👋 Hello everyone, and happy Father’s Day to all who celebrate it!
This morning I heard music playing outside. My first thought was that it was a noisy neighbor, but then I heard a live trumpet, so I popped my head out and realized that the trumpet was definitely from a live mariachi band. I marched outside and wandered around until I found them playing in the courtyard area between houses down the street, and one of our neighbors waved me over to sit with his family. He had booked the group to play for the neighborhood for Father’s Day. How cool is that?!
It was lovely to sit outside and hear live music; to hear words in Spanish; to know the tunes; to be surrounded by people I’ve never met, all enjoying this musical surprise. We met new neighbors, made plans for game nights and pub soccer dates, and walked away with pep in our step.
People! I have missed people. Just hanging out somewhere, seeing someone you know, meeting someone new, hearing someone’s story, sharing a laugh, learning new things. I do feel rusty on the chit chat front, though. Rather than, “hello, isn’t this nice weather,” it’s more like, “hello, please share your pandemic survival story.” 🤷♀️
What have you been up to lately? I’ve been…
🍟 Eating + Drinking
What kind of Army would I be if I didn’t at least try the BTS Meal at McDonald’s? 💜 Sadly, there’s no branded packaging in the U.S., just the special sauces. And they were out of Cajun sauce, so it was a lackluster experience. Anyway, I tossed the chicken nuggets and heated up my own veggie nuggets to try with the sweet chili sauce (which was all sweet and no chili). I also got this frozen red drink situation. I ate about half of the fries and half of the drink and called it done. (I grew up as a Burger King girl, so McDonald’s is just meh to me anyway.) 🤷♀️
We hit that pivotal day when I opened the fridge and realized I had bought a ton of veggies that were about to go bad. So I cooked them all up to make for easy meals during the week. My fave thing now is to shred cabbage and carrot and cook them just a bit in sesame oil and soy sauce. The texture is so fun! For this dinner, I topped rice with veggies, a soft-boiled egg, and my favorite Korean sauce situation.
Tuna gimbap filled with more of the prepped veggies.
Kimchi fried rice with even more of the prepped veggies, topped with cheese.
Broccoli (prepped veggie!) and cheese rolled omelet over rice with kimchi.
What even was this? 🤨 I think I just mixed all the prepped veggies with more of the Korean sauce situation and served it over sweet potato noodles. 😬
Jolly Pong shake! I grew obsessed with this cereal-shake after seeing it on a coffee shop video on YouTube. If you like cereal and/or cereal milk, I highly recommend a cereal shake. Just blitz some ice, milk (or oat milk for me), and cereal (I’ve seen Jolly Pong, which is like Honey Smacks, or Cocoa Puffs, or…) with a bit of sweetened condensed milk or other sweetener, then top it with cereal and serve with a giant straw. Miam miam.
Look! I worked in a coffee shop! ☕ I’ve been tagging along with Justin once a week or so when he goes downtown to play basketball, and he drops me off at or near the library. This time I wandered over to Merit Coffee for a delicious Mexican-vanilla oat milk latte.
🖼 Enjoying
I’m completely in love with this gallery’s Instagram feed. I have found so many pieces that I adore, and some have really surprised me. The three above are a few of my faves.
If you enjoyed the lo-fi playlist I shared a while back, you’ll probably love this site, the Sound of Sunday. It’ll be my Sunday soundtrack for sure.
I have to pace myself on this site, which is a compilation of interviews with people outlining what tools, apps, products, etc. they use. I want to try all the things!
😂 Laughing
That’s it! Thank you for reading—hit reply and tell me what you’re up to.
--Crystal