A ‘Sugar Date’ Gone Sour

In the fuzzy space between jobs and relationships, there’s a lot that can go wrong.

Chandler Fowles knew it wouldn’t be simple to move from Mystic, Conn., to New York City last year. But staying put held little appeal. Her degree in art history and fine arts from Eastern Connecticut State University wasn’t helping her land any job worth sticking around for. She was coming out of a tough breakup. She and her mother weren’t speaking at all after a particularly bad argument.

When you are 24 years old, jobless, boyfriend-less and in a fight with your mom, moving to one of the most glamorous, ballyhooed cities in the world can seem like a good idea. Never mind the expense.

- NY Times

Weird Halloween Costumes Of The 1970s And 80s

Unfortunately, most trick-or-treat attire of the 1970s and 80s was woefully bad. Generally, costumes consisted of a plastic mask and apron/smock. It was cheap and it came in a box at your local drug store.

- Design you Trust

AFTER THE FIRE - Murder, lies and a missing deer head

You would have been able to see it well before dawn if you lived across those fields, or if you happened to be travelling one of those dark and deserted highways: a spot of fire burning bright on the horizon, hot orange flames licking upward to the sky, a house disintegrating into embers below.

The first firefighters arrived around 7:30, when the family who lived in the house would usually have been up having breakfast, getting ready for work or chores.

In the country, it is friends and relatives who are called to help. On that morning, 16 volunteer firefighters from town and the farms around – local people who knew, as soon as they heard the location, whose house was in flames, whose lives were disappearing into thick plumes of smoke in the winter sky.

- The Globe and Mail

The true stories behind bill murray’s random interactions with strangers

You’re not alone if you’ve repeatedly asked yourself: what’s up with all those Bill Murray stories? The ones where he interacts with random strangers, crashes their parties, does their dishes? The stories have made him somewhat of a myth in movie culture. He pops up in random places with random people. Nobody knows where or when the next one will happen. We only know that, in most of these stories, Murray is reported to whisper the line, “No one will ever believe you.”

- i-D

How To Stay Positive In Dark Times

We are living in tumultuous and divided times. It can be difficult to stay positive in spite of all of the depressing news around the world, the overt ignorance and prejudice that have been resurrected by the populism that has resurged in the west. It can feel like the world is regressing in real time after years of progress. The future looks pretty bleak, and that we are sacrificing longer term interests and goals for short term political benefits of the party in power, consequently creating a worse quality of life for future generations. This is all in addition to the stress and grind of work and day-to-day life. If you find you are struggling to stay positive, here are a few ways you can improve your outlook:

- Forbes

Naked in the Mountains 100 Years Ago, She Invented the Advanced Selfie

Anne Brigman was turning up her selfie prowess about 100-years before the rest of us. For one, she was never the stoic, buttoned-up type, and felt more at home on a mountaintop than with a roof over her head. When Brigman stepped inside the lens of her camera, the result was a ‘selfie’ that looked like an Old Master’s painting come to life– and, might we add, with some serious ‘special effects’ long before Photoshop was available. She’d melt her body into the heart of a lightning-blasted pine tree, or twist like the limb of a cracked oak, all through the magic of photo manipulation before the digital age, when tricking the human eye was a feat of magic. Put yourself in the shoes of a human from 1907, and you can see why Brigman’s gauzy finishes, high contrast, and ethereal surroundings transformed her into a Pagan goddess amongst mortals…

- Messy Nessy Chic

Japan's unusual way to see the world

Originating in Taoism during China’s Song dynasty (960-1279) before being passed onto Zen Buddhism, wabi-sabi was originally seen as an austere, restrained form of appreciation. Today it encapsulates a more relaxed acceptance of transience, nature and melancholy, favouring the imperfect and incomplete in everything, from architecture to pottery to flower arranging.

Wabi, which roughly means ‘the elegant beauty of humble simplicity’, and sabi, which means ‘the passing of time and subsequent deterioration’, were combined to form a sense unique to Japan and pivotal to Japanese culture. But just as Buddhist monks believed that words were the enemy of understanding, this description can only scratch the surface of the topic.

- BBC

Chlamydia, gang-bang et introspection : ce qui se passe dans les podcasts d'Anouk Perry

Depuis huit mois, les histoires d'Anouk Perry se sont fait une place dans les écouteurs de milliers d'amateurs de podcasts. Ils reviennent pour la diversité des sujets qu'elle aborde (les extra-terrestres, les fantômes, le prénom Kévin, le sexe à plusieurs, etc.), mais aussi pour l'autodérision qui traverse en fil rouge son travail. 

Imperméable au malaise, elle exhume les pires hontes de ses proches, explore ses propres doutes sur le sens de la vie, enquête sur ses anciens partenaires sexuels avec une audace qui rappelle parfois les grandes heures de "Strip-tease" (la bienveillance en plus). 

- Rue89

Are You More or Less Committed to Your Relationship

I loved the movie He’s Just Not That Into You, which I think everyone can agree reflects poorly on my taste. At the time, though, it seemed charming, and refreshingly minimalist in its central philosophy: if a person likes you roughly as much as you like them, you will know. I know a lot of the movie is sexist and it’s certainly heteronormative and probably gender essentialist as well, but … is that titular line true? According to researchers, yes — only they, as academics, call it something else: “Asymmetrically committed relationships,” or ACRs.

- The Cute

Eugene, en Oregon, moins connue que sa grande sœur rebelle

Moins connue que Portland, la deuxième ville de l’Oregon recèle des pistes cyclables et des parcours de course uniques. Escale dans la ville si chère à l’auteur de Vol au-dessus d’un nid de coucou, Ken Kesey… et grand apôtre du psychédélisme.

- Le Devoir

Antonin Ziegler covers abandoned barn in zinc plates to create rustic home in northern France

Zinc plates protect the ageing wooden structure of this barn in the French village Notre-Dame-de-Bliquetuit, which was been transformed into a house with its own spa by Antonin Ziegler.

- de zeen

How an Untrained Architect Made Oklahoma the Capital of Kitsch

Meet the latest maverick of the architecture world to steal our hearts, Bruce Goff. Lesser known amongst design laity, but just as groundbreaking as his fellow Midwesterner and mentor, Frank Lloyd Wright, Goff’s work was quite simply jaw-dropping. Case in point? The domed, technicolour house above. It might look like a groovy LA pad from the 1970s, but this baby was built in the Middle of Nowhere, Illinois (drumroll) in 1948…

- Messy Nessy Chic