The Best Pens You'll Find

Bad pens infuriate me. Scratchy pens that leave a faint trail of ink in uneven thickness all over my paper infuriate me. 

Let's just say I'm always on the lookout for a good pen. Once you use a pen that leaves a thick, even coat of ink, you'll never go back to generics. Trust me.

THE BEST BLACK PEN: Pilot V5 RT (the RT stands for retractible)

The retractible versions are getting increasingly hard to find at stores. Pilot V5s have caps (non-retractible) and are easier to find, but I've had a few of them leak all over my hands when I open the cap, so I stick to the retractible version.

THE BEST COLOR PENS: Paper Mate Flair 

I'm a high school teacher, so I use a lot of colored pens for grading. I'm also a grad student, so I use colored pens for outlining articles. These pens are amazing for color coding notes, organizing information when you outline, and--most importantly--doodling. They write like thin markers, so you can't always use both sides of the paper, and they run out of ink more quickly than Pilot pens, but they're so good that I don't even flinch before buying a new set. I usually get the 5-pack, but a lot of my teacher-friends opt for the 12 or 24 packs because of the larger variety of colors.

(Photos at Giant Coffee in Phoenix)

How to Arrange Flowers

First Draft, at Changing Hands Bookstore

Wine-sipping at art galleries is one of the biggest lies in the media. The closest I came to it was at Ten-In-One, an event at Mesa Art Center--they served wine, but you had to drink it before you went inside the gallery. Drinking wine at an art gallery is a dream I haven't yet fulfilled. 

But drinking wine at a bookstore? That's a dream I didn't even know I had. 

Book bars are becoming more popular lately--I've read that New York, San Francisco and Denver have some great ones.

First Draft is inside Changing Hands' Phoenix location, and it's the only book bar I know of in the Phoenix area. I prefer drinking cocktails over beer and wine, so I don't think I'll become a regular here (The Duce is my jam.)

But if you're looking for a place with the ambiance of a cafe and the menu of a pub, First Draft might be perfect for you.

Apple Crostata

Moist cakes? I'm your girl. Pies? Uh... fine. I'll branch out. 

Today I made a tart with a buttery, flaky crust. After typing "buttery, flaky crust-ed tart" with admittedly strange google results, I learned some vital information:

A crostata, huh? I gave Ina Garten's recipe a try (with a twice as much orange zest than the recipe calls for.) 

But I didn't want soggy crust.

Pie crust is flaky (instead of soggy) when you work with really cold materials. You'll need a food processor to mix the dough, because the heat from your hands will melt the butter if you knead it. Toss the butter in the freezer for 15 or so minutes before you use it. And make sure you use ice water.

Square Ice Cube Tray 

If you don't have a food processor, I've read that using a grater to shred the cold butter helps keep the dough's temperature down--just use a spoon to mix instead of your hands.

I doubled the amount of orange zest because it smelled really good. I wouldn't think to pair apples and oranges in a pastry, but it was so delicious.

Next time, I'm zesting the entire orange.

"Fruit Snacks"

If it's 4pm, I'm probably craving a nap, and hating myself for it.

My tiredness has been persistent for years now, and my doctor recommended I start taking a general multivitamin and a B-100 vitamin.

(B-Vitamins help increase your energy by making it easier for your body to convert food into calories. After a month of consistent use along with a multivitamin, they've also shown to reduce feelings of stress and improve one's mood.)

I want my body to function well. Ideally, I'd exercise every day and eat well-balanced meals. But it's so hard. Don't get me wrong, I'm up on my feet and moving around all day. But my body needs more energy to do everything I want. I don't want to spend all my energy working, then trying to recover energy so that I can go back to work.

But I don't like taking medicine. I'm a gotta-ride-it-out, lets-build-up-my-immune-system sickie. My worst nightmare: having a little weekly pill box filled with this and that to keep my body running properly.

If I have a vitamin deficiency, I want to see if I can get those nutrients from food before relying on supplements. But I don't really know how to feed myself. Or cook regularly.

This is usually the point when I'd start obsessively reading health blogs and cataloguing recipes and then not actually cooking anything I find.

Nope, not gonna do it.

Baby steps.

I'm all about making good choices as easy as possible. So every Sunday, I'm getting a bunch of fruit and chopping it up. I Keep it in tupperware in the fridge, so if I'm ever in the mood for a snack, I know exactly where to go (i.e. not to Taco Bell)

Sometimes I just want a half an apple. Sometimes I want three. Cutting it into bite size pieces makes eating fruit way, way easy.

Here's a little tip: To keep fruit from getting mushy as quickly, squeeze a half a lime into the tupperware before you toss it in the fridge. It'll preserve the fruit!

For now, I'm taking the vitamins every day. But hopefully I can wean myself off of vitamins and just, you know, fuel my body properly.

One step at a time.

True Whit, by Whitney Port

I'm not quite sure who wrote Whitney Port's book, True Whit, because it has no traces of the sensible, charming person I remember from The Hills. The book as a whole is sloppily put together (there are lots of blurry/pixelated photos), and reads like a Seventeen magazine from 2004.

(photo via alamodeappraisal)

And it has nothing to do with the recycled fashion advice. What bothered me most about this book was its lack of depth.

I know, I know. "Grishma, it's a fashion book, are you really expecting depth?!"

Yes. Because unless you go to fashion shows like it's your job and report on them regularly like actual writers at fashion magazines, you're not going to be sharing any advice women haven't already heard. And that's okay! Because what you can offer--what only you can offer--are your stories. Stories about how clothes make you feel, why you like certain styles over others, about what fashion means to you. Don't just tell me that a colorful, patterned skirt goes well with your white blouse. Tell me about why you wanted to stand out at the office party you wore this outfit to. Tell me about how paranoid you were that you'd spill on your white blouse so you only drank clear liquids. Tell me more than just a pairing of clothes.

There are so many fashion books out there, that you have to really know clothes to write a good "how to dress" book. Whitney Port isn't a fashion expert (yet), and I hope that someday she writes a book with a stronger voice.

Until then, here are my top picks for fashion books:

1. Style, by Lauren Conrad: Great advice about choosing and maintaining clothes. She knows what she's talking about.

2. The Truth About Style, by Stacy London: Filled with meaningful stories, this is less of a "how-to" book and more of a "why should you care about clothes" book. She invites 9 women to share their stories (and helps them find clothes they feel confident in), and her empathy and humor is so charming that book was a really enjoyable read.

3. Style, by Kate Spade: The book has ingenious color palettes. I learned that certain colors I wouldn't intuitively combine actually look great together.