T.V. series, food obsessions, and more: February Favorites!

March 4, 2016March 4, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Well so hey, it’s March. Want to know what I loved in February? I’m going to tell you.

1). Luther (T.V. series)

Because Idris Elba is my ~~boyfriend~~ current favorite actor, and this series is awesome.

2). 11-22-63 (T.V. mini-series)

Because Stephen King’s magic always thrills, no matter where a closet transports you when you walk deep into it. (And I’m not talking about Narnia.)

3). Better Call Saul (T.V. series)

Because honestly, we couldn’t be more impressed with a T.V. show. Season 2 of Better Call Saul is blowing our minds.

4). Walking to and from work again.

Waiting at the train tracks on the way home.

Because I’ve been immensely enjoying the walk (five days a week to work, and three days a week home). It adds up to roughly 16 miles per week with a heavy backpack on my back. I make it a personal challenge to always improve my time, but the time is hard to gauge because of the red light variable. Sometimes I spend up to 10 minutes waiting to cross streets, and sometimes I make all the lights and only have to wait at one. ETA: And sometimes, I have to wait for the train.

5). Super cheap yin-yang necklace.

Cheap necklace from Claire’s.

Because I wandered into Claire’s across from the vision place in the mall where Callaghan was trying on new glasses, and this yin-yang necklace caught my eye. It was six bucks. I love it.

6). Cetirizine, aka “Zyrtec” (allergy medication).

Ceterizine antihistamine is everything.

Because this antihistamine allows me to breathe in the gorgeous scent of orange blossoms in the air, which is to say, ALL the air. My daily stomping grounds are currently orange-blossom-scent-saturated, and thanks to Ceterizine, it’s all appreciation, no sneezing.

If you’re like me and you’re allergic to every species of pollen on the earth as well as on all the other planets in our solar system, you’ll know what I’m talking about. You can get cetirizine/Zyrtec over the counter at any drugstore. I happen to get mine as a prescription.

7). Beanitos.

Beanitos chips

Because we tried these chips on a whim, and now we’re obsessed. I don’t use that word lightly. We seriously love these chips. They’re mainly made of beans, and there’s some rice and sunflower and/or safflower oil, guar bean gum (gotta have some kind of b.s. in there to keep them crisp), and sea salt. They’re high in protein, fiber, and iron, and they’re delicious. They’re awesome with guacamole. The original black bean one is my favorite.

8). Cookies.

Cookies from Trader Joe’s. Yes, they’re vegan.

Because there are too many cookies, and someone’s got to eat them.

I know that eating lots of refined carbs isn’t the best thing for the body, but I’ve been eating sugar pretty much constantly since the beginning of this year, and other than the occasional zit, nothing bad has happened. When a painful eruption happens on my face, I stop eating sugar until it goes away. Then I start again. Haha.

Trader Joe’s has some of my favorite packaged vegan cookies. I’m still eating the vegan cookies, doughnuts, and chocolate-chip scones from the Whole Foods bakery (as well as dark chocolate and tsoynamis from Green), but cookies are an essential of life.

Other than sweets, though, I do avoid refined carbs. I only eat whole wheat/grain pasta and bread, sweet potatoes (except for french fries every now and again), and brown rice – not the white kinds of all of that.

9). 365 brand pasta sauce.

365 Organic tomato basil pasta sauce

With pasta always and forever being my favorite food group, and rarely having time to really cook (plus always wanting to cook other things than sauce when I do have time), this sauce means a lot to me. We like to joke that Whole Foods is Whole Paycheck, but the fact of the matter is that 365, their generic brand, has a lot to offer at surprisingly reasonable prices. This pasta sauce is simple, organic, vegan, and tasty. I thicken it up with a generous amount of nutritional yeast and add dried oregano, red pepper flakes, and a little sea salt, and it’s marvelous. We also get Whole Foods’ 365 brand pasta. We eat pasta at least twice a week, on average, so this stuff is important.

10). Pears.

Pears

Because I love fruit, and the pears are wonderful these days. I don’t know if these are Anjou pears or Bartlett pears – they’re next to each other in the store, and we grab pears from both without looking at the labels (they pretty much look the same) – but it doesn’t matter. It’s all good.

The season of my favorite foods that grow on bushes or trees is upon us! Hello, hefty artichokes and fresh pineapple every day.

Spooktastic: THE BOY (A review, of sorts. No spoilers.)

February 12, 2016September 18, 2021That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

There’s a scene toward the end of horror movie Dead Silence (2007) where the protagonist removes a cloth covering a mysterious shape. “Is that a doll?” asks the detective as he studies the revealed marionette. “It’s not a doll,” says the protagonist. “It’s a boy.”

This captures the central question in The Boy, William Brent Bell’s new horror movie. Is it a doll, or is it a boy?

(from “Dead Silence”)

I love good possessed-doll horror movies. And bad ones, for that matter.

To write a horror movie review without spoilers is almost to write no review at all. The challenge leaves me, an amateur film critic, with little more to say than, “I liked this movie,” or “I didn’t care for this movie.” But I do want to say a little bit about The Boy.

After the obvious Dead Silence, the next film that comes to mind is Poltergeist (1982). Poltergeist matters because it was my first spooky horror movie, so it set a standard of comparison. (I say “spooky horror” as opposed to “psycho slasher horror,” “serial killer horror,” “sci-fi horror,” “psychological horror,” “mystery horror,” etc.)

Poltergeist made an impression on me partly because I was 14 and new to the genre, but more because it was just a great film. Looking back on it now, after 33 years and countless more horror movies, I can appreciate the restraint and effective use of fright tactics in Poltergeist. The 2015 Poltergeist remake, on the other hand, did nothing but bore me. I couldn’t help but set it against the original in my mind. I rolled my eyes when the family moved into the house and the kid almost immediately discovered a whole box filled with clown dolls. I didn’t finish the movie.

The Poltergeist remake failed me because I wasn’t spooked by a pile of clown dolls in a box. I was spooked by one clown illuminated in the night at the convergence of built-up of tension and weather, as in the original Poltergeist. That’s pacing. And nuance. And Steven Spielberg. Probably many of us Gen-X’ers derived our fear of clowns from that movie. I know for me, it was that clown that hooked me on the shiver of dread I’ve sought in spooky horror movies ever since. I don’t know that The Boy would inspire any such lasting impression on those who see it as their first spooky horror film, but it’s a solid example of nicely done metaphysical terror. Where spooky horror is concerned, “less is more” works for me.

The Boy has this focus in common with the original Poltergeist. There’s only one “boy” in The Boy. If a remake of The Boy is ever done and it features triplets instead of a single child, I would roll my eyes and walk away, like I did during the Poltergeist remake. The clown doll in Poltergeist was little more than a prop, but it was the most memorable prop for many of us, and the creators of the remake knew it. That’s why they figured they’d capitalize on its impact by filling a box with clowns and shoving it at us at the beginning of the movie. “You got a major rush from that one scary clown in the first Poltergeist? Here, have a whole bunch of clowns!”

Granted, that box of clowns might be terribly scary to a child who sees the movie, but as an adult who saw the original decades ago and has henceforth proceeded in life with an instilled dread of clowns, that box of clowns was ridiculous.

For a more literal comparison, you could align The Boy with other “possessed doll as main character” films such as Child’s Play or Annabelle. Unlike Chucky and Annabelle, though, Brahms (the titular character in The Boy) isn’t made to look creepy. At the opposite end of the spectrum, I think of “Amelia,” a tale in Karen Black’s Trilogy of Terror (1975). The possessed doll in “Amelia” is so over-the-top in its vicious appearance, it safely clears the level of “trying too hard” and goes straight to campy gore. It’s one of my favorites.

Brahms in The Boy is not a possessed doll-turned-slasher. Brahms is a normal-looking porcelain doll who sits calmly and does basically nothing. Brahms resembles the eight-year-old male child shown in a painting hanging above the stairs in the darkly atmospheric English country manse that provides the setting for the movie. If the Brahms doll is animate, it’s animate by suggestion only. We do not see it move. It is quiet. It doesn’t go tearing around the house with an upraised dagger. It doesn’t go ripping out people’s tongues. It’s this element of absence that spooks me more than the obvious, albeit entertaining, antics of the possessed dolls in other movies.

The Boy features its share of horror movie tropes such as jump-scares and phones that suddenly don’t work and terrifying scenes that turn out to be nightmares, but these tropes are used judiciously and kept to a minimum so the story can evolve of its own accord. It’s a rare horror movie that doesn’t depend solely on cheap tricks to get reactions.

The Boy impressed us with its fresh take on the possessed-doll horror theme. I don’t know what else I could say without spoiling the film, so I’ll stop here. I do recommend this film if you’re a fan of the horror genre, or if you’re just curious.

Oh, and by the way… the clown in Dead Silence is, to date, my favorite of all the scary movie clowns, and that includes the one in Poltergeist. To me, it’s the scariest.

One film, one T.V. series, delicious indulgences, and cruelty-free make-up: January Favorites!

February 2, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Let me start by throwing a huge THANK YOU out into the ether for Idris Elba’s winning a SAG Award (Best Supporting Actor, or however they call it at the SAG) for his role as Commandant in Beasts of No Nation. The win alleviates my annoyance over seeing that Elba’s well-deserved recognition wasn’t reflected on the list of Oscar nominations.

So, I’m back to doing these “monthly favorites” posts. January’s list is mostly about food and cosmetic items, the latter of which came from my stash – things I already had, but wasn’t using. The only newly purchased item here is the Burt’s Bees lip crayon color.

As usual, though, I’ll start with entertainment. Here’s the one film and the one T.V. series that held our attention in January:

1). Amy (documentary)

If I had to choose one word for this documentary: Devastating. It started with a scene showing footage of Amy at 14 years of age singing “Happy Birthday” to her friend, a heart-breaking scene because we knew how her story ended. Here was this happy girl in possession of a brilliant talent, and then she was neglected, used, and preyed upon by vultures masquerading as people who loved her. Well, they loved her, alright. They loved her to death.

Here’s that scene of Amy as a kid singing “Happy Birthday” to her friend:

R.I.P., Amy.

2). How to Get Away With Murder (T.V. series)

We started January binge-watching How to Get Away With Murder. Then we tried to watch the documentary series Making a Murderer, and on the heels of the former, it’s hard to watch the courtroom scenes without thinking of how Annalise would flatten her opposition in one sweeping, ire-charged oratory. “Steven Avery needs Annalise” became our Making a Murderer tag-line up until we stopped watching it. Seriously! One day with Annalise in court and Avery would walk.

Minus: Annalise is a fictional character. Plus: Viola Davis won a SAG Award for her performance as Annalise.

3). The Body Shop Shea Body Butter.

The Body Shop body butter in Shea.

This is an old favorite that’s made a come-back as our night hand cream. I’ll always love its unique scent, and the rich body butter formula is wonderful on our dry hands.

4). Burt’s Bees lip crayon in Sedona Sands.

Burt’s Bees lip crayon in Sedona Sands.

This was the only shade of Burt’s Bees lip crayons I didn’t have, and now it’s tied as my favorite (with Redwood Forest). I’ve been wearing Sedona Sands every day, since I’m feeling the nude/pink vibe right now. It’s hard for me to find a nude shade I really love, so I’m glad to have discovered a perfect one in my favorite lip color formula.

5). e.l.f. Flawless Finish foundation in Sand.

e.l.f. Flawless Finish foundation in Sand.

(Yes, that would be a half-eaten Larabar in the pic. I’d set it down on that paper towel and then decided to place the product next to it, for some reason.) Toward the end of last year, I experimented with a couple of high-end cruelty-free foundations and ended up putting the new one by Too Faced on my 2015 Favorites list. When I found this old bottle of e.l.f. foundation, I started using it again and realized that it actually looks better on me than the Too Faced one. So I stand corrected: The e.l.f. foundation IS my favorite foundation. Six bucks at Target! Amazing.

6). e.l.f. High-Definition powder in Soft Luminescence.

e.l.f. High-Definition powder in Soft Luminescence

(And yes, that would be Nenette poking her nose into the pic!) e.l.f. came out with this new-ish version of their High-Definition powder, so I had to try it. Also six bucks! Why not? And I love it. Their original (Sheer) High-Definition powder always seemed a bit chalky on me, and I was loving the Shimmer version for a while, but this one in Soft Luminescence is like the perfect hybrid of the two. It’s fabulous.

7). e.l.f. Jumbo Eyeshadow stick in Rock Out.

e.l.f. Jumbo Eyeshadow Stick in Rock Out

I still love e.l.f.’s Smudge Pot cream eyeshadow in Cruisin’ Chic, but in January I dug through my e.l.f. collection, found the eyeshadow stick in Rock Out, and have been using it ever since. It’s slightly darker than Cruisin’ Chic, and the color is more like a deep olive, kind of a shimmery, moth-like greenish-brown. It blends as easily as the Smudge Pot formulas, too.

8). Vegan donuts and cookies.

Vegan donut and cookie from Whole Foods.

I spent January eating way too much refined sugar, once again, and I had the zits to prove it. I just didn’t have the inner wherewithal to walk past Whole Food’s bakery without raiding the pastry case. They have vegan cookies, muffins, donuts, and scones. The donuts and the chocolate chip cookies are my favorites.

9). Nachos.

Vegan nachos.

Okay, so January wasn’t my healthiest month ever. For dinners, I mostly alternated between big plates of nachos and heaps of pasta. Callaghan was on a salad kick, so I didn’t even share. Granted, vegan nachos and pasta the way I make it aren’t that unhealthy, but my diet was definitely lacking in veggies in January! The nachos on the plate you see here are made of blue corn tortilla chips, vegan cheese, salsa, and avocado. What can I say.

10). Cheerios with peanut butter.

Original Cheerios with peanut butter for breakfast.

Those of you who hang with me on Instagram and FaceBook might remember when I posted this pic. That was the day I’d forgotten to bring bread to go with my peanut butter at work, so I ran to the little shop on campus and came back with this little container of original Cheerios. The Cheerios/peanut butter combination was a little dry, but I enjoyed it. Now I bring Cheerios to work every day. Nutritionally speaking, they really aren’t that bad! They have a little sugar and one preservative, but I’m not going to argue with whole grain oats.

11). Celestial Seasonings Honey Vanilla Chamomile tea.

Celestial Seasoning’s Honey Vanilla Chamomile tea.

Here’s another old favorite! I love this deliciously mellow, sweet tea. We often have it as a dessert between dinner and bedtime. I think it’s the hint of licorice that makes it special.

That covers it for January. I hope the first month of the year brought simple, pleasurable little things into your lives, as well!

“Beasts of No Nation” and The Oscars should have collided, but they did not, and I can’t believe it.

January 22, 2016January 22, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick 2 Comments

As the dust settled at the end of this crazy week at work, I finally got to sit down and look at the list of nominees for Oscars at this year’s Academy Awards.

I’m happy with some of the big nominations. Mad Max: Fury Road and The Revenant were two of my favorite films of the year (of the Best Picture nominees, I hope Mad Max wins). I also enjoyed Bridge of Spies, Creed, and The Big Short.

I hope Amy wins for Best Documentary Feature.

I wish that Ex Machina got nominated for something more than a small award.

Moving on to OUTRIGHT SNUBS, Straight Outta Compton, another of my favorite films of 2015, deserved a Best Picture nomination, in my opinion. I also believe that Straight Outta Compton is worthy of a Best Director nomination, and why Jason Mitchell didn’t get nominated for Best Supporting Actor as Eazy-E is beyond me.

But the main questions in my head as I read the list of Oscar nominees were:

1). Why wasn’t Idris Elba nominated for Best Supporting Actor for Beasts of No Nation?

2). Why wasn’t Abraham Attah nominated for Best Actor for Beasts of No Nation?

3). Why wasn’t Beasts of No Nation nominated for Best Picture?

4). Why wasn’t Cary Joji Fukunaga nominated for Best Director for Beasts of No Nation?

5). Why wasn’t Beasts of No Nation nominated for Best Costume Design?

Idris Elba and Abraham Attah in Beasts of No Nation.

6). Why wasn’t Beasts of No Nation nominated for Best Cinematography?

7). Why wasn’t Beasts of No Nation nominated for Best Original Score?

(“A Song for Strika”)

At least Straight Outta Compton received a nomination for Best Writing – Original Screenplay. Beasts of No Nation received ZERO Oscar nominations. It was completely left out of the competition, and I’m incredulous. Who, exactly, is responsible for deciding what constitutes art in cinema?

Idris Elba’s searing performance as Commandant should be recognized. And young Abraham Attah? His performance as Agu hurt my heart so profoundly, I’m unable to shake the memory of it, or the pain I felt when I witnessed it.

That’s how Beasts of No Nation made me feel: Like a witness. Not a movie-goer, an audience member, an entertainment seeker. A witness. That is what good art can do. It can put us in the picture, in the moment, make us see and feel things we don’t necessarily want to see or feel; it can unflinchingly cast light on the abominable, because we need to see it. We need to acknowledge it.

A part of the brilliance of Beasts of No Nation is that somehow, overall, it manages to be poetic. Maybe at the end I was too emotionally spent to see it, but thinking back on it now that I’ve processed the film as a whole, the imagery in that last scene was poetry… and it was beautiful.

My personal feelings aside, Beasts of No Nation is next-level outstanding in every respect of film-making, and for it to have been excluded from the Academy Awards is a gross oversight. A colossal oversight. I would go so far as to say that it seems like a deliberate oversight, because anyone with eyes and a heart can see that it’s a masterpiece, and the movie-nominating people have eyes and hearts, do they not?

Idris Elba’s and Abraham Attah’s performances are performances that deserve Academy Award recognition.

Beasts of No Nation is difficult to watch, for sure, as I’ve said before. But art’s intention isn’t solely to entertain us. Good art in all of its genres makes us feel things, including real despair for real-life realities.

How is it that The Martian received a nomination for Best Picture, while Beasts of No Nation and Straight Outta Compton did not?

Two of my favorite movies of the year – both of which I thought were objectively stellar – were snubbed, and I can’t fathom why. I could go on and on about Beasts of No Nation, but there’s no need. I wrote a lot more about it after I saw it, so click here if you’re interested in reading that.

I’m actually so disappointed about the omissions on the list of Oscar nominees that I’m not even sure I want to watch the Academy Awards this year.

We got wrapped up in the Golden Globes and I have no qualms about sharing my thoughts.

January 15, 2016January 15, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Before I get started, I want to give a shout-out to @proselfdefence for sharing my post in the Arts & Entertainment section of The Martial Arts Daily. Thanks, guys!

In other blog-related news, I finally updated my “About Me” page. I admit I’d been avoiding it because of the “…we have two cats, Ronnie James and Nounours” part. Updating the page was painful, but it’s done, all shiny and current. I also added new category links in my sidebar [**points to the right**] in an attempt to organize this body of content, so you can check there if you’re looking for posts on specific topics.

Now that the blog house-keeping updates are out of the way, I can focus on the shameless frivolity that’s the subject of this post. (“Shameless” is my favorite kind of frivolity.) If you fellow pop culture fanatics are curious about my thoughts while watching the 2016 Golden Globes last Sunday, read on.

[Thoughts during the pre-show interview with Leonardo DiCaprio]:

Alejandro González Iñárritu actually dragged his cast around the world – including to the southern tip of Argentina – so as to be able to constantly film The Revenant in the snow and the freezing cold? DiCaprio should win. Also, great film, The Revenant.

[Thoughts during the main event]:

Kate Winslet collects the ceremony’s first award, and she’s already delivered the most poised acceptance speech of the night… even though she seemed genuinely shocked that she won!
Not to be mean or anything, but is Jane Fonda aware that her dress looks like it should be covering a Kleenex box in Great-aunt Lottie’s bathroom?
YES Maura Tierney wins for The Affair!! She deserves it, and not just for that awesome scene where she’s drunkenly singing “Changed the Locks” in her underwear.
OH NO HE DID NOT. (Quentin Tarantino)
Jamie Foxx: “OH YES HE DID.” (In so many words. Okay, in one word.)
Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt’s skit while introducing The Big Short – LOL
Aziz’ fake bookcover about “Losing Graciously to Jeffrey Tambor” hahaha!! Aziz is hilarious.
Why didn’t Aziz win for Master of None?? ROBBED.
So that’s what they mean when they say someone is “dripping in diamonds.” (Helen Mirren)

thatasianlookingchick.com-HelenMirrinGoldenGlobes2016_MarieClaireUK

Dame Helen Mirren at the 2016 Golden Globes

Helen Mirren gets more beautiful every year. How is that even possible. #AgingGoals
YES Lady Gaga wins for American Horror Story: Hotel!!
What is this music? Why aren’t they playing American Horror Story’s awesomely weird and creepy, noise-infused main title sequence tune as Lady Gaga goes up to the stage? This is the music that identifies AHS:

Totally impressed with Lady Gaga’s graciousness and humility in delivering her acceptance speech. It’s all the more endearing in contrast to her fabulously eccentric and commanding music persona. I LOVE HER.
(Madonna is probably so chagrined right now)
Of course the James Bond song wins for Best Song.
Um… is Ricky Gervais bringing the same glass of beer every time he comes up to the podium, or is he on his fifth beer?
Mr. Robot won over Empire?! NO.
The hell… The Martian is a comedy? Did I miss something? Did I fall asleep during the part that was so hysterically funny that the whole movie had to be classified as a comedy?
DENZEL! DENZEL!! Apparently we’re not the only ones who call him, simply, “Denzel.” Love that Tom Hanks pointed that out.
This montage of Denzel’s work is really beautifully done.
Denzel seems speechless accepting his Cecil B. DeMille Award, but still… DENZEL!
YES Sylvester Stallone wins for Creed!!
YES Taraji P. Henson wins for Empire!! COOKIE!!

Tariji P. Henson as Cookie in “Empire”

Hahaha Tariji handing out cookies on her way up.
Where is Ricky Gervais’ glass of beer?
Matt Damon wins “Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Comedy” for a movie that isn’t a comedy. I’m a big fan of Damon’s, but in my opinion, Steve Carell should have won for his role in The Big Short.
Did they classify The Martian as a Comedy so Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio wouldn’t have to compete with each other for Best Actor in a Drama? Because they both deserve Best Actor awards. But so did Steve Carell.
Come to think of it, I wouldn’t have classified The Big Short as a Comedy, either.
Maybe the definition of “comedy” has changed and we didn’t get the memo.
YES and BRAVO to Alejandro González Iñárritu and Leonardo DiCaprio for their awards for The Revenant!!
Aaaaand The Revenant wins Best Motion Picture! Well-deserved. We saw it last month, and we couldn’t believe how DiCaprio wasn’t even recognizable by the end of the movie. You know it’s a great performance when DiCaprio no longer looks like DiCaprio.

[/thoughts]

NOW.

While I’m here, I just want to take a minute to see if I’m getting this straight:

In 2000, there’s a movie starring an actor with comedic acting roots. He plays a character who meets disaster during a storm, and he ends up marooned on a deserted island. He must try to survive physically, mentally and emotionally. He befriends a volleyball named “Wilson.” Wilson the volleyball is the actor’s co-star. The movie is labeled a Drama.

In 2015, there’s a movie starring an actor with dramatic acting roots. He plays a character who meets disaster during a storm, and he ends up marooned on a deserted planet. He must try to survive physically, mentally and emotionally. He meets disaster upon disaster until he’s finally saved in a hair-raising, dramatic rescue mission. The movie is labeled a Comedy.

You’re drunk, movie-classifying people. Get a Lyft and go home.

2015 Favorites!

January 5, 2016January 13, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Today, instead of “December Favorites,” I’m diving right into my top favorite little things (some not so little!) of the year that just ended. These are my favorites of the favorites… if some of them are from December, you wouldn’t have seen them here before.

If you’re curious or you just enjoy these “Favorites” posts, read on! Here are the things I loved the most in 2015:

1). Favorite cruelty-free skin care products: Burt’s Bees coconut & pear moisturizing lip balm, The Body Shop camomile waterproof eye and lip make-up remover, The Body Shop honey & oat 3-in-1 scrub mask, Lavanila Laboratories The Healthy Sunscreen SPF 40 face cream, Tarte Maracuja C-Brighter eye treatment, Alba Botanica Hawaiian facial cleanser pore purifying pineapple enzyme, and Alba Botanica Hawaiian facial scrub pore purifying pineapple enzyme.

2). Favorite T.V. series: Empire, The Affair, American Crime, Better Call Saul, Hannibal, The Good Wife, American Horror Story: Hotel, Jessica Jones, Modern Family, Scream Queens, and Master of None.

3). Favorite films: Ex Machina, Mad Max: Fury Road, Southpaw, Straight Outta Compton, Beasts of No Nation, Bridge of Spies, Creed, The Revenant, Soaked in Bleach (documentary), and Tyke Elephant Outlaw (documentary).

4). Favorite cruelty-free cosmetics: Too Faced Born This Way foundation in Nude, e.l.f. Essential volumizing & defining mascara (black), Burt’s Bees 100% natural lip crayon in Redwood Forest, e.l.f. High Definition powder in Shimmer, Urban Decay Naked Skin Weightless Complete Coverage concealer in Light Neutral, and Flower by Kenzo l’Elixer (perfume).*

5). Favorite foods: Dave’s Killer Organic Bread in 100% whole wheat, Arrowhead Mills organic buckwheat pancake & waffle mix, any natural no-added-B.S. creamy peanut butter, Lara fruit and nut bars, fresh pineapple, fresh artichokes, pasta with garlic and olive oil, and Sting ‘n’ Linger habanero salsa.

6). Favorite random thing: New footwear for the gym… Asics Gel-Venture 5 running shoes.

7). Favorite random events: Setting up our home gym in the garage, adopting our little girl kitty Nenette, going to Drag Bingo, and plastering my (work) Mac with a Microsoft Windows Ninja Cat Riding a Tyrannosaurus Rex laptop sticker.

2015 Highlights: Outfitting our garage as a home gym in January and adopting Nenette on the 4th of July were definitely high points!

*****

Four images and a video clip:

We’re enjoying our home gym immensely now that it’s not 110 degrees. The heat kept us out of the garage all summer. This year, we have a plan for making the space tolerable during the hot months, so we won’t have to stop training in there for so long.

Home gym in the garage, one year later.

(I’ll go into more home gym detail in a future post!)

Meanwhile, Nenette says, “Don’t breed or buy while homeless animals die. Adopt a pet and save a life.”

Stocking stuffers! Nenette laying next to her new wicker ball, hugging her new mousie.

What really happened to Kurt Cobain? The makers of Soaked in Bleach lay it all out. They don’t draw a conclusion, but the evidence, if it is what they say it is, is damning. This excellent documentary reveals details surrounding Cobain’s death that shocked us, quite frankly. I highly recommend this film, even if you don’t know or care about Kurt Cobain or Nirvana or music.

The final episode of Hannibal was glorious…

Maybe the most beautiful scene I’ve ever viewed in a television series. (Hannibal)

And The Affair? Its opening sequence’s images paired with the music and lyrics of Fiona Apple’s song (“Container,” which she wrote specifically for The Affair) become increasingly spooky and suggestive of clues as the story develops. By the middle of Season 2, we found ourselves replaying the opening from time to time, stopping and starting to search the images for answers. It’s haunting. It gives me chills. I love it.

(Don’t even get me started on Maura Tierney’s great performance, especially when she sings Lucinda Williams’ “Changed the Locks” in S2, Episode 4.)

HOWEVER, if I had to pick just ONE series as my current number one favorite, I’d have to say it’s Empire. If you’re a Shakespeare fan, you’ll love it, too, or you’ll at least see where I’m coming from. And Taraji P. Henson as Cookie is phenomenal.

*Kenzo’s perfumes aren’t tested on animals, and I’m glad because this perfume I’m wearing now was a gift. I adore the fragrance. I wouldn’t want it to collect dust.

L’Hôpital d’Antibes – Silent Hill (with a touch of American Horror Story: Asylum).

December 11, 2015December 11, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick 2 Comments

Back in Arizona as of last night! This morning, I woke up after sleeping for 3 hours out of the last 31. It always takes my body a few days to resolve east to west jet-lag across 8 time zones. Luckily, the weekend starts tomorrow.

So, France. We had a good visit with everyone despite the somber circumstances. In an extension of “funerals bring people together,” I got to meet several of Callaghan’s cousins from his Mom’s side, even though Papy was his father’s father.

One of the cousins had her baby the day of the service. The next day, I went with Callaghan, his sister, and his mother to visit her at the hospital in Antibes.

Little did I know.

Walking into the hospital, I had no reason to suspect that the place wouldn’t resemble any other hospital, medical clinic, or urgent care center. You know what I mean… a place brightly lit and charged with the hectic energy of people working and visiting, information desks and nurses’ stations, and the background noise of beeping, clicking, and clanging sounds… machines, doors opening and closing, patients shuffling down the hall with their I.V. poles, people talking, phones ringing, alarms, voices over the announcement system… normal hospital sights and sounds.

Even the quieter hospital areas feature sounds and human activity of some kind.

Naturally, I was taken aback when I found myself in a hospital that resembled the abandoned hospital in the horror video game Silent Hill.

First, the interior of the hospital opened to a vast, cold emptiness.

Hospital lobby/foot-traffic area… ?

Hello?

It was so quiet, you could hear an ant yawning.

It was surreal. So silent, and so very strange.

Another deserted hallway

Where is everyone? Why is it so quiet? What’s wrong with this picture?

Let me explain about Silent Hill. I generally don’t play video games. Silent Hill was the exception years ago because when I looked over my then-boyfriend’s shoulder and saw that the game he was playing was a 3D survival-horror-type deal with an eerie atmosphere, it hooked me, of course. You know how I can’t resist the thrill of any kind of horror! Silent Hill sucked me in. Next thing I knew, I was up playing it in the dark in the dead of night, every night… because 2:00AM is the best time to maximize the game’s creeptastic effects.

The game’s intriguing narrative involved an old hospital in the abandoned town of Silent Hill.

I felt like I was in the game.

It was bizarre how the inside of Callaghan’s cousin’s room seemed normal, with the right people stationed in the right places – mother and newborn in the bed, baby daddy and visiting family members standing around – but when we left and walked back through the hospital and it was still unnaturally quiet, dimly lit, and devoid of human life, I found myself listening for the spooky static noise forewarning of approaching malevolent creatures.

Yet another deserted hallway

There wasn’t even a nurses’ station in sight of the maternity ward! There was literally nothing and no one. A nurse did come into the room briefly while we were visiting, but where she came from was a mystery.

I found an evacuation plan posted on a wall in a (deserted) general area. Who was there to evacuate, exactly? At that point, everything about the hospital seemed sinister to me.

Hospital evacuation plan

I couldn’t stop taking pictures of the hollow corridors on our way out. Callaghan and his sister jumped in to photo-bomb the pics.

(Maman joined in on the monster act, cracking up with the rest of us, but I’m not posting her pic because I know she wouldn’t be okay with it.)

Impressed with the interior’s resemblance to Silent Hill’s hospital, I rushed out to give the hospital’s exterior a good look as we headed back to the car, since I’d been oblivious going in.

I swear the only missing elements from the game were snow and monster birds swooping in to attack us.

Here’s the exterior:

Hospital in Antibes

And here’s the hospital in Silent Hill:

Hospital in Silent Hill

Right?!

In fact, the hospital in Silent Hill looks less creepy than this one in Antibes, on the outside, at least.

Hospital in Antibes

Seriously….

AND THEN. We passed a certain building, and suddenly the whole thing merged with American Horror Story: Asylum.

AHS: ASYLUM

The picture was complete, but of course, Callaghan and his sister ran up to pose.

At the end of the day, I can honestly say it was the weirdest hospital I’d ever seen.

Callaghan’s cousin and her baby were sweet, though.

Yes… we’re still in France. (Many pics!)

December 8, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

First, thank you for your words of support following Callaghan’s loss. Thank you for your kindness, your thoughtfulness, and for being here… for reading, and for caring. All the love means more than we can say.

Callaghan’s been handling his emotions well, leaning on humor as a tool, enjoying time with family and friends, and keeping busy with work, as well, with some of his French clients. This morning, he left early for a full day of work in Toulon; I’ll spend the afternoon hanging out with a friend until Callaghan gets back tonight.

We brought Papy’s ashes home yesterday.

It’s been busy. The fact that we’ve been going non-stop since we landed hasn’t precluded me from taking tons of pics, though, so I thought I’d share a few of them here (sans family members).

To start, this first one is a quote we found in a German magazine on the airplane, because it had us in fits of laughter. A little lightening up is always good, right?

It was probably one of those you-had-to-be-there situations, because we’re not sure why we found this so hilarious. We just did, and I’ll tell you what… we’re not complaining about cracking up over some much-needed random silliness.

On that note, here’s a pic I took of an old bank in Nice the other night:

Old bank in Nice. No idea what it’s called.

I’ve walked by this bank hundreds of times, but I only thought to take a picture of it this time, because, again, Random Silliness Therapy was in order. See, this very bank is the bank that French actor Jean Dujardin’s character attempts to rob in Brice de Nice. Brice de Nice is one of my all-time favorite comedies, and was filmed here in Nice. The bank robbery scene was actually shot inside this bank (as opposed to on a stage set).

To give you an idea of the bank robbery scene, lest you haven’t seen the movie:

Six years before he swept up Best Actor awards at the Cannes Film Festival, the Golden Globes, the Oscars, the BAFTAs, and the SAG Awards for one film (The Artist) in one awards year (2011-2012), Jean Dujardin, then mostly known in the south of France as a comedian, wore ridiculous blond hair to play a ridiculous character of his own creation, Brice Agostini, in a ridiculous movie. (Brice de Nice is pronounced “Breece duh Neece.” The character calls himself “Brice duh Nice” as you’d say it in English, though… that’s a part of the humor.) Brice de Nice belongs in the “So bad it’s good” category of films, so if you haven’t seen it and you’re in need of Random Silliness Therapy, I recommend it! (Get the subtitled version if you don’t know French. Dubbed is awful.)

Brice de Nice has something of a cult following around here. The whole joke of the story is that Brice aspires to be a champion surfer, but he “surfs” at the Mediterranean beaches of Nice, where there are no waves.

Here’s the trailer from which I’d snipped the pics:

On a more somber note, due to current events, some loved ones in the States were concerned for our safety regarding going to France. I was cautioned to refrain from “galavanting around,” as I’m wont to do when I’m here, but galavanting can’t be entirely avoided if daily life is to be lived. We had (and still have) errands to run on le Rue Jean Medecin and the Place Massena, which is adjacent to Vieux Nice, which attracts a lot of people and is therefore potentially hazardous… and since our schedule’s been so hectic, we’ve had to go at night, mostly. But it’s been fine. Here are a few pics:

The Ferris wheel all lit up.

Nice Etoile (mall)

A less-traveled street in Nice.

Flag made of lights. French patriotism like I’ve never seen it. There are also a lot of French flags hanging over people’s balconies.

The train station where we went to get Callaghan’s great-aunt, arriving for Papy’s service.

Weather-wise, it’s been chilly and mostly overcast and rainy, but the sun came out this morning, giving me a good opportunity to snap the views. Here’s the view from our bedroom in Callaghan’s Dad’s house in Le Bar-sur-Loup, a village in the hills above Nice:

Bedroom view, Papa’s house, Le Bar-sur-Loup

And the view from the bathroom:

Bathroom view, Papa’s house, Le Bar-sur-Loup

And food-wise! I have indeed been taking foodaholic pics, even though I’m a vegan in France, which translates to “I’ve mainly eaten salads supplemented with things from my back-up supply of nutrient-dense food that travels well.” By the way, this is the first time I’ve stubbornly refused to deviate from veganism in France. Not a single pastry has passed my lips… no croissant, no pain au chocolat. No cheese, no dairy of any kind. It’s hard to figure out what to eat. This is not a country that makes it easy if you go out to dine at restaurants and at people’s houses.

But here are a few of the beautiful salads of which I’ve partaken:

Salad in a restaurant (greens, tomatoes, onions, toasted walnuts)

Salad at Callaghan’s Dad’s house (endive and green apple with a homemade mustard vinaigrette)

Salad at Mamie’s house (Callaghan’s grandmother): Mixed greens and tomatoes in another homemade vinaigrette, this one with garlic).

That’s a piece of tomato pizza off to the side, by the way. It’s a south of France thing, and in its original form, like this one, it doesn’t have cheese. We picked it up in the boulangerie across from Mamie’s place in Cagnes sur Mer. It was delicious.

While I’m sharing foodaholic pics, here’s what I ate at the airport when we stopped over in Frankfurt, Germany on our way here:

Muesli with soy milk

Because it was 5:45 in the morning. I also had coffee with soymilk. Germany is hip with the times and you can ask for things like soymilk and almost always get it, like in the States.

I also got a pretzel, since I was in Germany, the mothership of pretzels, and I love fresh, authentic pretzels:

Wonderful pretzels in Germany!

Last, I took a couple of pics of the artwork Callaghan did for his Mamie when he was just five years old:

Artwork for Mamie (Grandma) by Callaghan, age 5.

His signature wasn’t written by him, though.

And that concludes my sharing of random photos.

We have three days left here.

What I’m Digging Right Now – November Favorites

December 1, 2015December 1, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick 2 Comments

Oh, wow… December 1st! Time to rave about some of November’s memorable Little Things. How about this for a change: I’m starting with food this time, because there’s a lot of it. The month that just passed had a culinary focus. I actually didn’t experiment with any new cosmetic-type products in November, so this list is devoid of that kind of stuff. We didn’t see any movies, either (I guess we’ll catch The Martian at the cheap seats or online when it hits the site we use), and we only started one T.V. series… but man, we’re enthralled with that series!!

Let’s dig in.

1). Callaghan’s 7-spice Masala tofu.

Callaghan’s 7-spice Masala tofu with brown Basmati rice

Callaghan enjoys dabbling creatively with Asian flavors in his cooking, and he often comes up with concoctions that are out-of-this-word delicious. This tofu dish was one of them. I can’t tell you what’s in the sauce because it’s a secret (all I know is that it includes masala), but I know it doesn’t contain coconut anything or any kind of nut butter, which makes it unusual.

2). Coconut Aminos (Coconut Secret original).

Coconut Aminos (Coconut Secret original)

In my recent endeavor to drastically minimize the amount of processed food I eat, a lifestyle change I haven’t mentioned before (I embarked on this journey in October), I’ve been on the hunt for substitutes for old staples. One thing I learned is that coconut aminos make a fabulous stand-in for soy sauce, and in fact, we actually prefer it. No lie. Coconut aminos is simpler than soy sauce, more flavorful, and healthier. Get this: Coconut aminos contain TWO ingredients, zero chemicals, and a mere 90 mg sodium! Compare that to Kikkoman’s “less sodium” (green cap) soy sauce, which contains chemicals and 575 mg sodium. 575. That’s their lower sodium version. We haven’t touched it since we started using coconut aminos (which, by the way, tastes plenty salty to us). Last night, we finally just threw out the soy sauce. Our new motto is coconut aminos or GTFO.

3). Simple Truth walnuts halves and pieces.

Simple Truth walnuts halves and pieces

I’ve been eating a lot of these unsalted walnut pieces lately. There’s something about fall that makes me crave or think about walnuts more, and when I get going on eating them regularly, I always wonder why I don’t think of them as much year-round. Walnuts in salads are great, but I also love them by themselves. They’re an awesome source of plant-basted protein, healthy fats, and trace minerals, too.

4). Sting ‘n’ Linger Salsa Co. (hot).

Sting ‘n’ Linger Salsa Co. (hot)

I know I recently included a salsa in a “favorites” post… I know! But I’m back with yet another one, and let me tell you, this one makes the other one taste like glorified ketchup. Sting ‘n’ Linger hot salsa is made locally here in Arizona, and it’s completely unprocessed. There isn’t a single chemical in it, and the flavor is fantastic. We get it at the Tempe Farmer’s Market down the street… I’m not sure where else it’s available, but you may be able to find it online. This stuff is the shizz as far as store-bought salsas go, and that’s coming from someone who’s lived on the Mexican border in three different states her entire life (except for temporary overseas living situations).

5). Lindt Excellence 85% Cocoa Extra Dark chocolate.

Lindt Excellence 85% Cocoa Extra Dark chocolate

Like walnuts, I cycle in and out of periods of keeping the kitchen stocked with bars of bitter dark chocolate. This one by Lindt has been a favorite of mine for years. I have one or two squares a day, usually in the evening, and I cherish a kind of ritual around eating them: I take tiny nibbles from the square and let them dissolve in my mouth with just a little biting with my front teeth. Somehow, this slow melting prolongs the chocolate euphoria. I indulged thusly all through November, and I don’t see the end of the cycle as of yet.

Now for the T.V. series that took off with our brains (and a lot of our free time) in November….

6). Marvel’s Jessica Jones (T.V. series – Netflix)

What can I say about Jessica Jones? Stylish. Sexy. Smart. Badass. Beautiful. Oh, and the show itself is awesome, too, in pretty much every way. The only other comic book-based dramatic project I can think of that matches this one in all-around excellence (okay, in my personal enjoyment… I know art is subjective) is the movie Sin City. Netflix does it again!

Moving on to the objects part of the list:

7). Asics Gel-Venture 5 running shoes.

Asics Gel-Venture 5 running shoes

I knew from past experience that running shoes work great for me in cardio/plyometrics situations, so when we started Body Combat and I needed shoes, I got running shoes from Asics, my favorite brand. That was a year and a half ago, and the pair I got were Gel-Venture 4’s. They were amazing. Naturally, when I decided to splurge on a new pair a few weeks ago – my reasoning being that I was walking to and from work again and therefore needed good shoes for everyday street wear – I got another pair of Asics. They’re Gel-Venture 5’s now, and I honestly can’t tell the difference between them and the 4’s, though apparently the technology’s been updated somehow. I love them. Shoes aren’t my thing and I generally dislike shopping for them, but I do get excited about athletic shoes.

Yeah, if I can help it, I prefer not to wear street shoes in the gym. And yes, that picture shows me with my shoes up on the furniture. What.

8). Pentel EnerGel liquid gel ink pen, blue (needle tip 0.7).

Pentel EnerGel liquid gel ink pen, blue (needle tip 0.7)

It might seem silly to put a pen on a “favorites” list, but this pen and I were meant to spend hours together bonding over coffee. You know the feeling. There’s that one pen that feels perfect when you write with it. For me, that’s this one.

9). OfficeMax mug.

OfficeMax mug

Okay, I have a thing for mugs, and I’m particular about them. I love drinking coffee from mugs of a certain size and shape, so when I found this cheerful yellow one for $2.00 in a clearance bin at OfficeMax, I had to get it. And I had to share it with you here, because it was truly a Little Thing that added to my enjoyment of November. (By the way, this pic makes the mug look a lot smaller than it is. I was more concerned with capturing the sunlight than the dimensions of the mug.)

10). Method foaming hand wash in Pink Grapefruit.

Method foaming hand wash in Pink Grapefruit

We’ve been using Method hand soaps for years, but we just recently picked up the foaming one in pink grapefruit. Its sparkly, bright citrus scent reminds me of the lemon kitchen hand soap from Trader Joe’s, but I love this one even more. We don’t even care that it’s pink.

That brings this post to an end, and 2015 is about to go away, too. Next time, I’ll write my last “favorites” post of 2015! That seems surreal.

Beasts of No Nation: A review, of sorts (No Spoilers)

November 10, 2015January 13, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

I didn’t include Beasts of No Nation in my October “favorites” post because those posts are about Little Things, and this film is anything but that. Beasts of No Nation is an immersive experience, and it’s a heavy one. A powerful one. It didn’t feel right lumping it in with Scream Queens and salsa.

The crafting of Beasts of No Nation demonstrates exquisite mastery; if you’re into movies to appreciate the fine art of film-making, I’d say it’s a must-see. However, be warned: Beasts of No Nation is difficult to watch… it’s a must-see for reasons beyond its artistic merits.

There came a point where Callaghan just stopped. As tension tightened our throats in the scene that ended it for him, he muttered, “I don’t want to watch this anymore.” I understood where he was coming from. I was on the verge of stopping, myself. He got up and said, “I’m sorry… you can watch the rest if you want, but I don’t need to see this!”

The challenge when watching a war drama so finely rendered is that you’re there. The film engulfs you, and you become a witness to gut-wrenching circumstances and atrocities appalling beyond belief. It’s harrowing, it’s heart-breaking, and it took me two more days to finish watching Beasts of No Nation after we stopped (and Callaghan had gone to France for his business trip). It took two days because I couldn’t watch more than a chunk at a time.

While all movies of this nature don’t trigger my PTSD, enough of them do that I generally avoid them. I couldn’t turn away from this one, though, and I don’t mean that in a train-wreck kind of way. It was more like, I have to keep watching because at some point something has to happen that will restore my faith in humanity.

While the story in Beasts of No Nation is a work of fiction, the tragedy of it is real. The film depicts a reality that’s largely overlooked in our ongoing lament over global atrocities and human rights violations. We commonly bespeak outrage over horrendous things that are done to little girls, practices we know to be inhumane and abominable. Comparatively, we give negligible thought to the horrendous things that are done to little boys. We forget to acknowledge the trials of male children in some war-torn countries… trials that, as this film so brutally illustrates, result in bodily harm, psychological damage, and an obliteration of childhood innocence too sad to contemplate.

I’d never seen Callaghan so upset by a movie that he had to quit watching it. As for me, I’m usually dry-eyed while most everyone grabs at tissues… but there was one scene in Beasts of No Nation that had me crying, and it wasn’t due to illusory maneuvers on the director’s part. The director avoided any semblance of heart-string-pulling and simply let the power of authenticity do its dirty work, a feat allowed by his elegantly nuanced talent. My sorrow felt heavy, like a sorrow for the entire planet.

The director, Cary Joji Fukunaga (True Detective), also wrote the film’s screenplay (based on the novel by Uzodinma Iweala). I’ve seen several movies this year that I thought deserved serious Academy attention; Beasts of No Nation joins them and rises – urgently – straight to the top. I’ll go so far as to say that I hope it captures awards not only for itself, but for humankind. Fukunaga’s adapted screenplay and directing ought to garner Oscar nominations, at least, and actors Idris Elba and Abraham Attah deserve the highest accolades for their searing performances. They were both brilliant. The cinematography and costume design were also stunning. All of the art that went into the making of this film took my breath away.

Here’s the trailer:

Beasts of No Nation will do more than tug at your heart-strings… it’ll just seize your whole heart and crush it. But this film needs to be seen. Child soldiers need a place in the discourse of the problem of world suffering, and if swallowing our horror through the viewing of films like this can help bring awareness to the plight of these children, then we need to do that.

Child soldiers are not out there bearing arms and killing people because they had aspirations to do so as healthy children with sound minds. They are victims.

Beasts of No Nation elucidates one of the ways in which art is important and even essential for the well-being of the human race. We can’t continue to keep our eyes closed while certain things are happening in the world, and this is why Oscar-generated hype over Beasts of No Nation could be seen not only as well-deserved, but necessary. Everyone’s attention should be brought to this film.

Beasts of No Nation is Netflix’ first original film, being to movies what House of Cards is to television series. The movie streamed on Netflix the same day it appeared in theatres. If you have Netflix and you want to see Beasts of No Nation, it’s there for the watching.

What I’m Digging Right Now – October Favorites

November 6, 2015November 15, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

The theme here is Halloween, obviously. This “favorites” post is late, so let’s get right into it, shall we?

1). American Horror Story: Hotel (T.V. series)

People either love this season of AHS, or they hate it. We love it. It was love at first step into the extravagant art deco set, and so far, there’s no aspect of Hotel that hasn’t impressed us. For one thing, we were happily surprised to find, right from episode one, that Lady Gaga can act (it was anyone’s guess how that casting decision would pan out). Hotel is a gorgeously done gore-fest of lavishness, and an equally gorgeously wrought mystery. Fine writing. Fine directing and acting performances. Breath-taking set. And that intro with its split-second, neon flashes of the 10 Commandments has to be the creepiest (therefore the best) yet – at least, it’s our favorite so far.

2). Scream Queens (T.V. series)

We were skeptical about this new series, so I’m thrilled to include it here as a favorite. Every episode of this comedy/horror series features at least one moment that causes us to hit “pause” so we can pick ourselves up from the floor. We’re always a little surprised when we bust out in spontaneous laughter during Scream Queens. Its random humor just strikes you that way, out of nowhere. The series spoofs horror films, so it appropriately stars Emma Roberts (American Horror Story) and, most brilliantly, Jamie Lee Curtis in essentially the same role she played in Halloween H20. Between Scream Queens and American Horror Story, we were set for Halloween all through the month (and between Scream Queens and Modern Family, we were set comedy-wise, as well). Oh, and did I mention that two of Scream Queens’ creators are American Horror Story’s Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk? There you go. Now go watch it.

3). Drag Bingo (Melonhead Foundation charity event).

Off to the Melonhead Foundation’s annual Drag Bingo. This has to be my favorite wig yet.

The Melonhead Foundation put on its annual Drag Bingo gala, so of course we attended. Where else can you contribute to a great charity while playing dirty bingo dressed up for Halloween while some of the finest drag queens around MC the event and provide the entertainment, and there’s dinner, candy, a costume contest, and mystery prizes? Don’t say I didn’t told you… if you’re in Phoenix next October, don’t miss this event!

4). Too Faced Born This Way foundation (Nude).

Too Faced Born This Way foundation in Nude

Don’t worry… I’m still an e.l.f. devotee, and e.l.f. is still the brand of cruelty-free make-up I mainly use, but I unexpectedly found myself purchasing this high-end foundation one day in October. What happened was I went to Ulta in search of the Urban Decay concealer I prefer – one of two high-end cosmetic items I use – and just when I found (for the third week in a row) that they were sold out of my shade, the Too Faced lady, who had been lurking further down the aisle in the Too Faced section, snuck up behind me and got her claws into my common sense and then her fingers on my face and next thing I knew, I was walking out of the store $40.00 poorer. But the little orange bag I held contained this amazing foundation, and I absolutely love it. (Plus, since I didn’t get the Urban Decay concealer, I only spent $10.00 more than I’d planned, anyway.)

5). Iced Coffee.

Maybe it’s because October’s heat felt unusually extreme to me, or maybe the heat actually did register as unusual… in any case, I sort of fell into the habit of drinking iced coffee while home in the afternoons. I’d put the morning’s leftover coffee in the refrigerator, and then I had this fabulous, refreshing drink to look forward to later in the day. It became a special treat.

6). Tempe Farmer’s Market vegan breakfast burros.

Tempe Farmer’s Market vegan burritos

We live across and slightly down the street from the Tempe Farmer’s Market, so once we discovered that their deli offers huge, delicious vegan burros every day, it became challenging to go by without stopping in to pick one up. They’re a lot of food for a reasonable price, and there are all different kinds, so you never know what you’ll find. My favorite is the breakfast burro (the one on the right).

7). Frontera salsa (Jalapeño-Cilantro).

Frontera Jalapeno Cilantro salsa

Even something as simple as an excellent salsa can add to the enjoyment of a whole month! We’d never tried Frontera brand salsa before, so when we spotted it at Sprout’s one day, we decided to try it. This Jalapeño-Cilantro one immediately became my new favorite jarred salsa.

8). Larabar (Cashew Cookie).

Larabar fruit and nut bars in Cashew Cookie

These little bars contain a mere two ingredients: Cashews and dates. That’s it. While these tasty and satisfying nutrient-dense treats aren’t cheap, they’re definitely worth it.

9). New Hair.

Finally! I had bangs cut! By Melanie, my fabulous hair stylist and friend! Finally, my hair is back to the way it was before I moved to France, it’s out of my eyes, and it’s much easier to control. I’m displaying this particular pic because you can see the shape of the cut, even though it’s wind-blown because I’m sitting at the bus stop in the early morning and there’s weather and lots of fast cars going by.

New hair with bangs and a little face-framing and layering.

Hello, November! We’re already two weeks into the month, but it’s never too late to say hello.

How to cover a door window.

October 23, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick 4 Comments

Plans for the ongoing renovation project at my workplace include new doors for the offices. The construction crew finished installing the doors last week. Now my heavy, dark, 70’s-ass door is history, and in its place hangs a sleek, pale, Scandinavianesque door, outfitted with… a huge, clear window.

Plus: The new door looks great!

Plus-Minus: The new door looks great, but it doesn’t block out sound when it’s closed. (In fact, it seems to amplify sound.)

Minus: Because of the big window, there’s no privacy when the door is closed.

Like when I close the door because I’m trying to concentrate on a project.

Or when I close the door because I’m taking a lunch break and wish to hide.

Or when I close the door because I’m changing my clothes after working out.

The window is so large, it’s almost like having a dutch door with the top half open all the time.

Understand, this really isn’t an issue. I love the new door in all of its contemporary splendor, and its downsides mostly don’t matter because I keep the door wide open at least 95% of the time.

Gorgeous new door all the way open in my office.

When I do close it, though, it’s for a reason, right?

What the window does is it invites people to look in as they’re walking past. It actually draws the person’s attention toward the office interior, meaning at me because I’m right there in front of it. Invariably (human nature), I look up and make eye contact with the person. This sometimes leads to interaction, which defeats the purpose of closing the door.

It’s obvious that other people in my department share my concern, as some of them have already reclaimed their privacy by covering their door windows. One person covered his with blank white paper. Another covered hers with some kind of reflective material, like aluminum foil. This inspired me to create my own privacy, as well.

But what to use to cover my window?

In case you, too, find yourself in this predicament and ask yourself this very question, here are some privacy window-covering décor ideas from me, That Asian-Looking Martha Stewart:

Office as Velociraptor-occupied room outside of the kitchen in Jurassic Park.

Office as horse stable.

Office as Nicolas Cage magnifier.

Office as friendly aquarium.

Office as spooky haunted room.

Office as Oogie Boogie’s lair in Nightmare Before Christmas.

Office with Grumpy Cat “Do Not Disturb” sign.

So many options for this huge window!

This being a tough decision, my door window will probably end up looking something like this:

Because you can’t go wrong with black.

Onward!

What I’m Digging Right Now – September Favorites

October 2, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

I can tell it’s October. The shorter days, cooler mornings, proliferating Spirit Halloween stores (not to mention the Halloween decor and things in all of the stores), and the pumpkin spice explosion everywhere we look gives it away. I love October. I’m not sure if September seemed so long this year because I’ve been impatient for October, or if September just really kind of blew. I’m thinking it was the latter. However, September wasn’t without its list-worthy Little Things, and I’m happy to share them with you!

1). Empire (T.V. series)

We discovered Empire (created by the brilliant Lee Daniels) just a couple of weeks ago. Once we started, we couldn’t stop, and we didn’t stop until we were current, right up to Season 2, episode 2. Magnetizing.

First of all, Empire is Shakespeare from the very start. There was a funny moment when I turned to Callaghan to say, “This is King Lear!!” And right then, one of the sons actually said, “What is this, King Lear?” (Unsurprisingly, that son is one of my favorite characters.)

There’s no aspect of this series that isn’t rendered with spectacular quality and flair. Every detail is exquisite… every song could be a hit, and every rehearsal could be an award-winning video in its own right. The acting performances! The writing! The direction! The costumes! THE MUSIC. We’re Hooked with a capital “H.” (And that last episode! Lucious’ new song! That ending! Okay, I’ll stop.)

2). Modern Family S7 (T.V. series)

All month we were eager for the return of our favorite comedy, and since September went on forever, the wait seemed terribly long. But Modern Family is finally back, and its unique humor is more on point than ever!

3). Make Me (novel by Lee Child)

Lee Child’s 20th Reacher novel

Obviously, this book was a favorite. Reacher re-appears in a small town, and he’s more bad-ass than ever. Make Me is actually one of my top-five favorite Reacher books.

Speaking of Reacher, can we talk about pancakes?

4). Arrowhead Mills Organic Buckwheat Pancake & Waffle Mix.

Arrowhead Mills Organic Buckwheat Pancake & Waffle Mix

THIS.

This is your perfect, wholesome, five easy-to-read-ingredient pancake and waffle mix. The pancakes it makes are delicious, and that’s using egg replacer and almond milk to make them vegan. I took this pic last Sunday, when we ate them with Field Roast smoked apple sage vegan sausage, everything dripping in melty Earth Balance and pure maple syrup. The combination is sublime.

5). Raspberry Emergen-C.

Raspberry Emergen-C

Somewhere in early September, I mixed a packet of raspberry Emergen-C into a glass of cold water, and the resulting fizzy pink beverage was so refreshing, it became a daily afternoon treat. It wasn’t like I was an Emergen-C virgin or anything, but it just really hit the spot in that moment, and it continued to hit the spot every day throughout that long month. It’s wonderfully energizing, and even though I take my normal supplement combo every morning, who doesn’t like an extra 1,000 mg punch of vitamin C?

6). Pink Lady apples.

Pink Lady apples (this is a Cripps Pink)

So sweet. So tasty. So crisp. It needs nothing! We’re still eating fresh pineapple like it’s nobody’s business, but with these apples, the first flavors of Fall have arrived.

7). New reading glasses.

New reading glasses

I think I figured out why my old pair of reading glasses became ineffective: I cleaned the lenses exclusively with pre-moistened lens wipes. I’d been thinking that I just needed to take the strength up a notch, but these are the same strength as my old ones, and when I tried them on, I couldn’t believe how much better they worked! I guess reading glasses aren’t meant to last forever, anyway. Also, it may be a case of “all reading glasses aren’t made alike.” I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. I have these now, and they’ve made a huge difference in my life!

Also, I only clean these glasses with soap and water. No more pre-moistened lens wipes.

8). e.l.f. Essential Volumizing & Defining Mascara.

e.l.f. Essential Volumizing & Defining Mascara

I ran out of mascara, went back to the e.l.f. section at Target, decided to try this new (revised?) Essential formula, and a new favorite mascara was discovered. Two bucks, guys. Two. $2.00. That’s it. Stuff like this helps to balance out my more expensive cruelty-free products a lot.

9). The Body Shop Honey & Oat 3-in-1 Scrub Mask.

The Body Shop Honey & Oat 3-in-1 Scrub Mask

Okay, so speaking of more expensive, this isn’t the cheapest facial mask around. I processed a twinge of doubt while standing at the cash register, because honey & oat? Wasn’t this a ridiculous thing to purchase for such a price ($18.00) when I could probably mix up something similar in my own kitchen?

But I bought it, feeling appropriately reckless and guilty. And then I used it. And now I’m borderline obsessed, and to be honest, I’m kind of kicking myself for having gotten sucked in, because I’m going to want to re-purchase it when it’s gone, and I really don’t have room in my budget for luxuries like this right now. I can’t even explain this mask! It defies explanation. The entire experience and after-effect of it is fantabulous.

(See? That $2.00 mascara helps. Thank you for making awesome, dirt-cheap make-up, e.l.f.!)

10). It’s a 10 Miracle Styling Serum.

It’s a 10 Miracle Styling Serum

Due to the uncharacteristic and relentless streak of humidity we experienced all month, my hair was more impossible than usual (if there can be such a thing as “more impossible”) in September. It would have looked even more unruly if it wasn’t for this product by It’s a 10. I had a coupon for it, so I thought I’d try it; it’s cruelty-free, and it doesn’t have the overwhelming-fragrance feature that turns me off of most hair products. This is just a nice, mild serum that works okay for me. I’m glad for it.

That’s it! Happy Friday, All. =)

I finished “Make Me” by Lee Child. (This is not a review.)

September 25, 2015September 25, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Lee Child’s latest Reacher novel, Make Me, delivered. The story is tight and the tension is high, and Reacher is his usual, taciturn self. Reacher “said nothing” about 20 times. I kept track of all the “nothing” that he said. It was deafening.

If last year’s Reacher novel left me disappointed at all, Make Me more than made up for it. Reacher gets off a train and the story takes off, engaging instantly with intrigue (heightened by the knowledge that very little is extraneous – a perk of being a seasoned Reacher reader, though you absolutely don’t need to have read previous Reacher novels in order to enjoy this one), but I particularly loved this story with its details that correlate to details in my reality. It’s always fun when personally relatable aspects leap out at you from a novel.

There’s the female agent being Asian-American (which I am), and the tertiary character, a journalist, being a science editor with a background in molecular biology (I’d worked as a science editor in bioinformatics and molecular biology in the past), and the moniker ‘Callaghan’, “which at least was Irish.” (Hello, Callaghan! I’d written a blog post about how my French husband’s nickname is an Irish name.)

So here’s Reacher hanging out with this Asian-looking chick, and they find themselves, at one point, right here in Phoenix, where familiar places and things are mentioned. (Sky Harbor International Airport. Maricopa County sheriffs. Scottsdale. The “baking desert heat.”)

All of this coated the bad-assery with an icing of familiarity that added amusement to a reading experience that was already supremely enjoyable. But even without those details, there’s nothing like an excellent, well-developed, well-paced thriller/mystery to facilitate a much-needed escape.

If I ever find myself having coffee with Lee Child, I’m going to thank him for this one, especially.

Lee Child’s 20th Reacher novel

Make Me gives us classic Reacher, yet it deviates from the Reacher formula in a surprising way, at the very end. That’s all I’m going to say about that.

The problem with Reacher is a classic one, too… you can only hang out with him for the time it takes to finish the book. Then you have to wait a year for him to come back. I remind myself to be grateful that he comes back at all… surely Reacher will retire one day, and that will be the end. Meanwhile, the countdown is on for Reacher’s return.

The New Reacher is Nigh.

September 4, 2015September 25, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Today is September 4. This means that we’re T minus four days from the tentatively scheduled release of Lee Child’s new Jack Reacher novel, Make Me.

You regulars here know how I feel about Reacher.

Last summer, I so eagerly counted down the days until 2014’s new Reacher novel appeared in stores that its release seemed almost anti-climactic, though admittedly this may have been related to the fact that we were frantically preparing to move. We moved almost immediately after I picked up Personal. It was the end of August, and I had very little time for reading in the month of September, as unpacking consumed the entire month. (We’ve been in our house for a year now? What?!)

Non-stop domestic activity kept me from such tantalizing pursuits as pulpy reading, but even when I did find time to open the book, moving-fatigue dulled the experience. I remember reading two pages at a time before passing out late at night, and that was only once or twice a week, if that. I was tired, busy, distracted. I finished Personal with little enthusiasm, and I may have mentioned to Callaghan that the story seemed somewhat… reduced to its formula. I liked Personal, sure, but it just didn’t thrill me. Again, I’m not sure it wouldn’t have been different had life been routine and uneventful at the time.

This year, though? The cells in the part of my brain responsible for escapism have been salivating since I read the synopsis for the 20th Jack Reacher novel. Methinks that Make Me will be a super intense ride, and life circumstances right now are ripe for it!

In honor of Reacher’s return, I present the reappearance of Callaghan’s drawing of Reacher (this is becoming an annual tradition):

Callaghan’s drawing of Jack Reacher, as described in the novels.

So let’s raise our glasses, fellow Reacher fans, because may we all remember that blond, blue-eyed, NOT-handsome, NOT-glib, super tough, tall and inhumanly strong BADASS Reacher would toast us with a whole pot of coffee. We’d say, Tchin! with respect to his French mother… but Reacher would say nothing.

What I’m Digging Right Now – August Favorites

September 1, 2015September 1, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

It’s the first of September, and I can already feel a change in the quality of the atmosphere, though very slightly. I love the energy boost I always feel at this time of the year! Here are some of the Little Things that made big impressions in my little world in August:

1). Soundcloud.

LOVE.

I created a Soundcloud account toward the end of June, and it’s been one of my favorite new things of the summer. In August, I bumped up my focus on working out, which made me appreciate Soundcloud even more. The playlist I created for training reflects the fact that the gyms where I’d formally trained mostly played gangsta rap/hip hop, with some alternative metal thrown in (though my playlist contains more of the former). I threw in some dubstep because that’s also amazing for me in a training scenario. I find any kind of metal to be great workout fuel, too, but I prefer working out with rap and dubstep because my mind has this strange ability to convert them to background noise when I want it to. (For that same reason, I can also listen to rap and dubstep while working at work, which I often do.)

Check out my Soundcloud stream if you’re curious about my current workout playlist.

Callaghan claims to not like rap, but he makes requests from my playlist every once in a while. Also, he sometimes bursts out singing “Bitch better have my money!” while he’s doing things around the house, because deep, deep inside, he appreciates Rihanna. (Also, he has a client who owes him money, and that song’s lyrics are perfect for the situation.)

It’s pretty hilarious.

2). Straight Outta Compton (film)

Speaking of gangsta rap!

Here’s the thing: I grew up in California in the 70’s and 80’s during the “east coast rap vs. west coast rap” era, and I remember it well. I still have some Eazy-E in my collection, and rap has always been a genre in the diverse collection of genres I love (even when I was mostly listening to EBM and industrial music, I still popped in Busta Rhymes every now and then). All of this to say, considering that Callaghan doesn’t share this cultural background (having grown up in France) and affection for the genre with me, I was pleased when, after dragging him to see Straight Outta Compton on the Saturday of its opening weekend, he emerged from the theater as moved and as impressed as I was. As I’d mentioned above while talking about Soundcloud, Callaghan claims to not like rap, but this movie impressed him probably more than any film I’ve ever seen… and that’s saying a lot. It’s just really, terribly good. Last time I checked, the momentum of this genius film hasn’t slowed down, either… Straight Outta Compton seems to be barreling straight for the Oscars. Good.

3). Hannibal finale.

Maybe the most beautiful scene I’ve ever viewed in a television series. (Hannibal)

Oh my goodness.

I’m not finding any words to describe the way I felt during the final moments of the exquisite series Hannibal. I was prepared to simply feel sad that it was all coming to a close, but that last scene blew our minds, it was so utterly breathtaking, so stunningly beautiful. It was everything. Everything. It may well have been the most gorgeous and gratifying ending to any series I’ve ever seen. We were sad that it ended, but we both felt like we couldn’t have asked for more.

4). Epic monsoon weather.

Copious, spectacular monsoon activity left August battered and drenched right up until the last minute of the month, and we loved every minute of it! (Even stepping outside this morning and finding a section of fence damaged in last night’s storm.) The magic of the desert is never more potent than it is during the late summer.

Here are some pics from one of the many (I think we’ve had five-six…?) monsoons during August:

A wall of dust rolling in ahead of a thunderous rain.

Caught in a monsoon in the middle of a Target parking lot. The rain was fabulous!

Moving on to food!

5). Fresh pineapple and kiwi fruit.

Fresh pineapple and kiwi fruit

We feasted greedily on fresh pineapple and kiwi fruits all month. It was bliss on the tongue and so fabulously refreshing… a great way to wind down summer!

6). KIND Healthy Grains Peanut Butter Whole Grain Clusters.

KIND Healthy Grains Peanut Butter Whole Grain Clusters.

I was thrilled to discover this flavor of KIND granola… of course I love it because it’s peanut butter, but also, it’s high in protein and low in sugar. It’s a great new staple in our pantry.

7). Amy’s Pad Thai (frozen).

Amy’s Pad Thai (frozen)

You have to love being able to reach into the freezer and taking out a box of something delicious, healthy (healthier, for frozen processed food) and satisfying every once in a while. Amy’s Pad Thai is one of those things.

8). Deep Indian Gourmet Dal Masala Curry.

Deep Indian Gourmet Dal Masala Curry (frozen)

And here’s another one of those things! This frozen Dal Masala Curry makes us swoon, it’s so good. We eat it with brown jasmine rice, and it’s perfect… especially when you don’t have time to deal with food.

Here’s the one product on the list this time…

9). Alba Botanica Honey Mango very emollient bath & shower gel.

Alba Botanica Honey Mango very emollient bath & shower gel

We’ve been using this body wash for months now, but I haven’t featured it in a “Favorites” post yet, so I thought I’d share it this time! I’m very happy with the cruelty-free products we started using this year. This body wash has a lovely, light scent, and it’s just as moisturizing as the Olay body wash we used to use. Score!

And finally… because some randomness is in order…

10). Microsoft Windows Ninja Cat Riding a Tyrannosaurus Rex laptop sticker.

Microsoft Windows Ninja Cat riding a T-Rex needs no caption.

I have my friend Jodi to thank for pointing me to this delightful laptop sticker.

http://www.geekwire.com/2015/microsoft-windows-ninja-cat-returns-riding-a-t-rex/

How did I never know about MS Windows Ninja Cat before? I love it on my Mac at work. Heheh.

Callaghan, 0; Peanut Butter, 5.

August 28, 2015August 28, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick 3 Comments

I’ve always marveled at the borderline-comical dramatic reactions the French have to peanut butter. They range from mockery to disgust to hatred. I saw it for myself when I was living in France, I see it in my own home with my French husband, and I see it, from time to time, in pop culture. Epic is the humor that can be derived from the French disdain of peanut butter.

Peanut butter would almost always work as a French person repellent.

Not only are the French totally lacking whatever gene is needed to appreciate peanut butter, but they don’t understand it. The very concept of peanut butter confounds them.

This week, Callaghan demonstrated the extent to which they don’t understand it.

It happened early one morning as I was getting ready for work.

About half the time, if I’m running late in the morning, Callaghan will help me get out the door by getting my food ready for the day. It’s a low-maintenance affair. He knows which foods I cycle through, so any combination of things he throws into the cloth lunch bag (very low-maintenance over here) makes me happy.

My go-to lunch is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on whole wheat bread. It’s a balance of plant-based proteins, healthy fat, fruit and complex carbohydrates that works really well for me… plus, I love it. I always go for natural, creamy peanut butter – the kind that needs to be slowly, patiently stirred when it’s new – and jam with no added sugar. The rest of the bag can be filled with any combination of fruits, veggies, hummus, nuts, popcorn, blue corn tortilla chips, etc. I also keep a stash of various protein and energy bars in one of my big desk drawers at work. I basically graze all day.

There’s always a jar of peanut butter in the fridge.

Usually, Callaghan will ask me if I need help getting the food together, or I’ll ask him for help if I’m running late.

Not on Wednesday this week, though, because I wasn’t late for work that morning. In fact, I was earlier than usual, enjoying a chill morning, leisurely doing my make-up while drinking coffee. I reveled in knowing I could take my time getting ready, put my food together afterward, and still get to work early.

(Side-note: Callaghan’s been taking me to work. I haven’t walked in a while. The persistent humidity of monsoon season ended that… I’m a wimp in humidity.)

So it was Wednesday morning, I was making great time, and I was just finishing getting ready when I heard the vague background hum of activity in the kitchen increase in decibels and segue into a familiar stream of profanities in French.

I heard Callaghan clearly punctuate a string of muttered words with one of his favorite obscenities: “putain d’enculé.” Those were the only two words I heard, but they were enough to signal that something had gone awry. “Putain d’enculé” is French slang along the lines of “motherfucker.” (Not literally. The words actually mean something more like “fucking fucker.”)

What happened now? I thought, rushing down the hall to find out.

I got to the kitchen and found Callaghan covered in peanut butter.

I wish to all that is holy that I’d had the presence of mind to run for my phone so I could take a picture for you guys, but alas. You’ll have to use your imaginations.

Callaghan was standing at the kitchen sink holding one of my hand mixer beaters. It was dripping with thin, oily peanut butter. There was a full, large jar of peanut butter on the counter, which was splashed with peanut butter. The jar, itself, was spilling over with peanut butter.

There was peanut butter on the walls.

There was peanut butter all over everything I could see. It was all over the floor; an oily, brown patch glared up from the middle of the kitchen, partially smeared where Callaghan had started his attempt at cleaning it up. It wasn’t going well. Oil and water don’t mix.

As I stood in the doorway taking it all in, I realized that suddenly, just-like-that, I wasn’t ahead of schedule anymore. From the look of things, I was now going to be late.

But I couldn’t be annoyed, because I was too preoccupied a). trying to hold in the peals of laughter that were roiling up from my gut, b). reminding myself that Callaghan had only been trying to help (not knowing that I didn’t need help that morning – but he didn’t ask, and I didn’t ask him!) c). wondering what, exactly, had happened, and why.

I knew he was doing something with peanut butter for me because obviously, he doesn’t eat it. I deduced from the bread sitting out that he’d planned to make me a sandwich. I wasn’t sure what was happening with the peanut butter, though. It seemed like his colossal mishap occurred with a brand-new jar, but I knew there was an open jar in the refrigerator, so why would he open a new jar?

“What happened?” I asked, genuinely confused.

“I don’t know! I was trying to mix the peanut butter! I thought it would go faster if I used the electric hand mixer!! It blew up in my face!! Putain d’enculé!!”

I lost my battle and held my stomach as I bent over laughing. The image he’d painted was killing me.

As we cleaned up the kitchen, I shared my personal method.

“I slowly, carefully stir the new peanut butter with a butter knife, and I do it the night before I want to eat it,” I said, “So it can thicken in the refrigerator overnight. Otherwise, it’s too liquidy.” A new jar of natural peanut butter is a solid mass with an inch or two of oil sitting on top. It’s not easy to mix without spilling it, even when mixing it slowly and carefully. It requires a degree of patience. I couldn’t even imagine the peanut butter carnage when he’d inserted the hand mixer and switched it on.

When I asked him why he opened a new jar when there was an open one already, he said, “I wanted you to have fresh peanut butter. The other jar is all hard at the bottom.”

See? I couldn’t be annoyed. He was too sweet! I shared another insider trick: when the jar is almost empty, take it out of the refrigerator and keep it at room temperature so the peanut butter left at the bottom can soften.

I don’t remember being taught these things. The complexities of peanut butter handling and maintenance must be instinctual for Americans, while they’re utterly lost on the French. Peanut butter is a language they simply do not speak.

Callaghan’s face as it must have appeared mid-peanut butter apocalypse.

Callaghan put all of his clothes in the wash that same morning, but the oil stains from the peanut butter didn’t come out of his shorts… not even with the use of a pre-wash stain remover gel. They were ruined.

I guess you could look at the incident either as Callaghan getting his ass kicked by the peanut butter, or as the peanut butter getting brutally violated by hand mixer-wielding Callaghan. Each one could have said, “You should see the other guy.”

But in my opinion, the peanut butter won, if for no other reason than it made me late for work that day.

What I’m Digging Right Now – July Favorites

August 4, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Is it just me, or did July come and go at the speed of light? I hardly recognized it was July before it was over! I don’t even know what happened there! Well, I guess I do. A lot happened in July. We enjoyed and cherished the blessing of priceless moments with family, friends, and our new kitty, Nenette, but I’m glad to take this moment to dwell on the Little Things that helped to make the month awesome.

Jumping right in…

1). Mr. Mercedes and Finders Keepers (novels by Stephen King)

Stephen King novels – always a good time!

How did the existence of Stephen King’s Mr. Mercedes escape me for a whole year? Finders Keepers came to my attention when it became available this summer, but it wasn’t until then that I learned about Mr. Mercedes, which precedes Finders Keepers. On the up side, discovering the two books at the same time meant that I got to indulge in some delicious Stephen King binge reading. I heartily enjoyed the stories and characters in these novels, along with the technical surprises of them… they’re more thriller than horror, and King’s writing style departs from his usual, as well… but they’re not lacking in his usual flair. No matter how he writes, I’m always left wanting more. Such is the genius of Stephen King.

2). Southpaw (film)

Jake Gyllenhaal’s performance in this film is brilliant. It’s exciting to think that his superb portrayal of boxer Billy Hope, a role of a sort he’s never taken on before, might lead to an even broader selection of projects. He had nothing to prove in the first place, but now that we know he’s solid action flick material, we hope to see him turn up in more places we wouldn’t have expected.

3). The Body Shop’s Honeymania (fragrance).

Honeymania by The Body Shop (eau de toilette and body butter). I also have the Honeymania shower gel.

When I made the commitment to use cruelty-free products as much as possible, I started experimenting with fragrances from The Body Shop. You know I love their beautiful Madagascar Vanilla scent, but I found that I’m even more enamored with Honeymania. On me, this fragrance works better than the former in terms of staying power and sillage, and it’s gorgeous, presenting, with my particular chemistry, like wildflowers with a subtle note of honey underneath. Other people love it when they smell it on me, too, which is always a good thing! I keep the body butter on my desk at work so my friends there can enjoy it, too.

4). Alba Botanica Very Emollient sunless tanner.

Alba Botanica Very Emollient Sunless Tanner

This pic is supposed to show how the color from Alba Botanica’s Very Emollient sunless tanner develops on my legs, the only place I put the stuff. I’m aware that my legs still look pale. That’s because they’re very pale in their natural state! Like many mixed chicks, I’m two-toned, with varying shades and textures of skin on different body parts. My face and legs are pale with thin skin that burns rather than tans, while the skin on my neck, arms, torso and back is thicker and tans easily. Every summer, my neck and arms turn brown no matter what I do, so I like to do a little self-tanning on my legs just to even things out a bit.

I like the way this cruelty-free sunless tanner works, but my favorite thing about it is the surprising way that it smells. Inexplicably… this is a self-tanning lotion we’re talking about, remember… this product smells like a scrumptious, baked treat. Callaghan and I have been trying to identify it, and it’s been driving us crazy, as we can’t quite figure it out. It’s a familiar scent, kind of buttery and caramelesque, but… not quite. It’s a mystery. It’s awesome.

5). Naturtint Naturally Better permanent hair color in 5G (Light Golden Chestnut).

Excellent cruelty-free hair color by Naturtint!

Here’s another cruelty-free product that, because of what it is, has no business wafting a delicious food scent into your nostrils. This hair color actually smells like anise! This is a permanent hair dye. It smells like anise, not like chemicals. Amazing! The shade I use is beautiful, too. The color comes out rich and multi-dimensional, and it lasts longer than the product I was using before. Like the Honeymania fragrance, others have noticed; I’ve never received compliments on my hair color before I started using this one. In every respect, this hair color is superior to any I’ve ever used… and I never would have found it had I not gone cruelty-free.

6). Freeman Feeling Beautiful Golden Grain Brightening Mask.

Freeman Feeling Beautiful Golden Grain Brightening Mask

I’m missing my beloved Epielle sheet masks much less now, thanks to this product from Freeman. My explorations into the realm of cruelty-free facial masks led me to their Golden Grain Brightening Mask, which is unlike anything I’ve used before.

Formulated with vitamin C to brighten the skin and even out discoloration, the product comes out of the tube looking and feeling like clear hair gel. I eyed it warily at first, but there’s nothing even remotely unpleasant about it. The mask spreads over your skin like watery silk, not the slightest bit sticky. It’s good for dry skin, but it’s not oily or greasy. It’s thick, but it goes on feeling hydrating. If water came in gel form, it would be like this. I love its fresh, clean herbal scent, too, which is just as important!

I leave the mask on five minutes longer than recommended, and it never feels tight, dry or otherwise uncomfortable. The entire experience of this mask is pleasant and relaxing. I use it interchangeably with Freeman’s Feeling Beautiful Dead Sea Minerals Anti-Stress Mask, which is more like your traditional clay mask. I’ve said that I’d never go back to masks that harden on your skin and require work to remove, but my skin likes a variety of masks (when I was using the Epielle sheet masks, I alternated between four different formulas), so I re-thought that when I began my cruelty-free adventure. The Dead Sea Minerals mask by Freeman is a great one, as well.

Now that I’ve talked about products that smell like food… fragrance that smells of honey, self-tanning lotion that smells of a buttery-sweet dessert, and hair color that smells of anise… let’s talk about actual food!

7). Cherries.

Fresh sweet cherries!

It appears that I have a tendency to find things I love and then proceed to eat them to excess all month long. This probably isn’t the best idea, especially when the food in question tends to give me digestive issues! I’ve always had a mild sensitivity to cherries, but they’re my favorite fruit, so I eat them with abandon when they’re in season, regardless. I ate tons of cherries in July and didn’t regret a single one.

8). Spaghetti with garlic and olive oil.

Whole wheat spaghetti with olive oil, fresh garlic and coarsely ground sea salt.

This is my all-time favorite dish, and it so happened that I married the person who makes it the best, in my opinion! Callaghan’s pasta with garlic and olive oil is sublime. Of course, I grind more sea salt onto my plate than anyone should eat in a sitting, probably, but I love this dish on the saltier side. There’s just something about the combination of garlic and salt. We like to eat the pasta first and then distribute the minced garlic and olive oil (left at the bottom of the pasta bowls) over toasted whole wheat bread spread with Earth Balance. Fantastic garlic bread!

We eat this year-round – it’s one of our staple meals – but we went a little crazy with it in July. We started out the month with four pounds of whole wheat spaghetti in the pantry, and by the end of the month, we’d eaten it all. We’ll never get tired of it.

9). Sprouts’ Vegan Super Fruit muffins.

Vegan super fruit muffins at Sprouts

We found these muffins in Sprouts’ bakery, and we enjoyed them all through July. These are not your standard, oversized muffins, bloated with sugar and bad fats. These are delicious and just perfect. They’re large, but not two-servings huge, and they’re light and not too sweet. The fruit in them balances the flavor with a nice tang. I wish Sprouts existed outside of Arizona so you could all try them!

ETA: I just checked their web site and saw that new locations are coming to Colorado, New Mexico, Texas and Georgia! Sprouts is finally branching out of the Land of AZ. Move over, Whole Paycheck!

10). Clif bar in Nuts & Seeds.

Clif’s new flavor: Nuts & Seeds

Like the muffins, the new Nuts & Seeds Clif bar isn’t as sweet as you’d expect. I still love their Sierra Trail Mix bar, but this one’s my new favorite! I usually enjoy half a bar as weekday workout fuel. You can’t go wrong with a combination of complex carbs, protein and healthy fats.

That’s it for July’s Little Things… my list for August is already filling up, and we’re only three days into it!

“Southpaw” floats like a butterfly, stings like a bee.

July 28, 2015January 13, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

It seems like a long time ago that an upcoming boxing drama called Southpaw crossed our radar… or, rather, a long time since we found out that Jake Gyllenhaal, one of our favorite actors (we’ve never seen a film of his we haven’t enjoyed), would be portraying a boxer called Billy “The Great” Hope. We went online and found a photo of his Southpaw physique, and we hardly recognized him. Needless to say, we were stoked.

We admire Gyllenhaal because he’s consistently good, and he has a knack for choosing solid projects. He has depth. He has range. But we’d never seen his range extend into action/sports hero territory, and he’d never been an actor I’d expect to see in a gritty, testosterone-driven role such as that of Billy “The Great” Hope. Along with the rest of the world, we were eager to find out how he did. How he did was he went out and trained obsessively and developed himself the bod and the skills, and he smashed it.

Some actors, you can see how they come to casting directors’ minds for such roles: Robert De Niro in Raging Bull, Sylvester Stallone in Rocky, Russell Crowe in Cinderlla Man, Michael Jai White in Blood and Bone, Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler, and Mark Wahlberg in The Fighter, for instance. Then you have excellent but unexpected choices, like Will Smith, who bulked up and trained to play Ali and nailed it, killing everyone’s skepticism (that marked the beginning of Smith’s action hero career, didn’t it?)… and now, Gyllenhaal, who does the same in Southpaw.

There are several ways you can describe Southpaw. It’s a fight movie, a boxing drama, a story of redemption, a vendetta movie, a come-back story… and it’s a family drama.

Here, I have to say that fight movies – especially the ones about boxing – always carry a note of sentimental value for me, so I can’t approach them unbiased. I’ve mentioned before how my fascination with boxing began in early childhood, growing up in the 70’s sitting in front of the T.V. with Dad on Saturday afternoons watching the likes of Ali, Frazier, Foreman, Duran, and Hagler, and into the 80’s with Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas Hearns (not to mention Howard Cosell throughout it all) on ABC’s Wide World of Sports. Because of those intervals of bonding with Dad throughout my grade school years, I’ve loved the “the sweet science” of boxing for as long as I can remember.

Because I watched the film through the lens of some of my fondest childhood memories, I saw Southpaw as more of a family drama than as a straight-up fight movie. Southpaw is a simple story about a father-daughter relationship and how it was both shaken and healed by boxing. My own enduring affection for the sport of boxing was inspired by my father when I was a young girl of the same age as Billy Hope’s daughter. Unsurprisingly, I found the drama of that relationship to be the most inspired theme in the film.

Nevertheless, Southpaw follows a standard fight-movie formula; fortunately, it does its thing exceptionally well. It transcends the mundanity of its story with great acting and all the technical trimmings of the film-making craft. Neither Callaghan nor I had trouble forgiving the film its baldly formulaic plot, because if you turn it upside down, you can see that the formula works in Southpaw’s favor in some ways. It relieves the film of obligations to be fresh, and it opens up space for the characters and conflicts to develop. It’s telling an old story rife with clichés, and the refreshing part is seeing it done so well.

Family drama aspect aside, Southpaw’s boxing scenes are beautifully filmed and keenly impactful, and we found ourselves on edge even if we could predict the outcome of the bouts. Much of the movie is painful to watch. Southpaw is relentless, a film that needs no time to find its footing, gliding into its rhythm right from the outset. I’d love to watch Southpaw contend for Academy awards, and I think it could, considering the talent that infuses it: Director Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, The Equalizer); actors such as Forest Whitaker and Rachel McAdams, and, of course, Gyllenhaal. Then there’s the music by James Horner (the film was dedicated to his memory) and Eminem’s contribution of four songs, including “Phenomenal” and “Kings Never Die”… and the fact that the film was brought to us courtesy of the Weinstein Company.

Of all his memorable quotes, Muhammad Ali is perhaps most famous for proclaiming that he’d “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee,” and that’s what Southpaw does. It floats along on its easy, predictable plot, but in the end, it’s a knock-out.

Not Self/less Enough.

July 14, 2015January 13, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

You know how it is when you’re terminally ill and someone slips you a business card offering help, and, despite all the medical expertise your bottomless fortune could buy at the most prestigious of world-class medical facilities, you call the number, thinking that going rogue with your healthcare might resolve your mortality crisis… and if it doesn’t, you have nothing to lose, anyway?

That story.

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I went with Callaghan and two friends to see the newly released sci-fi action-thriller Self/less (directed by Tarsem Singh) on Saturday, but I’d seen the trailer, and I was intrigued. Though it’s been nearly 20 years since my college metaphysics class, my copy of John Perry’s A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality (1978) still occupies a sliver on my bookshelf, and it was partly because of this pamphlet-size book (required reading for the course I needed to complete my philosophy minor) that I wanted to see Self/less.

A relic from college metaphysics.

Metaphysics had been one of my favorite philosophy courses, and A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality is a text that’s echoed in the ravines of my memory ever since, as personal identity theory interests me greatly. My penchant for sci-fi action-thriller-type movies would have been enough to propel me into the theater for this movie, but academic curiosity heightened my anticipation. What were the writers of Self/less going to do with this challenging metaphysical topic?

Turns out, nothing. The people behind Self/less took on the subject by not taking it on at all. This is anything but a toothsome philosophical study; about a quarter of the way through, I accepted the fact that Self/less is a dumb sci-fi action movie, romping around the casings of the ideas.

But no matter! I was really there for the fun of it and the thrill of an action-packed ride… and sometimes, truth be told, the dumber the sci-fi movie, the more I enjoy it. Before I knew just how insubstantial and mediocre Self/less was going to be, I settled back for good times, but a part of my mind remained occupied, needled by the ghostly recollection of Perry’s book. I made a mental note to pull it down from the shelf when I got home.

An hour later, the credits rolled, the lights came on, and the four of us left the theater somewhat underwhelmed by what we’d just seen. The movie fell short of delivering in the “good times” department, as well.

When I retrieved A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality from my bookshelf the next day, I opened it and read the first sentence to greet my eyeballs:

“Memory is sufficient for identity and bodily identity is not necessary for it. The survivor remembered Julia’s thoughts and actions, and so was Julia.”

Just as I’d thought I’d recalled! I flipped back a few pages, read a little more, and couldn’t help but wonder if the Self/less script-writers had been inspired by Perry’s paper. The story behind the above quote reads:

“Julia North was a young woman who was run over by a streetcar while saving the life of a young child who wandered onto the tracks. The child’s mother, one Mary Frances Beaudine, had a stroke while watching the horrible scene. Julia’s healthy brain and wasted body, and Mary Frances’ healthy body and wasted brain, were transported to a hospital where a brilliant neurosurgeon, Dr. Matthews, was in residence. He had worked out a procedure for what he called a ‘body transplant’. He removed the brain from Julia’s head and placed it in Mary Frances’, splicing the nerves, and so forth, using techniques not available until quite recently. The survivor of all of this was obviously Julia, as everyone agreed – except, unfortunately, Mary Frances’ husband.”

This, essentially, provides the premise for Self/less. The “body transplant” procedure described in A Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality is called “shedding” in Self/less, and Perry’s Dr. Matthews correlates to the Self/less character Albright (Matthew Goode).

In Self/less, the (cleverly named) company offering to perform the body transplant/shedding, Phoenix Biogenic, has made an exclusive private industry of the procedure, available to the 1% who could afford it. The company’s slogan? “Leaders in Consciousness Transfer Technology.”

Consciousness Transfer Technology. The door is open here for a re-con mission into the complexities of mind, consciousness and identity in relation to the body, but mostly what we get is Ryan Reynolds playing a character vacationing in another character’s body until flashes of memory from the original owner of said body clues him into the reality of his situation. A bunch of predictable shit hits the fan. “Soon I’ll be gone,” Damian (Ben Kingsley/Ryan Reynolds) intones toward the end. “I can already feel myself fading.” Our protagonist gallantly bows out after Doing the Right Thing. Imagine that!

All snark aside, I have to say that Self/less deserves points for coming up with the most elaborate suicide I can remember seeing in cinema. The movie encompasses a long, slow self-destruction from beginning to end, with Damian unwittingly employing a convoluted and roundabout method of killing himself. This path proves to be beneficial in allowing him opportunities to tie up some critical loose ends along the way, such as banging a succession of hot chicks in his borrowed body (freshly shedded Damian remarks that his new young and healthy body “has that new-body smell,” and he wastes no time in taking it out for a few joy rides) and delivering a heartfelt letter to his estranged daughter, who believes him to be dead (atonement and closure, check and check).

Self/less wasn’t the worst sci-fi action movie I’ve ever seen… I thought it was marginally better than last summer’s disappointment, Lucy… but I’m thinking it rather dulls the luster on the resumes of some of its talented actors. As Albright astutely remarks, “Immortality has some side effects.”

What I’m Digging Right Now – June Favorites

July 3, 2015July 3, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

My favorite “Little Things” of June were mostly edible… succulent yellow nectarines, crisp, white nectarines and peaches, and white corn, too. Family and food. They go together. One major personal development for me in June was that when my parents were here, I ventured into Costco, and I didn’t have a panic attack! I don’t know how. It was like, that whole Costco thing was an irrational trigger that just ran its course.

So food was central, but let’s start with…

1). Sense8 (T.V. series)

Netflix released season one of this series early in June, and it came to our attention, so we found it and watched it on the site we use to watch T.V. shows (we no longer have Netflix). Our reaction was HOLY. MOLY. We really didn’t have any expectation going in, so it was a nice surprise when Sense8 turned out to be utterly brilliant, a tour de force of sci-fi action/drama with a story fresh and skillfully wrought, seemingly over-ambitious, at first, then startlingly adept at dealing with the intricacies written into the plot. It’s going to be a long year waiting for season two! We might re-watch season one again as season two’s release date approaches; it’ll be good to refresh our memories of some of the story’s complexities.

2). True Detective (T.V. series)

It’s been thrilling to finally sit before a new season of episodes that tell a new story in this excellent anthology series, but can I just say WTF, episode two?? Colin Farrell’s near-perfection in his role isn’t the only good and immediately evident thing about season two, but it’s the central thing so far, in my opinion. Just… really? That’s all I’m going to say. No spoilers here.

3). Jurassic World (film)

I actually deleted the paragraph I originally wrote about Jurassic World because I ended up digressing into a tangent that sounded more like a rant, and this is not the place for such thoughts. This is a place to highlight the Little Things I loved about June, so I’m just going to say (again) that I loved this movie. It’s a film with a plot that’s more or less a facade; it’s really just about dinosaurs and dinosaur-hybrids, particularly a monster in dinosaur clothing. This, to me, is the icing on the 2015 summer action blockbuster cake. A generous dash of visual sensationalism can sometimes have an anesthetizing effect, and Jurassic World delivered!

Now let’s get into some of the food…

4). Simple Truth organic creamy peanut butter.

Simple Truth Organic Creamy Peanut Butter

As a peanut-butter junkie, I’m sensitive to the stuff; I feel like each brand has its own, distinct character. Somehow, they’re all different, even the ones that have the same ingredients. In past “Favorites” posts, I’ve talked about Whole Foods’ 365 brand, and, more recently, Justin’s. This one by Simple Truth is wonderful, too, with its rich flavor and ideal, creamy texture that isn’t too thick or thin. I’m loving it, and I’d definitely buy it again, but we now have two large jars of Costco’s peanut butter sitting in our pantry… they’re next up when this jar of Simple Truth’s is gone… so don’t be surprised if I come back in August reporting on how I noshed ecstatically on Costco’s peanut butter throughout July! We shall see. One can never have too many “favorite” peanut butters, as far as I’m concerned.

5). Kirkland Signature Extra Fancy Unsalted Mixed Nuts.

Giant jar of roasted, unsalted mixed nuts from Costco!

Why are these unsalted, roasted mixed nuts Extra Fancy? Only Costco knows. They seem pretty normal to me, and I was happy to find them in these enormous plastic jars. It’s like, my life is complete now… and now that I seem to be cured of my Costcophobia, we’re thinking we might have to join ~~the cult~~ Costco, because what are we going to do once these nuts are gone?

6). SkinnyPop popcorn mixed with Go Raw 100% Organic Sprouted Pumpkin Seeds.

SkinnyPop Popcorn combined with Go Raw 100% Organic Sprouted Pumpkin Seeds!

I decided to pour some of these seeds over my bowl of popcorn one day after work, and I’ve been hooked on the combination ever since. It makes a thoroughly satisfying marriage of delicate flavors and delicious salt and light crunch and crisp meltiness, and hey, could salty snacking even get more American than this? Popcorn and pumpkin seeds. Welcome to the New World!

Here’s what a part of our kitchen counter’s been looking like:

What can I say. I snacked my way through June. The bag of blue corn tortilla chips is off to the side, and yes, that would be a big BOX of Justin’s dark chocolate peanut butter cups in the back.

7). Bark Thins Snacking Chocolate Dark Chocolate Pumpkin Seed with Sea Salt.

Bark Thins Snacking Chocolate Dark Chocolate Pumpkin Seed with Sea Salt

More dark chocolate! More pumpkin seeds! More salt!

Guess why these weren’t included in that happy little group photo of the other snacks? Because, yes, we polished off this gigantic bag of chocolate in less than a week. (Thanks, COSTCO!) Well, they weren’t all that unhealthy… not at all, in fact… but it was just a lot of sugar. In June, I probably consumed triple the amount of sugar I normally eat, and that is not an exaggeration. I’m surprised I didn’t break out. (*knocks wood*)

Actually, between this and that 28-count box of Justin’s organic dark chocolate peanut butter cups that I was helpless to resist, we might want to re-think that Costco membership. I need a dark chocolate intervention.

Enough food… let’s move on to products!

8). Lavanila Laboratories The Healthy Sunscreen SPF 40 Face Cream.

Lavanila Laboratories The Healthy Sunscreen SPF 40 Face Cream

Here’s an important distinction: I love the sun, and I love living in the sunniest spot in the U.S. of A. But I’m not a sun-worshipper. I’m a sunscreen worshipper. Sunscreen is the number one most important product that I use, and when I went cruelty-free, it became one of the most difficult items to replace. After making much effort with some varieties available in drug stores, I caved and went to Sephora to pick up this expensive sunscreen of Lavanila’s. It’s made for the face, and that’s what I needed… the sunscreens by the other cruelty-free brand I tried not only didn’t play well with make-up, but they also stung when sweat got in my eyes! Lavanila got it right with this sunscreen. It is outstanding.

9). Burt’s Bees Vanilla Bean Moisturizing Lip Balm.

Burt’s Bees Vanilla Bean Moisturizing Lip Balm

This is my cruelty-free answer to EOS lip balms, which I’d loved. I keep the Burt’s Bees Vanilla Bean Moisturizing Lip Balm in my bag, and on my nightstand, I put the Burt’s Bees Ultra Conditioning Lip Balm with Kokum Butter, because I like a heavier lip balm for night… but I found myself reaching for this one more and more while getting ready for bed. For some reason, it works better for me than the one that’s supposed to be more moisturizing. Now, the Vanilla Bean is the only one that I use. I actually prefer it to EOS!

10). Make-up removers: The Body Shop Camomile Waterproof Eye and Lip Make-up Remover and e.l.f. Studio Makeup Removing Cleansing Cloths.

My current cruelty-free makeup removers of choice: e.l.f. Studio Makeup Remover Cleansing Cloths and The Body Shop Camomile Waterproof Eye & Make-up Remover

It was so hard to find good cruelty-free make-up removing products. e.l.f. to the rescue once again! (Huge e.l.f. product review post upcoming, by the way, once I can find time to do it.) e.l.f.’s make-up removing cleansing cloths are really good… and when I explored the shelves at The Body Shop, I found this waterproof eye make-up remover, which is not only fantastic, but it’s better than the ones I’d used that were tested on animals. See? If not for my resolution, I’d have never discovered these products.

That’s it for June. Bring on July! (Maybe less chocolate, though!)

Happy Friday, All… and Happy 4th of July, U.S. friends. =)

Jurassic World… because sometimes, your life is lacking in dinosaurage. (“Rage” being the operative part of the word.)

June 16, 2015January 13, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick 4 Comments

Jurassic World spoiler alert:

There’s a huge, pissed-off dinosaur in it.

No, really. In one scene early on, park operations chief Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) explains that their on-site scientists needed to innovate bigger, better dinosaurs (she may have said the words, “faster, louder, scarier,” but I wasn’t taking notes… you get the idea) in order to re-boot the general public’s interest in visiting the park of living, prehistoric attractions. Because, you know, living prehistoric attractions aren’t interesting enough as they are.

I appreciated how Claire was just as much speaking of we, the audience, as she was of the fictional Jurassic World visitors. We movie-goers are the actual visitors of the park; we’re now on installment number four of this behemoth of a sci-fi action-adventure franchise, and let’s face it: At this point, we need “bigger, better, faster, louder, scarier” dinosaurs if any movie starting with the word “Jurassic” is going to get us salivating to the tune of (insert lofty dollar amount in theatre ticket sales). 22 years after the fresh, meteoric impact of the original Jurassic Park roused millions of imaginations around the world, the team behind this new chapter in the saga had to come up with something spectacular… at least in raw dinosaurage, if the plot lines were going to continue along the uninspired course they’d taken in the intervening years.

1993’s Jurassic Park, based on the novel by Michael Crichton, was just a tough act to follow, so to speak. Steven Spielberg unleashed it on a public that’d been unaware of exactly how well dinosaurs could be done in cinema, and not a mind that saw it was left unblown. The sequel was, in my opinion, dull, and the third one looked to be even less interesting. Following that disappointment, folks on the Jurassic World team got busy spawning a super enormous, intricately modified version of a dinosaur. Callaghan and I entered the theatre fully expecting it, since the trailer had looked promising, and we really wanted to believe the hype this time. We weren’t disappointed. Indominus rex was delivered, and the Jurassic thrill was back and intact.

Because Jurassic World quickly developed into a well-paced, rollicking visual fest of panic and people flung asunder, I was breathlessly entertained enough to shrug off my annoyance and suppress my inward eye-rolling provoked by some of the sub-plots and caricatures of the people in the story. I was willing to overlook the absurdity of the shoes on Claire’s feet, which were 1). white (I noticed as she was running through mud), and 2). high-heeled (I especially noticed as she was running through mud). In fact, from the time she started running, I made it a point to look at her feet in each scene, checking to see whether she’d resourcefully broken off the heels. She hadn’t. She ran at breakneck speed through a prehistoric forest and fields with rampaging beasts and her life in peril… wearing high heels.

I wasn’t there for well-developed characters devoid of stereotypes. I didn’t go in expecting to marvel at the usage of restraint in the writing, or in any other aspect. I was there for the suspenseful thrill of it all, and the snappy lightness of the script allowed us to simply enjoy that. We didn’t have to wrangle too much with ethics in science or the over-arching concept of “playing God.” We could just appreciate the excellence of everything done well in the film. We could admire the panache of the motorcycle-riding Velociraptor Whisperer played by Chris Pratt. We could feel gratified when Claire started to see beyond the dollar signs in her park’s living, breathing “assets” and “attractions” and developed respect for the dinosaurs as actual, sentient beings. We could bask in the nostalgic pleasure of the Jurassic Park theme music sweeping through the theatre, carrying us along on our ride, and we could enjoy exhaling before the spectacle of it all. There were angry, vicious dinosaurs, and they were impressive.

[Side note: Glancing around the theatre, we couldn’t help but raise our eyebrows at each other over the sheer number of young children we saw. Especially with the level of advancement reached in CGI technology, how did this film end up with a PG-13 rating? The girl sitting next to us had to be around six years old, and she was in good company with plenty of other children – including babies and toddlers – throughout the sold-out house. We were genuinely confused. Did the parents think that perhaps Jurassic World would feature Barney?

I remember when I went to the theatre with my family to see Alien. I was ten, and the scene that horrified me – the alien popping out of the guy’s chest – made Alien look like a walk through Mister Roger’s neighborhood compared to Jurassic World].

Directed by Colin Trevorrow, Jurassic World brings dinosaur-sexy back after all these years. It’s a satisfying blockbuster summer action flick to watch, and it’s certainly unlike any zoo you’ve ever visited.

What I’m Digging Right Now – May Favorites

June 2, 2015June 2, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Let’s face it… in our dusty little speck of the world, we’ve had better months this year so far than May. Like all of them. I photographed some of the things for this post in the days leading to Ronnie James’ death, because I knew they were destined for the list, and I couldn’t see motivating myself to do much of anything afterward.

But that’s what these Favorites lists are for, right? It helps to think of life’s pleasurable Little Things, and I’m going to tell you about the ones that stood out in May, as per usual!

Let’s shake things up and start with products this time.

1). Yes to Blueberries Age Refresh Face and Neck Oil and Deep Wrinkle Night Cream.

Yes to Blueberries Age Refresh Face and Neck Oil and Deep Wrinkle Night Cream

In my quest for Holy-Grail-caliber cruelty-free skin care, I’ve tried many different products. I listed the Acure night cream in a previous Favorites post, noting its strong herbal scent as its only draw-back. While I liked it enough to talk about it as a favorite that month, I didn’t repurchase it, and I’m so glad, because if I did, I wouldn’t have stumbled upon this magnificent night cream by Yes to Blueberries. Inexpensive, cruelty-free Holy Grail night cream, check! This cream is thick, soft and rich with natural, good ingredients. It feels incredible, and I love its mild, sweet scent.

I thought I’d try the facial oil from the same line, and I’ve been loving that, as well. I put three drops on my cleansed face at night, and two more on my neck, and gently work it all in. The oil is potent; it disappears into my skin and pulls an instant glow to my cheeks. After a few minutes, I mist my face and neck with water and layer the night cream on top. Done.

2). Tarte Maracuja C-Brighter Eye Treatment.

Tarte Maracuja C-Brighter Eye Treatment

But before the facial oil and night cream, there’s eye cream, and this one by Tarte has also earned Holy Grail status in my book. Unfortunately, it’s high-end and therefore pricey, but none of the drugstore eye creams I tried really did it for me. Tarte’s Maracuja formula brings to mind some of my past favorite eye creams, such as Clinique’s All About Eyes and Benefit’s It’s Potent! eye cream. Tarte managed to create this beautiful, luxurious cream without testing on animals, and I love them for it. Thank you, Tarte!

3). Burt’s Bees 100% Natural Lip Crayon in Redwood Forest.

Burt’s Bees 100% Natural Lip Crayon in Redwood Forest

I’ve actually had this Burt’s Bees lip crayon hanging around on my vanity for a few months now, but I didn’t really start using it until May. It was love at first wear. I LOVE the formula of this product, and its Redwood Forest color perfectly delivers the shade I’ve always been drawn to the most for lips. Redwood Forest is a gorgeous reddish-brown, but its rosier, almost pinkish cast saves it from severity. It’s not long-wearing, but it reapplies well, and it doesn’t dry out my lips.

Here’s what it looks like on… I took this selfie yesterday morning in the bright outdoors hoping to capture the true color of the product. I think I succeeded, though the rest of the picture got kind of washed out from the brightness (there’s no filter or anything like that… the haze is from the blinding sunlight. I was standing in the shade in my backyard).

Current favorite lip product: Burt’s Bees 100% Natural Lip Crayon in Redwood Forest.

For me, it’s that elusive, perfect your-lips-but-better color. LOVE IT.

4). Crystal Essence Mineral Deodorant Roll-On in Lavender and White Tea.

Crystal Essence Mineral Deodorant Roll-On in Lavender and White Tea

I feel the need to share with you the awesomeness of this product, because it was quite a find. Finally, I’m happy with a cruelty-free deodorant! I’d been intimidated by the idea of finding a natural deodorant that could stand up to Body Combat, and here’s this formula by Crystal Essence! It works well, it’s natural, it’s inexpensive, and no animals were harmed in the making of it. I couldn’t ask for more.

Now for food!

5). Artichokes.

Artichokes… the Food of Life.

We all know how I feel about artichoke season, right? (If you didn’t before, you do now. Welcome to my world of artichoke obsession.) It seems that I post a new artichoke picture every year in some social media account or another (or three), so here’s my 2015 artichoke cover shot! (Oh, it really is the Little Things.) My favorite dip for artichokes is still Veganaise with grapeseed oil, by the way.

6). Hass avocados.

The best avocados make the best guacamole. Fact of life.

The month of May well-addressed our love for a good avocado, let me tell you. We ate many, mostly in the form of Callaghan’s ultra-delicious homemade guacamole. Sublime!

7). Amy’s Sonoma veggie burger with organic veggies, quinoa and walnuts.

Amy’s Sonoma veggie burger with organic veggies, quinoa and walnuts

This Rolls Royce of pre-packaged, frozen veggie burgers is my favorite vehicle for the above-mentioned guacamole. I discovered it at Sprout’s one day, recoiled at the somewhat ridiculous price-tag, then thought to myself, it’s not more expensive than the free-range/grass-fed/chemical and antibiotic-free meats I’d be purchasing were I an omnivore. The veggie burgers promptly went into the cart, and they’ve been a staple in our freezer ever since. They are TASTETACULAR. Callaghan enjoys them, too, even though he does eat meat!

8). Strawberries.

Strawberries every day!

Strawberries bloomed fully in May, and, as with the artichokes, we didn’t squander their fleeting season. We’re still eating them. They’re still good. Somehow, the ones we get at Target are the best!

And lastly, entertainment….

9). Mad Max: Fury Road (film)

THIS MOVIE. See my thoughts here, if you haven’t already!

10). The series finale of Mad Men (T.V. series)

Mad Men series finale (2015)

Some people loved it. Some people were disappointed by it. I thought it was groovy and wonderful, and I admit that a little fizz of rapture actually bubbled along the backs of my arms when the episode ended with that Coke commercial. Most people I’ve talked to who were born in the 60’s, like me, also appreciated that moment of unexpected nostalgia. I just loved the way everything got wrapped up for these characters!

What a series.

So, here we are in June… I have a feeling it’s going to go fast, and I’ll be back here with June Favorites before I know it!

Mad Max: Fury Road – (SPOILER ALERT!!)

May 30, 2015January 13, 2016That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

(NOTE: So I started writing up my May Favorites for Tuesday. Mad Max: Fury Road was Number One on the list, and when my little blurb about it got too long, I decided to give it its own post. I’m publishing it now, off-schedule, because Tuesday will still feature my May Favorites. Carry on, if you will!)

When we sat down in the theatre to watch Mad Max: Fury Road the day before Callaghan left for France last weekend, I had no expectations. It was Mad Max, right? I’d read nothing about the film since its release. I settled in for what I hoped would be an action flick so action-packed it’d numb my mind for a couple of hours. That was what I wanted… a mind-numbing movie, a big, loud, dumb action movie, preferably with lots of explosions and car chases.

I wasn’t planning to employ my brain. I was there to shut my brain off, not to turn it on… but something in the story tickled my neurons at the beginning. At first, I couldn’t figure out what. It started with the improbable spectacle of Max being restrained and forced into use as a “Blood-bag” to keep a sickly child alive, a development that followed the opening sequence of events in which Max is chased down, abducted, attempts to escape, and gets re-captured.

That’s right. After Max – Max – was hauled back into hell, he was put to use as a talking, breathing blood supply. “Blood-bag,” in fact, even became his name… it was what his parasite (the bratty war-child) called him. And that sort of lit something up in the back of my brain, but things were happening quickly, and I wanted to keep up with the events, you know, as you do when you’re blasted into action flick oblivion on a convoy fronted by a demonic wraith of a dude playing a fire-shooting electrical guitar.

But at some point after Max was rescued by Furiosa, the female war-truck driver on a personal mission to free the Biggest Bad Guy’s imprisoned harem of wives, the tickle in my brain started crackling like a live wire with the realization that this parasite (that’s how I think of him… does he even have a name? …the war-child) was literally connected to Max-the-Blood-bag via I.V. line.

The first image that embedded itself in my brain like a song on repeat was of Max tied to the outside of the vehicle with his blood feeding into the child inside.

The second image? Max struggling mightily to free himself from the child, and, giving up, simply slinging him over his shoulders, still connected by the I.V., as he trudged over to Furiosa.

And I realized that Max wanted, among other things, an abortion. It was like he’d been beaten, raped and forced to keep the resulting baby. When he finally got free, it was at the hands of a woman. It had been the men in power who’d forced him to nourish the war-child with his own blood against his will. The I.V. line of “Blood-bag” (no longer referred to as a human being, Max had been reduced to a thing) was an umbilical cord.

What was unfolding before my astonished eyes was a role reversal played out on a massive scale in a spectacular, mainstream action movie, and it barreled on relentlessly until the end. It did not stop to care. How much did it cost to make this movie? Let me look it up… okay, about $150 million, let’s say, if Google is correct. This movie is an estimated $150 million dollar middle finger stuck in the face of all the standard action flick conventions.

Max played Robin to Furiosa’s Batman, and it was something to behold.

Many more things happened along the way, many other things I’d never seen before in a high-octane action flick (which, by the way, was practically ALL explosions and car chases).

Like a gang of weather-beaten, much older women on motorcycles lending aid to Furiosa’s group. WHAT.

And Furiosa making the tough decisions (like leaving the pregnant girl behind because going back for her would have put them all at risk).

And Furiosa being the one with the superior shooting skills (Max wisely and respectfully hands her the weapon when they’re down to their last round, and she nails their target).

Furiosa does most of the driving, and none of the sleeping. Furiosa dispatches of the Biggest Bad Guy. Furiosa is unequivocally the toughest no-bullshit badass female hero I’ve ever seen in an action movie. She has nothing to prove. Charlize Theron hammered her home.

Max joins Furiosa’s group of women and instantly has in common with them the fact that they’d all been used for their bodies. When war-child connects with that one girl (sorry, I’m terrible with names in movies, and I’m too lazy to look it up), their bond gives war-child the sense of humanity we assume he’d been lacking. We see nothing sexual happen between the two – I also find it refreshing that there’s nothing sexual in this movie at all – and the power of his emotional bond with her (love) proves to be more profound than his former physical bond to his “Blood-bag.” That old reliance disappears, and he’s able to recognize the humanity in Max and defect to the other side, even switching their roles and assisting Max.

When Furiosa lingers near death toward the end, Max finally reveals his name to her. “Max,” he says. “My name is Max.” There’s something about the way he says it, like the words are more meaningful to him than they would be to her. Max has emerged from the experience with a restored sense of himself, of his own humanity. Once again, he has a name and an identity. He’s no longer “Blood-bag.” He’s no longer an object, reduced to his body and used according to how it could benefit others.

I absolutely loved this movie, and Callaghan did, too. Everything about it impressed us. We pretty much left the theatre with our minds thoroughly blown. We just looked at each other and didn’t even know what to say except HOLY SHIT!! We have to see it again!!!

I went in wanting to zone out before a mindless spectacle, and ended up mentally stimulated while simultaneously holding my breath with the pace of the action. If I’d had expectations, they would’ve been obliterated… and I couldn’t have asked for a better soundtrack for such utter destruction, either.

What I’m Digging Right Now – April Favorites

May 1, 2015May 2, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Some levity is in order around here, right? Conveniently, it’s May now, so I can rave about some of the Little Things that helped to make April enjoyable!

For one thing, we saw a phenomenal movie…

1). Ex Machina (film)

The movie poster in the theatre lobby….

You know I love a good, well-crafted sci-fi thriller, and it’s been a while. I was just barely coasting along on the spectacular fumes of Pacific Rim when we walked into Ex Machina. I was almost skeptical going into it, but I knew that Luc Besson had nothing to do with this one, so I had high hopes that it wasn’t going to be another disappointment like last summer’s Lucy. We used the movie pass that Callaghan had gotten as a gift (thank you, friend!) and found ourselves stunned and in awe as Ex Machina dimmed the lights on its eerie, final scene. Certainly, the combination of elements made this film superb, but overall, I think it was the restraint used in its making that made it brilliant.

2). Mad Men (T.V. series)

We’re having the same experience as most everyone who watches this series, I think: Mad Men’s last set of final season episodes isn’t striking us as being as purposeful as those in previous seasons. Whatever. Mad Men is back, and we’re loving it. The set! The hair, makeup, wardrobe! Mad Men is still my favorite period piece in television, and they’re killing it more than ever now that they’ve taken up solid residence in the 70’s. I almost don’t even care what happens at this point; I’m just there for the eye candy.

3). American Crime (T.V. series)

Here’s a powerful new series that got right down to business and grabbed us by our throats. It’s dark, it’s gritty, it’s almost too ugly and depressing to watch… but it’s smashing.

4). Nurse Jackie (T.V. series)

We’re late arrivals on the Nurse Jackie train, but like the critic said, “You just want to keep on watching.” Yep. We plowed through the first three seasons in such a short period of time, I’d be embarrassed to say how long if I could remember when, exactly, we started watching it. We just started season four, I can tell you that much! The hilarious short (half-hour) episodes make this dark dramedy especially easy to binge-watch. It goes well with popcorn, too.

5). It’s a 10 Miracle Leave-in Plus Keratin.

It’s a 10 Miracle Leave-in Plus Keratin.

This is an old favorite! Since we’ve now got ourselves on a strict budget because of Ronnie James’ medical costs, I went digging around in places where I store things I haven’t used in a while, and I happily re-discovered It’s a 10. And guess what? This brand meets my recently established criteria for beauty products! Because of expenses, I’d been procrastinating on the hair care part of my 2015 New Year’s resolution to go cruelty-free with cosmetics and such, so I was pleased to find that I’d stashed away this pricier gem of a hair care item that just so happens to have not been tested on animals.

Shopping my home supply for forgotten favorites is the best.

6). Madagascan Vanilla Flower perfume oil (The Body Shop).

Madagascan Vanilla Flower perfume oil from The Body Shop.

My search for a gorgeous cruelty-free fragrance finally led me to The Body Shop and its array of perfume oils. Back in the 90’s, I’d used the one called “Ananya,” which was finally, recently discontinued. I still have a little bit left in my last old bottle, but it’s been a while, and it’s not what it was when I’d purchased it… its potency has faded, and the scent is slightly off. So I went back to The Body Shop and happened upon their Madagascan Vanilla Flower, and I am in love. I’m not usually drawn to vanilla scents, but this one is different… it’s a deeper, more exotic vanilla with its warm, ambery-floral heart.

7). Earrings from Target.

Current favorite earrings – sparkly cluster studs from Target.

This was just one of those silly impulse Target purchases, you know, when you run in to get some almond milk and you come out with three bags full of random crap. I’m proud to say that I’ve stopped with all of that this last month – somehow, and I know that many of you can appreciate the self-control I’m having to employ in this effort, haha! – but not before I found these earrings on clearance (back in March, I believe). Over the last month they’ve become my favorite uniform earrings to wear to work on days I don’t go to the gym. They’re just round studs made of little sparkly clusters. I think they’re perfect.

8). Arizona Yellow Bells.

Fragrant Arizona Yellow Bells on my desk at home.

Our Arizona Yellow Bells are all in bloom, and they are splendiferous! Callaghan surprised me with a vase full of them on my desk one day, where they perfumed my entire office with their rich, sweet fragrance. Arizona Yellow Bells are native to our desert, but I never experienced them until we moved into this house. There are two robust Arizona Yellow Bells bushes in our backyard, and they attract many a hummingbird, which we also adore.

While I’m at it, what would an Arizona spring flora favorite entry be without a shot of my favorite cactus blooms?

Spring in the desert is my favorite!

9). Rositas’ salsa.

Salsa from Rosita’s.

I have several favorite restaurant salsas around here, and this is one of them. Yesterday, I decided to pick some up on my walk home from work, and we had it for dinner. I love salsas that aren’t sweet, and this one is satisfyingly tangy and bold on the cilantro and onion… just the way I like it!

10). April Favorite pick for Ronnie James and Nounours: Bench & Field Holistic Natural Feline Treats (at Trader Joes’).

Bench and Field Holistic Natural Feline Treats.

Kitties’ Auntie M. gave them these treats for Christmas, and the little guys went nuts for them. The day we ran out was a woeful one, indeed. What’s more, we couldn’t find the treats anywhere, and Ronnie James and Nounours wouldn’t eat any other kind. Catastrophe. Finally, we asked a sales person at PetSmart. They didn’t have the treats there, but she looked up them up and told us that they could be found at Trader Joe’s. Yes! We went to get them, and happiness has been restored.

“With added vitamins and minerals,” it says. “OMEGA 6:3 Enriched” and “with Menhaden Oil,” it says. Ronnie James and Nounours just say, “MOOR PLEEEZZZ!!!!”

The thing is, while we were medicating the Wrah-Wrah to heck and back, these treats were the only consolation prize we could offer him. They got us all through and ended the sessions on a happy note.

That about wraps it up for this favorites list – Happy Friday, All! =)

What I’m Digging Right Now – March Favorites

April 7, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Update: Ronnie James has been home since Sunday night! This week we’re helping him to recover from his surgery here at home, and we’re waiting for lab results to come back. We should know everything by Friday, so I’ll post a detailed update then, for anyone who’s interested!

Somehow, March dragged. March aspired to be the Texas of this (albeit still very young) year… it feels like we drove and drove, and it seemed to never end. Some of it was amazing. Some of it was depressing. Much of it was great fun, and a lot of it was eye-opening, too.

It’s interesting how March going on forever makes the year, itself, seem long, and to be honest, I have to say that time creeping along like this bewilders me a little. Our sense of time is supposed to accelerate the older we get, a phenomenon I was experiencing normally up until this year. It’s interesting how circumstances in our lives can alter this perception.

Now that we’ve finally arrived at April, it’s time to look back at that long month and pick out a few “little things” that stood out. I never go deep in these lists and talk about the people who bless our lives and make the world a better place for being in it. These lists are for talking about mostly superficial things, the cheap thrills, so to speak!

And the winners are… starting with food…

1). Blackberries from Target.

These blackberries. THESE.

This is a weird one, I know. For whatever reason, the blackberries at the Target near us (Tempe Marketplace on Rio Salado) are the best. No other blackberries compare, and I don’t even want to know why. I’ll just enjoy them while we can!

2). Justin’s classic all-natural peanut butter.

Justin’s classic all-natural peanut butter

Callaghan brought this home for me one day, and I’m loving it. I’ve been a huge fan of Justin’s dark chocolate peanut-butter cups for a couple of years, but I’d never tried other Justin’s products before now!

3). Snyder’s of Hanover peanut butter pretzel sandwiches.

Snyder’s of Hanover peanut butter pretzel sandwiches.

You know how it is. Sometimes, you just have to run downstairs in the middle of the afternoon and get yourself something kind of dirty to munch on from the corner store. These peanut butter pretzel sandwiches were my processed food guilty pleasure in March. There’re not entirely terrible for you, either, as it turns out! I mean, they’re not as junky as junk food can be. If you appreciate peanut butter as much as I do, you might need these in your life.

Moving on to non-edible things…

4). Acure Night Cream.

Acure Night Cream

I got this cream when I’d used up my old one, as I’d planned. It’s the night-time counterpart to the Acure day cream I’ve been using with respect to my New Year’s resolution to stop buying personal care products and cosmetics tested on animals. This is a good, hydrating night cream, and other than its strong herbal scent, which I don’t care for, I like it a lot. It has a nourishing feel to it, and my skin feels dewy (for lack of a better word) in the morning. However, because of that strong fragrance, I don’t think my search for the perfect, affordable cruelty-free night cream is over… my next one will be from another brand. I like this one enough to return to it if future selections don’t perform as well, and obviously I like it enough to include it here as a monthly favorite, but at the same time, I’ll be happy to find one that equals it without the clinging, almost medicinal herbal scent!

5). L’Université Nice Sophia Antipolis hat and mug.

Mug and hat from my friend in Nice who works at L’Université Nice Sophia Antipolis.

When we went to France, a friend surprised me with a mug and a hat from the University in Nice where she works. Merci, Matita! L’Université Nice Sophia Antipolis, represent! I love stuff like this. I thought it would be fun to send her the same from Arizona State University. Now there’s an honorary Sun Devil working à l’UNS.

6). Body Combat in France.

And thanks to our friend Chantal, there was that Body Combat class in Cannes we got to do while we were down south! I have to rave about it again, because I enjoyed it so much, and it’s at the top of my March favorites list. That was our only workout in about 10 days, and we didn’t waste it. We went full-on beast mode, as usual… or, to steal a phrase from our friend Sarah, beast à la mode!

7). Bag – K by Kookai (black satchel).

I don’t know what I like better, this bag or the story behind it. In the weeks before we went to France, Callaghan became obsessed with the idea that thieves in Paris were going to sneak up behind me with scissors and cut the strap of the bag I was using at the time. “You need to get a little backpack with a strong strap,” he insisted.

I had no idea where this notion came from. I’d been in Paris five times before, and all that ever happened to me was an ill-attempted “dropped jewelry” scam. (That one where someone comes up with a bracelet or something else shiny, quickly drops it in front of you when she thinks you’re not looking, and makes a big deal picking it up and bringing it to you to ask if it’s yours while her partner hustles up to rip you off during the “distraction.” The two who tried it on me weren’t good at it. They were laughable. I’d give their performance a 4 on a scale of 1-10. Needless to say, it didn’t work.)

But Callaghan thought that my cross-body bag strap would get cut, so I found a small backpack-style bag with a zipper that ran down the length of the straps so you could use it either single-strapped or doubled. I thought the quality was good. It was from Marshall’s. I think it was a Steve Madden, or something like that. Anyway, long story short, the whole bag fell apart three days after we got to France. I mean, the zipper broke and the straps came apart from the bag itself, so, being a backpack, it was rendered unwearable.

I trotted around the French Riviera with the bag in my arms, like a baby, then switched to the only other thing I had: a large and awkward purple and pink vinyl Kenzo perfume bag that one of Callaghan’s relatives in Paris had given us to transport the bottle of champagne she was sending down south with us to Callaghan’s Dad. It was annoying and uncomfortable. I wanted to avoid getting a new bag, but once we got back to Paris, I gave up on that idea and went looking for one.

Luckily, we were staying in Montmartre, where you can walk to any place you might need. Case in point: Callaghan and I were dreading going to the f*cking Champs-Élysées* just because I needed a bag, but lo! There was a La Halle aux chaussures et maroquinerie down the street from our hotel, and I didn’t have to look further. There were five bags I really liked, and it was hard to choose! I decided on this:

K by Kookai bag

It’s just an unstructured satchel-type style with a long strap option, which I don’t use, but somehow, I like the bag a lot. Actually, I think it’s the red lining that I really like… and it was totally affordable. WIN.

*We like to jokingly call it “the f*cking Champs-Élysées,” but honestly? I wish they could move L’Arc de Triomphe out of there and set it somewhere less commercial and insane.

So after that long story, I’ll let the images speak for themselves in the rest of this post!

8). House of Cards, season three (T.V. series)

Oh, the lies… the plays… the dares! Now we wait a year to see what happens next.

9). The Following, season three (T.V. series)

WAIT – who’s doing the following, and who’s being followed? I love how you never know who’s who in this series. This season of The Following grabbed us by the throat in a way that last season didn’t, and we enjoyed last season! It’s always great when a good series gets even better, and it’s probably a good thing that the return of Hannibal was pushed back to June, or it’d be serial killer overload in our entertainment schedule up in here.

10). “Rico” (Episode 8 of Better Call Saul)

Scene from “Rico,” episode 8 (Better Call Saul)

Have you ever watched the credits roll after an hour and said to yourself, “Self, that right there was a really good episode of television?” That was “Rico” for me, though honestly, this first season of Better Call Saul has been getting increasingly more compelling and impressive. I find myself dazzled by the unexpected depth and complexity of the protagonist, and by the development of his character, as well. Then there’s the writing of these episodes. Superb!

Those were my picks for March. Now let’s get on with April!

The Breakfast Club according to Callaghan (or, the seven stages of Callaghan during The Breakfast Club).

March 31, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

Last week, it suddenly came to my attention that Callaghan, who’s almost my age and therefore spent his teen years in the 80’s, like I did, had never seen the movie The Breakfast Club. It was a remarkable revelation that made me blink in wonderment. How could he have escaped The Breakfast Club? Moreover, how could I not have known that the person I’d been with for five years had never seen The Breakfast Club? I never felt any particularly intense passion for the film, but all this time, I’ve duly acknowledged it as one of the most important films of that decade. Like it or not, The Breakfast Club largely defined the pop culture landscape of the 80’s, and it just never occurred to me that anyone could be ignorant of this, even if you’re French. Being a French person in France was no excuse for not knowing The Breakfast Club, especially since the most popular movies in France at the time were other American movies such as Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Ghostbusters and Back to the Future. I was nonplussed.

It was like that time I found out Callaghan had never seen Fatal Attraction. I’d just assumed that anyone would get any and all references to deranged jilted lovers boiling bunnies, until a certain episode of Hart of Dixie happened and the truth came out. Callaghan may have passed the test to earn U.S. citizenship, but obviously, the test is lacking.

Anyway, last week, we were watching “The Runaway Club,” the most recent episode of Bob’s Burgers. The episode opened as a Breakfast Club parody, complete with a parody of the Simple Minds song, which instantly had me cracking up, which led to Callaghan looking at me quizzically, which led to my realization that Callaghan had no insight to the joke, which he confirmed upon being questioned. Yes, this was a grave matter, and it demanded serious questioning.

So on Saturday night, we sat down to watch The Breakfast Club. We were righting a wrong, and besides, I was curious to see how someone would react to the movie three decades after its release! (The movie came out in 1985. I graduated from high school in 1987. Callaghan graduated in 1989. There was no way he was getting out of seeing the movie once I found out he hadn’t seen it.)

Below, I’ve provided a run-down of Callaghan’s responses, which – unbeknownst to him – I recorded in real time.

Stage One: He’s bored and on the verge of falling asleep.

“Baby, so far this is extremely boring.” (Five minutes in)

(in spite of himself, he laughs at something Bender says)

Stage Two: He starts paying attention.

“Huh. She reminds me of Edward Scissorhands.” (looking at Molly Ringwald)

Molly Ringwald in The Breakfast Club on the left. Johnny Depp as Edward Scissorhands on the right. NOT UNLIKE.

Stage Three: He accepts the reality that the whole movie takes place at the school.

“Seriously? The whole movie is about this scene?”

Stage Four: He gets drawn into it.

(laughs at something Bender does)

(laughs when Ally Sheedy throws the lunch meat in the air and it sticks to the sculpture)

“Did she just squeal?” (about a sudden, high-pitched noise made by Ally Sheedy)

Stage Five: He’s now totally into it.

(laughs at Bender crawling above the ceiling)

(laughs at Bender looking at Molly Ringwald’s crotch under the desk)

(laughs when everyone’s getting stoned)

“They made her look like Ozzy Osbourne.” (looking at Ally Sheedy)

Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club on the left. Ozzy Osbourne on the right. NOT UNLIKE.

Stage Six: He’s now a part of it.

“Heheh, I thought exactly that!” (when Ally Sheedy says that her parents ignored her)

(laughs at Vernon saying to the janitor, “Do you think I give one rat’s ass what these kids think of me?”)

(laughs when Bender says to Molly Ringwald that a girl is only a tease if what she does get you hot)

(laughs at something Ally Sheedy says)

“Yeah, that’s the exact opposite of Bender’s.” (When Emilio Estevez describes his dad)

(laughs at something Bender says to Anthony Michael Hall, who’s talking about failing shop)

“She’s going to put her tongue up her nose!” (about Molly Ringwald, who instead applied lipstick with her bra)

“SO WHAT CAN YOU DO?” (Callaghan shouts at Bender)

Stage Seven: He becomes an astute observer.

“It’s funny that Brian is way taller than all of them.” (When the three guys are dancing to “We are Not Alone” in the dance scene in the library)

The End.

So, what have we learned from this?

Callaghan’s conclusion: “That was cool. It took a little time to go somewhere, but that was really cool. That’s a movie they could make a re-make of. I mean, watching this, of course, we know it was there. That was us in high school. Not that kids in high school today are any different, but they have phones… I mean, they’re different today. But that’s why they should do a remake. Things are different today.”

My conclusion: I never realized before that to me, at least, Bender and Vernon are the only character-characters in the movie. In my notes, I called them “Bender” and “Vernon,” while I referred to the other actors by their actual names.

I loved the Bob’s Burgers parody, by the way, even though plot-wise, “The Runaway Club” strayed from The Breakfast Club pretty far between the opening and ending of the episode. Excellent tribute!

The Breakfast Club – dancing in the library

The dance scene parody in the end credits of Bob’s Burgers “The Runaway Club”

Thank you to Callaghan for ~~taking part in my sociological experience~~ watching the movie with me. I know you weren’t into it at first, so I’m glad you ended up enjoying it!

On that note – Happy 30^th Anniversary, The Breakfast Club! We agree that you’re basically timeless.

Greetings from France! I’ve got some pictures.

March 10, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

We spent the last two days in Paris doing what we always do in Paris – running around the city, dragging our luggage up and down the Metro stairs, racing through the stations (with and without luggage), jumping walls and running again to just barely leap onto waiting trains. It occurred to me, as I was jumping a wall after Callaghan in the Metro two nights ago, that Parkour was invented by a French guy. Perhaps he was inspired by similar action-intense negotiations of the Metro stations, running after trains in Paris!

We love Paris, and we had a great time visiting with relatives and friends. Plus, it was beautiful and sunny on one of the days, so for the first time, I got to see Paris in the sun against a blue sky. It was fabulous.

Now we’re on the French Riviera, visiting more friends and Callaghan’s immediate family. (He was born in Paris, but grew up down here.) This morning we caught an early TGV to Cannes, and the five-hour train ride gave me an opportunity to sleep a little as well as to resize some pics for today’s post.

Here’s a smattering of random images from the last two days:

Glacière is a stop on the Metro. We thought it was funny to see the sign next to a ski ad (“Glacière” translates to “ice chest.”)

Another pic from the Metro. Not even France is safe from the 50 Shades.

The view from our hotel window.

…and a nearby abandoned shoe.

Here’s an interesting little new car: a Smart Car-looking, single person electric Renault.

A random storefront that caught my eye…

Back in the Metro! An ad for an architecture exhibition.

In our usual selfie pose. We’re on the train again, en route to visit relatives.

Our queen! Long live La Tour Eiffel!

Back at the Metro – but this pic is to show that it’d been a sunny day!

Poster ad – again, in a Metro station – for a street artist exhibit at the Espace Dali.

Paris graffiti, with love.

Charlie Hebdo at the news stand, still going strong!

This sweet little girl was on our train to Cannes this morning. Her Mommy said I could take her picture. I love French Bulldogs.

Notice the absence of Jim Morrison’s grave. That would be because we still haven’t gone, as circumstances didn’t allow for it… but we’re heading back to Paris on Friday, and you know we’re going to Parkour our way to that cemetery the minute we get off the train.

Also not pictured is the group of police officers standing around expectantly in one of the Metro stations, an incongruous sight compared to what I’m used to here. I’ve never seen the cops just hanging around like that in France before. I wanted to snap a picture, but I didn’t think they’d appreciate it, so I held back.

I hope you’re having a great week!

Today is March 6th, and this is significant.

March 6, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick 2 Comments

Good morning! I have a few announcements.

One: Next week’s posts will come at you from a different time zone, as we’ll be visiting family and friends in France. I plan to post on Tuesday and Friday at around the usual time, so we’ll see how that works out. Also, I’m thinking there’ll probably be more images here than writing next week. I’m not anticipating having much time to write while we’re overseas, but I know a lot of pictures will be taken!

My hats from France, collecting dust on the back of a door, as black hats do.

Two: Today is my brother’s birthday. Happy birthday, Bro! (Trivia: Callaghan and my brother are the same age almost exactly. They were born in the same year, 10 days apart.)

Three: Today is also the 17th anniversary of the opening day of The Big Lebowski in the United States.

LET US TAKE A MOMENT.

17 years ago today, the Coen brothers introduced Americans to The Dude. Can you believe it’s been that long? I can’t.

“The Dude abides.” That three-word quote is genius. The Dude’s paramount personality trait is being laid-back to the point of almost-apathy, but rather than being apathetic, he’s just free of constraints (especially self-imposed ones)! He does care, in his way. He teaches us how to live in moment, and how to prioritize. For example, getting thrown into a police car is secondary to the more immediate and pressing concern of the beverage in his hand that’s in danger of spilling in the process. It’s easy to see why some of The Dude’s admirers would take it upon themselves to create a religion (Dudism) after the sub-cultural icon who embodies “go with the flow” to the point where he simply abides.

I’m not cool enough to exist in a perpetual state of moment-by-moment abiding. In addition to roaches and Costco, my two legendary hang-ups, I can think of several things by which I cannot abide. In honor of the Dude, He Who Has Been Abiding for Seventeen Years Today, I will present you with those things.

I CANNOT abide by:

1). Dubbed movies.

2). Celery.

3). More than two consecutive days of overcast weather.

4). Doing the ginga to Thai music instead of to Afro-Brazilian capoeira music. (This is my only Les Mills annoyance. Would it be so hard to throw a birembau into that Body Combat music tracklist, Les Mills?)

5). The little “silica” packets you find in such things as new bags and outerwear pockets.

And on that note, I’ll wish you a Happy Friday!

What I’m Digging Right Now – February Favorites

March 3, 2015March 3, 2015That Asian-Looking Chick Leave a comment

February – the month of Valentine’s, Callaghan’s birthday, new-to-me discoveries and other things I want to share with you!

Usually I start with entertainment, so let’s change it up and get right into it with food this time.

1). Kind Healthy Grains Raspberry Clusters with Chia Seeds (cereal).

Kind Healthy Grains Raspberry Clusters with Chia Seeds
(with assorted fresh berries and almond milk)

Since the beginning of February, this cereal has been my go-to evening snack on the evenings I want one, and I always have it just the way you see it in the picture… a third of a cup (one serving) covered in fresh berries and moistened with almond milk. We just picked up another bag. I like it because it’s not too sweet – in fact, it’s just barely sweet – and it’s super crunchy. This is a favorite that’s going to be a favorite for a while, methinks.

2). Mediterranean chopped salad (with added tofu) at True Food Kitchen.

Mediterranean chopped salad at True Food Kitchen.
I remembered to take this pic after I ate maybe a quarter of it. SO GOOD.

Here we have my official new salad obsession, guys, and I don’t use the word “obsession” lightly! This salad is a flavor stand-out as well as a nutritional powerhouse with its greens, cucumber, Kalamata olives, cherry tomatoes, quinoa, feta, sprouted almonds, and lemon oregano vinaigrette. (You can ask them to hold the feta if you’re going for a vegan option. For me, it’s a rare vegan exception.) I add tofu to boost the quinoa’s protein, and it’s out of this world. One of the principles of True Food Kitchen is to use what’s in season, so the last time we went (Sunday, when I took the picture) there were green beans in the salad, as well. IT IS SO GOOD. So, so, so good. I can’t even tell you. If you ever find yourselves in the vicinity of a True Food Kitchen, go there and try this salad. You’re welcome.

Now that I’ve raved about food, let’s move on to entertainment!

3). Better Call Saul (T. V. series)

AT LAST! The series Breaking Bad fans have been waiting for finally aired its premiere, but you don’t have to have watched Breaking Bad in order to get it. The story of Saul Goodman’s legal career and persona evolution tells itself with no reliance on the BB laurels. We’re enjoying it even more than we’d thought we would.

4). Kingsman: The Secret Service (film)

As in January, we only went out to the movies once in February, and only because there was a particular movie whose impending release kept us on edge for ages, it seemed. We went to see Kingsman: The Secret Service. I’m thrilled to say that it handily exceeded our expectations, offering up a caper of magnificent exuberance and cloaked in strategically overwrought, finely-sharpened darkness featuring great characters played by a great cast. Kingsman was action-packed, absurd in the best of ways, hilarious and just all-around entertaining in exactly the fashion you want your comic book action flick to be. The writing was terrific; many of the lines of dialogue surprised us. I’m not going to provide any spoilers here, so you’ll have to go see it for yourselves, if you’re into that sort of thing!

This brings me to a random favorite of the month:

5). The 4^th workout.

My woman cave! That South Korean flag was handed down to me by my Tae Kwon Do master before he moved out of state many years ago. After traveling all over the place with me, it’s finally found a wall on which to hang.

Awesome “little thing” number five is the fourth workout I’ve incorporated into my weekly routine.

I’ve been enjoying the training area we carved out in our garage, and in February, I made sure to get in there at least once a week (I aspire to adding another day somehow, but this is a good start)! Being the creature of habit that I am, it quickly became a Sunday thing. If you’ll remember, it all sprung from the arrival of the WaveMaster heavy bag that Callaghan got me for Christmas. I think I started working out here toward the end of January, having been delayed due to illness, but it really took off as a regular thing in February.

Every week, I look forward to my training session in the garage as much as I look forward to our three Body Combat classes at the gym. Though I mix it up and never do the same workout twice, the main elements are always cardio, stretching, abs, shadow boxing, and bag-work. As for the particulars of what I do, I just go with whatever I feel like doing. I don’t go in at the same time every Sunday, and I don’t time my workouts… sometimes I do a short session (20-30 minutes), sometimes longer (up to an hour). I have goals for the year, though, one of which is to find someone who can hold pads to come over and train with me!

Moving on to another totally random favorite thing:

6). Overseas, online pharmacy: InHousePharmacy.vu

Our latest delivery for Ronnie James (aka the Wrah-Wrah) from InHousePharmacy.com

I may have mentioned this pharmacy before, in passing, but I want to provide details now because we’re so happy with the service we get from it!

When we started treating the Wrah-Wrah for his pulmonary health challenges, I researched pharmacy options and found 4CornersPharmacy.com, which recently became InHousePharmacy.vu. The “vu” domain stands for Vanuatu, the country from which the medications are shipped. Yes, we get Ronnie James’ Albuterol/Ventolin inhaler and his steroid inhalers from a tiny island in the South Pacific. Online pharmacies can be sketchy, so I first vetted it as thoroughly as I could online, then we asked our vet about it, and then we showed her the goods once our first order arrived. She approved.

InHousePharmacy.vu’s customer service is outstanding; they’re extremely efficient and professional, and they offer FREE SHIPPING to the United States (and maybe to other places… I don’t know). We’ve been using this pharmacy for about five months now, and we’re very satisfied with it, so I figured I ought to share!

On that note, I’ll finish this list with a few of the new cosmetic and skin-care products I’m loving that aren’t tested on animals, since transitioning to cruelty-free beauty products was the biggest of my New Year’s resolutions….

7). Milani Color Statement lipstick in 26 (Nude Crème).

Milani Color Statement lipstick in 26 (Nude Crème)

I’ve never been a nude lip color person – I’ve always gravitated toward deeper red and berry shades, or darker neutrals – but on my quest to try all new things for the sake of the animals, I thought I’d venture out of my colorful comfort zone. Milani’s 26 (Nude Crème) is the lightest shade in their Color Statement line, and it’s the only nude lip color I’ve ever felt comfortable wearing. Callaghan was the first to give his approval (very important!), and then I got some compliments on it from friends at work, so I’m convinced! I love the lipstick’s formula, too. It feels nice, it wears well, and it also reapplies well, so it gets bonus points for that. I like it so much that I’ll probably pick up a few of my more typical colors at some point. I find Milani products at CVS.

8). Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Waterproof Eye Pencil (in zero).

Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Waterproof Eye Pencil (in zero)

I can’t believe it took a New Year’s resolution to go cruelty-free for me to find my Holy Grail lower-lash eyeliner. I’d been using one by Stila, which had been better than the Revlon one I’d used for years before that, and I just figured it wasn’t possible for eyeliners to wear really well under the eye for extended periods of time. Then I made this resolution and sprang for Urban Decay’s 24/7 eye pencil in the color “zero” (black), and wow! I’m so impressed. It’s creamy and easy to apply, and it literally wears the same ALL DAY. On the downside, it’s Urban Decay, so it’s pricey, and its creaminess means that you have to sharpen it often (it wears down quickly). I just repurchased it, even though I’m not done with the first one yet. It’s one of those things that’s worth the cost. I like an intense eye, anyway, so it’s worth it to me!

9). Urban Decay Naked Skin Weightless Complete Coverage Concealer (in light neutral).

Urban Decay Naked Skin Weightless Complete Coverage Concealer (in light neutral)
(Black negligee from Victoria’s Secret)

(I couldn’t resist using my black negligee as the stage for Urban Decay’s “naked” concealer. Just work with my sense of humor here.

Aaand yeah, while I was at the Urban Decay display, I picked up this (gulp) ridiculously expensive concealer. This whole high-end cosmetic stuff is atypical of me, by the way. I’m a drugstore makeup kind of person, but after successfully replacing 95% of my cosmetics with outstanding, inexpensive drugstore cruelty-free products – I think I might focus an entire future blog post on the glories of e.l.f. – I was once again just down to the eyeliner and the concealer. (Usually when I splurge on expensive stuff at Ulta, it’s for eyeliners and concealers.)

This concealer goes on as a silky liquid, but as soon as you pat it in, it somehow vanishes while covering what it needs to cover. It’s an invisible concealer that actually conceals, and the formula is simply magic. I can’t describe it. I’m not a beauty blogger. But I can tell you my opinion: this concealer is worth the expense.

(Yes, I know that Urban Decay’s parent company is L’Oreal, indisputably the worst offender in the cosmetics animal-testing industry, but Urban Decay products themselves are not tested on animals. Urban Decay makes the Leaping Bunny list of cruelty-free brands.)

And finally, we have a skin care product!

10). Acure Day Cream (for normal to dry skin).

Acure Day Cream (for normal to dry skin)

I’m pretty much there with cosmetics, but I’m nowhere near the point of finding all the good, affordable cruelty-free skincare items I need to find. However, it’s only March. I’m taking my time. I have a year to fulfill my resolution (I still have to find cruelty-free hair products, too)! I did discover this moisturizer, though, and I really love it. It wears well under my sunscreen, and it has a fresh, natural citrus scent.

Some text on the packaging:

“gotu kola stem cell + 1% chlorella growth factor – firm, hydrate, restore – clinical collagen + hyaluronic support”

And the text on the box further informs that the moisturizer is organic, vegan, and free of silicone, sulfates, synthetic fragrances, phthalates, parabens, gluten, petroleum and PEG. It’s cruelty-free, it won’t clog pores, and it’s 100% biodegradable.

I’m not going to question any of that. I’m just going to go with it. This moisturizer can be found at Target, so it’s affordable, and there are other products in the same line, so I predict (I hope!) you’ll find other Acure favorites here as the year goes on!

That’s it for February! Thank you for reading, as always!

That Asian-Looking Chick

poet-writer-blogger. combat sports-fitness enthusiast. combat veteran. vegan. aspiring minimalist. my kids have paws.

Pop culture

T.V. series, food obsessions, and more: February Favorites!

Spooktastic: THE BOY (A review, of sorts. No spoilers.)

One film, one T.V. series, delicious indulgences, and cruelty-free make-up: January Favorites!

“Beasts of No Nation” and The Oscars should have collided, but they did not, and I can’t believe it.

We got wrapped up in the Golden Globes and I have no qualms about sharing my thoughts.

2015 Favorites!

L’Hôpital d’Antibes – Silent Hill (with a touch of American Horror Story: Asylum).

Yes… we’re still in France. (Many pics!)

What I’m Digging Right Now – November Favorites

Beasts of No Nation: A review, of sorts (No Spoilers)

How to cover a door window.

What I’m Digging Right Now – September Favorites

I finished “Make Me” by Lee Child. (This is not a review.)

The New Reacher is Nigh.

What I’m Digging Right Now – August Favorites

Callaghan, 0; Peanut Butter, 5.

What I’m Digging Right Now – July Favorites

“Southpaw” floats like a butterfly, stings like a bee.

Not Self/less Enough.

What I’m Digging Right Now – June Favorites

Jurassic World… because sometimes, your life is lacking in dinosaurage. (“Rage” being the operative part of the word.)

What I’m Digging Right Now – May Favorites

Mad Max: Fury Road – (SPOILER ALERT!!)

What I’m Digging Right Now – April Favorites

What I’m Digging Right Now – March Favorites

The Breakfast Club according to Callaghan (or, the seven stages of Callaghan during The Breakfast Club).

Greetings from France! I’ve got some pictures.

Today is March 6th, and this is significant.

What I’m Digging Right Now – February Favorites

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