List 43 of my favorite things

I love them. It’s a big reason why I love this site so much. I love talking with people. And anything between the continuum of banter to impassioned argument/discussion.

What I don’t love is aggressive (or even passive) ignorance and bullying, and that’s probably for another entry. I’ve been enjoying my conversations a lot lately.:)

I love playing. I always have. I’ve always had an active imagination, and it progressed as I became an adult. My favorite classes in college were improvisational dance and theater. (And as a kid, I loved dress up.:) And through playful nothingness is how our performance pieces were created. I love the idea of things coming out of emptiness, like when a poem just appears from the blank white space. Like when a person in jest walks up to me and says something in a pirate voice, I’m completely game.

Movies. I love movies, and so many kinds of them. Musicals,
Foreign, Kung Fu, Comedies, Documentaries. If I like a particular director, I’ll try to see every film they’ve ever made. If you ever watch an Aki Kaurismaki film because you read this entry, I swear, you won’t regret it.

My love of all things subtitled originated with my early recollection of watching a lot of closed caption films, and sometimes I’ll even turn the captions on because I’m so used it.

I found a great sale on Fiestaware at Macy’s one year, and bought six sets in Lime Green, Peacock Blue, and White. I got the older sets that include little teacups and saucers, so I feel very ladylike whenever I drink tea out of them. The colors are vibrant and bright, and food looks amazing on them. The other wonderful thing about them is that they’re virtually unbreakable and unchippable.

My new Artesania mitten-gloves. Mine are purple, cream, and green and lined with polarfleece.

When I start my evening housecleaning ritual, I begin by lighting a stick of incense. With the nearness of Devon Avenue (little India), I’ve collected quite a variety of scents, but my favorite is always rose. (Nag champa is my second favorite.)

This is a line of washable sanitary napkins that my friend, Luci Daum, designed. I met her when she wandered into the store I was the body care and gift buyer for. Her sister, Lydia, happened to be going to school down the street at the Art Institute, and Luci was in town visiting her. They both felt that the apothecary would be a perfect venue for their product, and they quickly had me convinced. It helped that she gave us some free samples. When I finally tried them, I was amazed at how well they work. They snap right into place, don’t slip, and are amazingly absorbent. They’re also awfully cute and fun.

After months of trying to sell this product to my boss (this was a very long and humorous story; at some point I was calling him, his dad, and the other owner the Three Wise Men of Party in my Pants, when he said “I’ll show it to them and we’ll give it a try.” Try them?), he finally agreed to let me bring them into the store, and before we knew it, the line developed a following of dedicated customers.

We had a line of similar products before called Gladrags, that sat on the shelf for eons, and Luci’s line far surpassed that product in sales and quality.

I love my PIMPs and I love Luci, too.:)

Curly Wurly shampoo from Lush

Discovered this this spring when I ran out of all the free stuff from my old job. I have curly, wavy, sometimes fuzzy/frizzy hair, but since I’ve started using this stuff, my hair has been happier, and I can even go a little bit longer between haircuts. Only caveat is that it has little coconut bits in it, so people may wonder what that thing is in your hair if you don’t rinse it out really well.