“Breathe in, breathe through, breathe deep, breathe out” Swift, 2022
🎧 Culture Study podcast: Mean Girls. Anne Helen Petersen’s Culture Study is one of the best Substack communities out there, and she’s recently launched a podcast to go along with it. It’s a series of deep-dives into subjects you didn’t know you had a tonne of questions about. The latest episode is about the trailer for the new Mean Girls film, and if you listen closely 😉, you’ll hear yours-truly asking the first audio question! (Listen here on Substack or in a podcast app of your choice).
📕 This One Wild And Precious Life by Sarah Wilson. A healing-y book about keeping the faith (any sort of faith) while trying to make the world a better place, with lots of long walks and chats with influential thinkers. Did this book have me Googling ‘how to become a nun’? No comment… (Amazon - ad, affiliate link) A quick bit of housekeeping on the ‘recommendations’ point - I have been using both Amazon and Bookshop.org affiliate links since the start of this newsletter. No-one has ever clicked through the Bookshop.org links and bought a book, so I’m going to switch to using Blackwell’s as my Bezos-alternative, just as soon as they approve my application to join.
🍴 Seared salmon & puy lentils. I impulse-bought a copy of the BBC Good Food magazine in Sainsbury’s last week, and have been working my way through a bunch of the recipes in it. Last night, I made an amazing puy lentil and salmon dinner - and followed 90% of the recipe! (The section I skipped was that I used pre-cooked puy lentils instead of cooking them from scratch, because I am
lazyefficient, and then I added in most of a pack of spinach leaves that needed using up). I’ve also got a block of tofu in the fridge to make with the leftover lentils, according to the ‘vegan variation’ noted in the recipe page.
Last week I told you that watching Happiness For Beginners left me desperate to get outside. The weather forecast for last Sunday was absolutely stunning, so I got up early in the morning, caught a bus to the seaside (Portishead, to be exact - a medium sized town on the coast of the Severn Estuary, west of Bristol), and spent the day outside, walking down the coast path to Clevedon. The route was well-signed, being part of the ‘North Somerset Tidal Trail’, which itself is part of the ‘King Charles III Coastal Path’, so there were plenty of finger-posts - and when in doubt, it was simply a case of keeping the sea to my right hand side. Plus, there were plenty of walkers and runners around, so I never felt at all at risk of getting unsolvably lost (and as I was alone, it was good for peace of mind to know that if I’d twisted an ankle or something, someone would’ve passed before too long!)
It was freezing cold, so I wore two pairs of trousers (gym leggings under my walking trousers), which in combination with a good wool jumper, windproof jacket, hat, and hand-knitted snood, kept me nice and toasty. A pair of cashmere fingerless gloves (what luxury!) didn’t hurt either. This was also the first time I’d properly used my new walking boots; they were super comfortable, and just felt like light trainers but with extra support around my ankles. That said, I could have done with thinner walking socks, specifically around my toes, so I will keep an eye open for options.
Before I caught the bus from Bristol, I had bought a slice of cake from the lovely Society Cafe - any other ‘cake break’ is going to have to work quite hard to match this one for sheer spectacle. What a fantastic place to put a bench, looking out over the Severn estuary towards Wales.
After a few hours of walking, with periodic breaks to stare out over the sea and just say ‘wow’, I found myself approaching Clevedon. The first sight of it was Clevedon pier sticking out into the sea: it was described by John Betjeman as ‘the most beautiful pier in England’, and I certainly appreciated seeing it!
Using the extremely high-tech method of ‘the highlighter built into the iPhone’s photos app’, here’s a view of the route I took on a map (Ordnance Survey Explorer 154), along with the much-needed Somerset cider and glass of water I had with my fishfinger sandwich and chips at Teatro Lounge in Clevedon.
On a smaller scale, I’ve got a map of the whole island group that makes up the UK and Ireland on my wall, and I’ve highlighted the part of the coast I walked - it’s just a couple of centimetres on there, but I look forward to highlighting the next bit… It’s safe to say I’ve well and truly caught the rambling bug. Is this what happens when you turn 30???
Speak soon,
Lily
PS: The Amazon affiliate links above only work to give me commission if you click through from the Substack app or website, rather than directly from your email program. Other ways to support this newsletter include liking, commenting, and sharing it with a friend who you think might like it. Thanks in advance!
Yay for those few centimeters :) Happy rambling
I highly recommend Mountain Warehouse's walking socks - currently wearing some as I type, and they're the perfect "thicker than a normal sock, but not too chunky" thickness :)