I’ve had fiction writer’s block for way too long, but reading this helped… I think.
I read this and realized I hadn’t listened to any Tribe Called Quest in way too long so I loaded a playlist while I took a bath and it’s my new form of self care.
Thisis a great piece about why some black women have a fondness for fur and you should read it…
Some more concept art for my webcomic Mishaps and Matrimony! I am still in the process of developing the story and the characters, so I’ll be posting some W.I.P Posts as I render new ideas, looks, and scenes :)
This Friday Reads is dedicated to saying good-bye to our Marketing Manager, Loretta. She is leaving Simon & Schuster Canada and moving onto bigger things, and we couldn’t be happier for her. So check out what she’s been reading her last week at S&S Canada, it might just be your next favourite book!
Andrea, Digital Marketing Associate: I’m nearly done The Visitors by Catherine Burns. It’s a haunting and unsettling debut novel about a timid spinster who lives with her domineering brother and “the visitors” who live in the cellar. I won’t say more except that it’ll leave you looking at your neighbours with new eyes and wondering if they’re as “normal” as they seem…
Siobhan, Assistant to the President & Editorial Director: I just finished reading the ARC of Until It Fades by K.A. Tucker, which was a break from what I have been reading lately. It was such a sweet and satisfying romance, with a strong female protagonist who doesn’t need a man, but finds love nonetheless. Did I mention the love interest is a chiseled yet sentimental hockey player? I’m here for it!
Jacquelynne, Marketing Assistant: I just finished reading I Believe in a Thing Called Love by Maurene Goo, and oh my gosh it was ADORABLE. I loved Desi’s over-achieving personality (reminded me a bit of myself when I was a teenager) and her two best friends who were total enablers in her crazy plan to get a boyfriend. I also learnt about K-Drama’s, and might dive into one or two this weekend. The way Maurene Goo wrote about teenagers, and the high school experience was very authentic and reminiscent of Jenny Han. The situations were SO awkwardly adorable that I caught myself cringing a few times, but couldn’t stop myself from laughing out loud on the subway. If you’re into cute, light, contemporary YA than this is the book for you.
Loretta, Marketing Manager: Sing, Unburied, Sing is incredible. I haven’t encountered writing this powerful since reading All the Light We Cannot See. The story of Jojo and his family is in turns sorrowful, shocking, and stunningly beautiful.
Jojo’s childhood is wrought with hardship. His daily challenges of poverty and abuse are overlain with the influence of the spiritual world; the ghosts in this place have stories to tell. They remind us of the circuitous nature of the past and the connectivity of life. They remind us of the importance of telling and listening to stories. This novel from Jesmyn Ward feels like a gift. It is a rare and beautiful thing.
are you a hair up or hair down kinda person? horror movie or a rom-com? do you like coffee or tea? are you moon or sun? park or coffee shop? romantic love or platonic love?
are you a hair up or hair down kinda person? horror movie or a rom-com? do you like coffee or tea? are you moon or sun? park or coffee shop? romantic love or platonic love?
are you a hair up or hair down kinda person? horror movie or a rom-com? do you like coffee or tea? are you moon or sun? park or coffee shop? romantic love or platonic love?
This is NOT my usual content, and I’m sorry about that. But for my followers who are possibly interested in my personal life, I have a little background for you in the romantic department. I’m to a point where I think I need to just put this out there and let the universe take care of it for me so, here goes nothing.
I’m convinced that I met the real-life version of JJ Maybank (but this means much less of a man hoe). A traveling, weed-smoking, understanding gentleman that happened to be within arms reach this while time. My very own JJ Maybank was RIGHT THERE IN MY BEST FRIENDS FAMILY FOREVER.
I didn’t believe in love at first sight, I really didn’t. My love life is kind of a struggle. For a while, I blamed it on commitment issues. Then decided maybe I was just *scared*.
The first (and only) boy I ever fell in love with was a year above me. Every girl in theatre (and out of theatre) swooned over him. He was the definition of perfection.
6'1, thick dark hair, dark green eyes with an absolutely sculpted body. He had the voice of an angel and dance moves to get any sad-spirited person moving.
That’s not particularly what I cared about, but this story isn’t about him.
The next boy I was romantically involved with was a good friend of mine. We had an obvious connection (though I didn’t realize it was a *friend* kind of connection). I dated him for 4 days and dumped him ( broke his little heart) because I realized he was manipulative and possessive.
Mr. Rockstar is next, a year younger than me. He was the only guy I’ve ever done actual ‘couple’ things with. He seemed to be a gentleman. He always asked when doing things, took me on nice dates, played the guitar for me. But I should have taken our difference in religious and political opinion as a red flag. Soon enough he was going off to college, and that was something I didn’t mind. Though I guess the whole 'long distance’ thing was a problem for him. And he wanted the “full college experience”. This tore me a little bit, but I soon recovered.
My most ambitious quest for a guy was my ex-boss. Now I know how bad that sounds, it is. We also had lots of differences in opinion. But he was *so* funny and didn’t stand up for shitty men. So I saw him as a great guy. He, unfortunately, saw us on different paths (and also got my age wrong, showed how much he cared.)
After him I kind of gave up, I talked to a few guys, even went back to some old guys I talked to minorly. But, just as it was before, I wasn’t interested enough. I knew I had to be all in for a guy if I wanted it to last any amount of time. So I saw this time as a time for myself.
Not too long ago my best friend was going through an extremely hard time. Of course, I was there for her every step of the way. After the whole *event* she went through, I decided I wanted us to have a night out. Just us. I asked her where she wanted to go, saying I’d take her anywhere.
“The Bistro! It’s new downtown, my cousin works there. It’s kind of expensive but-”
“I don’t care, I’m taking you, sounds good.” She smiled, just nodding.
It was a mere hour before we were standing outside of the restaurant. It was a small place between a brokerage and a tobacco store.
“It’s not a very busy place because no one knows about it yet.” She said pushing the door open. I was fiddling with my keys, shoving them in my pocket, then looking up. I immediately made eye contact with a waiter. My heart was pounding in my chest in an instant.
*Woah, what is this feeling?*
It was a mixture of anxiety and a feeling I’m still not sure of, but I knew it wasn’t something I felt before. I couldn’t even see this guy’s face, it was covered by a mask, and he was giving me major butterflies. He then came up, hugging my friend.
*Oh you’ve got to be shitting me. **that’s** her cousin?*
Now I had met this kid before, about 5 years ago. And I would say *met* very loosely. I happened to be sitting in his house and he happened to walk through.
My friend spoke to him for a moment as we were led to our seats by our waitress. All while this is happening *I’m* trying to figure out what I just felt. We ordered our food and he came over to talk to us again. He talked to her about how he dealt with his emotions, meditation and a little bit of shweed if you know what I mean. He talked about how relaxing it was traveling all over the country and just having fun. The more he talked the more I thought.
*Maybe those feelings I was having? Was intuition that this guy was my type to a T.*
I left the restaurant with my friend *knowing* that I had to get this guy in my life, whether that meant he was just a friend or not.
Days later I told her about it, being extremely nervous, considering she was pretty close to him. That’s like telling someone you like their sister. Mind you this is my best friend, I don’t want her angry with me.
But she was quite the opposite.
“Oh! This is so exciting!”
“What?” I asked, looking up from my feet.
“I would rather you date him than almost anyone. You would be cute together!” I breathed a sigh of relief, metaphorically wiping sweat off of my forehead.
Days later my friend needed me to take her to a doctor’s appointment.
“Do you wanna go see your aunt? Since she got that surgery recently?” I asked as we headed to the office.
“You just wanna see him, don’t you?” She gave me a sly look, I kept my eyes on the road.
“No, I want to check on your aunt.” This was true, her aunt loved me. Said I could hold an intelligent conversation well and she found it admirable. Though my friend was also right, I was hoping he would be there.
“Yeah, okay.” She laughed, shoving my shoulder. “We can go see her.” And so we did, afterward.
We had long conversations with her aunt, her cousin walking out in the middle of one after we had been there for an hour. My friend looked at me with a smirk and I just rolled my eyes.
“You know, I would love it if you guys just moved in. I think it would be good for my mental health.” She said. Before I could even process that sentence, her son was intervening.
“Yeah! And I can make you guys breakfast in the morning and dinner at night. I need more people to cook for.” On the outside, I was cool calm, and collect. But on the *inside* I was screaming. This is too good to be true, what is even happening.
I set my drink down after taking the last sip. No more than 2 minutes later, mid-conversation the boy walks up and grabs my cup.
“You know that’s hers right.” She said, pointing to me.
“Yes mom, I know who’s it is.” He laughed, pouring more water into it and setting it in front of me. *Men like this actually exist, like actually exist!!!*
I thanked him and took another sip of water to cover my totally behooved face.
Soon enough we were on the topic of cooking and this really excited the man. He whipped out 4 spoons and two different quarts of olive oil.
“Now one of these is from Walmart and the other is from a healthy organic store. I want you to guess which ones which.” He poured some on the spoons, handing them to me one by one. I swallowed the first one, making my face scrunch up.
“Well, that one tastes like plastic.” He smiled, handing me the next one. This one was smooth. “That one actually kind of tastes good, on its own.” His smile grew.
“Yes!” He then went on with a detailed explanation of different olive oils and why some of them taste so bad. He cooks real, fancy food.
I can’t explain how much I like this guy. Not only is he all these chivalrous and kind things. He was also raised by a family who helped him work through his emotions properly. He listens when you talk about how you feel and tries to understand. He’s gone through hardships and he isn’t an asshole, he just learned from them. His spirit is free and fun and I just can’t get over it. I’m really hoping this is the one thing in my life that works out for me, because before this my luck was pretty slim (not just my love life).
So I’m personally asking the universe, please. Please don’t pull this rug out from under me. Just let me be happy for a little while, even if it’s temporary.
This is NOT my usual content, and I’m sorry about that. But for my followers who are possibly interested in my personal life, I have a little background for you in the romantic department. I’m to a point where I think I need to just put this out there and let the universe take care of it for me so, here goes nothing.
I’m convinced that I met the real-life version of JJ Maybank (but this means much less of a man hoe). A traveling, weed-smoking, understanding gentleman that happened to be within arms reach this while time. My very own JJ Maybank was RIGHT THERE IN MY BEST FRIENDS FAMILY FOREVER.
I didn’t believe in love at first sight, I really didn’t. My love life is kind of a struggle. For a while, I blamed it on commitment issues. Then decided maybe I was just *scared*.
The first (and only) boy I ever fell in love with was a year above me. Every girl in theatre (and out of theatre) swooned over him. He was the definition of perfection.
6'1, thick dark hair, dark green eyes with an absolutely sculpted body. He had the voice of an angel and dance moves to get any sad-spirited person moving.
That’s not particularly what I cared about, but this story isn’t about him.
The next boy I was romantically involved with was a good friend of mine. We had an obvious connection (though I didn’t realize it was a *friend* kind of connection). I dated him for 4 days and dumped him ( broke his little heart) because I realized he was manipulative and possessive.
Mr. Rockstar is next, a year younger than me. He was the only guy I’ve ever done actual ‘couple’ things with. He seemed to be a gentleman. He always asked when doing things, took me on nice dates, played the guitar for me. But I should have taken our difference in religious and political opinion as a red flag. Soon enough he was going off to college, and that was something I didn’t mind. Though I guess the whole 'long distance’ thing was a problem for him. And he wanted the “full college experience”. This tore me a little bit, but I soon recovered.
My most ambitious quest for a guy was my ex-boss. Now I know how bad that sounds, it is. We also had lots of differences in opinion. But he was *so* funny and didn’t stand up for shitty men. So I saw him as a great guy. He, unfortunately, saw us on different paths (and also got my age wrong, showed how much he cared.)
After him I kind of gave up, I talked to a few guys, even went back to some old guys I talked to minorly. But, just as it was before, I wasn’t interested enough. I knew I had to be all in for a guy if I wanted it to last any amount of time. So I saw this time as a time for myself.
Not too long ago my best friend was going through an extremely hard time. Of course, I was there for her every step of the way. After the whole *event* she went through, I decided I wanted us to have a night out. Just us. I asked her where she wanted to go, saying I’d take her anywhere.
“The Bistro! It’s new downtown, my cousin works there. It’s kind of expensive but-”
“I don’t care, I’m taking you, sounds good.” She smiled, just nodding.
It was a mere hour before we were standing outside of the restaurant. It was a small place between a brokerage and a tobacco store.
“It’s not a very busy place because no one knows about it yet.” She said pushing the door open. I was fiddling with my keys, shoving them in my pocket, then looking up. I immediately made eye contact with a waiter. My heart was pounding in my chest in an instant.
*Woah, what is this feeling?*
It was a mixture of anxiety and a feeling I’m still not sure of, but I knew it wasn’t something I felt before. I couldn’t even see this guy’s face, it was covered by a mask, and he was giving me major butterflies. He then came up, hugging my friend.
*Oh you’ve got to be shitting me. **that’s** her cousin?*
Now I had met this kid before, about 5 years ago. And I would say *met* very loosely. I happened to be sitting in his house and he happened to walk through.
My friend spoke to him for a moment as we were led to our seats by our waitress. All while this is happening *I’m* trying to figure out what I just felt. We ordered our food and he came over to talk to us again. He talked to her about how he dealt with his emotions, meditation and a little bit of shweed if you know what I mean. He talked about how relaxing it was traveling all over the country and just having fun. The more he talked the more I thought.
*Maybe those feelings I was having? Was intuition that this guy was my type to a T.*
I left the restaurant with my friend *knowing* that I had to get this guy in my life, whether that meant he was just a friend or not.
Days later I told her about it, being extremely nervous, considering she was pretty close to him. That’s like telling someone you like their sister. Mind you this is my best friend, I don’t want her angry with me.
But she was quite the opposite.
“Oh! This is so exciting!”
“What?” I asked, looking up from my feet.
“I would rather you date him than almost anyone. You would be cute together!” I breathed a sigh of relief, metaphorically wiping sweat off of my forehead.
Days later my friend needed me to take her to a doctor’s appointment.
“Do you wanna go see your aunt? Since she got that surgery recently?” I asked as we headed to the office.
“You just wanna see him, don’t you?” She gave me a sly look, I kept my eyes on the road.
“No, I want to check on your aunt.” This was true, her aunt loved me. Said I could hold an intelligent conversation well and she found it admirable. Though my friend was also right, I was hoping he would be there.
“Yeah, okay.” She laughed, shoving my shoulder. “We can go see her.” And so we did, afterward.
We had long conversations with her aunt, her cousin walking out in the middle of one after we had been there for an hour. My friend looked at me with a smirk and I just rolled my eyes.
“You know, I would love it if you guys just moved in. I think it would be good for my mental health.” She said. Before I could even process that sentence, her son was intervening.
“Yeah! And I can make you guys breakfast in the morning and dinner at night. I need more people to cook for.” On the outside, I was cool calm, and collect. But on the *inside* I was screaming. This is too good to be true, what is even happening.
I set my drink down after taking the last sip. No more than 2 minutes later, mid-conversation the boy walks up and grabs my cup.
“You know that’s hers right.” She said, pointing to me.
“Yes mom, I know who’s it is.” He laughed, pouring more water into it and setting it in front of me. *Men like this actually exist, like actually exist!!!*
I thanked him and took another sip of water to cover my totally behooved face.
Soon enough we were on the topic of cooking and this really excited the man. He whipped out 4 spoons and two different quarts of olive oil.
“Now one of these is from Walmart and the other is from a healthy organic store. I want you to guess which ones which.” He poured some on the spoons, handing them to me one by one. I swallowed the first one, making my face scrunch up.
“Well, that one tastes like plastic.” He smiled, handing me the next one. This one was smooth. “That one actually kind of tastes good, on its own.” His smile grew.
“Yes!” He then went on with a detailed explanation of different olive oils and why some of them taste so bad. He cooks real, fancy food.
I can’t explain how much I like this guy. Not only is he all these chivalrous and kind things. He was also raised by a family who helped him work through his emotions properly. He listens when you talk about how you feel and tries to understand. He’s gone through hardships and he isn’t an asshole, he just learned from them. His spirit is free and fun and I just can’t get over it. I’m really hoping this is the one thing in my life that works out for me, because before this my luck was pretty slim (not just my love life).
So I’m personally asking the universe, please. Please don’t pull this rug out from under me. Just let me be happy for a little while, even if it’s temporary.
From Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge, to Mohabbatein, Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi and now Befikre- director Aditya Chopra has showcased love in various ways since his first classic unforgettable film DDLJ.
Today’s film though was a tough one to see. To sum up my general thoughts…the first half of the film was flavorless, exhausting and simply not appealing. The second half kept me at this, “oh its getting…
