somebody had ripped open one of the bags and placed a roll under the windshield wipers of every car on South Street

I wish Santa Amoroso would visit me!

Don’t forget cicadas!

I love chipmunks! Such a big squeak from such a tiny body, plus I love their pointy tails :)

Yup I live right near the Brandywine. PA gets beautiful fall colors! They’re also great along the Delaware up near the Water Gap (but I’m biased because the Delaware is my favorite river) :)

Also Tapestry by Carole King

Come back one year!

That’s strange, I grew up in NJ and our roads tend to be well maintained. It was kinda shocking when I moved to PA and the roads had way more potholes and skinny useless shoulders!

The movie version of A Clockwork Orange was based on the American version of the book, which left out the entire last chapter. In that chapter, at 18 years old Alex pretty suddenly grows out of his violent and criminal ways and wants to start a family. Some say this ending is more optimistic but I actually think it’s darker, because it shows that any normal person you meet might’ve at some point been a wanton brute reveling in the chaos and pain they so arbitrarily inflicted. And that they can just move on and start living like a normal person.

How frustrating!!

I had a labral tear in my right hip, and I needed an MRI with contrast to diagnose it. Aetna wouldn’t cover the MRI until I’d done 6 weeks of physical therapy. I ended up paying out of pocket for the physical therapy because it was an $80/session co-pay vs their self-pay rate of $70/session. Then once I’d finished therapy there was about 6 weeks of waiting until I could get in for the MRI, because Aetna wouldn’t let me get an MRI at the local hospital, I had to go to an outpatient imaging center and they were booked up. And when I got the results - what do you know, near complete detachment! Something that physical therapy would never help with. After that, I consulted with a surgeon (6 week wait), and his waitlist for surgery was 4 months. (Granted, I went to one of the top surgeons in my area - I was OK with waiting for that.) So it ended up being 10 months from noticing the hip pain in May 2023 to finally getting the surgery in March 2024, and a lot of that delay was because Aetna was being obstructive.

I suspect they want people to get fed up with the roadblocks and just give up on pursuing medical care.

Ah, we got the Robert Redford version. I had to google the dicaprio version because I didn’t even know it existed!

• For some reason we watched Beauty and the Beast in junior high
• In my grade 9 (or maybe 10, can’t remember) Social Studies class we watched Not Without My Daughter
• At the end of the school year in grade 10 we had those few extra days with no curriculum, and we watched Se7en (no idea how this was allowed)
• In grade 10 we saw Romeo + Juliet (I think it had just come out on VHS and we’d just finished reading the play in English class)
• Cool Hand Luke sometime in grade 9 or 10, don’t remember why
• Grade 11 we saw both The Great Gatsby and Othello in English class

I’m sure I’m missing some but these are the ones that stick out to me

Yeah, both prices I gave were for name brand (Quaker). The generic Aldi oats are just as good!

Only brand I’ve ever had is Oodles of Noodles, and I don’t even know if they still make that.

Ginger

I’m huge into makeup, and I watch a lot of beauty content on YouTube because I want to see how certain makeup looks and performs before I buy it. This AI bullshit defeats the purpose of demonstrating makeup.

Some thoughts:

• Buy in bulk - if you compare unit prices, you’ll see the bulk version is usually cheaper
• Make your own snacks - e.g., granola is pretty quick and easy to make at home
• Try Aldi or Lidl
• Give generic versions of things a try - a lot of the time they’re pretty close to the ‘real’ thing
• Things that are convenient are usually more expensive. Just looking online quickly, I see the big tub of old-fashioned oats is $6.39 for 30 servings (=21¢/serving), vs a box of instant oatmeal at $3 for 8 servings (=38¢/serving). So to save money, choose the less convenient version.
• Plan your meals before you shop, and pick up only what you need - this helps avoid impulse purchases

We’re 47 and 43, living in an exurb of Philly, and we cook at home 95% of the time (=20/21 meals weekly) and eat out once a week. Since it’s summer, we grill a bunch of protein and veggies - chicken, turkey burgers, and salmon, plus squash from our garden - every 5 days or so, and use that as a base for our lunches and dinners. That way each individual meal is quick to throw together and we’re not spending a bunch of time cooking every night.

When we were young we did a lot of eating out and delivery, and I wish we hadn’t. Not to harsh your mellow, but restaurant food is mostly terrible for you. Loads of fat, sodium, and sugar, and often doesn’t meet your micronutrient needs (depending on what kind of food you’re getting). Cooking at home can be way healthier. And also better for your wallet!

I love brutalist architecture.

A side of statin.