Songs for Summer

CHVRCHES - The Mother We Share

Dan Croll - Compliment Your Soul

Empire of the Sun - Alive

Caveman - In The City

HAERTS - Wings

Still Corners - Fireflies

Hipster Statues

He must be contemplating the new Daft Punk album...

See them all here.

Weekend Reading List

I have discovered my spirit animal, via an online test. I had no idea it was so easy.

Balance Your Work and Personal Life Like A Pro

I've been wanting to make fun sleeping bags for years! Anthropologie beat me to it.

Care-less: The Sin of Indifference

I have finally cleaned up my [email] act.

Public Radio Tattoos!

Rediviva: A Rustic Revival

It was just after that random Aberdeen planning commission meeting I went to a while back, discussing ways to improve downtown, when I first heard the news that Andy Bickar had plans to open a new restaurant. The "young people" (that's what they call us, I'm sure) from the meeting headed out to happy hour at Billy's for a debrief. There's nothing quite like commiserating with fellow business owners and community leaders over a beer and a salmon quesadilla, compliments of the chef. Andy was among us and dropped the news that he was in the process of buying the old Mallard's Restaurant building, a few blocks away.

Best. News. Ever.

That was back in November of 2012. Now, we are mere weeks away from the opening of Rediviva. Named after the ship of Captain Robert Gray (yeah, hi, namesake of my store as well), the name literally means "revived."

He is, very literally, reviving this old downtown Aberdeen building. I stopped by last week to see the progress and, let's be honest, to get a first glance at what will probably be my new drinking hole. Compared to the previous building's high-end restaurant, I'll say this is going to be anything but a "hole." During my visit, I saw a lot of scaffolding and drywall, but I could already tell that it will likely be one of the most beautiful spaces in Grays Harbor. High ceilings. Exposed beams. Talk of a chandelier and over-sized art work. I'm in.

Andy wants this place to look like it was plucked right out of downtown Seattle and dropped in Aberdeen. Now, I'm a sucker for good interior design, but I'd also be willing to bet that the food will be top notch as well. He told me about his plans to offer fresh, local and foraged food at reasonable prices. Fresh seafood and oysters. New American, he called it. And let's not forget about the bar: micro-brews, hand-crafted cocktails and Mexican Coke. Anybody who cringes at the idea of serving regular fountain Coke is ok by me.

As far as I can tell, Andy's doing everything right: the layout (banquette seating really is the only reasonable choice), the design (rustic yet modern), historically significant (because us Harborites are weirdly obsessed with the past), and good food (we can assume, based on Andy's fancy awards and press attention). Next time you see me cruising the streets of downtown Aberdeen some random evening on the old Schwinn, you can assume I'm on my way to Rediviva.

Sleepless and Sewing

On Tuesday, I was recovering from an all nighter. Something I don't do often, and only happens on those occasional nights that I either a) am feeling like a fun addict and can't seem to pull myself away from something awesome, regardless of how early I have to get up in the morning or b) worked at the youth shelter in town because a kid needed a place to stay for a night. On this particular Tuesday, it was the latter cause for my sleep depravity. I had rolled crashed into bed at approximately 7:30 am and set my alarm for 9:30 am. Ahhhh sweet sleep...

After working a few hours at my day job, where I had consumed a, let's call it, "decent" amount of coffee I officially achieved zombie status. My brain had stopped working almost completely but my body was full of energy. Most likely from all of that caffeine.

As I was pacing back and forth in my apartment, trying to figure out what I could do to calm my shaky self, my friend Krister Lile saved the day. He had a project for me!

FYI: Krister is cool. He is a local interior and graphic designer and you should probably hire him for your next remodeling project.

Anyway, what he had in mind for this day was a quick sewing project. He was creating invites for a party being held at his parents' house and, being the clever guy he is, he wanted these paper invites to be sewn together.

I busted out my machine as he drove up the hill from his studio to my apartment. I hadn't used my tiny blue sewing machine in quite a while, since I always seem to be working on project at my shop. I was excited to get this thing out again.

The project took less than 10 minutes. We decided on a zig zag stitch. Gold thread on one side (because that is what the bobbin currently held... nobody wants to reload a bobbin, you with me?), black on the other. I sewed each one in line with the next, creating a sort of paper banner, and we used a knife to cut them apart.

We agreed that more paper sewing should be done in the future.

Apple's Got INTENTIONS

I am totally fascinated with this ad.

Apple wins again. They take an inspirational design philosophy and somehow turn it into an inspirational life philosophy... so, naturally, I must buy this thing (or things, I suppose) and cling to these ideals.

if everyone is busy making everything

busy... it's like a dirty word. And, yes... my attention is really divided among so many things...

how can anyone perfect anything?

what am I doing with my life?

we start to confuse convenience with joy

Holy crap. Am I happy? Did a buddhist monk write this ad?

abundance with choice

yes.... ok. I've been to the Cheesecake Factory. I've tried to order from their 20 page menu. Abundance is not always a good thing.

designing something requires focus.

eeek. I need to focus. What do I want in life?

delight

yes...

surprise

want...

love

need...

connection

I suddenly feel like I need a hug

then we begin to craft around our intention

that's a word that seems lost in our culture. It sounds so serious... and... intentional.

it takes time

I'm so impatient... I should work on that.

there are a thousand no's for every yes

O_O

simplify

I need to clean out my closet

we perfect

I want to perfect something

start over

life is so hard sometimes

until everything we touch

where's that hug?

enhances each life it touches

I want to change the world

only then do we sign our work.

Oh, right. This is an ad. But I have so many feelings now. What do I do now? Buy the new Mac Pro? Maybe...

Reminder

Wish List:

I want a Co-Working space in Grays Harbor.

via AcceleratorYYC

A Good Life

kushandwizdom

Trivia Night

Team Assiniboine (it's a mountain in Canada, heard of it?) united for another successful game of Tuesday Trivia at the 8th Street Ale House in Hoquiam. We came out on top in the U.S. History round through no help from me. Oh wait, I knew one answer. What did Yankee Doodle call the feather in his cap?

Macaroni.

We came in second place in the movie round. Henry loves his Crunch 'n Munch.

The loot.

We'll be back next week for music trivia!

Back to Work

I recently started listening to a podcast called Back to Work. It took me a while to realize what the purpose of the show is. I mean, I realized it probably had something to do with working or business or something, but why was it called "Back to Work?' Sounded a little boring to me.

What finally hooked me was their show titled Vocational Wheel where they discussed a listener's so-called "quarter life crisis." I tend to have a quarter life crisis on an almost annual basis, so an entire hour and a half discussion on the topic really peaked my interest. After getting sucked into their (sometimes franticly) entertaining conversation style, I naturally felt the need to listen to every single one of their episodes from the beginning. I've made it through 10 so far and one recurring message has stood out dramatically.

Both of the guys in this podcast would be considered "inspirational" types. They have a lot of great advice and people (like me) spend hours listening to them talk about how to get stuff done (and other less useful topics), but I think their best advice is that inspiration doesn't get anything done.

Seems an idea fraught with irony... and potentially a dangerous thing to tell your faithful followers...

...but for some reason, this just clicked with me.

I've been in the midst of my yearly quarter life crisis and trying to figure out how to make my skills and resources work for me rather than pulling me in so many different directions and causing me stress. I want to find ways to be more successful, especially with the projects I already have in motion, yet I have been finding it difficult to move on many things. I was seeking inspiration when really I should have just gotten back to work (ohhhh... now I get it).

Merlin Mann says in his podcast that new ideas don't come from some external inspiration... they come from doing work. My favorite analogy he makes is that it's like someone who is always asking for tips on running but never actually goes out running... you're never going to get better at running. Run or move on to something else because, really, you're wasting your time worrying about something that will never happen. If you want to be a writer, stop spending all your time buying new notebooks and just write something.

I tend to be a big picture thinker. With big life decisions, I like to have everything figured out before I move forward. Sometimes, when I can't figure out the big picture, I just forget about the whole thing and move on to something else. I'm starting to realize how much this sometimes hinders my success. Sometimes a project gains momentum and I start to doubt the plan, freeze up until I can find my inspiration, then get overwhelmed by the amount of work I have to do.

My big light bulb moment of the week. Do work. How did it take me 28 years to figure this out?

[My other fave advice from Back to Work: Count your priorities, if you've got more than two, you're going to need more hands.]

Get Lucky

Remember When I Used to Write?

I should do that again....

Coolest thing EVAR?!

via Unconsumption

Genius

via DudeCraft

Purity Ring - Fineshrine

I've listened to this song at least 10 times in the last 24 hours and this video reminds me of the vivid dreams I  often have, though thankfully they don't typically involve plane crashes.

Purity Ring - Fineshrine from Young Replicant on Vimeo.

A Place at the Table

A Place at the Table

This looks like a great new documentary investigating the hunger issue in America. Nothing gets me more riled up than a good documentary about our terrible food industry...

The Weekend

Having friends visit from out of town is usually a really great excuse to spend an entire weekend eating and drinking, so of course I was happy to have my friend Steve pay me a visit. I'm not sure whether he finally decided to visit because I am fun to hang out with and he missed our days of playing Settlers of Catan at Portland pubs and Tuesday night karaoke or... he just really wanted to eat some free chocolate at the Chocolate on the Beach Festival.

After I took him on a walk around my historic neighborhood to stretch his legs after his drive up from Oregon, we grabbed my friends Eric, Nikki and Henry and headed for Pacific Beach. It's about a 40 minute drive from my house to this little beach town on the North Coast, so when we arrived, we were hungry and excited to get some chocolate! I tried chocolate granola (yum) and some dark chocolate bits from Blissful Wunders truffles (bonus - Steve bought one of the giant truffles and shared). There was also a booth that had Lavender Raspberry syrup... it was super delicious.

We hopped over to Seabrook to get dinner at Mill 109. They were pretty busy, so we took a walk around the new beach town... well, new-ish... the paint is starting to peel on some of the houses.... After dinner, we cruised down to Ocean Shores to taste beer at the Elk Head Brewery Taproom and we each guzzled a pint and snacked on some of their complimentary pretzels.

Steve, enjoying his brew from a tiny mug.

Leave it to my friends to spend most of the day discussing what we would make if we were hosting a chocolate festival. Some ideas: a chocolate salad, chocolate burger, and a beer with a chocolate bar in it.

Eric's rendition of the chocolate bar beer... our new chocolate gang symbol. We also had to give our gang a name. B.E.N.S.H. (Britta, Eric, Nikki, Steve, Henry). Srsly... we are so fun. Right?

We had planned to have a karaoke night, but we were still craving chocolate, so we ended up heading back into town and stopping at the grocery store for chocolate wine, chocolate Chex Mix, 50% off Valentine's Day candy and Salsito's (it's like a chip and salsa COMBINED). Then we spent a few hours snacking and watching videos of goats yelling like humans and cars doing tricks.

On Sunday, we managed to visit Billy's for lunch (because it was a major breakfast fail.. can we get a place that will serve me some eggs after noon?), Tinderbox Coffee for an afternoon pick me up, Westport Brewery for some more beer tasting and Trivial Pursuit, and Thai Carrot for dinner all within about 8 hours. Not bad.

Wine + Music = Best Decision Ever

I am of the belief that many of the best decisions I've ever made were made in a very short amount of time. I think this is one of them: I just bought tickets to Bottle Rock Napa Valley!

I'm pretty much dying for a vacation and Napa Valley is one of my favorite places, so attending this festival just made complete sense to me. The Sasquatch music festival has been such a topic of conversation lately among my friends who hope to go as well as those of us who have gone before. The lineup was tempting, but the thought of spending 4 days in the desert with a heavy crowd of drunk teenagers... not so much.

So, when my friend Nikki mentioned this, I was ready to hit the road! Too bad I have to wait until May because I'm ready to go now. Can't wait to drink wine, lounge on a lawn with my t-shirt quilt and listen to some awesome music. Most excited to see these guys:

Hope to see you all there... cheers!

Local Zine

All y'all should get yourself a copy of this sweet zine, Tumblehome.