Weekly Roundup: December 2, 2022

Well, it’s again that time when I express profound amazement at the beginning of another month. It’s already December?! The elf is on the shelf and the chocolate-window calendar (as my daughter calls it) has been deployed. We are officially in holiday mode. I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving (that feels like three months ago now, doesn’t it?).

Quote of the week:
“When things fall apart and we’re on the verge of we know not what, the test for each of us is to stay on that brink and not concretize. To stay with shakiness—to stay with a broken heart, with a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness and wanting to get revenge—that is the path of true awakening.” –Pema Chödrön

What I’m reading:
I’m almost done with The End of Men by Christina Sweeney-Baird. It’s about a pandemic involving a virus that only kills men. This novel may trigger PTSD in some. It definitely brought me back to the panic mode of the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Overall, a good book.

What I’m listening to:
I listened to Women Talking by Miriam Toews last week (now the movie is on my list). I wanted something totally different this week so I picked And Now We Have Everything: On Motherhood Before I Was Ready by Meaghan O’Connell. Any new mom should read this one!

What I’m watching:
Just finished the last season of Dead to Me on Netflix. The mix of drama and humor on this show is top-notch. I’ll miss it! Over the holiday break, I saw Strange World with my daughter. It was all about adjusting our human behaviors to protect the Earth, though this message may have been lost on the young ones. I asked my daughter what it was about and she said, “friendship.” That was also in there so I’ll take it.

Writing news:
Nothing to report this week!

What I’m talking about:

• The passing of the Respect for Marriage Act. We needed some good news! I’m disturbed by the 36 Republicans who voted against it, but going to celebrate for now
• All the mass shootings. More than 600 so far this year… University of Virginia, Club Q, Walmart… I really don’t know what it will take before serious legislation is actualized. This is just too much
• Antisemitism. What the actual eff is going on? I cannot believe we are living in a world where people (eg, Kanye) are suggesting that Hitler was a good person and that the Holocaust did not happen. I’m just horrified, honestly. Trump having dinner with Kanye and Nick Fuentes is just amplifying hate. It needs to stop
• The downfall of Twitter. Once again, what the actual eff is going on? I give it two months before Twitter is officially done. Thanks, Elon, for ruining it

Interesting things I learned this week:

• Humans shed 70+ pounds of skin over their lifetime (and 500 million skin cells every minute!)
• “Gaslighting” is the Merriam-Webster word of the year
• Pantone’s color of the year for 2023 is Viva Magenta
• The world’s smallest possum, thought to be extinct after bushfires in Australia, was found on Kangaroo Island. It’s the cutest thing ever, as you can see here

Weirdest thing I googled this week:
“Grinch dog.” I couldn’t remember his name. It’s Max. I also thought our new doggie resembles the Grinch dog but their ears are totally different. On a related note, the doggie DNA test is in and our pup is 55% Chihuahua, 15% Poodle, 7% Shih Tzu, 5% Lhasa Apso, 4% American Eskimo dog, 3% Maltese, and less than 2% of a handful of other things (including Boxer and Dalmatian…???).

What I’m grateful for:

• Health in the midst of the current Covid/flu/RSV tri-demic. I think we already had RSV, had Covid over summer (and got boosted since then)… We are vaccinated against the flu, so fingers crossed
• Holiday lights in the neighborhood. Always brightens my mood
• Live theater, museum visit, 10K race—lots of fun things lately (see below)
• My first in-person yoga class in more than a year

Snapshots from the past couple weeks: