We're older now than I'd like to admit
Oct. 24th, 2012 09:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quadruplifyCURRENT FAVORITES:
Bat For Lashes, "Marilyn"
Fuck Buttons, "Rough Steez"
Sky Ferreira, "Everything Is Embarrassing"
Yeasayer, "Fingers Never Bleed"
Yeasayer, "No Bones"
••• So, the trip to Vermont a little over a week ago went extremely well! We stayed at the Waybury Inn in a nicely decorated "rustic" room (I wish I took pictures of the place because I think some of you would've liked it), and had an excellent breakfast all three mornings we were there. We arrived Friday evening; I was feeling tired and a bit sick, we noticed the fall foliage was already past peak, and the weather was cold and raw (it even snowed at one point, though it didn't stick), but we managed to make the most of it. Dinner at Two Brothers was delicious as always, and afterward my mom wanted to see what was up with the Middlebury Art Walk -- an event once a month where stores stay open later on a Friday night and local businesses promote artists from the area -- so we walked around the center of town for a while. It turned out that there really wasn't much to see, though we did finally get around to visiting Otter Creek Used Books, the other "big" bookstore in town; it was anther one of those places that was filled to the brim with books, but it was loosely organized and you had to take the time to dig through tons of books to find anything that looked interesting.
Saturday morning was the Dalai Lama talk, so we got up early to plan and make sure we got to the campus in time. Since tickets sold out before we had a chance to buy them, we had to go to one of the auditoriums where they set up a live video feed of the lecture, which wasn't a big deal since it was still exciting to know the Dalai Lama was just down the road from where we were. The talk itself was amazing; he was very funny and interesting to listen to, and even though he had some difficulty explaining certain concepts (his English is broken, and sometimes he needed the help of his translator), it was pretty easy to understand the gist of what he was trying to say. If you want to know for sure and you have an hour and a half to spare, here's his talk:
(And for reference, the talk he gave the previous day, which was only open to the college community, can be found here.)
There were a lot of little moments I liked about the whole thing, such as his thoughts on mosquitoes (which led into a brief discussion on what level of intelligence animals had to be before they could experience and show appreciation), the story of the rich family and the tranquilizers (which was good because there wasn't a hint of judgment or disdain when he told it, which was refreshing), and his political views. On the one hand, he praised the United States for being a force of good in the world (you can't really blame him for thinking that, given that he was forced out of Tibet and all the other stuff that happened to him when he was younger), but on the other hand, he proclaimed he was a Marxist and that there was hardly any difference between Republicans and Democrats. And he said all this was while Sen. Patrick Leahy was in the same room. He's nothing if not brave and opinionated. XD And my mom liked a moment early on when someone dropped a pen and the Dalai Lama reached down to pick it up, which illustrated his humility. Overall, it was all stuff we've heard before, but it was still really worth it.
After that we had lunch at the Storm Cafe and browsed the farmer's market, and then we went our separate ways and wandered around town some more. I went to the Henry Sheldon Museum because in all the time I've spent at Middlebury, I've never been there before; it's a small museum dedicated to local history and the history of Vermont, with lots of antique furniture and exhibits on what life was like for a well-off industrialist family in the 1800s. After I went through the museum I ended up having a conversation with the woman at the front desk about some of the more interesting stuff I saw there, like a piece of hard tack preserved from the Civil War, a piano cover made of cigar ribbons, furniture that Stephen Douglas (who ran for president against Abraham Lincoln) may have helped build, and an exhibit on the history of the county fair. Then I spent time at the other big bookstore in town; even though I have way too many books I still need to read, I ended up buying another one -- Lev Grossman's The Magicians, which looks really interesting. When I met back up with Mom we had dinner at Sabai Sabai, a Thai restaurant that opened up sometime after I graduated; service was a little slow, but I'm glad we went.
And I only managed to take one picture that day: an Instagram of the falls in the center of town. I hope it came out okay. O_o;
On Sunday we went to Burlington's Church Street Marketplace, like we usually do whenever we go to that city; there were a lot more interesting stores we went to than the last time we visited. I like browsing stores like Frog Hollow and Ten Thousand Villages because the stuff there is different than what you'd normally find at other gift shops, and sometimes seeing other people's work can be eye-catching and inspiring, but I normally don't like buying anything unless I absolutely want or need it, because I end up feeling like a consumerist zombie otherwise. I did manage to surprise myself, though, by buying an ornament from here and a lamp from here (I'll have to take a picture of it in the near future, because it does look pretty cool). We had lunch at Asiana Noodle Shop, and later I finally managed to drag my mom to Dobrá Tea just so I could show her what it's like to go to a proper tea shop. ^_^; When we left, we had a quick dinner at Rosie's back in Middlebury because we were just too full to have anything substantial.
Since we both put in full days on Saturday and Sunday, we decided to just get out of there on Monday morning, with a quick stop at the Vermont Country Store to buy candy. Yeah, they've got a lot of stuff there, but the food's the only real reason why you should go should you find yourself in that area. 8D
••• Other than that, not much else has been going on. I finally got around to starting Richard O'Connor's Understanding Depression, which I got for Christmas aftermmouse15 rec'd it to me, and I've been finding it very helpful; I even found parts of it connected a lot to parts of the Dalai Lama's talk regarding mindfulness and thinking of happiness as a skill rather than an emotion. Otherwise, ever since the trip to Vermont I've fallen back into the rut I've been in for the past few weeks now (partly because I was pretty wiped after doing so much). With my psoriasis trying to come back and the days getting shorter and colder as it is, all I've been doing is refreshing Tumblr/Twitter/LJ every five seconds, watching trash TV, and sleeping in. It's not as bad as it once was, and I certainly don't feel as guilty about my well-being right now, but it's still frustrating. Maybe I might actually do NaNoWriMo this year? I do feel more up to it than I was last year, so we'll have to wait and see. ^_^;
Bat For Lashes, "Marilyn"
Fuck Buttons, "Rough Steez"
Sky Ferreira, "Everything Is Embarrassing"
Yeasayer, "Fingers Never Bleed"
Yeasayer, "No Bones"
••• So, the trip to Vermont a little over a week ago went extremely well! We stayed at the Waybury Inn in a nicely decorated "rustic" room (I wish I took pictures of the place because I think some of you would've liked it), and had an excellent breakfast all three mornings we were there. We arrived Friday evening; I was feeling tired and a bit sick, we noticed the fall foliage was already past peak, and the weather was cold and raw (it even snowed at one point, though it didn't stick), but we managed to make the most of it. Dinner at Two Brothers was delicious as always, and afterward my mom wanted to see what was up with the Middlebury Art Walk -- an event once a month where stores stay open later on a Friday night and local businesses promote artists from the area -- so we walked around the center of town for a while. It turned out that there really wasn't much to see, though we did finally get around to visiting Otter Creek Used Books, the other "big" bookstore in town; it was anther one of those places that was filled to the brim with books, but it was loosely organized and you had to take the time to dig through tons of books to find anything that looked interesting.
Saturday morning was the Dalai Lama talk, so we got up early to plan and make sure we got to the campus in time. Since tickets sold out before we had a chance to buy them, we had to go to one of the auditoriums where they set up a live video feed of the lecture, which wasn't a big deal since it was still exciting to know the Dalai Lama was just down the road from where we were. The talk itself was amazing; he was very funny and interesting to listen to, and even though he had some difficulty explaining certain concepts (his English is broken, and sometimes he needed the help of his translator), it was pretty easy to understand the gist of what he was trying to say. If you want to know for sure and you have an hour and a half to spare, here's his talk:
(And for reference, the talk he gave the previous day, which was only open to the college community, can be found here.)
There were a lot of little moments I liked about the whole thing, such as his thoughts on mosquitoes (which led into a brief discussion on what level of intelligence animals had to be before they could experience and show appreciation), the story of the rich family and the tranquilizers (which was good because there wasn't a hint of judgment or disdain when he told it, which was refreshing), and his political views. On the one hand, he praised the United States for being a force of good in the world (you can't really blame him for thinking that, given that he was forced out of Tibet and all the other stuff that happened to him when he was younger), but on the other hand, he proclaimed he was a Marxist and that there was hardly any difference between Republicans and Democrats. And he said all this was while Sen. Patrick Leahy was in the same room. He's nothing if not brave and opinionated. XD And my mom liked a moment early on when someone dropped a pen and the Dalai Lama reached down to pick it up, which illustrated his humility. Overall, it was all stuff we've heard before, but it was still really worth it.
After that we had lunch at the Storm Cafe and browsed the farmer's market, and then we went our separate ways and wandered around town some more. I went to the Henry Sheldon Museum because in all the time I've spent at Middlebury, I've never been there before; it's a small museum dedicated to local history and the history of Vermont, with lots of antique furniture and exhibits on what life was like for a well-off industrialist family in the 1800s. After I went through the museum I ended up having a conversation with the woman at the front desk about some of the more interesting stuff I saw there, like a piece of hard tack preserved from the Civil War, a piano cover made of cigar ribbons, furniture that Stephen Douglas (who ran for president against Abraham Lincoln) may have helped build, and an exhibit on the history of the county fair. Then I spent time at the other big bookstore in town; even though I have way too many books I still need to read, I ended up buying another one -- Lev Grossman's The Magicians, which looks really interesting. When I met back up with Mom we had dinner at Sabai Sabai, a Thai restaurant that opened up sometime after I graduated; service was a little slow, but I'm glad we went.
And I only managed to take one picture that day: an Instagram of the falls in the center of town. I hope it came out okay. O_o;
On Sunday we went to Burlington's Church Street Marketplace, like we usually do whenever we go to that city; there were a lot more interesting stores we went to than the last time we visited. I like browsing stores like Frog Hollow and Ten Thousand Villages because the stuff there is different than what you'd normally find at other gift shops, and sometimes seeing other people's work can be eye-catching and inspiring, but I normally don't like buying anything unless I absolutely want or need it, because I end up feeling like a consumerist zombie otherwise. I did manage to surprise myself, though, by buying an ornament from here and a lamp from here (I'll have to take a picture of it in the near future, because it does look pretty cool). We had lunch at Asiana Noodle Shop, and later I finally managed to drag my mom to Dobrá Tea just so I could show her what it's like to go to a proper tea shop. ^_^; When we left, we had a quick dinner at Rosie's back in Middlebury because we were just too full to have anything substantial.
Since we both put in full days on Saturday and Sunday, we decided to just get out of there on Monday morning, with a quick stop at the Vermont Country Store to buy candy. Yeah, they've got a lot of stuff there, but the food's the only real reason why you should go should you find yourself in that area. 8D
••• Other than that, not much else has been going on. I finally got around to starting Richard O'Connor's Understanding Depression, which I got for Christmas after
mmouse15 rec'd it to me, and I've been finding it very helpful; I even found parts of it connected a lot to parts of the Dalai Lama's talk regarding mindfulness and thinking of happiness as a skill rather than an emotion. Otherwise, ever since the trip to Vermont I've fallen back into the rut I've been in for the past few weeks now (partly because I was pretty wiped after doing so much). With my psoriasis trying to come back and the days getting shorter and colder as it is, all I've been doing is refreshing Tumblr/Twitter/LJ every five seconds, watching trash TV, and sleeping in. It's not as bad as it once was, and I certainly don't feel as guilty about my well-being right now, but it's still frustrating. Maybe I might actually do NaNoWriMo this year? I do feel more up to it than I was last year, so we'll have to wait and see. ^_^;
no subject
Date: 2012-10-26 04:47 pm (UTC)Oh, I am so jealous of your trip to Vermont! Those places look and sound amazing! And to get so close to the Dalai Lama is fantastic.
When we were up in the Cotswolds we found a second hand book shop and spent a while digging through. It's really relaxing to do, but I've noticed we just don't have that many of the little second hand book shops over here any more. I can't really say why except high rents maybe? I mean there's plenty of people who still read paper format (myself included and I've got a Kindle).
I love that photo of the falls, very pretty.
I hope you do decide to do NaNo this year, maybe it'll give you something to focus on? Not surprised you felt/feel low after that holiday though - they're so tiring even if you are enjoying yourself. *hugs* Best thoughts to you for finding another happy niche to be in.
no subject
Date: 2012-10-26 05:37 pm (UTC)It's pretty depressing how few independent bookstores are out there, much less ones that sell used books. Church Street in Burlington only has one indie bookstore, Middlebury has the two I mentioned; I know two towns nearby have one indie apiece as well, but that's about it, as far as I know. Near where I live, there's only one independent bookstore in New Haven (Atticus, which I'm sure I mentioned before), and only one used bookstore in a nearby town that I know of. The rest of them tend to be Barnes & Noble, which is the only big chain since Borders collapsed. So yeah, sometimes trying to find where to get books is more of a hassle than it should be. :/
I wish I knew why it was too; I think big chains like B&N have really taken over, plus people probably like to buy books online. I guess e-books are contributing too, even though I don't see too many people reading them when I'm out and about. And yeah, browsing through used bookstores is nice, but you need to have a lot of time on your hands, and on that day we just didn't.
I do need to use Instagram more often; it's fun to experiment with the various filters and options on it. ^_^;
Yeah, I think NaNo will give me something to focus on. I'd really like to get back into the habit of writing, and I do have a few story ideas floating around, so I might as well put them to good use. Plus, the challenge is writing 50,000 words; no one ever said those 50,000 words had to be good. :PPP Anything to break out of this rut I've been in for the past few years, I guess.