Showing posts with label favorite. Show all posts
Showing posts with label favorite. Show all posts

Thursday, September 18, 2014

For Ishanicat and Sakhzi

Reposting this because some of my friends need happiness in their lives and I'm hoping some of my favourites are general enough to make anyone happy. Also hoping that words referring to happy things are enough to make people happy and remind them of the beauty of life and all that jazz.


A few of my favourite things.

Pens that work. Unexpected hugs. A smile from a stranger. A satisfying article. A job well done. Orange juice. A hot choco-lava cake. Soft, warm cookies. Unexpected compliments. Any compliments! The scent of a bakery, the fragrance of impending rain and wet soil. Knowing things. Stumbling upon the perfect word to describe something, as opposed to having it on the tip of your tongue and not being able to remember it. When you vaguely wish for something, and it just happens. When the perfect song to match your mood starts playing. Good food. Chocolate food. Coconut biscuits. Pretty pictures and scenes. A fun holiday. A few hours with friends. Watching a child completely absorbed in doing some inconsequential thing. Pleasant surprises. A productive day. A day just spent lazing around. Catching up with old friends. A good, stimulating debate or conversation. Your favorite show coming on TV, just as your boredom peaks. A funny ad. Celebration. Pretty lights on houses. Presents! Palm trees and beaches, not necessarily in the same place. Discovering a new song, artiste, sitcom or book. Writing, reading, talking and listening. A happy story. Shopping, and stumbling across a pretty bag, or a hair clip, or the perfect outfit. When the sun is setting behind the blue curtains of my blue room and imparts that warm, dim glow. Being awake when no one else is. Peace. Neat work; a tidy, organized room. Rediscovering a favorite toy from your childhood that you'd forgotten all about. Making lists. A beautiful morning, welcome with a hot cup. Smiles and laughs and wit and humor and a pinch of sarcasm. Being surrounded by the people I love, when I love them. A banana split sundae. Toast with butter and jam. A slice of bread slathered with nutella. Biscuits soaked in tea. A hot, steaming cup of thick hot chocolate. Caramelized apples. Any apples! The smell of coffee and rain and flowers and sunshine. Pretty boquets with liles and orchids and little white and yellow rosebuds with dewdrops on them. An overflowing fruit basket, filled to the brim with mangoes and apples and bananas and oranges and strawberries and cherries and blueberries whatnot. Strawberries and cream and chocolate! Blueberry muffins. Being dressed up all prettily, with my hair done and my heels on and my dress just right. Losing a pound (or two). Setting a new high score. Opening my eyes in the morning with a smile on my face. Closing my eyes at night with a smile. A nice, long, hot bath, complete with scented candles and bubbles. Shutting my eyes and imagining and hoping and wishing and dreaming and fantasizing. Finding that thing, or a friend texting, just when you need it most. Sitting in a corner, or on a window-seat, and reading that perfect book while it pours outside. Slowly removing the outer layer of MnM's. Long, shapely nails. Making people laugh. Laughing. Melting chocolate in my mouth while the rest of it melts in my hand. Getting wet in the rain, provided my phone is safely dry. The euphoria after a satisfying run. The sun's rays shining on me on a mountain top. Snuggling in my warm bed on a winter morning. Cuddling with my mother. A baby's laugh. A child's innocent laugh. A baby's gurgle. The smell of petrol. Lying flat on my back after a long day. Massages! The color of newly mowed lemon grass, the color of the Australian sky over the Outback. Purple and magenta and crimson and black. Serendipity and Enchantment. Henna on my hands. A trouble-free day. My mom feeding me when I'm sick. Ganging up on my parents with my brother. Finally finishing that huge mound of work. Reminiscing old memories; rediscovering long-forgotten pictures. Raindrops on windows, and drawing on a dusty windscreen. Playing with connector pens. Designing something really pretty. The taste and smell of cinnamon. British accents!

And bluebells.

Walking in that.

~Sam


Sunday, August 31, 2014

August Favourites

This has been a pretty quiet month on the favourites front (I think?? I usually have a post saved in my drafts to record favourites as they happen because I will forget them all by the end of the month, or forget whether they happened in this month or the last one (or five years ago, for that matter) but I didn't do that this month because a) nothing really stood out and b) I was lazy and overworked.).
But from what I can remember:

1) Birthday month!!!! I had a lovely birthday, more or less, and it involved a lot of chocolate, singing and trying on the most amazing (Harry-Potter themed, constellation-having) cape ever (not that I've tried on many. Or any, apart from this one), among other things unfit for public consumption. Birthday also meant that all of my friends wrote me happy mushy messages about how awesome I am, which is always good to hear about, and generally overwhelmed me with all of the love.

2) Birthday month also means that OUR BLOG IS NOW THREE YEARS OLD! Which sounds both very young and very old. I'm glad it's lasted this long, even if our frequency of posting has kind of withered. Speaking of...

3) I wrote stuff this month, after a while. It felt good. ^_^

4) Jessie wrote me a poem! It's the first poem anyone has ever written for me (of course, there will be more), and it's beautiful, and I love it, and I love her, and that is all.

5) I got (even more) posters for my room. Must redecorate and move things around to make space. X_X But now I can have a mini wall mural of baby Po to look at each morning, so it's all worth it.

6) I found (what I think are) amazing presents for some of my friends! :D

7) And got amazing presents from my friends! So many books, I'm so happy! And a lovely tshirt, and poster, and just generally good stuff.

8) I did okay at this thing I thought I would totally suck at. And decided to do this thing I thought I'd never have the courage/stupidity to do. Let's see how it works out though.

9) I went home. ^_^

10) And video-chatted with some of my lovely friends. ^_^

11) And updated my wall of memories (which is basically ticket stubs and coasters and all sorts of memorabilia stuck on my wall) and wallowed in nostalgia for a while. ^_^

12) And reached out to an old friend with whom I now have some of the loveliest email threads ever (I can't believe that only happened in the middle of this month, it feels like so much longer!). Non-work emails are the best.

13) And received and replied to a letter. ^_^ Jess, if you're reading this, I AM WORKING ON YOUR REPLY IT WILL COME SOON I SWEAR.

This is a horribly undetailed post but suffice to say that, now that I think about it, it's been an absolutely lovely month of friends and family and general joy. Touchwood.

OH, HOW COULD I FORGET, 14) I GOT AN ACTUAL DREAMCATCHER!!! Thank you Darren. The internet tells me this is not cultural appropriation so I'm just going to be an ostrich and not think about that anymore.

15) Oh, and I auditioned for a play, like I'd said I would last month! I wasn't great, but it was fun.

16) And today Doobie and I snuck into the teachers' colony and swung on the swings in their playground (the playground is for the teachers' kids, not the teachers. That would be weird. And awesome) and talked and talked and walked and the sky was a stunning blue which turned orange-y and the trees were outlined against the sky and the the swings swung gently in the breeze after we left them for the slide and see-saw, looking very beautiful and vaguely horror-movie-ish, and it was just an excellent evening, all in all.

So yes, good month. I like this favourites thing, it makes me focus on the good.

I shall leave now.

Much love to you all.
~Sam

Thursday, July 31, 2014

July Favourites

It's been a long, happy month (except the last week, that kind of sucked) of simple pleasures and awesome new experiences; spontaneous, impulsive decisions, largely consisting of unplanned hours of unproductivity and happiness. Though I really must get back to the working life.

1. MY BIRTHDAY IS COMING! Incredible slowly, but it's comin'!

2. Hot chocolate and cardigan weather. <3 This amazing white crop sweater I saw someone wearing, with NERD written on the front in pink or red or something. So simple, so attractive. My new long blue skirt. Long skirts, generally. Watching "Begin Again"! I love that movie. And its soundtrack. God bless ya, Noelly, for telling me about it. Other good songs, generally. Playing childhood games and just..being happy with friends. It's all one needs, really. And also childhood music. I listened to Hilary Duff again after like five years and relived that entire phase and it was so nostalgic and happy. And Jesse McCartneyso much Jesse Mccartney, and Enrique Iglesias and Ricky Martin and The Ketchup Song! Ah, youth. :')

3. Baby love! It started with cooing over adorable footballer babies (seriously have you even seen Thiago Messi's cheeks what are they), and then I spent a happy afternoon hour playing with a random one year old my friends and I found near her house. She was so delighted with the simple act of throwing a pencil away and getting it fetched back for her, the cute little destructive dictator, it was adorable. And then called me the vernacular word for elder sister and I just melted. Baby ^_^

4.  We redid our room, and I finally have a mattress on the floor, thus fulfilling my lifelong dream and aspiration (I will now stop calling it that, I swear). Also I have a view of my desk from my spot on the bed, which is nice. There's something about looking at a desk and a chair which appeals to me. That, and pictures of pathways leading to pretty places. Anyway, desk in question is surrounded by various memorabilia I've collected over the past couple years, so that's nice too. And I can finally see my posters from this end of the room! They're on the wall on what used to be my side of the room, except I usually had my back to that wall and so never really got to appreciate them. Man, I have good taste. And we finally got rid of the bunk bed (which is never something I thought I'd want to do, but whatever), and our room is now unbelievably bright. And so much homelier!  Yay!

5. I went karaoke-ing (?) for the first time in my life, and IT WAS SO AMAZING I LOVE IT! I even sang! With the mic a safe distance from my discordant voice, of course, we wanted to have fun, not scar people.

6. I participated in a reading of the play Baklavia, by D.M Larson, available here, which was so much fun! The play itself is awesome-about a pastry factory which declares itself a new country because the government has increased taxes-and reading out the parts in character was crazy fun. I played Clenious, a strange cousin who sings a lot- the strangeness I could handle, the singing was horrible, but it was an amazing experience in general, lots of laughing and innuendoes and happiness, so it didn't even matter that I didn't know any tunes. I fully intend to audition the next time a play is staged here; let's hope it works out!

7. The month got a little less awesome towards the end because I felt like a fail person in life for a number of reasons and was generally emo and needy. Getting quick reassurances from my friends that I was an awesome person (no idea why I even doubted it) was amazing. Special shout out to Anne for the call (and generous spending of balance :P), Elly for the timely "hi" and for generally listening to my ranting so much this week, and to my Empathy Horses for the Korean hand heart and the animal smileys and the "of course you're awesome what is wrong with you" and the general love. Thanks, you guys. You're the best. <3 #goop


Much love,
~Sam
Note to self: Find and use synonyms for amazing. 

Monday, December 3, 2012

December

As of now, my most favorite month of the year is December. Because the weather. And because it's the ending, and the time for reflection and retrospection and introspection and bonding and talking and loving and hugging. And cuddling and warmth and soup and bread. And because it's a sign that we're alive, and things are moving, maybe not where and how we want them to, but moving. And changing. Breathing.

There's just so much to December.

~Sam