Happy Sunday, everyone. I’ve spent most of this weekend putting finishing touches on the term paper for my psychology class. Lots of work, but it’s interesting work: I’m writing about issues that pop up routinely in these weekend reading posts. Specifically, I’m considering the placebo/nocebo effect as it relates to our experience of food. Too much to summarize neatly here (plus I’m a little braindead from combing through citations), but the research has given me a deeper understanding of what I know intuitively from my work, which…

The process of clicking around in search of links for these weekend reading posts is always full of surprise and discovery. It’s often filled with emotion, too—grief, sadness, or excitement, depending on what I find and how it strikes me. This week, my heart ached and then celebrated along with Lily, who bravely shared her story of returning to the kitchen space after her mother’s death on Food52. “My mother was my portal into the world of the senses,” Lily writes. “She taught…

One of my favorite discoveries of 2017 so far (thanks to Twitter) is the work of Ashley C. Ford. I read and hear a lot about vulnerability these days, but it’s rare to encounter writing that’s as truly vulnerable, candid, and self-exploratory as Ashley’s. I never feel as though her essays are intended to teach me a lesson or prove a point: rather, I feel as though I’ve been granted an invitation to be a part of her thought process. Another reason I’m drawn to Ashley’s work is…

It’s been about two weeks since I took the RD exam. I’ve been easing back into things very gradually, giving myself time to appreciate the closing of one chapter and the start of another. This was the first weekend in a very, very long time in which I not only didn’t work, but didn’t feel that I should be working. I’ve struggled a lot with time scarcity in the past few years: a constant, low-grade anxiety about scheduling, planning, and falling behind. At…