The Expenses Of Wining Down

By: Saint Twenty
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I’m gonna need Trader Joe’s Wine Shop to reopen immediately. This city is expensive enough, the wine deals were unparalleled. There is no line like a Trader’s wine line, on a Friday at 5:30pm. You wasn’t there, I’m talking down the block. It’s been over a year and I need answers. Their boxed wine is literally divine, the only one of its kind that deserves an award. College kids need two buck chuck, as do the galleries on Thursday nights. New York City runs on the stuff, this is a stressful town. Wining down is relaxing. Via: Square Sayings

Sanitizer Spray Over Everything

By: Saint Twenty
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You down with OCD? Yeah you know me! Literally anyone who knows me can attest that cleanliness is next to godliness in my eyes. I don’t fuck with libraries (yuck!) unless all the books are brand spanking new, when you come into my home your shoes must be off; nothing bothers me more than just mopping and someone bringing their outside mess onto my floor. I can’t. Bleach and cleaning products are the scent of heaven and I always carry sanitizer, so when everyone started buying it for the pandemic I was furious. For you it’s a preventative measure, for me it’s a lifestyle, but discovering the spray when the liquid gel ran out was definitely a silver lining of my existence.

Sanitizer spray beats basic sanitizer gel for countless reasons. Let me put you up on game by giving you three.

Reason one: When I get my nails done I love adding translucent chrome powder, which comes off when touched by sani. The spray allows for more control in application whereas gel has to be rubbed all over. Now I can be safe and cute without the chrome peeling.

Reason two: Once in a blue moon you forget to wash your masks, which should be done daily. When in a rush spray some sani on it to kill the bacteria and dip.

Reason three: You can spray anything! The train seat, the doorknob, the train pole, your steering wheel, cell phones, Ipad cover, your purse, pens that fell on the floor, lighters you stole from other people, the part of your clothing that touched a garbage can, or a stranger. Anything your OCD heart desires to cleanse of germs.

I am forever changed. Unless forced I will not be returning to the regular gel. It just doesn’t compare to the value and versatility of the sanitizer spray, you welcome. Via: Trader Joes Obsessed

Kick Push For Feminism

By: Saint Twenty
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A necessary perspective. Despite sitting on the steps of Union Square for a majority of teenage hood, it never dawned on me how sexist the sport of skating is. Betty gave me new eyes; now passing by on my way to Trader Joe’s the glaring gender disparity amongst skaters is all I can see. One that is perpetuated throughout the culture, from the stars, to the video game avatars emulating them. It’s amazing what you don’t notice when you aren’t searching, even if it’s doing backflips in your face. The only female there was watching her boyfriend cut up. I’m not making an assumption, they kissed, although they could be open, or friends with benefits (I don’t know their life).

Dating a former pro-skater who left the scene to produce reggae riddims, I had a slight foray into that world. We’d go to Carl Schurz Park where he taught me the basics. As counter-intuitive as it felt, the trick is using your dominate foot to steer. Eventually I was able to kick push without the safety net of him running alongside me, holding my hands. However when I wasn’t learning, I too was the one girl watching her boyfriend and his friends shred from the sidelines.

Betty tells the story of several young women coming of age, who are excluded from the boys club and decide to create their own table. One of the ladies is an exception to the bigotry and has an in with the men, but at what cost? A much appreciated and necessary contrast.

As a native New Yorker I must say I was left nostalgic for humid summer days turned into nights, filled to the brim with eternal adventure. Never knowing who I was going to befriend, or bump into. The scene when they hotbox the van is all too real. Do you take time to see different perspectives, or stick to narratives you already know? How does this choice play into your understanding of other people? Via: HBO


New Season Who Dis?

By: Saint Twenty
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These designs scream Fall is coming. Usually we associate darker colors with cooler seasons, so this is a cute take. Like most black people, I knew summer was over when I saw how ashy my hands were today. Shit was wild. Shout out to my Asian sister, after doing my nails she hooked me up with oil. Time to get a new tube of Trader Joe’s hand lotion. Which set do you prefer? Via: Goddess Provisions (Top) Munchis Love (Bottom)

Garment Collecting

By: Saint Twenty
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What to do, what to do with the clothes you can’t donate? The tattered, armpit stained, dingy old things that can’t be bought back to life. I use to throw what I couldn’t give away, or pass down to my siblings in the garbage. Then I learned the fashion industry is the second most wasteful regarding the environment.

An environmentalist, I kept my recent old clothing in a Trader Joe’s tote, until I could figure out what to do with them.

Then I found out that H&M will take all the contorted bras, the stretched out leggings, the shirts filled with holes…Just drop it off in the collection box at a store nearest you, then redeem you 15% off coupon. Photo: H&M

Death Anniversary

By: Saint Twenty
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Two years ago today I almost died on Jacob Riis Beach.
When Cameron and I arrive the water is furious, half the shore eaten up. With little to no sand to settle on we decide the rocks are a good idea.
Each of us a has a bottle of Merlot from Trader Joe’s.
Earlier we blazed in the backyard of my building.
We felt so safe, languishing in the brilliance of our position.
In retrospect it was idiotic and almost got me killed. Water slapping against craggy rocks is far more dangerous, the tide has a stronger pull.
Idiocy also saved me.
Having the audacity to lay down, only my elbows propping me up.
When the waves crashed in I was skipped like a pebble five feet forward. My elbows preventing my head from cracking like an egg, then preventing me from being sent to sea when the water receded.

A man ran twenty feet, leaving his baby and partner to help me. Cameron just watched, gripping the neck of the wine bottle I purchased for him (he was unemployed and broke).

Between my head cracking and being sent to sea there was a 66% probability of death. I made it. What shook me to the core was that this was the anniversary of my grandmothers death. In 2003 there was a city wide black out. The hospice my grandmother resided in felt it frivolous to turn on their back up generators, all the people were there to die anyways. So the next day she did.

Almost dying instilled in me a deeper reverence for water. So when the waves are incensed you better listen you puny human. A swift reminder that we are at the mercy of nature at all times. There’s just gotta be something keeping it all together for us, because it believes we’re worth consciousness.

Photo: Diztant Dreamer