Tuesday 9 November 2021

To The Fall I Was Nervous About



I was nervous about this fall. I was worried I was going to miss it and the thing is I've needed this fall. I was feeling overwhelmed and I wasn't sure I was going to be able to slow my mind down enough to be able to enjoy it. Sure it was incredibly busy, I mean life has been insane. It always is, but chaos in my family seems to come in two's and three's and the crises never seem to be little things. I really didn't think i was going to get it and I needed this fall. Anyways, I had a few things I wanted to do and for the most part I did it. I even did more than I thought I could've hoped to get to.


1. Carved Pumpkins And Wore A Pumpkin Head In The Woods.

Pumpkin heads are really heavy. No one talks about that. It sounds really aesthetic but dang I had a tender spot on my head for days. Glad I finally got to do it though. 



You can barely tell but I used a pink shower cap underneath 
which is the funniest unaesthetic thing to put with a jack-o-lantern
and I low-key love it

2. Smashed Pumpkins In The Woods With Some Siblings


Setting them up like this reminded me of a boyband and I still think it's a 
lot funnier than it actually is 










3. Fall Books I Read (to be fair, I started some early)

The Secret History by Donna Tart

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The Halloween Tree by Ray Bradbury

I reread a good chunk of Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

I've been reading the Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

I've been reading Lore by Allen Menke

While it doesn't feel like enough to count, I read the first couple chapters of The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle. I'll probably have to return it to the library and recheck it out but sometimes I need to remind myself of the books or I'll forget about them later

To be honest I didn't think I was going to get through The Secret History before October was over so the amount I got to even if some of the books were small or I've only read bits of  them is an accomplishment.

3. Scary Movie Night/Fallish or Halloween Movies in General/Music

I more or less did this one. I do still want to do a proper one but I still could. There's really nothing stopping me.

I did movies in general quite a lot. I didn't really have a list I was following so I watched whatever I wanted to watch and I've had the realization confirmed (once again) that everything can be a fall movie if you want it to be.

Stardust and Interview With A Vampire were ones that I was not expecting to have as much fun watching as I did. My unintentional vibe for this fall was a combination of sad girl autumn and 80's fantasy movie aesthetic. Whether I accomplished that or not I don't know but I've had fun. It's probably been more of a slightly 2000's vibe in all honesty



4. Did A Corn Maze/Ate Mini-Donuts

Went to a zombie themed corn maze that had 4 different trails you could pick from. I loved it, I was nervous about the clowns but eventually when you and pretty much everyone in the maze is all standing there trying to find out from the clowns how you leave because no one could find their way out was kind of hilarious and honestly it was the best one of the mazes. After the first maze all the other mazes the zombies just sort of stayed in their designated attractions. I never thought I would say there was a surprising lack of zombies at a zombie centric maze. It made me happy though. The corn was tall, the music was very creepily whimsical, the moon was out and I loved all of it.


My sister and I
My spirit animal/creature. I don't actually know what this
was supposed to be but I love it

5. Baking (Cheater's Edition)

So I really wanted to do some fall baking particularly bat cookies and cinnamon rolls. I was either too busy or too tired to actually do any baking but I bought cinnamon rolls later and I found this box of bat brownies which wasn't good but they were shaped like bats and that's all I really cared about.

Not related to baking but I got to eat some plums and concord grapes. I'm always excited for concord grapes every time fall comes around

6. My Fall Mementos 

A crow

A cat cup

A notebook with constellations all over the cover

This looks like I'm hoarding sparklers, which I do,
but in this case I was lighting them and handing them out

7. Fall Walks (Particularly at Night)

Honestly this is the reason why I feel like I got fall. I was so concerned about doing things that felt fall and then I went for a quick fall walk one day on my path in the woods gave me every emotion and fall feeling that I've been so anxious to capture. It's such a small thing but it was somehow possibly my favourite thing this fall. I don't how I would have been without them.



8. Razor Ride And Hitting Puddles

I feel like this one needs very little explanation. Except all of us in the razor got very soaked, cold, and covered in mud. It was amazing. 

9. Got A Starbucks Fall Drink And Tim Horton's Peach Quenchers

The quenchers were supposed to just be a summer item on their menu but it must have done so well they're still selling it and I'm incredibly happy about it.

10. Saw A Sketchy Animal Skeleton (there's a photo)

On one razor ride I was on, all of us in the razor passed a skeleton of some animal that looked burnt and was just very clearly sketchily put there by a human. It's gone now and now there's a toolbox there, but it was in such a weird place to just leave an animal. So who knows what that means exactly. To be fair, it might have been covered in mud but I still think it was burnt. 

The top part looks like a head in the photo but 
that's really the back end of whatever this animal is.
Where it's head or legs are we have no idea.


11. Did A Sort of College and Career Scavenger Hunt Thing

Essentially all the groups got the same list pf things you were supposed to take a picture with or take back with you.

A Tim Horton's cup

A stop sign

Newspaper with today's date

Hang on the monkey bars

Find an acorn (nobody could find one)

Take a photo with a person walking their dog (the random stranger we asked was so nice about it. Shockingly it's not the first time she's been asked by groups doing something like this)

Because you got extra points for creativity my group all posed like dogs peeing on a fire hydrant. So that's a thing that exists on someone's phone.

We had an hour and a half and a list of like 40 things to hit and whichever group got more things won. My group sadly lost but it was really fun. Definitely recommend frantically running to locations in the dark with a group of friends/people that you feel pretty safe with and looking crazy.

12. Looking At Stars

This is connected to the fall walks one, but it deserves it's own thing.

Not the stars obviously but still

13. Looking At Trailers

This is a personal thing. My sister and I are looking at cheap trailers and it's been a big thing we've been doing for awhile so I'm adding it.

And the thing is, fall isn't over. October might be, as sad as I am about that, but I don't have to have missed anything. I got, and still have, my fall.

For the fall I feel like I fought for a little in my own melodramatic way




Saturday 6 November 2021

The All About You Around The Blogosphere Tag

Thanks to McKayla for tagging me for this! I've been pretty dead to the world, working, pretending I've been doing homework that I haven't, ignoring the insanity of life in general, stolen my fall moments, and I will probably continue to do that for awhile. I have a lot going on so this was fun to work on while I had a day where I did absolutely nothing. 

What is your favourite book/series and why?

I recently ordered the Solitary Tales by Travis Thrasher. I've read them before a couple years ago and really liked them. They've all finally arrived now so currently that's the series I'm most excited about.

It's very American Gothic and perfect for this time of year. It makes me think of the smell of leaves on a fall walk. I don't how to explain it but it has an almost M Night Shyamalan movie feel to me. I'm usually pretty picky, especially with Christian books, but I really liked this series. Chris, the protagonist, can be dumb but it worked.

One of the greatest books ever written is 'The Muppets Meet the Classics: The Phantom of the Opera'


It's essentially the original Phantom of the Opera story, but with Muppets and it's the stupidest thing I've ever read and more people need to know that this book is real. It's a glorious thing. I've owned it for years and I'd completely forgotten about it until I was going through my books recently.

Who is your favourite author?

At this moment it's Shirley Jackson. She wrote We Have Always Lived in the Castle and I've been reading The Haunting of Hill House while on my work breaks and I've been loving it. I haven't gotten too far into it yet, but she's such a good writer.

What is your favourite food?

There's so many things. One is Pho. It's a Vietnamese noodle soup dish. It's so good. I highly recommend it. 

Not my photo. It's from google images. I saw something about a creator called Journeyonair 
attached to it.

What gives you inspiration for your books?

Everything to be honest. Music, any sort of media really, emotions, the weather, the way something smells...

This is an odd one but the spaciousness of something or the tactile-ness of things affects a lot.

Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

Introvert. Some things are better with groups of people but I'm definitely an introvert at heart.

If you had a warning label what would yours say?

I feel like I have a lot but then I felt odd writing it for myself so I asked Skye (thanks btw!) and her answers were better than anything I was going to write for myself anyway so I'm hijacking those. 

Crazy, clearly.

Prone to overthinking and analyzing. Don't try to sort it out for her. Will return to normal in 1 and a half business days.

Practically a cryptid. Quite possibly the last of her kind.


Feel free to to this tag if you'd like! What's the strangest book you've ever read?