits were also on point.

Lion: I know this is based on a real story but I had somehow completely missed the whole media coverage around this and had no idea how it was all going to turn out. Sunny Pawar and Dev Patel were both captivating as Saroo. Nicole Kidman also turned in a great performance. And Dev’s Australian accent was surprisingly good! Loved the use of food as a trigger for memory, very Proustian. It’s a very powerful story that really hits you in the feels.

Moonlight: Maybe it was just because I was tired but this didn’t do anything for me. I’ve read these amazing reviews for it since I saw it and I wish I could have had that experience but for me it felt like the film your friend makes for his final film project that you try to be supportive of but don’t really get. It’s too arty for me, is what I’m saying. I wanted it to be shorter, and quicker paced. I found the camera work jarring and annoying. I also found it really odd that the story starts with an adult basically just taking in a kid he finds loitering around to lunch – just doesn’t seem like a reasonable thing to do when you find a kid somewhere it shouldn’t be. But I completely appreciate what it was trying to do in telling a story about sexuality and masculinity, and I’m 100% for telling more stories about different communities and experiences.

Manchester By The Sea: I didn’t know what this was about when going to see it and if it had been described to me (man has to return to home town after his brother dies to take care of his nephew, also: traumatic past) I probably wouldn’t have gone to see it. But it is by far my favourite out of the four. Just a phenomenal piece of storytelling, perfectly paced and with genuinely funny moments despite quite a bleak outlook. And the main scene with Michelle Williams was devastating. A well-deserved Best Original Screenplay Oscar winner. I loved this so much.