weekender

I had the perfect weekend last weekend. Despite the weather being cold and hazy, Cameron and I bundled up and went on a walking adventure downtown. We toured the Church History Museum on Temple Square, which had all sorts of unexpected treasures like model immigration-ship-style bunk beds you could climb into, death masks, vintage hand-stitched Relief Society banners, and church presidents' glasses! Plus just all the awesome museum stuff you'd expect chronicling 19th century American life - shaving kits and trunks and blankets and shoes. The basement also had a really beautiful exhibit of photographs of LDS historic sites, most in the rural northeast, taken between 1860 and 1928. The whole thing is online here. Having not grown up in Utah, I like to visit places that played a role in Cameron's childhood field trip days (just like the time I took him to the Smithsonian Natural History Museum! Ha!). And how could I not appreciate a free museum that's right down the street? I can't believe I'd never been before.

Plus...
-browsed the used book shelves at Sam Weller's and came away with a few highly sentimental items
-checked out the crop of new cafes on Main Street and enjoyed lunch at Vasuvio's (really good salads)
-saw 500 Days of Summer at the dollar theater Saturday night
-sipped morning tea at Two Creek Sunday morning
-went to the Broadway mid-day on MLK Jr. Day to see the lovely A Single Man

Although this weekend doesn't have the three-day bonus going for it, it will, I hope, make up for in substance what it lacks in leisure. I have a little thing called Sundance to look forward to and enjoy bits of with both my brother from Boise and my sister from D.C., and both their significant others, in town for the festivities.

90s awesome + tv

All 19 episodes of My So-Called Life are up on Hulu for your viewing pleasure. I watched the premiere episode today and the theme for their high school yearbook was "The Year 2000" (it aired in 1994...when I was 10). Amazing.

Here are the opening credits and my favorite clip from the series to whet your appetite for all the 90s goodness.



I go through phases with tv watching...addictive, all-consuming phases. As I've alluded to before, for quite some time now I've been hard at work on the ambitious goal to watch all five seasons of Lost on Netflix before the final season airs in February. I watched the pilot episode in September, but lucky for me the storyline lends itself to the sort of compulsive marathon-style viewing that's my specialty...and in the span of five months I've watched almost five years' worth of the series. Taking it in in mere weekly doses come February frees up my evening schedule for a new obsession. I'm hoping books to start with, but I'm also introducing Cameron to My So-Called Life, he's introducing me to Dexter, and we plan to start watching the first season of Mad Men together. It's a lovely little set-up to get through the long winter, don't you think?

p.s. Did you watch the Golden Globes last night? I don't always follow awards ceremonies but kept it on while I did dishes, cooked dinner, and cleaned up the apartment. My favorite thing about them is seeing people in moments of such personal joy take the time to (publicly) express love and gratitude for their spouses. There seemed to be particularly sweet husband-and-wife moments from the podium last night.

the desert

From top to bottom:
Joshua trees reflected in our trip soundtrack, Kid Cudi's Man on the Moon; the YarYar taking in the sights in the ghost town of Cima, California; me walking on desert roads; Shoe Tree (x4); snapping shots of Roy's in Amboy; wind farm outside Palm Springs

The drive between Las Vegas and Palm Springs unexpectedly became one of my favorite parts of our little trip. We cut through mostly unmarked backroads with the aid of an atlas straight through the Mojave Desert. The scenery was really beautiful and calming and we rarely passed another car or person. I had to keep reminding Cameron to take pictures (I was at the wheel) so most of my memories of how good it felt to be on this road are non-photographic. Most of the towns we passed through were just abandoned buildings - really old, dilapidated buildings with doors and windows wide open - along the still active railroad. The only exception was the aforementioned Roy's in Amboy, where a few fellow travelers stopped to use the restrooms and check out the little store, and the incredible Amboy Shoe Tree, where we met an older couple and their dog.

Eventually we hooked up with 29 Palms Highway and drove through desert towns with great names like 29 Palms, Joshua Tree, and Yucca Valley. I think it was along this stretch that we started to see the mailboxes. Every couple of miles or so in this presumably more populated area of the desert we'd pass a neat little row of old, mismatched mailboxes, clustered together at various heights. They'd be at the end of dirt roads leading off into the distance where desert dwellers kept their homes or trailers. You couldn't really see the homes, just the mailboxes, leaving you to imagine the homes of the people who dutifully get in their cars or on their motorcycles everyday and drive down to the highway to collect their mail, possibly extending the courtesy to pick up the mail of their neighbors. Amazing!

We stopped for pizza in 29 Palms and it was fascinating how everyone we met shared little bits of their life story...the man in front of us in line giving us great recommendations of the place, telling us he'd been eating there for 18 years or some such number; the owner apologizing for being slow at taking our order, he'd just had family in town you see and there's a reason he lives in California and they live in New Jersey; the woman who came in coughing and wheezing and pitifully asking for soup, explaining to anyone who'd listen just how sick she was and how much she needed the soup.

This little stretch of rural highway singlehandedly changed my opinion of Southern California. There will hopefully be more of the Mojave Desert and Coachella Valley in my future because there are two very important stops we did not get to visit: Joshua Tree National Park and the Cabazon Dinosaurs, featured at the emotional apex of the movie Wizard, a childhood classic for myself and Cameron. (Sidenote: did anyone know that the teenage female lead in that movie is played by Jenny Lewis??)

peace love & gap

Merry Christmas, everyone!
I've compiled some of my favorite Gap Holiday commercials, both current and vintage, as a little gift from me to you. The Gap Kids "Talk to the Moose" ad never failed to make me smile this year; I think it is adorable and the details are genius (the little moment when they scream like maniacs, the backflip, the train at the end). I dare you to watch these without feeling the spirit of giving striped sweaters and scarves.

signs, graphics & designs: Palm Springs

From top to bottom:
Roy's Motel Cafe on Route 66 in Amboy, California; The Ace Hotel & Swim Club (x9); midcentury Bank of America in downtown Palm Springs; The Palms Restaurant somewhere in the Mojave Desert.

signs, graphics & designs: Las Vegas

From top to bottom:
Circus Circus; Coney Island Emporium at New York New York; New York New York; Coney Island Emporium at New York New York; Terrible's Casino somewhere outside of Las Vegas; Las Vegas welcome sign; Dale Chihuly sculpture at the Bellagio; Nancy Rubins canoe sculpture at the new CityCenter; CityCenter (x3); Old Vegas (x2)

home is where your heart is

Cameron and I got home from our winter vacation last night. In total, we drove in the little Yaris for about 24 hours, which may be part of the reason why this pair of mid-afternoon sunshine driving photos is one of my favorites of the trip. We're still in Utah here, cozied up in the car and so excited to be sharing another one of our little adventures. Gives me butterflies!

I hope to share bits and pieces of our vacation over the next couple of days. Like most things, I am comically behind on anything Christmas holiday related. Luckily my preferred style for the last several years is to go light on the gift giving and receiving (I've bought one person a gift and have conceptualized the gift for another) and limit the decorating to a few simple traditions saved for the last couple of meaningful days before and during the holiday. I very much wish to become the type of person someday who crafts Christmas wreaths for the doorway, garlands for the front porch, and fills her home with all sorts of handmade holiday goodies (see here, here, here, and here for some of my blog inspiration this year). But for now I am content with a real (baby, last-minute) Christmas tree and simple white string lights.

p.s. It's such a comfort to be at home with the cats and to see how their little personalities express happiness to see us. Many, many thanks to their Aunt Chelsea for taking care of them while we were away.