Rants
Category
This Is Not My Dress and Other Thoughts
This is going to sound arrogant (and perhaps it is), but I rarely find people whose thoughts on fashion I’m genuinely interested in. The insiders can be uncritical and take themselves way too seriously, the outsiders often don’t understand how the industry works and/or are bitter because they are outsiders. The best person to have views on style – and on most things, really – is a somewhat disillusioned (former) insider.
On Recommending Books
“Oh, you like books, tell me, what should I read?” is among my least favourite questions in the world. It’s not that I don’t like to recommend books per se – I do, I like doing almost anything book-related and it’s also rather flattering when people see you as some sort of a book whisperer who can pick the right one for them. But that’s exactly the problem: recommending books is a bit like working with vulnerable animals – very tricky and also a huge responsibility. What if I mess up?
Lockdown Life: Training Like a Madwoman
A Facebook friend recently shared a Sunday Times article about middle-aged middle-class women who are hell-bent on exiting the lockdown with defined abs. I haven’t read the article for two reasons: 1) it was behind a paywall and 2) I was afraid it would hit too close to home. There is no denying I’m spending significant portions of my week strengthening my core. And I have a hunch that these ab-obsessed women do not come out of that article very well.
Lockdown Life: Rethinking Things
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Writing this post has proved trickier than I thought: not because I have no views on isolation living or because they are too complex to get down on paper/screen (frankly, they are pretty basic). It’s not what I have to say, it’s the cont..
Yes, These Are Actual New Year’s Resolutions
I’m writing this in a hotel room in Thessaloniki, after 10 days of exploring Greece – proof, if needed, that life can have extremely unexpected plans for you. As J is now working in Athens, I will most likely be coming to Greece often, something I’m looking ..
Life Update & the Future of the Blog
Well, yes. I have been awfully quiet here. It’s been mostly for a very specific and I think understandable reason: I started a new job three weeks ago and you know me and work – it can get out of hand. The good news is that I am extremely happy with the job:..
On the Unintended Consequences of Exercise
I have been working out regularly for a little bit more than a year now. I do it twice a week, with a personal trainer, for 45 minutes, at 7am. When I’m finished, I get a coffee from my favourite café across the street and walk to the office, which takes abo..
On How I Read
Let me tell you right away that this is going to be a boring post. I have already shared with you my best tips on how to get more reading done, I’ve got nothing else to give on that front. But I’ve been asked – many times – how I, personally, read. When exac..
On Thinking Yourself out of the Box
I like to believe I’m a pretty clear-eyed person when it comes to myself: I tend to think I know myself well, don’t have many illusions and can assess my strengths and weaknesses with relative accuracy. While I do often ignore that knowledge – I’m frankly no..
On Dressing During the Apocalypse
If you are a regular reader, you know that I occasionally talk about sustainability and environment and climate change, but not really in depth. It’s not because I don’t think these things are important, I think they are HUGELY important – I have worked with..