Pride is over and we are reaching the peak of heat and summer time! Pool parties, bbq’s, and vacations. Whether you are taking a trip to Philly or looking for something new to do, lets take a look back and figure out the rest of your summer plans but talking about my monthly moments from June!

Pride! Obvi!

So obviously Pride is over, but the festivities and events are just getting started! So the actual Pride march and festival was June 1st and it was such a blast, as it always is! But the air this year was different, the energy was out of this world and the love was everywhere. The Dj’s and their choice of music was itching the right spot and the vendors absolutely blew me away with their homemade creations. It felt good to be around community, celebrating and supporting one another. The Gayborhood doesn’t just disappear on July 1st, in fact there are plenty of more events to join in and make memories. Cavanaugh’s River deck is having their annual Hotter than July event with live music, games and contests! However, if you’re looking to detox your liver, every Saturday morning, Philadelphia Front Runners holds a go at your own pace athletic event of walking along the Schuylkill River. Or if you want to hide away from the heat, Fragments of Lesbos, is a reading and sharing circle to learn more about the book “After Sappho” and focus on uplifting and discussing women artists within the community.

Grad/Birthday Sips

Alright so while May was birthday month for a lot of my friends, one of my friends really had the month of their lifetime. With the first day of Sips falling on their birthday, to which the following week they would graduate from college which was also celebrated on Sips. We were able to make happy hour reservations at Bodega and Attico. This is also very important information since a lot of restaurants/bars don’t specifically take reservations for Sips. I had never been to Bodega previously but walk past it all the time and I was excited I got the chance to try the place out! I had a house wine, which was nothing special (it never usually is) but their creamy veggie empanadas were out of this world and really hit the spot. We also ordered chips and guac and fried calamari for the table which didn’t stick around for long as everyone ate it so quickly. Then we went to Attico the following week, a place I had been at before, and it was an absolute blast! It’s a rooftop bar so you have to take an elevator to get up, which if you have a reservation you can skip the long line. With a reservation you can also secure a sitting area and we scored a spot that is inside but held a gorgeous view of city hall, the sunset, and that cooling evening summer breeze. The wine was good but the food was better. For the table we ordered the marinated cucumbers, shaved mortadella toast, and I think the short rib steak and jerk chicken. I had my eyes set mostly on the cucumbers and toast so I wasn’t sure what else was on the table. I will say though, their food tends to lean on the boujee small dish end so I would eat before or get a big meal after being here! Definitely like a pregame place.

Phillies Outings

We are deep into baseball season and the Phillies are on the up! (at the time of this post that is.) But I had gone out at least once a week during the month to catch a Phillies game in our favorite local sports bar with friends! It’s been so hot, so none of us had really had the drive to actually go to the stadium and sizzle our skin down to our bones so we’ve been opting for AC and hot filling food. We do this during football season as well so we’ve become close with the bartenders and it is always such a blast to just hang with the Philly community while our hearts sinks to our stomach while watching our teams.

Movies I’ve Watched

So I’ve seen two very different types of movies this month, one a documentary and a classic Wes Anderson film. To start I watched the Titan submersible documentary. Now there is no shortage of these (shocker) but I specifically saw the one on Netflix, “Titan: The OceanGate Disaster”. And I just want to say how blown away I was with this, I’d be interested to watch the other documentaries about the event but this really showed the true nature of OceanGate in the typical unintelligent billionaire who just has lots of money and wants to be an a hole. So we can add this to the list of 4,598 reasons why I hate rich men! But some people have had concerns about learning the minute by minute of the last dive, however they only really cover that in the last 15-20 minutes of the documentary! I’m also someone who is obsessive about deep sea stuff, whether it’s just learning about the life down their or the submersible stories it is almost like another planet down there. So it was really interesting to learn about the Titan itself and how it was affected while diving to get to the Titanic. So if you’re looking for a little bit of education on deep sea submersibles and curious on how it all went wrong from day one, watch this!

As for my next film The Phoenician Scheme, I can proudly say this is one of the few Wes Anderson films that actually makes sense to me! Now I don’t want to get to into because I can ramble for days about Anderson’s films and what the meaning of all of it is, but I can say it is a great adventure film! It has Anderson’s classic cast, signature shots, and indirect storytelling that makes his films so iconic. The bases of it all is that the main character is heavily disliked by the government and they make an attempt to kill him. However, he just seems to always come back to life. So what should they make hurt more than his heart? His pockets.

TV Shows I’ve Watched

Alright, so while the movies may have been to anyones taste, I’m back on my reality real estate grind. Now that I can only access Netflix for 14 days (F you Netflix and your dumb internet rule, you suck.) I wanted to pick up a show I could watch within two weeks. I fear I have struck gold. Buying Beverly Hills, so you have the worst type of people on the show, rich west coasitians who take their private jets to go to Aspen, only wear Hermes and Dior, and the kicker, an “it’s all about me attitude”. Alright, to be far I’m being a little dramatic, the people on the show are human and they grow on you but I’m not far from wrong. Anyways, of course it takes place in the Beverly Hills area with The Agency company founded by Mauricio Unmansky (Ex husband of the Kyle Richards), his nepo daughters, and some other grown up silver spooned type of people. I mean some of these people are selling houses over 20 million dollars to people who are single and have no kids, what do you need all that damn space for? So if you’re looking to see what the crazy people are doing on the west coast the show is on Netflix with two seasons and 18 total episodes.

Books I’ve read

So reading hasn’t been my strongest suit this month, but I’m heading on vacation and will be diving deep into finishing Onyx Storm but in the mean time I’ve started reading in another language. I specifically picked up the book Extasis by Gabriela Mistral, a poetry book written entirely in Spanish. Now I’m very intermediate, I’m not the best but I did find this book to be a good read! Not super easy but not super difficulty that I know what’s being said in the poems with context. I was looking to find a Spanish book since I’m attempting a different route to find my own resources for learning the language. And Duolingo is so outdated and lame (“AI-first” company). So I took the initiative to buy a basic Spanish learning book as well as Mistral’s small Spanish poetry book. I really feel like I’m learning a lot more and applying it to contexts I work more often with, reading and writing. So I was able to get over Duolingo pretty quick! While also finding resources, I’m having a better time connecting and learning the language.

Thank you so much for reading! Have a wonderful day!