Mitch, Please: 10 Things, 4/13

A recent lunch date at Summer House with Kelly and Lucy. How funny is her mini MZ Wallace tote? 

Mitch here!

Here are the first 10 things that come to mind this morning. Enjoy!

• Random thought: I love having family in New Orleans. Kelly’s brothers (and sister-in-law and nephew) all live in New Orleans and I couldn’t be happier about it. New Orleans is one of my favorite cities and I absolutely love having an excuse to spend as much time there as possible (outside of the typical bachelor parties and birthday weekends). The typical New Orleanian apparently does not go to the French Quarter every day, so we spend our time in the Uptown and Garden District neighborhoods. I can’t wait to get back once Baby #2 arrives.
• I have crossed so many tasks off my I’ll-get-to-it-one-day list this week. As Kelly mentioned, my parents have the kids right now, and Kelly and I are taking some time for ourselves but also being very productive. (It kind of sheds some light onto how crazy our parenting situation has been over the last 5+ years, trying to be stay-at-home parents but also keep our heads above water with our businesses!) We each dedicate a couple of hours every morning to tackling some “one day” tasks, and I feel great about it. (For example, we finally handled our will. That’s a big deal!)
• I’m emptying out my office. I’m putting cabinets in there to hold my products and packaging and whatnot, so I’ve been forced into going through junk and deciding what stays and what goes. Most has gone.
• My mother may have broken Lucy’s pacifier habit and I love her for it. THANK YOU, MOM. Seriously, my mother is the best. The girls make so many strides when she’s with her; she’s responsible for Emma sleeping in a big girl bed and for Lucy starting potty training! Kelly and I can be softies, and while my mom is the most loving grandmother ever, she also gets things done. Many, many thanks, Mom.
• We’ve started having backyard bonfires again. Now that it’s spring, I’m looking back and realizing that I didn’t have a single solo stove bonfire last fall, so I’m making up for it now! Smells amazing. I wrote about the Solo Stove in depth here and it’s on super sale this week if you’re in the same kind of mood I am.
• I want to build an arcade machine. I found this Wall-Mounted Retro Arcade while scrolling around online and I’ve become obsessed. Kelly absolutely did not approve of the idea of a giant gaming cabinet downstairs, so I’m planning to build out a small gaming rig out of an inexpensive computer like a Raspberry Pi to emulate retro games. I’m great at starting projects like this and not so great at finishing them, so I’ll update you if I actually get this thing off the ground.
• #LarkinLuck strikes again. Kelly’s cousin is getting married on Nantucket this summer and I was very proactive in booking our flights really far in advance. But JetBlue stepped up and cancelled our flight and all other flights plans from Chicago to Nantucket that don’t require an overnight stay in either New York or Boston without either spending an extra $2,000 for the flights or cancelling half the trip. Phew! That was a mouthful. For weeks, maybe even months, it was looking like our best bet right was to take the Seastreak Ferry from New York City to Nantucket, which is six hours long, but then the clouds parted and we somehow found a new flight that works. I’m so happy!
• Painters broke our toilet. And flooded Emma’s bathroom. To their credit, they brought a plumber in to fix the major problems, but the plumber installed the toilet handle upside down and (in Mitch fashion, actually) I then broke that while trying to fix it. It then took me two clumsy weeks to get those toilet working again and I’m happy to report that I did it. What’s the opposite of a handyman? Because I’m whatever the opposite of a handyman is.
• What I’m Listening to: Live Music! It’s concert season in Chicago and we’re giving it our full effort. We’ve seen Kacey Musgraves, Cautious Clay, Animal Collective and Porches—and we have the Decemberists and Barenaked Ladies/Gin Blossoms upcoming. I’m spending my time doing the work in listening to all their new music so I’m on top of it for the shows.
• What I’m reading: The Sovereign Individual. I have an Econ degree and over the last year I’ve taken a deep dive back into the world of economics. I find it all to be so fascinating. Economics is the study of production and consumption, and the more I learn about it the more I see it as an attempt at understanding how the world works from large organizations like governments down to an individual making decisions. The Sovereign Individual is a heavily researched book that attempt to highlight what a unique time it is to be alive and productive in the scope of human history and just how much change we’re likely to see as a species in the next hundred years or so. I’m sure it’s not for everyone, haha, but I’m loving it.

Mitch. OUT!

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