Hello! Hello!Welcome to another weekly episode of Good Things where I give you a peek into my everyday life during the week, and roundup my good links, ideas, books, and more.
Got a fresh cut from Lucy Danger (can’t look straight into the camera though…)
Some moments for rest, and thoughts on doing less.
This week I stumbled through the week feeling like I was trying to ward off an illness that was threatening to appear.
Having experienced a bout of brain fog last year that I definitely do not wish to repeat, I’m trying to be more mindful of not just “pushing through” when I’m feeling under the weather.
Rest though, for me, is perpetually challenging. There’s a weird tension between having a lot of physical energy (which I do, most of the time!) and feeling limited by mental fatigue and tanked executive function.
Aside from rest, it’s also a challenge to know what to dial down and pull back from. As someone who enjoys self-imposed structure and strong commitments, I’ve learned to start checking in with myself more regularly: is this goal/commitment/idea actually supporting me right now? Do I have the energy to pursue it? Is it feeding me? Do I need to stop doing something else to make it happen? Do I need to do less of it?
💛 For those of us who chronically add more to our plate, this is your reminder that it is OKAY to stop doing something if it’s not working for you right now.
If you’ve reached the point in January where maybe you were hoping for a little bit more energy and get-go – and are feeling existentially tired, please give yourself a little bit of grace!
This Week in Good Things:
🖼 This week I went on one lovely excursion: to an evening event at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum! I had a good time with my friend Amanda. The museum is absolutely magical at night. If you haven’t seen “This Is A Robbery”, the Netflix special about the heist at the ISG, you might enjoy it!
💪 Let’s MOVE! Starting the year off strong, I’ve eased into my new fitness cycle. I’m committed to weekly strength training over the next 16 weeks that is my favorite: boring and effective lifts with progressive overload. I had a pretty fun milestone in the gym this week, too – I had never done Barbell Hip Thrusts, and worked my way up to a couple of reps at #315 pounds on the bar! (Not too shabby for a first time PR!)
✍️ Writing: I’ve focused my daily writing this week on short and sweet Daily Good Things – to continue in the groove of writing and releasing something daily.
🐾 Pup Walks with Friends: we ran into Josie the Pug and her human Jess this week; and several longer walks in better weather while it hit 60 this week after the storms. (In not-so-good things, we had an off-leash Belgian Shepherd come over to try to rough Bertram up yesterday while we were walking by right around the corner from our house – he’s okay! – but I’m still feeling rattled!)
Other Good Things
📖 Reading: I’ll be updating my reading list (here is last quarter). Still reading Jessica McCabe’s new release How to ADHD, finished Richard Kadrey’s fun noir novella ‘The Pale House Devil’ and I’ve started Viveca Sten’s ‘Hidden in Shadows’ – The Åre Murders book 2, a crime drama based in a small ski town. I’m a fan of reading season-matching books, so Scandinavian winter mysteries are some of my favorite to read in January.
📺 Watching: almost done with season 2 of Reacher, who solves problems with low emotional output and his large size. I’m about to kick off party-watching ‘Echo’ with my friend Caroline.
🛍 Good Acquisitions: influenced by BookTok, I finally got myself a Kindle page turner and I’m not being hyperbolic when I say it’s a *game changer*. I also got a gooseneck clamp to put it up so I don’t have to hold my device, but I think you can go without that one. Also? LED candles. The ones I got I don’t know if I’d recommend specifically, but I really enjoy the flexibility.
🚘 Tackled a nagging task: after realizing that my registration doesn’t expire for another year and I’m not going to have to go to the DMV this month, I set out to first get myself to Valvoline for an oil change. (For those of you in the Boston area, the Valvoline on Main Street in Waltham is consistently great.) Next up? Inspection sticker.
👁🗨 Spa Activity: I’m a fan of eye masks, and keep some in the fridge to put on while I sit and read. I’m still hoping to book some time at Kelo Spa in the next few weeks, but it’s always nice to do a little something for yourself at home.
🤣 Memes and randomness of the week: experiments with malort and industrial food thickener // Lizzo birds (or when you ask a bird photographer what their favorite bird is // for those of you who remember Jessica Simpson’s chicken of the sea, a redux (also, I really do love her sense of humor) // if you’ve watched Saltburn, Edinburgh Rugby // Fendi partnered with Pokémon.
Treat options: Burdicks chocolate winter box. TJ’s Pretzel Breadpudding. TJ’s Iced Gingerbread in the freezer. Peppermint Hold the Cones. Pumpkin Sticky Toffee Pudding. Fried bananas.
🥑 Good Eats from this past week: Spinach and tofu with rice and yogurt. Bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon from Zabar’s. Noodles, crispy pork, mushrooms, bok choy and tahini vinaigrette. I love the combo of tahini and black or rice vinegar and a splash of soy sauce. It was so good I made it twice this week. Also, having the Thai wheat noodles from Trader Joe’s on hand made a few last minute meals easy. Rice bowl with grey sole, bok choy, pickled chanterelles. After my trip to New York, I’ve found myself craving Korean food. On the coldest day, I ordered myself seafood pancake, kalbi, and tofu soup from Kaju. Perfect Shinko asian pears.
What are you eating this week?
Previous Years:
Something I really enjoy doing is flipping back in my journal or my blog to the week of the year over the past several years. When I write it out in a list like this, it feels like a nice accomplishment!
Good Things, First Snow of the Year, and the Weekly Meal Plan.
Hello! Hello!Welcome to another weekly episode of Good Things where I give you a peek into my everyday life during the week, and roundup my good links, ideas, books, and more.
I’m wearing my fleece onesie after a full day on the first snowstorm of the year! I had plenty of time in the great outdoors, including running my daily mile in the snow, and then taking Bertram on a walk with his best bud, Sawyer.
This Week in Good Things:
Let’s MOVE!
🏃🏻♀️Running! The first week of the year is always a great week for me to get moving. A few things of note: I ran my first race of the year, the Needham 5k. I’ve run this for maybe a decade now? It’s a great way to start the year!
🏋️♀️ Weight Lifting. I’m kicking off a 16 week training cycle with a group of folks. “Boring” progressive overload, how I like it! I did my three workouts at home, and hit my weekly session with my trainer Ryan at AnkFit.
🧘🏻♀️ Yoga. We kicked off a four week Vitality series for the New Year at Ompractice on Thursday night, with Tasha Edwards. I let people into class, and had a great time participating. In the mornings, I’ve been taking Yoga with Adriene’s 30-day flow series. (I adore Adriene, and while I love taking our own classes, I was finding that doing a morning class on our platform meant that I was kicking myself into “work mode” before I wanted to. (Adriene is one of my favorite alternatives!) I not so secretly wish she would teach with us!
🌱 Create: I kicked off a workshop this weekend with a group: “One Month, One Goal” where we create and tune our singular focus goals for the month and then check in weekly. I’m also bringing back my *Do The Thing hours, my weekly co-working sessions for folks who registered for the month!
✍️ Writing: I wrote up my Kitchen Resolutions, and Good Things to Eat in January, and my first Ship30 essay “structure will set you free”. Ship30 is a daily writing challenge that I’ve participated in several times over the years. Since I typically write and publish most days anyway, it’s just nice to participate with a group of people doing the thing you like to do.
💪 Saving the Day: I love when I can feel generally useful – and when people give me the opportunity to help! (Note to self: it’s okay to ask for help – people feel good when you give them the opportunity to help!) I got to rescue a dog who was inside for the day while her humans were stuck doing RMV related tasks. And then I got to help with a car situation, and then carry some doors.
🐾 Pup Walks with Friends: a SNOW walk with Sawyer (the Corgi) and her humans; a quick backyard party session with Sylvie the Frenchie.
📺 Watching: season 2 of Reacher, who solves problems with low emotional output and his large size. My first movie of the year was The Holdovers, which you’ll very much enjoy if you like slow burn and 1970s New England prep school winter vibes.
✏ Creative inspiration:From Marie of Llama Life’s newsletter: “Short Trip created by Alexander Perrin is an ‘interactive illustration created for web as a study into capturing the essence of graphite on paper within a digital context’. And it’s really lovely!”
Treat options: End of the See’s box. Tapioca Pudding. TJ’s Pretzel Breadpudding. TJ’s Iced Gingerbread in the freezer. Peppermint Hold the Cones. Walker’s Shortbread. Pumpkin Sticky Toffee Pudding. TJ’s Apple Tartin Tartelettes. (You’ll notice that this list keeps growing – I have a bad? habit of getting fancy desserts from Trader Joe’s from my freezer and taking forever to eat them.
🥑 Good Eats from this past week: Marcus Samuelsson’s Black Eyed Peas (seriously you need these in your life). Smoked Sable on a bagel. Chopped chicken liver on toast. Ottolenghi Chicken Thighs with Fennel and Arak. Salmon roe on toast. Alison Roman’s Slow Salmon with Citrus. Palak Paneer and tofu. Salmon and whitefish salad on toast. Fila Manila Kare Kare chicken and potatoes.
What are you eating this week?
Previous Years:
Something I really enjoy doing is flipping back in my journal or my blog to the week of the year over the past several years. When I write it out in a list like this, it feels like a nice accomplishment!
This year, I’ve committed to writing more, and it’s been working.
Aside from this blog post, this week I wrote about leadership goals, running project management at Ompractice as we grow – with Agile methodologies, agile sprint planning, and the sprint retro. Personally, I wrote about documenting and codifying my Ideal Week.
While the bulk of my writing remains unpublished, I’m thinking of this writing a little bit more like book writing than blogging.
The end goal is to build a bigger body of work on topics that I’m interested in, both for myself, and to share with others. While I love blogging, I want my thinking to be better organized, more structured, and edited to reflect developing insight over time.
I know this to be true about myself: writing is the best way for me to clarify and organize my ideas. It’s a process. Whenever I start a new project, I sit and brainstorm on paper. Then I take to the road for a long walk, or the shower, with a structure to ruminate upon. Back to my desk, I make more notes, and edit accordingly. Sleep on it, and edit again. Rinse and repeat.
But like many things that are obvious – knowing something that is true, and consistently committing to put it in practice are two separate things. This year I wanted to make sure that my desire to write actually turned into work written.
Fortunately, writing begets writing, so here we are. Like my run streak (it’s been over a year), one of the keys to success for me was to build daily doable habits. So this is what I’ve been doing loosely: writing about work during the work week, writing about life on the weekend, posting on this here blog, and then adding good things to my notebooks in between.
The two biggest shifts that has positively impacted my writing habit: scheduling the time for it, and reducing my actual time spent on my phone consuming social media.
{Assorted Good Eats:}
You’ll have to imagine them, because most of the week my phone was away from me on the charger, and I only took a handful of blurry unlit snaps of my meals. (That gorgeous spread above is what I was eating a year ago in Istanbul!)
Chicken marinated in Trader Joe’s Amba (fermented mango sauce). You can find it in the fresh case by the pesto and hummus, and it’s a phenomenal marinade or all purpose sauce for any meat or fish. I can’t recommend it enough.
Whole Foods Matzah Crack. If you go by your local Whole Foods this week, I recommend picking up this seasonal treat: matzah coated in a sweet and just slightly salty caramel/toffee, and dipped in dark chocolate. Smitten Kitchen has a good recipe if you feel like making your own.
Trader Joes’ Braised Beef with mashed potatoes and cruciferous crunch salad. This beef (with demi glaze) is one of the best things at Trader Joe’s.
Lot’s of good meals on tap for this week. This is what my lightweight meal planning looks like most often. I also keep a spreadsheet when I’m inspired to do things digitally.
{Good Things}
I cleaned and re-foiled the grill to get ready for grilling season. All that’s left is to hook up the new gas tank, give the grates a bit of seasoning, and I’m ready to go.
I cut the cord! After far too long overspending, and time wasted with the television just on in the background, I finally got rid of cable tv, and switched from Comcast to wildly faster fiber internet with FIOS. I’ll still have Netflix, Hulu, and the occasional live TV access when desperate, but I’m decently sure that I’ll be using it far less than I have been. And while I do enjoy watching live sports, I *love* listening to sports on the radio. The only thing I anticipate missing is the clicker to my Xfinity box.
A pup walk with my friend Teri. Teri was in town for the Boston marathon (which she CRUSHED with solid training, and a 10 minute PR), and I was delighted to get the excuse to head into town with Bertram for an active recovery walk with her on Wednesday evening. Normally I don’t bother reaching out to people who are visiting for the marathon – they usually have enough on their minds! But I was SO delighted to get to see her, and the weather was beautiful.
Great reading this week: Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism (I opted appropriately, for the hardcopy), my friend Anna’s forthcoming book Shadow Magic, Ben Horowitz’s Hard Thing about Hard Things (Audible), Karen Wickre’s Taking the Work out of Networking, some Essential Jim Rohn, the last in the Discovery of Witches series (Audible), and got started on a galley of Sarah Gailey’s upcoming Magic for Liars.
Passover Dinner: this year we had a smaller dinner at my Uncle Allan and Aunt Roz’s house than normal, with many family members spread across the country and unable to come home for the meal.
This didn’t keep us from some of our favorite traditions: reading from several different Passover Story Haggadahs (Haggadot?), singing songs, opening the door for Elijah, Miriam’s cup, and some sephardic traditions including the Moroccan Bi Pilu (going around the table and blessing each participant with the seder plate over their heads.) Our youngest participant was just shy of 27, so the four questions were a collaborative effort.
In addition to our regular updated Silverman Haggadah – which I’ve always enjoyed for it’s Retro late 50’s artistic style, we read from the Gateways Haggadah, a pictorial version of the Passover story, which is written to support families with children of all abilities and disabilities, and is meaningful to our family. And this year, some new readings from the HIAS Haggadah, connecting the Passover story to today’s global refugee crisis. Ex: the section about the modern ten plagues of the refugee crisis: violence, dangerous journeys, poverty, food insecurity, lack of access to education, xenophobia, anti-refugee legislation, language barriers, workforce discrimination, and loss of family.
For dinner, we ate traditional seder plate fixins, two types of charoset from my mother – “New England Style” with a lot of apple, and “Turkish Style” with spices and dates, hard boiled eggs, a terrine like gefilte fish with plenty of horseradish, matzah ball soup, Moroccan mini meatballs and peas (we do kitniyot), my aunt’s Tsimmes, green beans. And for dessert: fruit, macaroons and a berry crisp my mom made.
Looking forward to:
My birthday gift from my mom: a generous MFA museum membership with reciprocal privileges at top institutions!
Spring planting in my potted garden! Fresh herbs, flowers, and vegetables, I’ve missed you.
It’s a little astounding to me that we’ve reached March already. Spring was peeking out, and then we got a snow storm – there was almost a foot last night here, and I’ve finally dug myself out and acquired pet friendlier ice melt, so my day is a success.
A part of my regular routine this year has been sticking to a “weekend template”. At some point, I realized that 90% of what I do each weekend is the same – home chores, errands, business work, and if I add in dedicated time for weekly creativity, I get to enjoy more of the things that I love to do on weekends: creative dates with myself, sketching, reading, etc.
I also set aside some time this weekend to do a little recap on my month before writing out my March Intentions – and then proceeded to get very little actually done because I was under the weather. That’s how it goes sometimes.
{Good Things}
This was the first week in a while that I found myself scratching my head at what I actually did this week when I sat down to write. (One of the reasons I do this exercise: we tend to forget things that we’ve completed and keep hold of things that were unfinished. This is good for keeping track of things in progress, not great for gratitude and appreciating the good stuff.) But despite feeling that I did nothing, I actually got quite a lot in.
Gave Blood – the last few attempts at doing this were a resounding failure (due largely to dehydration), so I was thrilled that hydrating well this time around gave me a quick 7 minute bag fill. If you have the capacity and ability to do so, this is a quick and easy way to help save lives. Also: my favorite part about giving blood is that somehow, the conversations always turn to food? (I have no idea..) But while I was there, several of us had a long conversation about using dried fruit in home made meatballs. While I’m a raisin hater, I can concede that a golden raisin in a meatball is probably a good idea. (Also, I ended up eating oreos and two bags of cheez-its’ because my decision making capacity was strengthened by blood loss.)
Fitness, this week:
Monday: a mile outside, Ompractice Yoga Nidra with Amy.
Tuesday: OrangeTheory
Wednesday: Foundations with Traci at 7:30 on Ompractice (60 minutes)
Thursday: Yoga for Tight Shoulders and Neck at 12:30 ET with Niki on Ompractice (amazing!) and another OrangeTheory!
Friday: a “rest day mile”
Saturday: was feeling a little run down, so ended up doing another rest day mile and a 20 minute Peloton ride.
Sunday: “recovery mile” outdoors.
Do yoga with me! A quick note because I’m so proud of this work we are doing and would love to see more of you on the mat with me: annual memberships on Ompractice are only $149.99 right now – unlimited live yoga and meditation classes with teachers who see you. (That’s less than two months cost of a regular studio membership!)
This was a StitchFix reject – didn’t love the shape, and it was a little too short for my long torso – but loved the color of this vest! If you want to try out StitchFix, here’s my affiliate code and we both get a $25 credit.
Creative Date: because of my schedule and generally being under the weather, I took myself to see Free Solo on the big screen. The film documents Alex Honnold’s (successful) attempt at Free Solo’ing El Capitan (ie: rock climbing up thousands of feet with no rope). We all know he made it, but I had to practice ALL of my meditative skills to keep from losing it during this film. If you can watch it on the big screen, do!
Food Shopping Special: I took myself to Russo’s in Watertown for some extra fresh vegetables and little treats. They always have a delightful assortment of hard to find vegetables, fruits, and goodies. And beautiful flowers! I get most of my plants there in the summer.
{Good Eating}
For the past week, I’ve been ravenous. It’s taken me 20+ years to realize that yes, this is a cyclical hormonal shift that happens pretty much the same week every month. Funny how that works. Fortunately, there were plenty of good meals coming out of my kitchen. Here’s some of them:
A cafe au lait at George Howell. Somehow the perfect beverage before the snow storm.
Tikka Masala Chicken and Tofu with arugula and lime salad. I keep a jar of Patak’s Concentrated Tikka Masala Curry Paste in my fridge to make quick flavorful meals out of leftovers. I had some tofu and some leftover roasted chicken that needed eating, so I heated them up with some curry paste and a little bit of yogurt.
Hodo Soy Moroccan Tofu Cubes over rice with arugula salad. I’m not a frequent soy eater, but last week I went to the grocery store hungry, and told myself I could purchase anything as long as it was protein rich. So I came home with a lot of tofu. These were a little bit on the bland side, which was disappointing!
Shan-a-Punjab takeout. On Thursday, my parents came to spend time with their granddog, and we ordered Indian takeout and I introduced them to their first episode of Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat. (How often is too often with Shan-a-Punjab deliver? Asking for a friend.)
Trader Joe’s Chicken Piccata over herb and cucumber salad. This is one of my favorites from the fresh case – not too lemony, not too salty. While it’s technically convenience food, I really enjoy these for lunches.
Snack: Black Forest Ham on Lucky 7 Bread – I ran out of the St. Mang Rubius cheese I was spreading on the bread in the earlier part of the week, but ended up just going french and making myself a beurre jambon with my salted sweet cream butter from my Walden share.
Vietnamese Noodle Bowl with Lobster. I picked up Andrea Nguyen’s Vietnamese Food Any Day cookbook, and before getting to cook a recipe, found myself craving my favorite Bun. I grabbed her Nuoc Cham recipe, and made these PERFECT rice noodles. (This was my FAVORITE DISH ALL WEEK.)
Mediterranean Chicken Bowl with Baba Gannoush and Labne. Trader Joe’s has Shawarma marinated chicken thighs that are delicious. I cooked some up and made a salad bowl with eggplant, a cucumber and herb salad with tomatoes, and a bit of Samira’s olive labne. Also wildly delicious.
Fish Curry with Cabbage and Herb Salad. When I order from Shan-a-punjab, I usually order the side of masala sauce to make a new meal later in the week and extend my gustatory joy. I opted for a fish curry, which I served with a lime punched cabbage salad that I adapted from Niloufer King’s My Bombay Kitchen.
And for your weekly Bertram (part deux) – here’s the little buddy with a sleepy lip, not interested in getting up in the morning.
Today it rained. It was cold and grey all day long.
I helped my friend Alexann pack what was left of the home that didn’t go into the two pods on their way to Colorado. We worked through the things to be tossed. The last of the cabinets. Her landlord fed us warm apple cake out of the oven. The back of the car was packed with the last of the closet items. That was an adventure that involved folding for a quarter of an hour in the rain.
There was cleaning. I felt inspired to go home and throw out the majority of my belongings to avoid the hassle of any future moves. I inherited a Swiffer. I adopted her violets. I really hope I don’t kill them.
And then, after some hours of good hard work, we were done. Just like that. The rooms were empty.
And so we rested. We drank tea, and coffee. We got carded at the wine store. “And how old are you today?” the woman behind the counter asked me? It took me a full minute to think about it. We left with a bottle of red, and parted ways, briefly, before heading towards another friend’s house to have one last celebration.
We had burritos.
We stood in the kitchen, watching Love Actually, but not really watching. We talked. For hours, about all the usual things. It was good.
We talked about blogging, about business, about creating something to support women and moms. About what it means to make a place for yourself on the internet in this day and age. I gave my best advice I could. If you want to really get into blogging. Write. Start writing now. Forget about the blog, web hosting, comments. Forget about it all, and just write. For days, weeks, months really. Write until you have enough content that you can go on autopilot and learn all the things you’ll have to learn to run a website, at least, if that’s what you ultimately decide that you want to do. I think there’s so much more out there though. A blog – it can be one piece of. But the internet, it can be scary. You have to learn, I think, about the hard things. The horrible comments. The trolling. I had to tell them about gamergate, about how the internet can be a violent place for women. It really pained me to share that. It’s a lot, really. But all this – it’s nothing to worry about. Start writing now. Just write.
I’m getting a little heavy here.
We drank wine.
Tonight I’m grateful that dear friends can be kept thousands of miles away. That the internet and modern technology bring us all together like never before. I’m looking forward to a weekly email chain. A book club where you read the books together, and don’t meet. (The inverse of our usual book club, which should have been called drink wine and talk about the gym club.) Although, on further thought this evening, I realized that we could just have book club on Google Hangout and each sit in our respective houses and crack open bottles of wine and talk about the book together. Wouldn’t that be nice?
The Second Lunch is a (mostly) food blog by Sam Tackeff about recipes, food writing, ingredient hunting, travel, healthy living, fitness, and everything in between.
Please do not steal! Email me at sam [at] thesecondlunch.com – if you’d like to use one of my photos, and I’d be happy to share my terms. Thanks!
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