I can’t do anything now that G-Dragon is back. Every time I sit down to update this thing, I am just like, “No….must watch G-Dragon’s new videos again. Must watch other people watching his videos. Must hound Chooch to watch his videos. Must throw my head back dramatically while hyperventilating thinking about the upcoming tour.”

I would throw myself down on the line for this man. I have no problems saying it.

Crying again. I missed his voice so much. I feel this song in every cell of my body.

I will sit in the very last row if I have to, Lord just help me get a ticket to see him.

Sorry, I am all-consumed. Cannot focus on anything else.

I have been driving my friends at work nuts with this too. They even changed the name of our group chat to this the other day and I love it:

All I want to do is talk about this album!!! Thank god Henry is into it because I have no one else, lol.

NEVER FORGET, ONE OF THE BEST BIRTHDAYS OF MY LIFE (only thing that topped this was when I got to spend my birthday in Korea!):

Act III:Motte, Part 2: Where I Left My Body On Earth & Wafted Up to the Heavens

Remember when he was mere feet away from me, Jesus Christ, how did I ever get that lucky.

Back at the start of the pandemic, I had somehow come across retrowave playlists on YouTube. Actually, I’m pretty sure the algorithm did its thang and my obsessive listening to the Black Queen organically planted me in the lap of this beautiful synth movement. I tend to not listen to Kpop while I’m working because it distracts me (I will start to try and translate what I’m hearing and then I need to stop what I’m doing to check if I’m correct, or I want to get up and jump around, or I will start daydreaming about Korea, etc etc etc) but there is something magical about retrowave because it’s soothing, nostalgic and it puts me in the right zone for working.

HOWEVER.

I accidentally began to associate this with Drew. I guess it’s natural since she was always with me while I was working, and I’d say things to her like, “OMG IT’S OUR JAM!” and try to make her dance lol.

Some of this stuff hits on a very emotional level to begin with – it itches the nostalgic side of my brain, you know? But, after she died, all of it became like that to me and I have not been able to listen to any of it since then. Which is sad because this was my happy place during the work week. Now, I’ve been struggling to find something else. Norwegian pop. Russian pop. Afrobeats. Romanian Club Hits.

But nothing hits like retrowave.

Then a few months ago, I saw that Ollie Wride was coming to PITTSBURGH on his US tour. Ollie Wride is one of the PRESTIGE singers in this genre. His voice sounds like he’s soundtracked the 80s high school coming-of-age movie from your dreams. He did a song with FM 84 several years ago and that song is basically at the top of the retrowave leaderboard of my heart. Probably the one I have listened to the most, and the first time that I really stopped and started looking more into these singers and bands. I found a version that was recording for a livestream during COVID and at that moment, I swore that I had to see Ollie Wride live if ever presented with the opportunity:

Please watch this and tell me it doesn’t plant you firmly into a pair of Jellies during the spring of 1987.

When I hear this song now though, I imagine Drew here with me, sitting on my work laptop because she liked the warmth. I am so broken over this, just the most pathetic sad sack.

Anyway, my likeminded retrowave friends Shawn and Jess were down to join us at this show so I felt good about it, like this could be a healthy step in the healing process. It’s either face it head-on or keep sitting here crying alone like a fucking maniac.

Shawn and I were dying because the show was held at the Crafthouse, which is a small venue across the street from a bar we used to be regulars at back in the early 00s, plus we were best concert buds back then too so this was such a fun “reliving our youth” moment.

And so, on Sunday evening, Henry and I arrived at the Crafthouse a bit before doors opened because we wanted to secure a good table. However, due to technical issues, the doors were delayed by about 45 minutes. We stood outside with a handful of other early birds and chatted about retrowave, darkwave and then bands I didn’t care about and then A LOT of stuff about the college where three of the people work and that stuff bored me so I lulled off into a happy place in my head – j/k the place in my head was where I retreat so that I can scream into a psychic pillow and start thinking about all the ways my life is being inconvenienced by things not starting on time. This is…who I am, you guys. I am working on it, and will probably talk about it tomorrow in therapy lol.

I do want to put out these things for remembering though:

• one of the guys mentioned Kraftwerk so I RAISED MY HAND and said, “My doorbell plays a Kraftwerk song.” Henry said later, “Yeah, I knew that was coming.”
• someone mentioned king gizzard and the lizard wizard and Henry and I chuckled to ourselves because Chooch likes that band too.
• I got to give The Black Queen a much-deserved promotion and was actually surprised that these guys hadn’t heard of them and simultaneously shocked that I wasn’t mansplained or talked over. The one guy even showed me his phone later and said, “Is this them? Cool, I’m adding them now – thanks!”

Anyway, we finally got to go inside around 6:20. We were in the third group that went in but there were VIPs who were already inside so all the good tables were taken. Then I was like, “NOPE” when we chose a table and a group with A BABY sat down at the next one. I just didn’t want to sit next to a baby, maybe I’M A MONSTER. So, we switched tables and it was much better.

I was excited to drink IPAs, who am I.

We were the coolest table in the house, except for maybe the one table that had a guy wearing a fitted leather jacket with SYNTH RIDER spelled out in studs on the back. I told Henry to get out the Bedazzler and do that to my pleather jacket.

I dunno what to say about my dumb pose other than I had two beers at this point and that is so many beers for me.

Henry went to the bathroom at one point and when he came back, I said I had to go too and asked him where it was. He told me and then said, “And say hello to your friend Bethany on the way there. She’s leaning against the wall.”

“Bethany??” I asked.

“Yeah, she said to me ‘your Erin’s husband Henry, aren’t you?’ and said she recognized me from Instagram.” That’s Henry’s most favorite thing to hear, btw. “Erin’s Instagram.” “Erin’s blog.” LOL.

Anyway, it was my friend Bethany from Balloon Ride Fantasy! I haven’t seen her since pre-pandemic when we met up for Korean food at Nakwon Garden (she used to live in Korea years ago as an English teacher!). She was there for the second opener, Vacances and came over to sit with us for a bit before Ollie Wride and it was so nice to catch up with her!

Speaking of openers, I’m not used to this because kpop concerts don’t have openers and it’s actually…nice lol. But that night, there were two and the other was Caleb Kopta. It was OK. I made eye contact with him a few times and tried to brag that we imprinted.  Henry was like, “That’s nice.” I did really like Vacances though and would be up to see them again since they’re local!

And then it was time for OLLIE WRIDE. “Sorry, Henry,” I said as I bolted for the floor by the stage. Jess quickly joined me and it was so nice to have a friend at a show with me! (Sorry again, Henry lol.)

I just want to say that Ollie Wride’s live vocals are immaculate. The high notes were done HIT, y’all. Sheesh. And the energy he brought onto that stage with him.

This jacket didn’t stay on long!

These pictures are so awkward because I was snapping them while recording but what can you do?! It was also amazing to be AT THE FRONT OF THE STAGE like in my other lifetime of going to shows. I’m always like, “no it’s fine, I don’t mind being back far” but then the show starts and I’m like SEE YA and I run to the front. It’s the FOMO in me, I’m a true Leo. And also not cool enough to just casually slink against a wall in the back and watch while texting. I can’t pull off that amount of effortlessly cool.

I don’t have the set list but I can tell you that he performed Back To Life and that was the first time during the night when I thought to myself, “Am I going to be OK? I’m OK…right?” I mean, I was screaming along and doing when Henry called my “happy sort of dance thing” because apparently, he was spying on me from the table like a creeper. And I can tell you for certain that I was very happy that night. Henry wasn’t being dumb, we had good beer, I was with two of my amazing friends, saw another friend….talked to strangers, even! If I can only make this a habit, maybe I’d feel less lonely on every other day.

Earlier in the night, I had made an offhanded remark about how I’m not outgoing and Jess stopped me.

“Yes, you are,” she said firmly.

“No, I’m not really,” I said, face scrunched.

“You are definitely outgoing, come on!” she argued. And you know what? I am fucking outgoing. I just let situations and people stifle me and I think it’s because I’m just too tired to fight it. But Jess is right, at my core, I am an extrovert and I am going to work on making that dominant trait again. (I’m also very obnoxious too which goes hand-in-hand with me being an extrovert so toning that down is a bridge I’ll cross when I get to it I guess.)

OK, the last song was, of course, Running In the Night which is when I did fully break. This fucking song.

I would have paid so much more just to hear this one song. But the entire night was so sublime. He performed Victoria too! And his band was incredible to watch, too. This night. Man.

We rejoined Henry at our table afterward. Most of the crowd had cleared out but we stayed and chatted some more, no one in any hurry to leave.

“Hey, there’s Ollie!” Shawn pointed over my shoulder, where Ollie was one table away with a tiny group of people. “He’s signing stuff! Go ask him to sign your record!” he urged. I didn’t even hesitate. I grabbed my record, purchased as soon as we arrived because I do not wait for merch, and waited my turn.

“What’s your name?” Ollie asked me when it was my turn.

“Erin,” I said, and then, “Can I tell you something weird?”

“Sure!” he said as he was signing my record.

“I associate your music with my cat,” I started, to which he said, “Oh, I have animals, too.”

“She died.”

He stopped signing.

“And tonight was really healing for me. Thank you,” I said as I was on the verge of tears all over again.

And he fucking hugged me.

“You got an Ollie Wride hug!” Shawn squealed (lol) when I came back to the table! And apparently, I hadn’t stopped recording after the last song, so there is a 20 minute long video of the ceiling of the Crafthouse with us chatting post-show. Sadly, I was a bit out of range for my phone to pick up my convo with Ollie but you can hear a hushed, “Aw!” from my table when he hugged me.

Unfortunately, you can also hear how fucking annoying I am talking about kpop scandals for 10 minutes straight but whatever – I’ll be keeping that ceiling rafter video for posterity!

I know everyone is so sick of hearing my cry and lament about my dead cat but I am really trying here. Tonight was a big step for me. I feel so emotional but in a good way because not only did I get to spend time with good friends, but I got to catch up with Bethany and also experience the fantastic Ollie Wride as the cherry on top. I’m really glad I didn’t pass this up. When I saw ten tour announcement last summer, I was scared because of what retro wave has become to me, but – safety in numbers. And I needed to rip the Band-Aid off so I can eventually go back to enjoying this amazing genre of music that used to be such a comfort to me.

And then maybe this can happen:

OK BYE I’M CRYING LOL.

I stayed up until midnight for G-Dragon’s new album drop – there are two MVs and I am fucking dead. “Drama” – are you fucking kidding, Jiyong? Chills, goosebumps, feels, etc etc. I am feeling this in MY BLOODSTREAM. “Untitled 2025” for real.

AND THEN THIS BANGER?! Anderson . Paak AND Karina?? Karina who once got to dance with Taemin and now GD? But also Karina who is a brilliant idol in her own right?! I can’t believe this. We have waited so long for Korea’s King to return and it was worth it, he delivered, he has STILL GOT IT. No one does it like G-Dragon.

HOW AM I GOING TO SLEEP NOW!!!????

My Pappap’s death defined me for YEARS. It happened so abruptly, a few short hours after I had just left his house where he had been sitting on his worn spot of the couch, watching TV and making work calls. Business as usual.

Then BAM – he was gone. Aneurysm. Didn’t even make it to the hospital.

I don’t want to say I’m over it but you know, almost 30 years later and I think it’s safe to say that I can look at photos of him and feel joy rather than grief. Because he was the greatest man I have known and loved. The father I didn’t have. My safe space.

These things are being rehashed in therapy. I didn’t realize how much unprocessed trauma I have in relation to his death. The residual grief that rears its head in odd places and times. Drew’s death over the summer was so similar to his and it opened something inside of me and now I have been grieving them both this whole time, trying to make sense of it. My Pappap’s untimely death was the #1 worst thing that ever happened to me, hands down, no contest. And Drew’s death is a close second. Maybe that will help illustrate why I have been such a shell of myself this last months. The triggers have been so real.

He was the only one in my family who ever showed me true unconditional love. He’s the reason why when I think of my childhood, I feel like I’m bursting with happiness and not dwelling on the bad things that were happening at my own house where I felt like an intruder, like I didn’t belong. I never felt like that at my Pappap’s. Which is why his house is my “happy place” that I think of to calm down when we’re doing EMDR in therapy. Except that after he died, my grandma and Sharon slowly ruined that for me.

If there is one thing I wish, it’s that he and Chooch would have had a chance to know each other. “If you think I was spoiled, I guarantee it would have been next level with Chooch and my Pappap,” I said to Henry, who mono-grunted in response.

He did everything for me, and gave everything to me.

When he died, NO ONE WOULD TALK ABOUT IT. I was dying on the inside. I needed my family more than anything then and everyone just shut down. Nothing was ever the same again and I am not being dramatic. You want to talk about an empire falling. This was exactly that. My family never bounced back. I have like, no relationship with any of them except for my brother Corey. It is so fucking sad.

While today is the anniversary of his death, I’m not sad per se. I mean, I shed a few quiet tears, but I think I am just more….introspective today. Just thinking about everything he taught me, how he was actually my saving grace, my role model, and the type of selfless and giving person that I still aspire to me. I hope that one day, I can be that for someone. (CHOOCH PLEASE GIVE ME GRANDKIDS SOME DAY, I WANT TO HAVE THAT CHANCE.)

This guy was literally the glue that held us together. He gave me such a strong love for travel, too and the desire to do everything possible to give Chooch experiences as he was growing up.

He wasn’t even ashamed of me when I got fat, braces, and fugly-ass bangs!

You know, another thing is that my Pappap was a very wealthy business owner so I had a very comfortable childhood and we all enjoyed a rich lifestyle up until he died, when money was mishandled, the business ran into the ground. But because of how he raised me, I was able to go my own way and live my own life without handouts. Henry and I struggled financially for YEARS but we worked hard, paid off debts, tried (still trying) to be smart(er) with our finances and while we aren’t rich and will likely never be higher than middle class, I appreciate everything that we have earned over the years and I get those values from my Pappap. I bounced back when the only other option was to do nothing and sink. I have been really sitting with these thoughts a lot lately, I guess it’s that season of life, and more than ever do I appreciate everything I learned from my Pappap. I don’t take things for granted, I didn’t stay spoiled (well….lol), and I don’t expect ANYONE to do anything for me. I have strong work ethics and I take pride in my work.

Because of my Pappap. The greatest man I have ever known.

Hey. I started off the new year pretty strong. Let’s recap SHALL WE.

1. Parasol Against the Axe by Helen Oyeyemi

This wasn’t my FAVE Oyeyemi book but it was still brilliant enough to keep her firmly planted at the top of my favorite author list. I don’t know how she writes these things, they are so quirky, smart, brain-bending, full of WTF. This is a weird one because I love her bizarre and insane writing style so much but there was a book-within-the-book going on here and I didn’t like those parts at all. But the present-day narrative was chef’s kiss – unhinged, smart, and thoroughly confusing as always.

There was a line that went like “my skull was full of souffle” and that is exactly how this book (any of her books!) made me feel, like CrossFit for the brain.  You gotta be prepared to put in the work, this book isn’t going to read itself to you.

2. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

I mean, you know this book, or the movie, or the TV show. It was a solid read.

3. How to Kill Men and Get Away With It by Katy Brent

This was fun, especially if you hate men and believe me, I do. But it also wasn’t very unique or revolutionary. I have read better “female serial killer” books but this one was still a fun and quick read.

4. Howl’s Moving Castle (Howl’s Moving Castle, #1) by Diana Wynne Jones

I mean I must be broken because I only thought this was just OK and there is an entire sector of society out there who probably want to string me up for not having a glowing review.

I tried reading this years ago and was bored. Then this time around, I listened to the audio and was still not entertained. I will say though that I have NOT watched the animated film adaptation but it’s Japanese so already I feel like it’s gotta be better than the book.

5. The Reappearance of Rachel Price by Holly Jackson

Actually kind of wild for a YA mystery. I didn’t LOVE it, but it was like, the fuck is going on this is so far-fetched, what??

6. Love Interest by Clare Gilmore

OK so hear me out. The man character was Korean American so there would be like, Korean words and references thrown about here and there which makes me hope that the author either has a vested interest in Korea or has some relation to Korea so I will give her that but the narrator was BOTCHING it up big time. I was cringing every time she fuck up a Korean word like it was his first run-through, no going back.

Also, she pronounced subsidiary as “SUB-si-dairy” instead of “sub-SID-iary” which got under my skin because in my job, we were talking about subs A LOT and everyone uses the latter pronunciation.

Also x2 this book was just boring and I was not having any feels whatsoever.

7. Shiver: Selected Stories by Junji Ito

HELL YEAH. This has been on my TBR for years and I finally picked it up from the library. I loved almost every story, they were so creepy and affective, but “greased” seriously almost made me throw up it was so disgusting. I loved it.

8. Graveyard Shift by M.L. Rio

No. This was just bad. Worse than mid.

9. The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley

OK I enjoyed this way more than I thought I would being sci-fi adjacent I guess and while it remains true that as with most books in that genre, I oftentimes had NO IDEA what was going on, I genuinely loved the characters, their development, their relationships. It was a wild and inventive premise too, Bill & Ted’ish in that random people from the past are brought to the present day. Hilarity ensues.

10. Bottled Goods by Sophie van Llewyn

We are planning a Romania trip later this summer (this is pathetic but we can’t officially book our flight until I know when G-Dragon is touring the US lol) so I have been trying to add some Romanian novels to my TBR to help aid me in getting stoked. I LOVED THIS ONE. It had a bit of magical realism in it but mostly portrayed life in Communist Romania which I admittedly do not know much about so it provided a great historical bent as well.

I really enjoyed this one!

11. Sky Full of Elephants by Cebo Campbell

OK wow another sci fi, who is she. Anyway, this was fascinating – one day, almost all of the white people walk to the nearest body of water and drown themselves and now POC are running a post-racial America. There aren’t any zombies in this but it did give me some The Walking Dead vibes where you have a group of people trying to get to “the Kingdom.”

I really enjoyed this but I couldn’t stand the main character’s 19yo daughter. She was such a fucking brat and her chapters were a drag.

12.Things Don’t Break on Their Own by Sarah Easter Collins

My friend Lindsey recommended this one to me and it was a solid 5 stars, brother. The mystery / thriller element was such a page-turner but the characters. Robyn’s parents. The old lady in the house. The shit Willa endured. The HOLY SHIT moment at the dinner party. This book was so rich with trauma and palpable pain, but also so much love between friends. I loved it so much, every page of it.

13. The Pairing by Casey McQuiston

But then I read this next and it was sooooo bad. I have loved her books in the past but this was just actual trash and I did not care about either person. The European food tour aspect of it wasn’t even enough to redeem it – usually books like that will poke at my wanderlust and it will make the rest of the shit tolerable but this was, as I said, trash. I didn’t care why these people broke up and I didn’t care if they were going to get back together. In fact, I was kind of hoping they would both die. At least Theo. I hated them so much. Wah wah wah.

14. The Third Gilmore Girl by Kelly Bishop

I mean…come on. It’s Kelly freaking Bishop. I admittedly did not know much about her outside of the Gilmore Girls realm but wow has she lived a life. I love memoirs.

*****************

OK bye for now!

You guys, we were staying right down the street from the Bean and even though we have seen it several times before I thought that maybe, on a frigid Monday morning, there might not be crowds so we walked on over.

Had we been ONE MINUTE FASTER we’d have beaten this one couple who arrived seconds before us and proceeded to do an entire amateur photoshoot and I was trying to be polite and not get in their way but also, COME ON.

We stayed to the side for awhile and then finally when they were, readjusting or something, regrouping, discussing the next series of poses, who the fuck knows, I ran over and was able to have Henry take one picture of me quickly.

We were going to leave after that but I was like NO I WANT ONE TOGETHER THIS IS RIDICULOUS.

So I interrupted them and asked if they would take one of us together. The lady of the couple agreed and proceeded to take some very bizarre and unpopular angles, not once getting the whole Bean, and then I had to crop her fingers out of every shot.

Also, she somehow TURNED OFF LIVE so our “jumping shot” looks like this:

But whatever, I can’t complain too much because it was a nice to experience the Bean without throngs of people duck-facing it up.

She did take this “behind the scenes” video though so I guess there’s that lol.

Now my toes are frozen and we’re on our way home. I miss Taemin with my whole fucking heart in case you were wondering.

I was telling my therapist last week that I keep finding myself in this mortality spiral where I sit on the couch and my life flashes before my eyes like one of those stupid flip-page illustration books but it’s mostly my time as a mom, Chooch through the years, Bambi and then no more Bambi, and I start to panic about how time is just fucking Days of Our Lives’ing through my fingers and how much time do I have left with Henry and will Chooch have a happy life on his own without us and before I know it, I can’t breathe and I’m so sad that it’s crippling. Like right now I’m typing this and just flat out ugly-crying and choking on mucus, it’s fucking pathetic. I know that, to an extent, this is normal. It’s like a rite of passage for moms, right? I guess some of the more emotionally attuned dads too.

But I feel so stuck on a loop and like instead of enjoying whatever time I have left, I’m wasting it by wondering HOW MUCH TIME DO I HAVE LEFT.

The other day, I was looking out of the backporch windows at the crows and the squirrels and even though it’s so gross and cold out, there was some crazy split-second glimmer of a vibe, an essence in the air, that made the thought “spring will be here soon” ticker across my stupid brain, and then I BURST INTO TEARS. Thinking about a spring without Chooch. Opening up the backporch for just one cat, not two. Probably having even more gray hair. Henry limping. EVERYTHING IS DIFFERENT. WE ARE ALL SO OLD.

(OMG if you could see how hard I am crying right now, I actually just took a step outside of my body and am cracking up at how fucking hysterical I am being. Do I need drugs?! WHAT DO I NEED.)

(THIS HAS GOT TO BE A MIDLIFE CRISIS.)

I just finished this one book that I had mixed feelings on for almost the whole thing until the very end when it just BLASTED me with grief and emotions, a mom at her son’s wedding, not knowing her husband would die in a handful of years, adjusting to life alone, etc etc and I was like SCREAMING INTERNALLY while giving my eyeballs full reign to just dump the tears out, who cares anymore. If you ever see me and I’m NOT crying at this point in my life, check my pulse because I might be dead.

I miss having Chooch around so much, yes we text every day and yes he still annoys me with his random displays of incompetency and his frustrating, surly one-word answers. But then he will open up about life in Philly and allow me tiny glimpses and I am like I LOVE HIM SO MUCH and then I feel so happy but also somehow more sad.

Yesterday in group chat, some people were sharing photos of their babies and grandbabies for Valentine’s Day and I was so bereft that I no longer fit into these conversations, being in some cold, parental limbo. I had nothing to contribute and then it made me remember this old Valentine’s picture of Chooch and I was too sad to share it then but I will share it now because I miss having a baby. I just miss HIM as a baby.

:( 2008

In an overwhelming fit of “I NEED TO DO SOMETHING TO SHOW HIM I LOVE HIM” I sent Chooch a Saxby gift card for Valentine’s Day, for which he thanked me (even used an exclamation mark!) and then promptly bought his coffee with Henry’s debit card, lol. Little signs of “some things will never change” and I am grateful for that.

I finished the aforementioned book this afternoon and left the house for the first time in over week, finally feeling better, to walk it back to the library. On my way there, the Las Palmas taco cart was BLASTING Alphaville’s “Forever Young” and I actually laughed out loud, more like a sarcastic bark though, at the universe’s sick, totally on-the-nose joke. Really? THAT song? I had to pause before entering the library because I could feel my eyes started to sear with sorrow AGAIN. I am basically just walking around like an unhinged woman on the edge these days, it’s so pathetic. Can I go one day without crying, please.

My therapist told me to start writing this stuff down and I guess that’s what this blog is now, a page for FEELINGS AND CHAOS. It’s so annoying. I’M so annoying. Hopefully one day I will reenter the land of the living. Because whatever this is, it AIN’T IT.

I am so obsessed with this. I am so glad G-Dragon is performing again because similar to the last time we had a dictator stinking up the White House, I am letting myself get lost in kpop delulu land again as a reprieve from all of the doom and extreme panic I feel and no one helps with that more than G-Dragon. Then add in Taeyang and this feels like such cozy comfort and nostalgia.

This song is a classic. I never tire of hearing Taeyang performing this and all these years later I am still so glad that I sold our 2017 Riot Fest tickets for one Taeyang concert ticket. It was worth every penny.

Can we talk about G-Dragon’s wardrobe changes? He looked like such a fucking prince. Of course BTS fans (the insane ones, I realize there are normal ones out there but sadly it’s the crazy ones that are the loudest) said that he looked like he just came in off the street, LOL. OK. Calm down, we know you’re mad that he performed at the same concert as your fave and the GP ate him up more because he’s a living legend.

Anyway, this was a charity concert in Paris benefiting sick children. Katy Perry headlined, and GD and Taeyang were in the middle of the lineup. However, when the concert was edited for the televised replay, the editors moved this performance to the end after seeing how insane the crowd reaction was. It’s really helping me decompress this week but I still am daydreaming hourly about Trump tumbling headfirst down a set of concrete steps while eating a Big Mac, landing with a broken neck  and choking to death while being ignored and stepped on by migrants and minorities of all walks of life trying to enter the unisex bathroom that his wide orange berth is blocking.

Somewhere nearby, Elon Musk melts inside an exploded Cyber Truck.

Fuck you, both.

G-Dragon for President.

My sister Amy and I have been staying vigilant with getting together more often over the last year or so and I am honestly loving it. I can’t remember if I ever really talked about it much on here but Amy didn’t come into my life until I was about 30, I think? She is my older sister and our mom was forced to put her up for adoption by our grandma. Anyway, despite having completely different upbringings, we keep discovering more and more uncanny similarities that make Henry actually guffaw (literally, it’s an inspired guffaw!) and Amy’s husband Dick frown in disappointment. Everything from us being brats about the dinners they make us to our refusal to put away our clothes that THEY have laundered for us. It’s just too good.

Anyway, Amy is also one of the catalysts behind my recent beer awakening. She and Dick enjoy going to breweries and yeah, I know I can go and either not drink or get a seltzer or a cider if available, but I wanted to hang with the big dogs, you know? So, every time, I would get a flight and end up saying, “That was OK but I never want to drink it again.” LOL. But now I can not only drink BUT ALSO ENJOY pretty much all types of beers except for stouts and porters! I’m also kind of a snob about it, but this should not come as a surprise to anyone.

We met up at Voodoo Brewing in Houston (PA, not TX!) and I was so stoked because my options have greatly expanded since I last went to a brewery. The girl working did not like me one bit. First of all, Henry and I were THE ONLY PEOPLE THERE so it’s not like it’s super chaotic and she was trying to serve 100 people like some glorified German bar maid. She just stood there and watched us as we looked at the options, never once asking if we needed help, offering suggestions, or I DON’T KNOW POINTING OUT THAT THERE WERE SEPARATE MENUS which I didn’t  know and only selected from the seasonal list which meant that I had just 3 from Voodoo and the other 3 from rando’ breweries and then when I was like, “Wait, what are those behind you?” and she monotoned that they were the ones that are always on tap, I asked, “Oh no, is it too late to change my picks?”

She said no, but she said it with an air of exasperation and annoyance. I said, “I’m sorry, did I screw this up?”

“No,” she said with a clipped edge. “This is just my last sheet of paper, that’s all.”

OK? AND? Use a napkin to write down Henry’s?? Also, why was that the last paper for flights when it was only 2:30pm?? That sounds like a Voodoo supply management problem not a me problem.

So far, we have established that I of course love my Belgians (the tripel-ier the better), IPAs (but not all – it takes a lot to WOW me though I do really have a taste for that stringent grapefruit rind essence), and THIS JUST IN, I have a crush on red ales now too.

I don’t like how Henry is leering at my beers.

LOLOLOL I posted this on Instagram too. I was only taking it for UnTapped purposes but this deserved to be enjoyed by all.

DON’T POINT AT ME.

My OG BESTIE CAT Marcy hated being pointed at. This just reminded me of that. She would growl and lunge at jutting phalanges and she was paws out / claws out all of the time, in case you were wondering. The only one she never maimed was Chooch and I still don’t know why because I don’t think she actually cared for him.

Amy and Dick are big football people and we are definitely not but we still always have so much to chat about and this is why I love hanging with them. I LOVE TO TALK. Amy and I were in tears at one point when Dick and Henry were comparing notes on us and I thought to myself, in that moment, “THIS is what I needed.” Real connection.

According to my Untapped app, the winners of the day for me were:

• Don’t Leave Me Edith – IPA
• Wynona’s Big Brown Ale – Brown Ale (this was Henry’s and I only had a sip which made me immediately regret not including it in my flight selection)
• Voodoo Love Child – Belgian Tripel
• White Magick of the Sun – Witbier

Next! We walked next door to Helltown Brewing and even though it was less trendy/flashy/artsy, the vibes were immaculate from the start. First off, it was way cozier and packed with friendly people – two of whom were Dick’s niece and her husband! We sat with them and they were wonderful, super down to earth and easy to chat with so I felt very human, like my old self.

Henry and I went to a haunted house last fall and Helltown actually had a little stand set up. I was like LET’S GET A BEER LIKE ADULTS, WE ARE EMPTY NESTERS and he immediately said, “YOU WILL NOT LIKE A SINGLE ONE OF THEIR OFFERINGS, WOMAN OF MINE” and I was like, “OK hold my future beer and let me be the judge of that.”

Jackass.

I got the Oktoberfest only because at that time, I was certain I wouldn’t like anything else (it was a small sampling of what they have – an IPA-heavy lineup). Anyway, we got one can to share and I liked it so much that I ended up drinking most of it.

So, I was pretty excited to come here and try some more! They actually have waaaay more of a selection than I thought.

Dick’s niece recommended the Mischievous Brown Ale to me and it was one of my favorites of the whole day.

I also really liked:

• Willow Hazy IPA
• Belgian Wit
• Red Eye Red Ale (WHO AM I)

LOL so…my whole flight basically.

But then Amy got a second flight for us to share and of that one, we got my favorite of the whole day – the Headless Wylie pumpkin/yam beer. FINALLY, a pumpkin beer that tasted like pumpkins to me! I was so impressed. And I also really liked Idle Hands – IPA. The other two were a lager and blonde / golden ale which were mid but drinkable. I for sure know what I like now though!

I made this face on purpose and Henry was annoyed.

I was hammered. Henry said I had the equivalent of 2 full beers, maybe 2.5 LOL.

HAHAHAHA.

I took this picture on purpose because Amy made Dick start talking to that guy down there about some football player and then he ended up being really cool and reminded me of my brother Ryan brother (Henry immediately co-signed when I mentioned this on the way home).

Stil fully daylight and I was practically sliding off my stool.

And then we made not-Ryan take our picture because it’s tradition.

I am so happy that this happened and can’t wait for next month!

(Normal people go out and it’s not some big PRAISE BE, SO GRATEFUL event but I am truly half dead inside because every iota of human contact I get is like, news alert, Erin made a connection with a person and now an ordinary trip to a brewery just became some major OMG U GUYS tale for the blog. I fucking hate myself lol.)

I know some people were UP IN ARMS when the craft conglomerate MICHAELS did an early release of Halloween decor last year right before summer and it was OMG in a retro summer palette. But shooooo, I was into it. I love orange and pink as complementary colors, and I loved the 1960s mini-skirt floral print that was used on some of the decor too. LIKE THIS COFFIN SHELF, for instance. I had been bitching about we need to have more knick knack shelves because I am hoarder-adjacent. I love souvenirs and things like that! I can’t help it.

It’s so perfect for my needs and aesthetic. I love death-stuff but also colors. And vintage floral!

Henry was stoked to see that I moved this Pal’s Styrofoam cup from the top of the fridge where it had been living for approx. 3 years to the shelf. I just really wanted a memento from Pal’s OK?? It was a very sentimental part of one of our past road trips and I refused to let Henry throw it out!! Originally, I wanted to turn it into Art somehow but Styrofoam is weird to work with and also, isn’t this Art enough on its own?

Speaking of that hyperlink, this is such a sad glimpse into my life currently but I have putting myself to sleep at night by reading old road trip liveblogs and then dozing off on a pillow of nostalgia. I’m so sad that those days are likely over, at least for the three of us, because this summer coming up will be his last summer home from school since Drexel does Co-Ops. I have been on this kick lately where I daydream about him graduating and eventually having a family and then we all drive off into the sunset together on crazy road trips, destination: random amusement parks.

I don’t know if you can tell, but I am struggling over here lol. I’m not as weepy as I thought I would be but I definitely feel like he took half of my heart with him to Philly. I never really considered myself the type of person who identified solely as a “mom,” but I think it’s more that in addition to being my son he was/is MY BEST FRIEND. I miss hassling Henry together, getting on each others’ nerves, arguing over the last word, having stupid adventures and inside jokes.

It’s stupid (it’s not stupid) but this cup is kind of a symbol of that.

Random lighters! I used to be a HEAVY SMOKER in my late teens right up until I got pregnant at 25. I am so grateful to pregnancy making me flat out averse to cigarettes for obvious reasons. But I still have these two remnants of my past nicotine-clouded life (and two cigarette cases!!!). Also, my second cat was named Nicotina – that was how idiotic of a smoker I was.

Anyway, I bought that first lighter at a smokers (and also bondage lol) den on the South Side called Slackers. And the Robert Smith one was an eBay purchase back when all I did was scour eBay for Cure memorabilia. (Never forget when I threw myself down prostrate on my mom’s kitchen floor because I wanted her to give me like $5000 to purchase a ROBERT SMITH AND LYDIA LUNCH SHARED JOURNAL and I was even prepared to sell my car but it was in MY MOM’S NAME and she said NO.)

The infamous bottle of Bela Lugosi’s grave dirt that I had saved on Etsy because I wanted to purchase it for my friend Alyson who’s LJ name is “gravedirt” and then Henry the Goof saw it and thought it was something I wanted and got it for me for Christmas. I was so confused. IT WAS ON YOUR WISHLIST he said. And I was like YES FOR SOMEONE ELSE. Joke’s on me ‘cuz I just assumed bro never looked at that shit. It still cracks me up when I look at it because THE ONE time Henry tries to “do the right thing” things go awry.

Anyway, I used to keep this on my desk at work for years and it was a great conversation starter.

(And conversation killer.)

Um, this frog…I honestly can’t remember where he’s from?!?! He could have been purchased from some shop of handmade wares while on some grand vacation.

Or…Pier One.

In either case, I’ve had him since high school so he has been a consistent part of my home decor for possibly 30 years. Yikes. An heirloom.

(OMG DO YOU THINK THE PALS CUP WILL BE AN HEIRLOOM ONE DAY TOO.)

Oh, this one makes me cry for several reasons.

1. I bought this on our last day in Korea last year, from a halmoni who hand embroiders them. That is her name on it too – Hoon Jae. She was so sweet and I am kicking myself for not buying more. I love it so much that I won’t even take it out of the organza bag because I want to keep it clean and protected forever.

2. It used to sit on my home desk and Bambi would always jump up, sniff it out, and start chewing on the bag. I miss her so much that if I could go back in time, I would just let this be hers only. Bambi’s halmoni hanky.

Well, that’s it for this edition of Things Around My House.

Oh shit, P.S.!! That crow that looks ancient was gifted to me this past Christmas by my brother Ryan! He was like, “I dunno, it just seemed like something you would like” and boy howdy, do I ever. I have a big appreciation for crows because we are on the same side when it comes TO GETTING THE HAWK TO FUCK RIGHT OFF.

….straight from my head to here.

We’re in the middle of a cold nap here in Pittsburgh and my motivation and drive are both definitely frozen along with our pipes. It’s days like these when I am extra grateful to be working from home but I am so lonely and feel on the verge of cabin fever.

I had a therapy sesh yesterday and we were technically supposed to be gathering more information for our next EMDR session which is going to focus on my childhood and growing up as the stepkid in our household, not feeling like I belong, etc. You know, typical shit. But then I started ranting about how I’m 45 and still in a sick cycle with dieting and food phobia and weight obsession and it all can be pinned on ONE PERSON in my life – my fucking grandmother. It’s so much a part of me that sometimes I don’t even realize how much it controls my life, how many times I have canceled lunch plans with friends because my food-fear and obsession with weighing myself is unhinged. I told my therapist that, unless we’re away, I legit weigh myself every morning and that stupid number can and does set the tone for the day. It can be the difference between having a pleasant day with Henry or blaming everything on him (accusing him of sabotaging me, not caring how I feel, not holding me accountable, etc.). I can be a downright monster. I have ruined entire days, road trips, holidays, you name it – all because I’m afraid of just letting myself live my life and eat the things I want to eat and not care about how I look or, god forbid, admit that NO ONE ELSE FUCKING CARES EITHER. LITERALLY NO ONE IS GAPING AT ME WHEN I WALK INTO A ROOM AND EVEN IF THEY WERE, THAT’S ON THEM NOT ME, RIGHT.

Yeah, easier said than done.

You guys, I can vividly recount numerous times, too many to detail individually, where Henry and I (I have tried not to do this anytime Chooch was with us, he already knows I’m psycho) would get as far as being seated in a restaurant, maybe even putting in our drink order, when I suddenly cannot stand being in there for one second longer, I’m panicking over the menu and what fits into my diet, everything is closing in around me, that one person might have glanced at me I’m not sure, and next thing Henry knows, I’m abruptly absconding from the establishment. Except maybe less “absconding” and more “causing a scene in my chaotic haste to get outside.”

Also, I have spent almost my whole existence feeling like the ugliest girl in the world thanks to my grandma, please refer to this post for background and actual handwritten evidence from my vacation journal:

Some Things Sunday

Also, when my therapist asked me if I have specific memories to use during EMDR, I was shouted, “OH BOY DO IT!” Again, I refer you to the above (I did tell my therapist and she made a face which I knew to mean, “Jesus Christ”) and also the times my grandma would make my underarm fat swing while making disappointed clucks.

Oh and also when she had my mom put me on Slim Fast when I was in, wait for it, 6th grade so that I wouldn’t ruin my aunt Susie’s upcoming wedding by being a fugly blimp in a junior bridesmaid dress and boy did I have news for her when I did end up losing weight but still had BAD HAIR AND BRACES.

Boo hoo, Erin. Right? Get over it.

You don’t think I have been trying!? It has nearly ruined my relationship with Henry and sometimes I feel like I have been holding myself back so much in life because of this stupid control my grandma has over me even from the grave.

(Yes, I was sad when my grandma died. No, I did not cry nor did I mourn.  I even tried to reject bereavement leave when my manager at the time tried to get me to take time off. I truly didn’t want it.)

Life is so weird. My childhood had way more joy in it than not (mostly thanks to my pappap) but these are some of the bad things that stand out more in my mind sometimes. When people are like, “You’re lucky that you grew up rich”* and I’m like, “Yeah but was I really lucky though?” Lol look at the neuroses I inherited!

*(Literally no one has ever said that except for Chooch, lol.)

Anyway, I’m going to end this here, eat some low-calorie soup and then do Kpop cardio later in an effort to burn it all off because I am still fully stuck in the cycle!

Hey-o, I read 157 books in 2024. Goodreads tells me that I gave 14 of those a 5-star rating but looking at that list, I’m not sure how strongly I feel about some of those. I pared them down to 5 that I would confidently recommend to friends and would happily buy a hardback copy for my own collection some day if I ever have room for books ugh.

I just really, sincerely loved this book with my whole heart. Great dialogue, bright characters, a compelling plot. I was tense and also laughing out loud more times than I could keep track of. I would recommend this to either someone who doesn’t read books regularly because it’s a freaking easy read and page-turner, someone in a reading slump, and someone who liked picturing young Bruce Willis as a main character because that is where my mind immediately went from the very start of this book. Blue-collar Bruce Willis trying to save his daughter.

This one broke me.

A horror novel that is actually scary because it’s based on real life events in Jim Crowe Florida. Haunting. Brutal. It will rip your heart out. Recommended only to people who can handle painful and heavy narrative. It is a horror novel but the scariest parts are the things that the living do to the living. This book will live in my head forever.

A sprawling, vivid, surreal Korean tale, and another one that was painful and hard to read at times because of the brutality – especially toward women.

But Jesus, I am so glad I picked this up because the pay-off was huge. I don’t know who I would recommend this to and am honestly not sure if I would have even considered it if I weren’t already into Korean culture. But there is something about Korean novels – IYKYK. If you’re looking for an epic novel that will transport you to someplace violently magical chockful of trigger warnings, then give this one a shot lol.

In a nutshell, this is an epic family drama spanning several generations. 

I was completely invested in every generational POV, my favorite being the one set in the late 90s. There’s also a little bit of magical realism in this which caught me off guard. I think I would recommend this to anyone, really. It’s just that solid.

I was still very freshly mourning the death of my cat Drew when I read this.  It was irreverent and LOL funny, exactly what I needed to keep me from cannon-balling off a parking garage in Chicago. Such a sad sack of a protagonist and I wanted nothing but the best for him. The writing was fresh and smart – would have made me jealous if I still even slightly considered myself a “writer.” Let me just say that I don’t follow many authors on Instagram but I immediately started following Gene Kwak after I read this. Funny, awkward, painful, and uncomfortable encounters; a VERY WTF swimming pool scene; a mother/son road trip; an underlying theme of identity crisis – this book has it all. Ricky is a character I won’t soon forget.  I don’t know who I would specifically recommend this to. You, I guess.

Your turn! Lay your 5 star reads on me.

My mom brought a bagful of photos over to Corey’s in Christmas Eve. I already had copies of most of them because I took all of the photos from my grandparents’ house when we were cleaning it out and they most have had doubles printed of everything to share between houses. I come from a very photo-happy family.

As such, I was letting Corey and Ryan take whatever they wanted but when I came across this shot of Ryan and me with our grandma on the BELOVED DARKRIDE La Cachot, I snatched it up with a quickness. I have never seen this picture before! And for some reason, we don’t have many pictures from our visits to Kennywood which is wild to me.

This ride definitely shaped my love for dark rides; it was a personal favorite of mine as a child and I still get so stoked when we go to an amusement park that has an authentic, vintage dark ride and not these new-fangled shooting rides which I hate. I want something with black lights, hokey K-Mart-esque Halloween masks, Pretzel cars, and the stench of damp basements and moth balls.

I don’t know if this was a Yinzer thing but my friend Keri always called it Lickashit.

They tore down the building in 1998 – for years I thought it was because that it had caught fire but evidently, the plan was always to tear it down because the building was so old and it was deteriorating, I guess (per the below video) and in the process of tearing it down, there was also a fire. IMO, removing this was the beginning of a slew of bad and questionable decisions made by Kennywood. I guess it doesn’t matter who owns the park, dumb moves are still bound to be made. This is making me feel extremely bitter.

(Apparently, you have to watch this video on YouTube.)

But yeah, that’s all I’ve got for this snowy, bitchy Sunday. Back to hypnosis via Enhypen videos.

Happy random Monday in January. I have been obsessed with the BooSeokSoon comeback since last week and that has been keeping me properly infected with joy during these cold, gray days.

In case anyone is actually reading this and cares, BooSeokSoon (BSS) is a sub-unit of Seventeen – Boo Seungkwan, Lee Seokmin (DK), and Kwon Soonyoung (Hoshi). They are basically the nation’s cheerleaders if we’re being honest. One of their older songs, Fighting, was the official song that played for Team Korea during the last Summer Olympics. It’s like THAT.

They’ve been making the rounds on all of the music shows but so far this one is my favorite because I love Seungkwan’s weird little yodel in the beginning lol:

Hopefully this cheers you up if you were having a bad day!

And in case you were wondering Henry’s stance on BSS, he stans. So, I bought him a BSS hat for Christmas :)

Wow. Pop off, Kpop Dad.

Henry actually likes Seventeen in general so much that he has rejected my invitation to start stanning Enhypen and Zerobaseone. He’s a devoted Carat and sends me Seventeen reels all day long.

Anyway, that’s all I have for today, a gross Monday in January that started off with an 8AM dentist appointment, UGH what was I thinking when I scheduled that?? Less than an hour after I walked home, I looked out the window and it was a white-out out there so I’m really glad I didn’t get caught in that, sheesh.

Wow, that title was lame even for me. Please accept my apologies.

Anyway, I read these books in December while counting down the end of a shitty year.

1. Eight Hundred Grapes – Laura Dave

I was double-fisting the Laura Dave to kick off December. I remember really enjoying her novel “The Last Thing He Told Me” and saw that she has a new one out, so I started to read that AND THEN I saw that the audio for this one was available on Hoopla. It’s an older one and I thought it was just OK. Probably just because it was giving the TV show Brothers & Sisters vibes because of the family vineyard story line. It was a lot of family drama, small town characters, runaway bride with little pay off. Also, I made the mistake of reading a review where someone pointed out that she writes in fragments a lot of the time and then I couldn’t stop noticing that, like she learned how to write from LiveJournal in 2001. Not the worst book but I would only recommend as maybe an option for a flight or train ride, I don’t know. This is not my profession.

2. The Night We Lost Him – Laura Dave

This is the new one and it was better – way more mystery vibes. I wouldn’t go as far as calling it a thriller. I was very invested in this for the first half and then it did lose steam for me. I couldn’t connect well with the main character and as such it turned into a “figure it out or don’t, I don’t really care” type of read for a bit but I was back into it by the end and glad that I stuck it out.

3. Heads Will Roll – Josh Winning

Even after re-reading the synopsis, I couldn’t remember actually reading this book at first?! But now I remember and it was decent – better than his other book, Burn the Negative. It has a “summer camp for adults who need to detox from social media” kind of plot, but of course there’s a killer in the woods gunning for all of them. Now that I’m remembering this book, I can confirm that there were times when I was genuinely creeped out by the imagery but I did think all of the characters were extremely corny and written as caricatures. And when we finally find out why the main character was “cancelled,” it was kind of anticlimactic.

4. A Good Happy Girl – Marissa Higgins

I gave this a 2. This whole unhinged and confused single girl in her 20s trope is wearing on me. Also, I’m 45 and not single (albeit unhinged and confused) so I am definitely not the target audience here but I have liked books from this niche genre in the past. This one is mostly about a depressed woman trying to fill a void by being the third wheel in a lesbian couple’s marriage and it is so uncomfortable and actually gross a lot of the time, to be honest, and I have a pretty high tolerance for reading about kinks, etc. I should have known from the cover, tbh.

5. Lula Dean’s Little Library of Banned Books – Kirsten Miller

Entertaining and with a message! I thoroughly enjoyed this one. The characters were rich and real, I was rooting for the good guys so hard, swearing at the racist bigots, and laughing out loud at the absolute havoc this little library was creating around town. This one I do recommend.

6. Heartstopper Vol. 5 – Alice Oseman

The Netflix show has kind of gotten on my nerves, but this book series is still so solid. I  think it would have been semi-life changing if it had been available when I was a kid.

7. Mr. Fox – Helen Oyeyemi

4.5. God, I love Helen Oyeyemi with my whole heart. The things she does with the English language is ABSURD. SORCERY. Sometimes I think she is an absolute psychopath. I can’t explain it – you just have to read one of her books to understand and godspeed if you do. The first time I read a book by her, I thought I hated it until it occurred to me that I just hated how stupid it made me feel, but not in a dark academia sense. You have to go into her books with the understanding that it will stretch your brain like laffy taffy, it will make you yell WHAT AM I READING, and it will be so rewarding in the end. As someone who admittedly spends too much time doom-scrolling, every Oyeyemi book is like a reset for my mind. It reminds me that at one time, I was kind of smart. I was good at English. I liked to read challenging things.

8. Perfume & Pain – Anna Dorn

Unlike that “A Good Happy Girl’ trash I read earlier in the month (which comes up as “readers also enjoyed” for this book on Goodreads LOL), this one did it for me enough that I gave it a 3. I had fun reading it, I rooted for Astrid and wanted so badly for her to get her life back on track. I loved the cast of characters she had orbiting her. Plus, the cover speaks to me. This would have been a good vacation book.

9. Rental House – Weike Wang

This is the second book of Wang’s that I’ve read and they both have a similar disassociated kind of vibe going on with the main character. Keru was pretty unlikable (I mean, even the dog prefers the husband over her) but I still just wanted good things for her. There really isn’t much of a plot to talk about – it starts with a married couple sharing a rental house with both sets of parents during the pandemic – Keru’s Chinese parents come for the first half and Nate’s white / American parents come the second half and the atmosphere is very different for both but the universal sense of OVERBEARING INLAWS is the same.

The second half of the book finds the couple several years later renting another vacation house and having strange interactions with a family of three in the house next door and then an unexpected family visitor. It was actually pretty stressful. I don’t know that I would actively recommend this to anyone but I did give it a 4.

10. The Midnight Feast – Lucy Foley

Truthfully, I could not follow along with this. Between mixing up the characters and a general ambivalence toward the story itself, I have realized that it’s time to put Foley on my DNR list because all of her books up until now have been major wastes of time for me. I even tried the audio and that was somehow worse. Hated it.

11. Greta & Valdin – Rebecca K. Reilly 

A boring book about two siblings who are roommates and the brother is obsessed with his ex-boyfriend who is also the brother of some guy married to his uncle or something?! You know it’s going to be bad when the book starts with a literal WHO’S WHO and some of the characters inexplicably have the same name.

The only parts I liked was when Romania was referenced here and there.

12. Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance – Alison Espach

So….I only read this because I’m waiting for the library to get her new book The Wedding People which has been very buzzworthy of late and some of my friends have rated it highly. Now I’m nervous because I lowkey hated this book. I gave it 1 star for the sheer amount of times I rolled my eyes. It’s narrated by the younger sister of the girl who “disappeared,” and it starts in elementary school and works its way up to present day. The elementary school era of the book seems to drag on for-fucking-ever for apparent reason other than to build a foundation for the readers to see that the sisters have a close (?) relationship. Or used to. It honest to god just drones on and on though and is cheesy and aggravating, to be quite frank. To the point that when  the “disappearance” happens, I was so simultaneously relieved and also underwhelmed. Sure, it was sad but like…

I don’t know. I think this year (2024) burnt me out.

Bye.