Month: March 2018

April TBR

Posted March 30, 2018 / Book Lists, Features, TBR Lists / 5 Comments

My monthly TBR feature here shows my progress based on last month’s TBR, my plans for this month, and anything else I might be thinking about from a reading perspective. Sometimes I feature a little poll at the bottom so you guys can help me figure out a certain title I should read from a group of books. March Progress Not bad for March! I managed to read two library books (even though technically I did the audio for DATSAB instead of reading the actual book), two egalleys, and my book club selection. I would have gone deeper into some of the other books on my list but I was distracted by the new and shiny OBSIDIO library hold that came in way sooner than expected. Oh well! I also DNFed NO FILTER. On Deck for April Books with Due Dates – Library & Book Club The Chaos of Standing Still by Brody | The Case for Jamie by Cavallaro The Wedding Date by Guillory | Book Club: Beastly Bones by Ritter I ended up listening to some of the library books I had checked out via audio, which was a cheat-y way to get them out of here, but at least I did! These are my current books. I’ve already started reading and listening to THE CHAOS OF STANDING STILL, and will definitely get to the other two later this month before they’re due back. Also, BEASTLY BONES is our book club pick for later this month! Egalleys […]

State of the ARC | End of Q1

Posted March 28, 2018 / State of the ARC, Weekly Memes / 12 Comments

State of the ARC is hosted by AvalinahsBooks, which is a fun way to share our ARC progress (or lack thereof!). Instead of linking up monthly, I’ll be making a quarterly post to check in on my ARC-related progress, especially as it pertains to my 2018 Netgalley & Edelweiss Challenge progress. I will not be including physical ARCs here because most of them are borrowed from friends and/or I don’t have as much trouble reading ones from the publisher. This will only be to help me with NG & EW. Current Netgalley Percentage: 70% Each quarter, I’ll recap the ARCs I read from my Netgalley and Edelweiss accounts… Egalleys Read: 9 …and then I’ll share which ones I have left to read, listed in release date order. 2018 Releases: 11 Backlist: 18

Top Ten Tuesdays #176: Another Country

Posted March 27, 2018 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 5 Comments

Books on my TBR That Take Place in Another Country Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. This is something I’m always interested in because I have yet to travel outside of the continental United States. The farthest I’ve gone is actually to Florida (and Chicago, I guess, in a different direction). I’ve only been on a plane a few times too. I love reading books that feature international travel because I’m inspired by places I plan to go someday. I even have a Goodreads shelf to help track these books! I decided to feature books on my TBR instead of books I’ve already read. All-Around European Trip The Summer of Us by Ceclia Vinesse | “American expat Aubrey has only two weeks left in Europe before she leaves for college […] She and her best friend, Rae, have planned one last group trip across the continent. From Paris to Prague, they’re going to explore famous museums, sip champagne in fancy restaurants, and eat as many croissants as possible with their friends Clara, Jonah, and Gabe.” I See London, I See France by Sarah Mlynowski | “Nineteen-year-old Sydney has the perfect summer mapped out. She’s spending the next four and half weeks traveling […]

Add It To My List – March 2018

Posted March 26, 2018 / Add It To My List, Personal / Information / Etc. / 4 Comments

This linkup is hosted by Lauren and Bre, where you’re able to share what you’re currently recommending to people in real life. You’ll likely see movies, shows, podcasts, books, household items/purchases, technology – the list goes on! The linkup happens on the last Tuesday of the month, but I’ll be posting on the last Monday or Wednesday due to Top Ten Tuesday. Add to your shopping list Trader Joe’s Favorites: Pita Bite Crackers, Olive Tapenade, and Everything But The Bagel Sesame Seasoning It’s no secret that I’ve been addicted to TJ’s lately. It’s not quite walking distance to my apartment, compared to the Hannaford right across 2 parking lots, but it’s worth the two second drive to get there. I try to go in between Hannaford trips. One of my new favorite snack combos are their Pita Bite Crackers and the Olive Tapenade (I got the one in the jar instead of the fresh one because it was cheaper by a few bucks). These crackers are truly some of the best I’ve EVER had and my new olive tapenade obsession continues with this stuff for only $2. The seasoning apparently took the internet by storm a while ago and I’m late, but seriously… This stuff is the best. It’s basically like if you took whatever random seasonings are on top of an everything bagel and put them in a container. The first time I tried it was on avocado toast and it was unbelievable – so much flavor! I’ve […]

Thoughts on Rereading and Rewatching

Posted March 23, 2018 / Discussions, Features / 4 Comments

A common theme in my fantasy-football-turned-everything-group-chat on Twitter is rereading favorite books or rewatching movies. We have spin-off chats for certain book series (ACOTAR) and movie universes (Marvel) for those who read/watch them. I don’t remember anyyyything about these books or movies because my memory is terrible. But, everyone also does a lot of rereading or rewatching and I am just so bad at it. As I mentioned in a recent TTT, there are some books I could reasonably reread more than once, but I don’t do it as often as other people do. Don’t get me wrong – I can see the appeal of jumping back into an old favorite. Whether that means watching a movie or show you love for the millionth time or rereading a book that you love, there’s just something comforting about hopping back into that world for a little while. I genuinely love that feeling, on the rare occasion that I actually do it. I have rewatched the entire series of Friends over and over and over for the past 15 years. This is my one (huge) exception to the general rule that I don’t rewatch/read. There’s something just so perfect and nostalgic and feelsy about this show that coming back to it is like coming home. So now that the exception is out of the way, here are some of my general thoughts on the whole thing. Reasons that I reread: 1. A new book is coming out in a series I read a while ago, and […]

Current Podcast Rotation

Posted March 22, 2018 / Media, Personal / Information / Etc. / 0 Comments

I’ve posted two podcast recommendation posts in the last year that focus on some of my favorite topics. I usually listen to only true crime, with maybe some comedy or wrestling mixed in. You can read those here and here! I wanted to take a minute to show which podcasts I’m currently rotating through on a weekly basis. I spend a lot of time finding old podcasts and catching up on back episodes before becoming up-to-date, but there are plenty of others that I listen to weekly/monthly as new episodes come out. I’ll call this my “current podcast rotation” if you’re curious to know what I’m playing every week. This is accurate as of February/March. True Crime The most common podcast that I listen to is the general category of “true crime.” There are a lot of one-off podcast that have one story in one season that I’ve listened to, but there are some that still come out with new content as of right now. The ones below are either individual story episodes (one case per episode) or season-long stories (one case per season). I kind of like the individual story ones more because it’s quick and easy; the season-long cases usually get too dragged out for me after a while. Criminal This is one of my longtime favorites and I love how consistently the episodes come out! The host even made a spin-off podcast (coming up later in this list) that I’ve been listening to. This show features little […]

Weight Loss and Health – Calorie Counting Apps

Posted March 21, 2018 / Food & Drink, Goals & Planning, Personal / Information / Etc. / 4 Comments

I started calorie counting back in 2016, I believe, when I saw Lindsey was using Lose It. I loved a lot of elements of this app (more than My Fitness Pal, which my other friends used) and had success for a few months. I lost some weight, and then the holiday season came. Oddly enough, even though I paused the calorie counting, I kept that weight off. I started counting calories again with Lose It when I moved to Maine, for about 200 days (it tells you the streak). Last month, the Bella Twins (some of my fave wrestlers/personalities) posted about a 90 Day Challenge they were doing with LifeSum. It’s another calorie counting app, but they have a bit more in terms of analyzing overall health and lifestyle changes. There are more features (especially when you buy Premium, which I had done with Lose It as well). I’m here today to talk about my weight loss/health journey through these two apps, as well as pros/cons for each one! DISCLAIMER: I will be reviewing both of the apps fully but know that I did upgrade to premium subscriptions for both of them, so some of the information may be for the free versions but some may be for premium only. I also am not a health professional by any means, so don’t take my word for anything in terms of calorie counting being the healthiest or best option for everyone. I know what works for me, so that’s what I do! […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #175: Spring TBR

Posted March 20, 2018 / TBR Lists, Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 6 Comments

Ten A Lot of Books on my Spring TBR Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. I love TBR posts like this because it puts the whole season into perspective, instead of just monthly ones like I usually do. I usually have long-range reading goals based on the books I own and need to read, ARCs on my Kindle/shelves, and book club picks. I’m definitely featuring more than ten because that’s how I roll. Book Club Picks: April/May/June Jackaby series (#2, #3, and #4) by William Ritter I already know what book club is reading until we finish this series. I’m including April, May, and June here because we’re going to just blaze through them depending on when I come home each month. We started with JACKABY in March, so there are the rest for the spring into summer! Advanced Copies Coming Up Furyborn by Legrand | Valley Girls by Lemon | Bookish Boyfriends by Schmidt August and Everything After by Doktorkski | The Elizas by Shepard I’m including all of the egalleys that are being published between April and May. I’m keeping away from the June/summer ones just because my list would be… extensive. I know that I WILL read […]

Blog Tour: Finding Felicity

Posted March 19, 2018 / Book Reviews, Cover Colors, Features / 8 Comments

I knew exactly what I wanted to do for a post when I saw this blog tour announced by the Fantastic Flying Book Club. Felicity is a show I’ve always wanted to watch. I was constantly watching Friends with my mom (when I was way too young to watch it), but I never saw Felicity because she didn’t watch it. I was only 7 years old when the show started so the college-aged main character fascinated me, but was out of my reach at the time. I loved the concept of Finding Felicity when I saw the book’s synopsis a long time ago, and vowed to watch the show before reading the book. As you might have guessed, my role in this fun blog tour is to watch Felicity for the first time and share my feelings before reading the book. I’m going to include a little late 90s outfit Polyvore collage with Cover Colors as well, because I can’t resist. A first time Felicity watcher binges the show The tour was announced at the beginning of March, so I knew I had a few weeks to get going on the show. I decided to keep my live-blogging to just the first episode because it would get out of hand for all the episodes (I learned this very quickly). I embarked on the binge the first weekend of the month when my boyfriend was working (and sleeping, due to his work schedule). Here are my thoughts on season one, starting with a live blog […]

How I “Meal Prep” – AKA Slay the Leftovers Game

Posted March 16, 2018 / Food & Drink, Personal / Information / Etc. / 4 Comments

I’ve been thinking about this post for a while and seeing Steph’s recently gave me a push to post it. I live with my boyfriend, which means I have to sometimes modify recipes for two people, or make a huge batch of something that we’ll be sick of in a few days. There’s no easy way to cook for two people without extra math or work. I’ve gotten the hang of it recently though. The trick for me is to prepare meats and other ingredients in a more simple way, so the cooking is out of the way early and all in one shot. Here’s how I slay the leftover game so we don’t get sick of eating the same thing for days, and a few recipes I use for multiple day meals. Cooking for Two Modify recipes to fit your ~family size~ aka couple. I do this when it’s really easy to do the math. If there’s a recipe that makes eight chicken breasts with sauce and some kind of side, I will cut the recipe in half so we each can eat two pieces of chicken. (More on that later.) If there’s a recipe for a HUGE batch of soup or stew, I will either cut the recipe in half so we don’t get sick of the leftovers, or freeze it when applicable. Eat “complicated leftovers” meals for lunch the day (duh). I call them “complicated leftovers” when you make a full meal, instead of just basic meat prep that […]