Just a brief intro this week. 

I spent Thursday, Friday, and Saturday morning on a brief spa getaway to Bedford Springs with my bestie. The kiddo's daycare was closed for spring break this week and my parents were in town to help. I took advantage of this to leave for a few days. (The husband left for his own solo vacation.)

I thought I would feel guilt about this trip - both from a financial and a parenting perspective. Instead, zero guilt. I feel absolutely no guilt whatsoever about spending time and money on myself. It was a glorious few days where I was reunited with the cold dip pool which is my mental happy place.

The bestie and I made plans to make this a thing we do every two years. 

It's a good decision - one I feel no guilt about.

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I’ve made my way to the halfway point in Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters by Mark Dunn. The novel is structured in such a way that the author uses fewer letters of the alphabet as the narrative progresses. It’s an interesting choice but one can feel the author delighting in this artifice. The story is intriguing but the play with vocabulary feels contrived.

*Books shared here are affiliate links for Bookshop.org

• The great comedy and bland politics of The West Wing. [The Similitude] 

• I did not know this about baking bread. [Wordloaf]

• Teenagers need sleep but schedules work against them. [Is My Kid the Asshole?]

• Why we're drawn to personality tests. [The Atlantic - may be paywalled]

• The unspoken rules of hip hop. [Up First]

• The global appeal of bagpipes. [Atlas Obscura]

• How to run for office. [Life Kit]

• A bubble bath, while enjoyable, is not self-care. [Code Switch]

• While scrolling through one of our watch lists, I came across A Most Wanted Man. I decided to put it on after seeing it listed as Philip Seymour Hoffman's last starring role. It wasn't his best part, but the film was still well done. The plot is based on a  John Le Carré spy novel and those are always full of twists and turns. The cast was stacked with great American actors, but I couldn't get past that most of them had to put on German accents. It just felt all wrong. [Amazon Prime]

• While my parents were in town, we watched Shock and Awe together. This is the story about the lead up to the Iraq war and how most news publications just trumpeted the false news coming from the White House. Woody Harrelson and James Marsden star as a team of reporters from Knight-Ridder who get the story right. This film is in the same vein as Spotlight, All the President's Men, and The Post. [Amazon Prime]

• I ate the vast majority of my meals out this week. The husband and I took advantage of my parents being in town to go on a fancy date night. We shared a small but delicious charred octopus appetizer. The thin slices of chorizo that accompanied were some of the best I've eaten. For my main, I opted for the pan seared branzino. The dish was slightly oily, but the excellently crisped skin made up for that. We also got a bottle of cabernet sauvignon from a local vineyard we like. [New Heights]

The intersection is where you find librarians. [Indexed]

If you were a kid in the 90s and had a Spriograph, you’ll love Inspiral Web. All of the fun, none of the pen jumping out of the wheel.

After a week of familial support and spa goodness, I now head into a week of solo parenting.