A Good Old Fashioned Bender 😵💫
➕Bel's latest chime, an update on Turkey, and a NZ pilot has been taken hostage.
Angels!!! I’m battling the slightest of hangovers this morning as I write this for you, because Rubes and I had a few drinks and went to a Maisie Peters concert last night (you may remember her from when I was obsessed with her song ‘Cate’s Brother’ and kept recommending it to you!!)
She was cute, it was fun, and I’m looking forward to having the leftover pizza in my fridge for breakfast. Actually, that’s given me inspo for today’s mundane poll…
🔔Bel Chimes In: Sometimes all you need is a good old-fashioned bender 🔔
New Zealand pilot taken hostage by separatists in Indonesia
An update on the quakes in Turkey
Do you prefer leftover pizza cold or reheated?
🔔Bel Chimes In: Sometimes all you need is a good old-fashioned bender 🔔
This section is written by my crush, the refreshing-as-a-house-chardonnay-on-a-steamy-day, Bel Hawkins. She also writes our Saturday newsletter ‘No News is Good News’ which all our paying supporters receive. Upgrade your plan to get her newsy here!
Mōrena besties!
Another week, another j'adore j'adore being here! Especially as this one's... my birthday week! And I'm bringing it up for both a) your attention and b) because it feels cute for you to know I'm a human turning round the sun and not an AI bot trying to tap into feelings we all have 💖
I also like, don't LOVE birthdays and am trying to change that because bleak to be a grinch AND a non-birthday gal as well? Discuss...
All of this is to say that this week's a bit of a chaotic Chime because I'm extremely busy atm (but banning descending into Worn Out Woman chaos until at least mid-March) having celebratory sips of fizzy wine with my friends to celebrate tonight, eating noodles up late with a gorge witch designer friend working on a fun secret project all week (for now, I know, we bait you but you'll be the first to know), working, living, and being all sentimental about another year passing and another one to come. Which brings me to this:
Going on a capo bender
Ok, so on the weekend just been, my friends Holly and Si and I were meant to be camping out by the sea wearing hoodies, getting salty and drinking cocktails out of tin cups and turning fish on a little barbecue, being all summery and free (literally my favourite past time). But because of the rain that feels like a snow globe that won't stop being shaken up here, we had to postpone our trip (this is all leading somewhere useful, I promise), leaving a long weekend stretching open before us.
Instead, we decided to take a day trip to Hamilton (for non-NZ readers - this city cops SO MUCH FLACK for being... bleak? boring? bogan?) and ended up having THE BEST time. On the drive down, we were trying to understand the recession, whether we're in it already, why printing cash affects everything when you pay by card and whether we'll ever feel like we have enough money. Which led us to affectionately calling the day a 'capo bender' (capo = capitalism, lol) where we would treat ourselves to cute things to feel better about the incessant grey rain, climate change and the sometimes seemingly futility of life.
We bought Wild Bean coffees (an absolute road trip essential) a cute outfit, some sick Kiwiana merch (a keyring for my spare key), a delicious Vietnamese lunch and ended up walking all the way back to the car along the river with our shoes off, all sweaty and happy from a day out somewhere new. On the drive home, we played DJ roulette where the brief was 'fun and sad songs to play at your funeral', and it felt like an episode in a tv show where things are sweet and right for the whole half hour.
Eugh, money is really tough right now, and I want to acknowledge how frivolous and um rich? the above sounds, which I don't ever want to come across as. It's more like... meant to be about the joy of treating yourself every once and a while (something I'm still mastering) and hopefully this little snippet of my life feels like a cute reminder to keep implementing joy in your life! A capo bender could simply be saving to be able to buy a coffee on the way to work each week, and that's just as valuable and sweet. Figuring all this out = a life's work.
Til next week! (or on Sat!!!) I'll be so much older and wiser then.
xx
New Zealand pilot taken hostage by separatists in Indonesia
Huge tone shift here - I know - but yesterday a New Zealand pilot - reportedly Captain Philip Mehrtens - was taken hostage in Indonesia by separatist fighters in Indonesia's Papua region “who have threatened to kill him.” (Quick context note here: the separatists here want Indonesia to recognise the independence of the province of West Papua.)
What happened was, the plane was set alight, the other five passengers (including a child) are thought to have been released, but Captain Mehrtens has been taken by the ‘West Papua National Liberation Army’ (a group which Indonesia has designated as a terrorist group), who have claimed responsibility for the attack.
What are NZ doing about it?
According to The NZ Herald:
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) is providing consular support to the pilot’s family and said it wouldn’t comment further because of privacy reasons.
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said he had been given preliminary details and told RNZ the New Zealand embassy in Indonesia was on the case.
I’ll keep you updated on this!
An update on the quakes in Turkey
After I wrote about it yesterday, the death toll of lives lost across Turkey and Syria has surpassed 11,000 people. Here are some more ways we can help:
And as bleak and upsetting as the news coming out of these areas continues to be, I saw this thread about the heroes, and thought I’d share it with you all:
Today’s mundane poll:
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I don’t know if this helps with the birthday thing but what I try to remind my husband about- who also doesn’t like celebrating his birthday- is that it’s giving the people in your life who you love the chance to celebrate having you in their lives, and for you to celebrate being in theirs. Also there are no rules about how you should celebrate, use it as an excuse to do something you find fun! Though I do firmly believe if you’re having a birthday cake, you should not have to make/organise your own cake.
Pizza reheated but it has to be done in the oven/air fryer not the microwave