It’s spring and I am excite, as they say on the internet. The people out walking their dogs early in the morning are no longer hunched into their coats against the fearsome winter weather. No, they’re wearing shorts! And flip flops! And tee shirts! Although to be honest, in my southeasternly pocket of the USA, a lot of people wear shorts even in the winter because it’s pretty mild. But I’m celebrating spring shorts here.

My spring celebrations:

Another great thing about spring is that it’s both my parents and my birthday season.¹ I love birthdays. And birthdays in the spring are so fabulous because it’s like the entire world is waking up and starting over, putting out those shoots and leaves and so are you! I’m coming out of my winter hibernation to turn another year older and that’s the real celebration of life.

When I was a kid, my mom used to make a really big deal out of birthdays. Special, homemade cakes in all sorts of shapes and colors. Parties with all my friends. From my dad’s side, we had a family tradition of waking the birthday person up early in the morning with cake and candles, singing the Happy Birthday song at the top of our lungs to startle the person awake. Unfortunately, this year, I’ll be at the Information Architecture Conference on my birthday, which is not as fun as waking up to cake and candles.

But! My mom and I always take a short trip in the spring to celebrate being alive. We’re headed to the Hammock Coast of South Carolina, which is a string of beach communities from Charleston to Myrtle Beach. We’re gonna relax in a cute AirBNB in Murell’s Inlet, go to Pawley’s Island and Georgetown for some shopping and noshing, head over to Brookgreen Gardens for a day, and then come home. So while the day of my birth will be spent with nerds, my entire birthday won’t be lost to navigation systems and taxonomies. And being totally honest—spending time with nerds is pretty fun for me. My people!

The one true downside to spring? The pollen. My car is a delightful shade of neon greenish yellow right now. Not even those spring rain storms have washed my car clean. I’d be embarassed about it but everyone else’s car is the exact same color. I do feel bad for those of you with allergies, though. I hope the Claritin kicks in soon.

Go outside!

Kiss Slay Replay by Rachel Harrison: I love Harrison’s version of feminist horror and even though I am a book or two behind in her recent releases, I’m gonna buy this the moment it comes out.

The Entanglement of Rival Wizards by Sara Raasch: Two enemy wizards/grad students from rival departments must work together on a grant in order to graduate with honors.

I’ve said it before: enemies to lovers are not my jam. I’m more of a “the least likely of them falls first” kinda gal. So, in the beginning, when Sebastien and Elethior truly hate each other, I felt like giving up on the book. I’m glad I persevered because I got an absolutely lovely story of two wizards falling in love despite some pretty nasty emotional wounds. And the magic! What great worldbuilding. I’m over dark gothic academia and totally here for magical, chaotic academia. I’m desperate for the next in the series. 4.5 stars.

Matchmaking for Psychopaths by Tasha Coryell: I didn’t like the narrator. She very heavy-handedly hinted at deep, dark secrets in her past and I just wasn’t interested.

Fiona has a stinky shoe fetish. But other than sticking her face into shoes, she and the rest of my cats are doing quite well. Except for patio time.

Even if I am out there with them, they are still not quite comfortable hanging out outside. I even had the porch screened in and turned into a catio for them! When I sit outside, they will mostly hang out by the open door, ready to spring back into the apartment at a moment’s notice. My previous catio at the beach house was on the ground floor so maybe being up on the second has them trepidatious. Either way, these cats better get used to it because we are not moving again.

OMG, I had life changing noodles at Olivero, again. And, once again, I didn’t take a picture. But if you are in the area and want something delicious to eat, I recommend the mafaldine² with “chorizo fresco, romanesco, cilantro gremolata, and mahon.” You’ll need a reservation.

It’s actually been an incredible time for pasta as I spent a gorgeous weekend in Tucson, AZ visting with my BFF and she took me to a place with delicious bucatini in a meatball sauce. And this time, I did take a picture! My friend ordered off-menu and got a shrimp scampi over pasta that she loved.

Tucson was incredible. The weather was perfect and the desert was in bloom! Saguaros everywhere. I also ate some amazing al pastor tacos and drank not one, but two prickly pear drinks. That stuff is so good, I came home and ordered two kinds of prickly pear tea and a bottle of syrup to mix in my seltzers.

The weather is gorgeous, the vibes are immaculate (even if the news is dismal and the world is most definitely on fire), and I’m wearing linen. It’s my birthday and while I am firmly in my middle age, I feel vibrant and excited. I know that times like these, with violence and corruption everywhere—it can be difficult to sustain optimisim. And pretty soon, the heat and humidity will take over and all we’ll feel is hot and damp misery on top of everything else. So, I’m going to celebrate this spring season for as long as it lasts.

Love, Marcella