October-in-Review and November Goals

I can't believe October is done! What? Seriously this last year has truly flown by. DH and G headed out on a camping trip with DH's brothers and their sons along the Oregon coast. They all had a blast and left me alone for a week. I got a beautiful fall hike in, extra work done, and oh a pesky sinus infection that has only started to clear up this last week...

Halloween was fantastic! G and I dressed up as Shaggy and Velma. DH even helped me dye my skirt and sweater the proper colors. It was a lot of fun this year. I made some fantastic chili and cider too. The weather was colder than it has been the last few years but I enjoyed it because it made the cider and chili even yummier.

I saw some families gathered outside their houses with a fire pit and drinks and candy and the candy bowl to give out to the kiddos. That is exactly how I want to spend my Halloween nights one day when G is off doing his own thing on Halloween. Spend a couple hours outside with a fire and a good beer and friends while handing out candy and scaring the children...sounds perfect!

My reading and watching went well this month too. 14 books! Granted, some of them were started before October began but...I'm still counting them! So there.

Last Month I...

Read:

14 books: 

• Scariest Stories You Ever Heard by Mark Mills 
• The Conquest of Happiness by Bertrand Russell
• Monstress, Vol. 2: The Blood by Marjorie Liu 
• The Forgotten Girl by India Brown Hill (Highly recommend this one) 
• Chase the Darkness with Me: How One True-crime Reporter Started Solving Crimes by Billy Jensen 
• The Agony House by Cherie Priest
• The Ruins by Scott B. Smith
• City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab
• Monstress, Vol. 3: Haven by Marjorie Liu
• Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places by Colin Dickey
• The Whisper Man by Alex North
• A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay
• Dead Voices by Katherine Arden (read with G)
• Dracula by Bram Stoker (Audible listen)

Listened to:

Audible version of Dracula by Bram Stoker. It's a good one with a full-length cast!

Watched:

TV:

• Endeavor on PBS. 60s British mystery in Oxford. What's not to love? 
• Great British Baking Show. Always a good baking time! I always want to bake after watching this! Ha ha!
• American Horror Story. I'm loving the summer camp theme this season.
• Stumptown. Based in Portland, Oregon, my old stomping ground. Yay! Also it's a good one!

Movies: 

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Haunt (2019)-- Pretty fun house of horrors. Enjoyed the twist.

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In the Tall Grass (2019) on Netflix-- The story was a bit disjointed but still an interesting watch.

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Edward Scissorhands (1990)-- I hadn't seen this one in years like since I was a teen. Showed it to my G for the first time and we had a good time. Such a magical show. One of Burton's best.

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Uncanny Annie (2019) on Hulu-- My only complaint was Annie wasn't scary enough. She was silly and that took a bit of the punch out of the horror.

Fractured (2019) on Netflix-- An interesting watch but not great. The script was terrible.

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Hustlers (2019)-- I went into this not knowing much about it. I was pleasantly surprised. It had some heart and it was funny! I loved it.

Eli (2019) on Netflix-- I loved the premise. Definitely, some creepy moments and the ending was really fun. Overall, a nice Netflix surprise.

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Little Monsters (2019) on Hulu-- Lupita Nyong'o is always amazing so see it for her! It has some heart and Josh Gad is a ham.

Wake Wood (2009) on Amazon-- This one was recommended to me as another example of some folk horror. I didn't quite get the ending but everything else was fantastic in this little Irish horror.

Wounds (2019) on Hulu-- This was super weird but I really enjoyed it. The ending was like WHAT? but it had some great gruesome moments and some great scares. Not to mention the psychological breakdown Armie Hammer is fantastic to watch. And bugs. Yikes. All over.

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Addams Family (1991)-- We watched this one as a family Halloween night and it was a lot of fun. It has been a long time since I've seen this one. Anjelica Huston was fantastic. Christina Ricci, fantastic. And it made me miss Raul Julia.

Made:

I made a lot of fun stuff in October. My mom's chili. Skillet cornbread, honey butter. Cider and lots of cookies. Oh and pumpkin pancakes. I've made a lot of things with pumpkin and I will probably continue to make a lot of things with pumpkin this month as well! Tis the season!

Reading Goals:

Fall, for me, is the time (well, after Halloween) to read some memoirs and some books about death and dying. It's a time to reflect on the cycle of life and dig into those stories and ideas about the inevitable. I even leave room for those movies I know will make me bawl my eyes out... "The Descendents," "My Life."

I have a few books I have to read with G for school but without further adieu, I hope to dive into most of these this month:

• Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? Big Questions from Tiny Mortals About Death by Caitlin Doughty
• Found by Margaret Peterson Haddix
• Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis
• The Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward
• The Work of the Dead: A Cultural History of Mortal Remains by Thomas W. Laqueur
• The Unwinding of the Miracle: A Memoir of Life, Death, and Everything that Comes After by Julie Yip-Williams
• The Undertaking: Life Studies from a Dismal Trade by Thomas Lynch
• Voices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster by Svetlana Alexievich
• The Collected Schizophrenias: Essays by Esme Weijun Wang
• Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed by Lori Gotlieb
• The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman

Currently listening to:

The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin and I hope to start My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante soon!

Looking forward to:

Thanksgiving weekend, of course! I'm also looking forward to making all the pumpkin things and drinks and reading under my kotatsu table. Here's to a great November!