Hi ! Sorry this is late. (Slight) explanation below.  This week I am thinking and writing about Chinese food, loops, Parisian museums, cockroaches and my contradicting attitude to meeting people in person- Eve D.❣️

Week in review…

🇮🇳 Went out for Chinese Indian with G (see below). It was so so good. I wish I took a photo (you can tell I am not a born content creator, right?).  The place had a bit of a hole-in-the-wall vibe, but the owner assured us he is from South India, which apparently (and accurately) meant that the food was extra good. Hope we go back some time. 

💾 I worked. Which included doing in person meetings, which honestly does not happen that often. (I wanted to say it was the first time this year, but then I remembered I had about three just in the last month, so I think it’s more a case of wanting to forget I did them, or that I ever have to do another one). But also…it was a great week at work, and there are hopefully at least two very exciting things happening in my work life early 2026. Which, to be fair, is exactly to the plan I had for 2025 ie set it up for a fantabulous 2026. 

🥳 For fun, I: coffee’d with friends, coffee’d with my sister, coffee’d with myself. I lunched with G. I gymmed. I also spent a lot of time talking on the phone with friends far away. I hung out watching high school water polo (nail biting stuff. Sport is tough). I do wish I was doing more exciting things with my free time, but I also don’t know how I would even start to find the time and the energy. I think that for now, it’s deep-breath in and let’s-just-make-it-to-December out.

🎄 In better news, the end of year plans are proceeding nicely and it will be fun to bid the year goodbye by hanging out with friends over lunch/brunch/drinks/dinners. My friend Laura is organising a proper Christmas party (in November!) with invitations, RSVPs, Secret Santa and all. It’s happening end of November which is exactly what is required to bid the work season goodbye, and welcome the December mindset. 

Food for thought:

Fish or Chicken?

So here’s something that happened last weekend. G gave me two options for dinner: Indian or Chinese. I obviously chose Indian, because it’s my favourite cuisine by far. Then, the options were fancy-sit-down or take-away. I opted for takeaway. We went on with our day, and when it was time to get dinner, we got into the car to go get it. Half way there I realised we were on our way to the Chinese, not Indian. 

“You said you wanted Chinese”, G says. 
“No, I definitely said Indian.” 
“You said Chinese.”
“No, I said Indian.”
“Ok, I’ll turn around.”
“No, don’t be silly. We’re basically there. Chinese is fine.”

We arrive, park car. 

“But you did say Chinese”
“No, I said Indian. Why would I ever choose Chinese over Indian? I love Indian”
“Eve, if you want Indian, we need to get Indian. I don’t mind driving. Do you want to?”

And here is when I was reminded of a brilliant Substack read where author talked about how women have forgotten what we want (sorry, I’ve lost the link to article 😡 ). We are so busy giving in and prioritising other people’s needs and preferences, we have lost our ability to want things for ourselves. And even if we kind of sort of know what we want, others will need to pry it out of us with wild horses. Like now. I was stuck. On the one hand, I definitely wanted Indian and had been thinking about it the whole day. On the other hand, we were already parked at the Chinese restaurant, and I didn’t want to be an inconvenience. But on the other other hand, I am dating someone who is happy to allow me to put my wants ahead of his convenience (rare!). On yet on another hand, we were both tired, and far far away from our usual Indian spot. Deep breath…am I going to do it?...am I?...am I?...

“Ok, I do want Indian”
“Google, show me the nearest Indian restaurant”. 

Google points us to a place kilometre away; we drive there but the whole centre looks very  dodgy, and we can’t locate the restaurant anyway. Of course, I waiver. 

“Maybe we should just go back to the Chinese restaurant”
“No. You want Indian. Google, show me the nearest Indian restaurant that is not here”

And that is how we discovered a new favourite Indian place! But also, now whenever there is a mild disagreement G just looks at me and says “Indian” and I believe it’s his way of telling me that I give mixed signals all the time. Which I don’t (and I didn’t), because I clearly said Indian the first time round, and he just wasn’t listening properly. Men. 🤪 

The actual point is: it’s difficult to give myself permission to take up space, speak up for what I want and own it. But good things happen when I do, so I’m learning. (G would laugh at all this point of view! First of all, he’d say I definitely said Chinese. Second, he’s already told me I can be quite forceful and dogmatic. He doesn’t know what I’m (maybe) about to unleash 😂 ).

Close your loops

Saw this on my social feed recently “The real reason you are tired all the time: it’s not your workload. It’s your open loops. The text you haven’t answered. The apology you owe. The decision you’re avoiding. The conversation you keep postponing. These run in the background of your mind all day, draining your battery. Close your loops. Watch your energy return. Mental clutter is more exhausting than physical work ever will be”

I agree! My mind is working all the time, always running through a list of all the outstanding things I need to do. Some of them are small, some of them are massive. All of them give me a headache. This is one of the reasons the newsletter is late this week, btw. I usually write it on a Friday evening, but this past Friday I really didn’t feel like it. I was mentally exhausted. I said to my kids that I wished I could just go to my room for the night and be able to do nothing for a change. And then I realised that, actually, I can. And so I did. And I’m not even sorry. #SorryNotSorry

I am picking up some tricks to get rid of the mental load. Some thing work, some things don’t, some things work but only for a short while. One thing I’ve realised: everyone’s system is personal, and it’s a never ending process of iteration. What works for me probably won’t work for you. For now, my current system is extremely simple: I write everything down into a checklist, and then I check it off. The goal is to have as few things on the checklist at end of day as possible. That means I have to do things, but it also means I can’t put too many things on the checklist in the first place. I also am trying to teach myself to do 5 min jobs in the odd 5 min of down time throughout the day (in between meetings, example). I multitask where I can. This doesn’t even have to be high level stuff (I had coffee with a friend on Friday while having my car cleaned). TL;DR: I am slowly learning that the best way to get rid of a long list is to actually do the stuff on it.

Very much related to this system of thinking, I saw this on my feed and I can also relate! 

“The peace of mind of no longer trying to help people who never asked for your help is honestly unmatched. Minding my own business is amazing.”

I am putting this into practice!! I am perpetual people pleaser, and always want to be helpful, but let me tell you: there is such peace in realising that I don’t have to do this. For now, my focus is on letting people know that I am more than willing to help them, but they have to ask for that help first. This is a big win.

Not that funny:

When I saw this on my feeds, I took a screenshot because I knew I wanted to share it with you as a funny story. “Sounds appropriate!” would be my caption, or something like that. But then I did something rather unusual for today’s online habits: I actually read the article. And let me tell you: it’s not funny at all. This woman used a lighter and flammable spray to try and kill the cockroach. As a result, some of her furniture caught fire, and this spread to the whole apartment block. Her direct neighbours tried to escape through a window. The husband went first to an adjacent balcony, the mother passed him their two month old baby (!!), and the mother tried to make it across. She slipped, fell…and died.  It’s a horrendous story, and the headline doesn’t seem appropriate at all. 😢 

Very funny: 

Conversely, the Louvre heist story is hilarious. We are all rooting for the thieves, aren’t we? And I do believe this is a genuine, real photo of the detective on the case. Gotta love it!

I’ve been watching…

We ended up watching Annie Hall this week, which was quite good but I am not sure I can explain why. I can’t even tell you what it’s about, exactly, other than “it’s a story of a relationship”. I did think that the couple was a bit mismatched: I couldn’t buy the fact that a Diane Keaton-like person would date a Woody Allen-kind of person, but then I was told they dated in real life, so there you go.

Next week we are watching A Haunting in Venice which is appropriate because a) I believe it’s set during Halloween (which is next week) and because it’s a Hercules Poirot mystery, which goes hand in hand with the Louvre heist etc.

Looking ahead…

I am attending my first network-in-person event in years. I am super excited. I used to organise these type of events myself, and loved doing it but that was in another lifetime. Monday morning, I am going to meet 40 new (or new-ish) people, and I am thrilled. I’ll let you know how it goes 😄 

Thanks for reading!

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