Oh My Gac

hellogiggles:

Eartha Kitt, dropping some self love realness.

Legit.

What advice and coping methods do they offer and suggest to people who work in professions that deal with victims of extremely harrowing and traumatic events?  I.e. for the counselors and nurses and doctors that are caring for the three women who escaped from Ariel Castro’s home.  For the  DA that’s been assigned to represent this monster in court.  

I work for ABC News and I am forced to monitor and watch how we cover things like this.  I do it minimally, especially with hard, and awful news like this, because it does really get to me.  

I know that in this case, it is a blessing these women are alive and back home, but as a very empathetic person, I stayed up pretty late last night thinking about the years he took away from them, these young, beautiful women: the experience of having their first child with a man they love, the celebrations of holidays with their families, the mere freedom of living for and by their own devices, going to college, working at their first job, moving out of their parents homes, celebrating 10 birthdays however the f they want to.  Not enslaved by a cruel man who takes their dignity and respect as women in any way possible.  

Sometimes my thoughts get away from me and I find it debilitating, worrying about these women, how they are healing, how they will learn to love again, trust men again, feel safe again.  And I have to remind myself that these cases are rare, and that true humanity is good.  We can and must have faith that it will always overpower evil.  And most of all, damn we as women are resilient as hell.  Strong.  A force to be reckoned with.

I should ask my mother who worked as a visiting nurse in low income communities for years, and has been a professor teaching nursing at the graduate and undergraduate level for almost 25 years now.  How do we help people that face and deal with such trauma?  Let alone the actual victims.  What can we do to help them heal?

I can send myself into a tizzy sometimes, wondering why God had forsaken them and how criminals can hold such cruelty in their souls.  But I do remind myself too, that despite living this harried life in a city that literally never sleeps, working with content day to day that is often unbecoming of us as humans, I have not been desensitized to any of it.  I have not lost my sense of feeling, or ability to empathize even when things feel jaded and despairing, and that’s just one other thing to be thankful for.

#funsies #kids #poetry

One of my good friends is the chef at East Harlem School and I feel so lucky to be invited to his school’s annual Poetry slam and fundraiser. The kids are middle schoolers from low income homes and they have some of the most moving pieces of writing I’ve ever heard!  Always a bit of a tear-jerker!  

thedailywhat:

Touche of the Day: Mrs. Doubtfire’s Dress vs. Kim Kardashian’s Dress

Comedian Robin Williams chimed in on Kim Kardashian’s custom-designed Riccardo Tisci evening gown by comparing it to the floral dress he wore in the 1993 comedy film Mrs. Doubtfire. The socialite’s attire became quite a hit during Monday’s Met Gala, spawning a series of photoshopped images poking fun at the reality star’s “sofa slipcover”-like dress.

(via shes-reading-again)

Source:

For those of you who care (and those of you who don’t), last night we celebrated yet another dear friend’s birthday at Empellon Taqueria in the West Village (formerly Chow Bar).  Since they discourage cell phone use, I didn’t really get any good pics of the food, especially because it was constantly flowing and insanely delicious and unique.  

We started with guac, which was accompanied by warm chips and two very different salsas - cashew and chile de arbol.  Then an octopus ceviche, three different queso fundidos - shishito pepper, black trumpet mushroom and green chorizo, which I didn’t expect to like, but I did!  Pictured here, the amazing poached quail egg sopes with refried beans.  But oof I’m tired… we basically ordered everything on this menu except for the sweetbreads and pork tongue tacos, which was slightly disappointing to me, but I know I tend to be a much more adventurous eater, and it wasn’t my birthday anyway ;)

All in all good times and great! great! great! food.  I always love a perfectly composed taco, but dear God my diet’s pretty much gone to sh!t.  *sigh

Summer, here we come.

And deliver us from evil. Amen.

Has anyone ever died from seasonal allergies? 

Don’t answer that, but please know I’m dying here.  If only I could shove ice cubes up my nostrils or scratch the inside of my head, or live in a bubble…

More highlights from the weekend. The weather was gorgeous and I wanted to capture the quaintness of the entire place.

A lovely weekend in the beautiful Catskills. Delicious food, quality girltime, bonfires, gluten free beer (oh yes) and bike riding along a babbling brook and rolling mountains.