Have a Loving Weekend.
What are you up to this weekend? Freddie, a smattering of boys, and I are going to see the movie Coyote vs. ACME, which legitimately looks very funny. Have you seen any good movies lately? Hope you have a restful weekend, and here are a few links from around the web…
“I lost my dad on 9/11. He loved his office with a view.” What a beautiful, heart-wrenching personal essay. (NYTimes gift link)
People are losing their minds over Nathan Fielder’s new documentary on Elizabeth Holmes. The trailer is SO bizarre.
This new collection has me ready to move to the English countryside.
Wait, why aren’t all dry shampoos applied like this?
17 things that are better secondhand.
Speaking of, my secondhand shopping strategy is searching for brands I already know and love, like Jamie Haller, Clare V. and Loeffler Randall.
I want to be a dad. *laughs hysterically* *wrings hands*
How fun are these goof-around photos of Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle?
I spotted these cool ballet pumps all over Europe.
Passive-aggressive emails from my toddler about starting school. “Appreciate you doing the legwork but this is a pass for me.”
Emma Cline’s new novel, Switzy, might be the best book I’ve ever read. And how to create the life you want. xoxo (Big Salad gift links)
Plus, two reader comments:
Says Emily Crowder on what do you want to learn this year? “When my grandmother passed away, she left me a little spending money. I put it away, too full of grief. A year later, I was taking a yoga class, and the instructor put on a cello piece. Tears rolled down my cheeks. When I got home, I enrolled in an adult beginner cello class every Tuesday night. Learning to be humble and look for something beautiful in all my screeching has brought me immeasurable pleasure and joy. I think about my grandmother while I practice scales and how hungry she was to learn things until the very end of her life. It’s a huge, huge gift.”
Says Karen on would you wear ghost lashes: “250+ comments on not wearing mascara! Joanna, you are the OG blogger for a reason, haha.” Says Jess: “I thought the same thing! The way a simple post can make us feel like we are gabbing with girlfriends at dinner is unparalleled.” Adds Nadine: “Thank you to the wonderful CoJ community. I was feeling very down and tired, and reading the comments on mascara (which I have no major feelings about) made me feel better. There are so many good people here, who are respectful, interested, and warm.” Ed. note: Love this community so much. xoxo
(Photo by J Danielle Wehunt/Stocksy.)
Comments
75 commentsonly saying this because i think this community would appreciate it and receive it as intended which is with goodwill but it is ‘wrings hands’ not ‘rings hands’ <3
Thank you, Ann!! Fixed! I really appreciate your note xoxoxo
Joanna, I think you spoke about “mortal terror” in a Big Salad interview recently…did Switzy not terrify you? I just put it on hold at my library, but honestly I’m scared!
I can’t remember what I did a few days ago, but I can still remember the terror of every minute of that day.
Budget dry shampoo option: cornstarch applied with a makeup brush, just like the one in Jo’s link! Stir in coca powder before you apply if you’re brunette. When you do get to shower, it smells like chocolate as the cocoa powder rinses out. It’s lovely.
I really don’t understand why there is no discussion or acknowledgement of 9/11. Don’t you live in New York? Why do you resist acknowledging the 25th anniversary? I don’t get it. Maybe transplants don’t care as much.
the first link is about 9/11. we, of course, care very much.
And it’s a beautiful essay. I don’t read NYT often these days but I appreciate this gift link a lot.
Right. We all have our thoughts and feelings about that day and will remember the horror of it forever, but what we really need is some random person on the internet to chime in and make it a little more distressing and unpleasant. So thanks for that. Your comment makes no sense and helps nothing.
You know, I had the same thought. I expected something community building like, “where were you on 9/11?” or discussing how it’s changed the city or changed the writers’ lives. The NYT gift article was lovely, and about 9/11, agreed. I was surprised – not judgmental – about the casualness of a single mention on this historic date.
Ugh Jenn, why the truly snarky comment? Did it feel good to post a holier-than-thou note when you were in the wrong to start with? Jo, you are gracious as always with the poison pen comments.
I met a couple of friends at a beach near where we all live in Nova Scotia to sit on blankets for a few hours and chat and knit, and I brought up “ghost mascara” and my one friend said “you read Cup of Jo today too!!” a bit later I took out all the lip products that just live in my purse and counted them….9. we laughed a lot. being in your 50s feels a bit like being a teenager somehow?
For my friends, if I mention I read sth on “my blog” they know I am talking about COJ :)
I also started learning cello as an adult! I’m terrible at it and I love it.
Yes! Terrible but in love about sums it up. This year I’ll be in a beginner adult ensemble 💕
Hmmm. This just brought up PTSD about when I wanted to play cello in middle school but parents could not afford it until my younger sister was in middle school and then they could. So she got to play cello. Why cello? Because she loved whatever I loved, which I was too disgruntled to appreciate at that age. Maybe I should right the wrong now that I’m a grown up and start cello!! I love this thought!!
My 13 year old had written me texts about dinner “looks good but I don’t think it’s for me”.
hah!
Just had to stop in and say that the “passive aggressive emails from my toddler” could be interchangeable with my 15 year old son! I used to teach high school and when asked about it, I would always say; high school kids are just 3rd graders in giant bodies and I still stand by it! haha
Thank you for the article about PEN15. This is one of my all-time favorite shows. I daydream about them making a show about being moms since I know that they had babies around the same time. Their point of view is spot on and needs to be celebrated. The power of female friendship is the best I’ve seen in their show.
Thank you Jo for writing these posts, I can’t imagine life without them and hope you never stop writing them. Xxx
Just wanted to say Shana Tova to those who celebrate!
Shana Tova!
Shana Tova!
I learned about Shana Tova from your (our?!) mayor on instagram :) Happy celebrations!
Shana Tova!
My sister-in-law wrote Coyote vs. Acme!! It is SO FUN (even if I weren’t related to her ;). It’s such a great movie to see in theaters – and I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a more diverse range of ages at a movie before?? Hope you all love it!
Omg that’s amazing!!!!
So so cool! I saw it in the drive in and it was so fun.
Would it be appropriate for a 6 year old?
Also, that is so cool that your SIL wrote it! Congratulations to her!
Mer, my husband and I saw it last weekend and had so much fun! Congrats to your SIL and thanks for the laughs!! This will be a movie we revisit, for sure. P.S. Acme? Ac you!! (Ha!)
I saw it last night in a packed theater and loved it!!
I got to see an advance screening of Practical Magic 2 the other night! I’m a long time Alice Hoffman fan ( and if you haven’t read any of her Practical Magic books, do! They are even better than the movies!) so I was thrilled to see the film in a full theater with all the Practical Magic fan girling ,decked out in witchy wardrobe peeps and the cool swag!
In preparation for the new film, my husband and I decided to watch the original the other day. I remember seeing it when it came out…for whatever reason, after the first few minutes I was so bored we turned it off! I don’t know what I was missing, but decided not to struggle to try to continue…
I read Practical Magic years ago, finished it while hanging out in Barnes & Noble with my daughter and openly bawled my head off in the store. ( Don’t worry, no spoiler,I cry for any number if reasons, probably something sentimental, I forget I don’t remember much about the book, only that I loved it. She was my favorite author for a long time. Loved all her earlier work. But at some point, her writing became trite and shallow,in my opinion and I have not read many of her more recent books. I do have all her old ones. She introduced me to magical realism which I loved. I have not read Practical Magic 2. But yeah she was my fav long ago.
Bess and Erika are such gems! I loved both their newsletters. Excellent roundup this week!
Coyote v. Acme was surprisingly good! I thought it was going to be terrible- I rated it 8/10!
It is so kind of Boden to design a collection specifically for me…
Emily Crowder, thanks to you, I just found the 40 most beautiful cello classics playlist. It’s so beautiful, and I had no idea. Wishing you years of cello playing joy.
That Boden site gave me a good laugh. $220 sweaters and $300 skirts. I think I am officially too poor for Jo’s links.
I feel ya! But other people must buy them and fund the content here. Even though my income puts my family in the top 10% in my US state, with the cost of living, most new quality clothing is out of my comfort range these days (you’re telling me Quince is cheap essentials????!!!!!), so I keep a folder of screenshots to inspire my thrifting journeys on Depop and Vinted.
same but also i had a look and the first two dresses i looked at were more than 50% polyester. I’m not mad at brands that produce ethically at that price point but all that money for plastic fabric??? please don’t buy that, cup of jo readers who can afford it. buy some freaking doen or christy dawn damn.
$268 for ballet pumps that are most probably still made in terrible working conditions and have no real guarantee of quality makes me think Americans are getting taken for a ride.
If it helps – I am on the Boden email list, and there are frequent sales. Their clearance sales are usually very good. I bought a pair of jeans a while back that were marked down from $140 to $45, and they are my favorite pair of jeans ever. Also Boden customer service is first-rate.
So Boden have been operating in the UK for-ev-er. I discovered them in 2001 while I still had a fashion designer roommate. Their quality has always been a little tiny bit better than high street, but they’re really selling convenience…. The kids clothes were annoyingly better quality than the ladies clothes at double the cost
Boden has quality clothes that I buy from their sample sales and online sales. My wardrobe is Boden, j crew factory and Target.
@Katie Jameson – Just checked out Christy Dawn. The knitwear is gorgeous!
I miss the quality of Bowden‘s clothes in the early 2010s. For me they were worth the price- like dresses that were natural fibers, usually lined, with pockets,that lasted forever. Now I mostly buy secondhand versions of the clothes I loved from that era. Occasionally, I will sort through the website and find something in natural fibers that is well made enough or on sale enough to keep. What brands have cute, actually well made clothes in the Boden price range? I’m a size 12-14 so that’s a factor too.
I buy Boden on Poshmark for a fraction of the price! You should look there if you find something that catches your eye.
Crown Affair- you can do the same dry shampoo thing for pennies with baby powder and your own brush. Their products are lovely, though!
Or better yet – corn starch. Disappears more quickly and was the key ingredient in many original dry shampoos.
please use something talc free, its been linked to cancer
Baby powder *is* corn starch now; it has a light pleasant scent and comes in the shaker bottle which makes it easy to use.
Yes! I use a baby brush (leftover from when my teenagers were babies because I never used it on their hair!) and corn starch.
My favorite advice I have read online about the Nathan Fielder documentary is, “If you haven’t watched Nathan before, you need to prepare! ‘Nathan for You’ is the gateway, you need to build up your tolerance for discomfort.” haha! My favorite name dropping is that as a teenager who grew up in Vancouver and competed in the Canadian Improv Games, I believe I saw Nathan live at a competition and tried to speak with him afterwards because he was SO funny but he was so shy, he could barely make eye contact with my friends and I. Clips of his old work on a CBC comedy show ‘This Hour has 22 minutes’ have been making their rounds on the internet lately too and they are a good introduction. He is a Canadian treasure. If you haven’t ever watched the show, “How To with Jon Wilson” which was produced by Nathan Fielder, please go watch it! John Wilson films everything and makes amazing thematic episodes in a sort of filmed collage. The episodes are simultaneously mundane/shocking/moving/beautiful and hilarious all at the same time.
Haha I saw this advice too! I also saw someone say after seeing the trailer, “Nathan Fielder Nathan Fieldered too close to the sun”—made me laugh
My favorite take on this trailer was “a fake sociopath meets a real sociopath”
Second-hand shoes? No way.
I have a pair of vintage red knee high Frye boots that I got for basically free at a garage sale that I wouldn’t trade for anything. If anything ever happens to them, I’d get them resoled and repaired by a cobbler. I brought a pair of my husband’s extremely battered but beloved shoes to a cobbler and he resoled them using the original colors (pink and lilac), cleaned them (the uppers are fabric overlaid on leather), and they came back looking as good as new. I did this as a birthday gift because otherwise the shoes would have been toast. I also had my favorite shoes repaired because they were very scuffed and needed a new heel. All of that to say is if you find a really beautiful pair of vintage or second hand, well loved shoes, it’s often worth it to get them refinished or even just cleaned professionally to give them a second life. Often by the time you get to them any of the things you’re probably worried about would be gone or something a good sun bath would take care of.
i bought a pair of gucci loafers secondhand and wore them for years. they looked unworn. $50!
Nicole I don’t know if you’ll see this but I have a question about getting boots resoled – I had a beloved pair of suede boots re-lined (not even resoled) and they came back narrower in the instep and hurt to wear! Is this normal? Maybe they have to take up more material to hide the original holes? But now how can I wear them?
@Nicole- I am trying to re-think my approach to shoes and buy better quality (instead of only buying tennis shoes on sale), and while I am a strong advocate of having a good tailor for clothes, I forget shoes can be worked on too, and a good cobbler can make a difference. I have wanted a pair of Frye boots since I was 15 years old, and will keep your comment in mind as I contemplate purchasing.
Liz here, weighing in again. Thought readers would know what I meant by “no way”. The risk of getting a nail fungus (which can take up to year to eradicate with an expensive prescription) or athlete’s foot is too high for me. Same reason you wear shower shoes at the gym and slippers in a hotel room. Am sure that gorgeous footwear can be found secondhand, it’s just not for me.
Agree, shoes are one thing I never buy second-hand. Good shoes, especially boots, will tend to conform to the wearer’s foot, plus there’s a chance of getting a fungal infection.
Why not? If they’re in good shape or you enjoy them, why not? Sometimes people buy a pair and find, after just a few wears, that they’ll not be a comfortable fit. I’ve felt so lucky to find several of my favorite pairs second hand, including several pairs of hardly worn Frye, Swedish Hasbeens, Castañer, and Aquatalia for ~$50. While I wouldn’t personally want well worn sneakers (as they wear quickly, have more swear, and may mold to the original wearer’s feet) or underwear most well made shoes and clothes can be infinitely cleaned and repaired for many, well-loved years to come.
There are also a lot of thrifted shoes out there that are brand-new, even with tags and boxes. I often find great deals for “New With Tags” shoes on Vinted (for example) at a steep discount. I love giving unwanted items a new home!
if you need to chill, watching Scottish cobblers restore shoes on youtube is annoyingly satisfying slow tv (what am I doing with my life? lol…). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkJJldt1_90
Yes! Emily Crowder. I would love to learn the cello. So beautiful. I live in a small rural town so our ability to go somewhere to learn something is limited. Frustrating! I do think being curious about the world and wanting to keep learning (about anything!) is so important. We should all keep educating ourselves!!
This is so true. Legendary octogenarian Iris Apfel once said that her secret to staying young was to maintain her sense of curiosity and wonder about the culture. As a middle aged woman, I have so many friends who are stuck in the ruts of their youth when it comes to their interests (especially when it comes to music), and I definitely feel like it’s detrimental to their enjoyment of life.
John Waters says that you have to have Youth Spies as you age: https://austinkleon.com/2019/04/24/youth-spies-and-curious-elders/
Ok fun fact…Nathan fielder and Emma cline are dating LOL
Omg I had no idea!!!!
this is such a funny coincidence! It’s like when Jo posted about watermelons and her plan to watch Dirty Dancing for the first time in her life in one post, too, and we were all losing our minds! (sorry, I just posted this – but not as a reply, feel free to delete the other comment)
This is the ULTIMATE fun fact!!