two very belated summer journaling prompts

[desecrets]

... for sunshine_revival !

Challenge 2: Journaling: The romance of summer! What do you love? Write about anything you feel sentimental about or that gets your heart pumping.

One upside to the heatwave is that I've had the first ocean swim of the year! 🌊

There's a super nice beach in a little town that's about an hour's bus ride away from my mum's place -- which is a bit of a trek, but it's a lovely place with one part sandy beach and floating dock, one part concrete piers with diving boards and whatnot, and one bit that has a ramp, plus grass to sit on all along the beach.

I don't think I've been to a place exactly like that since maybe primary school: I've gone swimming in the sea since, but only from docks, or bedrock.

Sitting on my big towel on the grass next to my mum, sopping wet, bikini and self slowly drying in the sun, eating snacks with half-wet salty hands and watching people go by, felt like time travelling a little. ☀️

Another thing I have to include is Scandinavian summer skies! This one hits me again every year when the sky goes transparent and endless. I think summer nights with hardly any dark are called white nights in English, and it's apt in a way that's a little tricky to describe without visuals.

This far out from the summer solstice, the sun does set around 10.30 to 11pm where I am, but getting out of work at 9pm to sunshine is wonderful. The sky at sunset on a clear night is this wonderful descent from very delicate pale blue, hardly any colour at all, through faint green and yellow and peach closer to the horizon, to pink and violet at the bottom. I spent a whole bus journey into Oslo last week craning to see the sky better and wishing I'd sat in the front.

Challenge 4: Journaling: What is making you smile these days? Create a top 10 list of anything you want to talk about.

This is not a Top 10, but it is a list of ten recent good things, in no order of rank.

1. The Rain on a Tent ambient noise generator from myNoise (even better with slider animation on!)
2. Actual rain (we finally got some)!!
3. Cold grapes straight from the fridge
4. My friend who needed surgery finally got it after days of delay!
5. Solitude by Black Sabbath. I was really surprised to learn this was a Sabbath song, it's so soft and folky.
6. About 45 minutes ago I captured and released a moth, and noticed it left behind some dust on the inside of my hand -- I anxiously googled, and found that actually, moths losing some scales is fine! Hurrah!
7. I went for a run two days ago expecting it to be murder as I don't exercise at all, but it was fine!! I may have to do it again just for that. (Muscles still screaming, though, and I work evenings all week. Maybe on Sunday!)
8. This blog on tumblr that identifies fonts!
9. Postcard from a friend arrived 💗
10. This whole bit from Jon Stewart last night, but if you don't want to watch all the serious political talk and would just like something a bit more uplifting, start from 24:54. 

Comments

[muscle_wizard]

That whole ep from Jon was incredible, I really needed it.

I also watched Stephen's response to "their financial decision" to cancel the show and I LOVE the frank, uncensored language.

Lovely list of joys, it made me smile c:

[desecrets]

Right?? It really felt like him potentially putting his own job on the line while also managing to be funny about it, it was really good. Class act.

I haven't seen that yet, I'll have to go look it up now!

I'm glad to hear it!! So did your comment!

[dr_zook]

My mind is always reeling when I read about Scandinavian summer nights; it cannot compute that the sun can stay in the skies for that long!

Wishing your friend a speedy and thorough recovery. 💪

Ah, man. Goodbye, Ozzy. That's such a neat folky piece, thank you for reminding!

[desecrets]

It feels a little weird while it's happening too, ngl! I'm too far south to ever get full midnight sun, but my mum's birthplace up north gets it, provided we visit close-ish to the solstice. Even being used to it, it does kind of boggle the mind to have daylight and check the time and it's like 00:20. But conversely, I remember finding it incredibly strange to visit Italy and Greece in the middle of the summer and have it get dark at like 8.30 and still be so hot!

Thank you!

Isn't it just? It's so weird that he died but then again, not surprising per se... Just odd and sad that we're coming up to the time when these guys start going!

[regshoe]

Sometimes I catch moths that have lost so many scales in the course of their normal moth lives, obscuring the patterns on their wings, that they can no longer be identified to species level. They're fine, just getting old; you let them go and don't try to record them!

Those sunsets sound absolutely lovely.

[desecrets]

That's actually really interesting and cool, I didn't know that could happen! 💗 I suppose I didn't even know moths could live that long. Thank you for sending me down the search engine hole -- I learned something new and got to see lots of fuzzy moths.

[regshoe]

:D Glad to have set off a search engine adventure—moths are so cool!