Category — Microblog Mondays

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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After reading (and seeing) Crazy Rich Asians, I am devouring every article linked to inside other articles, and found this one about crazy rich honeymoon planners.  (Actually, it’s not that the honeymoon planners are crazy rich.  It’s their clients.  So I guess that moniker doesn’t really work.)

Anyway, $50,000 for a honeymoon!  Or more.  The minimum is $20,000 to use their services, and they talk about one that cost $1.8 million.  FOR A HONEYMOON.

We went on a great honeymoon.  We went to St. Lucia.  We had good intentions to explore and learn the patois, but we ended up face-planting on the beach and sleeping or reading every day.  We managed to head into a nearby town twice, catching a street fair one night, and we went on a hike (though quit early so we could go back to sleeping).

If you’re married, did you go on a honeymoon?  If not, where would you want to go?

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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There was a fascinating article earlier this summer on unneeded spaces in houses that pointed out this fact from a study:

Nobody is actually using their formal living and dining rooms. Families actually spend most of their time in the kitchen and the informal living room or den. Yet we continue to build these wastes of space because many Americans still want that extra square footage.

Okay, it’s a very judgy article, but it does make a point.  When you take a step back and look at homes, it’s a bizarre idea to keep a living space that you seldom use when rooms that get continual use can be changed to accommodate entertaining.  And it’s also true that entertaining is emotional; inviting people into your space is emotional.

We don’t have a second living room or a dining room.  I’m curious how many people who have them use them on a daily or weekly basis.

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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I finished the first book in the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy, and then put myself down on the waiting list for the second book at the library.  This was a huge mistake.  There are dozens of people ahead of me, and zero chance that I’ll remember how everyone connects by the time it’s my turn at the library.  I should have gotten on the wait list the moment I got the first book.

You live and you learn.  And then you visit the bookstore and buy.

I usually don’t read series straight through.  I’ll read one book, then I’ll read something else.  Then I’ll return and read the next book, and then maybe read two more books after that before I dive into the third one.  I can’t think of any series that I’ve sat down and read start to finish without anything else in between — at least, not on the first read through.  On subsequent read throughs, I tend to go back-to-back.

Do you read a series in one go if they’re all out*, or do you skip around and keep revisiting the series with breaks in between?

* Clearly, if the books aren’t released yet, you can’t read them in one go.

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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Pascal said, “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”  All?  I’d probably argue over the word “all” since it makes a lot of assumptions about humanity’s capacity to create or solve problems.  But it is a value skill: to sit alone with your thoughts and no other distractions.

I am pretty good with this even if I struggle with meditation.  I can sit quietly with my thoughts easier than I can clear my mind of thoughts.

Like I can sit in silence on a bus for hours and stare out the window.  Or in a room; I’m good in a room with complete silence and a good wall to stare at.  No one taught me how to do this; it just naturally occurred.  I remember driving cross-country as a child and staring out the car window for days on end without a need for a Walkman or book.

And the twins are pretty good with this, too — especially the ChickieNob.  I didn’t teach them; they just started doing it.  But as I move through all of these attention-building or bettering exercises this year, I keep wondering if this is something that can be taught.  That should be taught.  Should we teach people how to sit silently without distraction for long periods of time?

Are you good at being alone with your thoughts and no distractions?

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.

Not sure what #MicroblogMondays is? Read the inaugural post which explains the idea and how you can participate too.

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I don’t have a lot of regrets.  There are things I wish had been possible, like going to Harvard (I didn’t have the grades) or studying abroad junior year (I would have had to let go of two awesome jobs to do so — no way).  But those aren’t regrets because I understand that they were either out of the realm of possibility (I’m just never going to be Queen of a small nation) or the trade-off made it not worth it. (They were really awesome jobs.)

Yet I was still interested in a recent article in the Guardian about regret that I think a lot of other people will be interested in, too, if you missed it the first time around.  This sums up the main idea:

A distinction between what they call the “ideal self”, the person you’d be if you fulfilled all your goals and ambitions, and the “ought self”, the person you’d be if you met your obligations to others, and lived a morally upright life. Overwhelmingly, they found, people regret ideal-self failures – in short, not pursuing your dreams – more than ought-self failures, such as failing to visit a dying relative or cheating on a spouse.

Go read the whole article and then let me know, what are your regrets?

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Are you also doing #MicroblogMondays? Add your link below. The list will be open until Tuesday morning. Link to the post itself, not your blog URL. (Don’t know what that means? Please read the three rules on this post to understand the difference between a permalink to a post and a blog’s main URL.) Only personal blogs can be added to the list. I will remove any posts that are connected to businesses or are sponsored post.