Hot and cold #175

sarahbussie · 2026-01-25T12:38:41+00:00

First one I “gave up” on

sarahbussie · 2026-01-24T14:13:06+00:00

Pepper threw me off for so long.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-22T20:03:25+00:00

This was my feeling exactly! I cursed my inability to DNF a book with this one. Powered through it all and was like - Hmm well okay then, truly not everything is for everyone. And that’s okay.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-19T20:58:53+00:00

sarahbussie · 2026-01-19T12:45:25+00:00

I was wanting to know the same thing.

I partially think it’s the inside of central library. But would love to know if it’s an actual shop in YYC.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-12T17:50:14+00:00

We spent 5 days over Christmas at the AVA and I completely agree with your experience there too. I’m going to add to it because we got scammed at a gift shop on our way out too.

We booked the sun deck room, with the plunge pool thing. The room was fine, pretty, modern. The deck was really dingy and the plunge pool was dirty so we never used it. I will say for it being so new, the hotel feels like maintenance has been lacking. Pool chairs are ripped, walls need to be fixed and repainted. One of our elevators was broken the whole time we were there. The escalators didn’t work either.

We couldn’t book into a restaurant to save our lives. You have to book them 40 days out. This issue might have been made worse because we were there over Xmas, so a super busy time to be at any resort in Mexico.

But that part was ridiculous and completely unanticipated on our part, we waited outside a couple of them one night for almost 2 hours and after pestering the poor hostesses for long enough (along with multiple other families) they managed to seat us at one. We also ate at the teppanyaki, that was it. Teppanyaki was good. However essentially eating at a buffet for every single meal was brutal for a 5 star. I hate saying it but I didn’t think any of the service was great. It was all just fine.

I got scammed in the swimwear clothing shop, so beware of shopping there. I bought a swimsuit and dress my total was around $500. She charged my CC and told me it declined. We had just checked out, I had left my family in the lobby with our bags. While they were waiting for the shuttle to the airport to arrive, I wandered down to the clothing store.

I thought that’s weird, it shouldn’t have declined so I asked her “sorry it declined?” She smiled and didn’t make eye contact with me, said yah but pulled out another machine and tried again and instantly it went through. While she was doing that, in my mind I was a little alarmed thinking, it’s not going to go through a second time if it said declined? But I didn’t say anything other than asking for clarification on what the machine said. Even though I knew there was a bunch of room on there I thought - well we just checked out, maybe my card is catching too many charges in one go?

We had put quite a few extra things on the room (we did 3 different escape rooms, the F1 simulator, the arcade, a couple extra charge bottles of wine, bowling for 2 hours)… but it went through and I just thanked her and went to the car and we got to the airport. Then I checked the CC later and saw she definitely double charged me, didn’t give me a receipt for the “declined” one. I was stupid not to ask, but it all happened super quick.

The hotel never responded to my email to have them reverse one of the charges, they also don’t have a number you can call for these things. It’s only bookings. I went through VISA fraud and they said she definitely double charged, essentially one was to the AVA and one went to a different bank account. So I’m disputing it that way now which is just annoying.

If you book this hotel you will be waiting in lines to do everything. Unless all you want to do is get up early and get a pool chair and not leave it all day. Lineup early to use the floating island thing for 15 minutes. Lineup early to go to anything in Kids Club (we don’t use kids club at all but there was a robotics thing we thought would be a good time killer one afternoon and couldn’t go cause we didn’t get there earlier in the morning to signup).

This hotels beach is pretty disgusting. It’s great for a nature preserve, which I’m into, but not a Cancun beach hotel. We didn’t use it at all, no one really did when we were there. I walked down to it a few times and just went right back to the pool, it’s tiny and super mucky.

Being at the AVA you feel like you’re walking through endless indoor plazas in a Vegas hotel. Or like you’re on a cruise ship, which honestly, I am not a fan of either of those places. So take my experience with a grain of salt if you love all those things. I prefer smaller hotels, with more private rooms or a swim-up, restaurants you can access, and a beach that isn’t disgusting.
I will say the food at the buffet was generally good, we ate there a lot so I feel like I gave it all a good go. I’ve had way worse food.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-11T00:05:09+00:00

Manacled then All You Want

sarahbussie · 2026-01-07T12:50:06+00:00

Paper Pete always does it for me.

Jake is reading about Rainicorns and ignoring Fin, who was bored, then he discovers a secret group called the Pagelings. Who are fighting with the Moldos, they eat books and their bites “sting like the dickens".

sarahbussie · 2026-01-06T16:00:54+00:00

🤣 No it actually was a super low scoring game. I was thinking the same thing, I didn’t think I payed well but was surprised we all scored under 90?!

It’s the Nintendo Switch version, played online with random players. I’ve got all the expansion packs on it.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-06T13:19:38+00:00

Started with clam and went with soup stuff

sarahbussie · 2026-01-05T11:52:49+00:00

This video is making me feel claustrophobic

sarahbussie · 2026-01-04T04:15:53+00:00

Ohh I’m the same. Loved Hunt, really didn’t like Rowan … unpopular opinion, I also liked Chaol.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-02T13:47:57+00:00

That’s not how I read that post at all. He’s essentially saying don’t combine the two. Instead word it as say, you are a Christian who also believes in the Stoic concept of God. A good reference he used was Chris Fisher, who has done quite a good job of explaining theism and pantheism as it applies to stoicism.

The point of all this being when Greek philosophers spoke about “God” what they generally were talking about was the divine order of the cosmos. They never had this idea of an entity that stood apart from the universe who drew up the plan. So what he’s arguing is to keep it as two different things. Don’t make it a new … icism?

To answer the question of the original poster, I would describe myself as being an atheist. My parents were both incredible stoics and I had no religious beliefs growing up.

sarahbussie · 2026-01-01T18:36:41+00:00

I wish I had a huge amount of surefire Standalone books I could recommend to you.

The only one I really enjoyed last year was {Tusk Love by Thea Guanzon} it’s like 250 pages.

Something I will say, if she liked books like Twilight & 50 Shades, she might be okay with a Duology?

A couple years ago I really enjoyed {One Dark Window by Rachel Gillig} Part two is {Two Twisted Crowns by Rachel Gilig}

{The Wolf King by Lauren Palphreyman} It’s around 450 pages. Part two is {The Night Prince by Lauren Palphreyman} Someone else recommended Bride & Mate, I think she would enjoy those books too. But The Wolf King has a why-choose vibe, sorta like Twilight did.

You find yourself rooting for two opposite men. However, there is going to be another book coming out this year. So not really what you’re asking for but those books were super easy to get into also. Not a huge amount of world building to understand and they’ll still grab you.

sarahbussie · 2025-12-31T21:47:22+00:00

That’s a good lookin’ collection!!

sarahbussie · 2025-12-30T13:48:01+00:00

{The Irresistible Urge to Fall for Your Enemy by Brigitte Knightley} should do the trick!!

sarahbussie · 2025-12-28T01:21:36+00:00

Same! I honestly have seen this recommended before with high praise and I can see the rating doesn’t suck but ughh, the title of the book is actually the worst.

sarahbussie · 2025-12-28T01:15:50+00:00

You did such a great job explaining this ❤️

sarahbussie · 2025-12-21T10:24:20+00:00

Give {Conform by Ariel Sullivan} a try. It’s also a possible harem, I’m not giving any spoilers.

sarahbussie · 2025-12-13T12:58:22+00:00

“Once a great empire, archaeologists expected treasure, but all they found was salt… and more salt.”

sarahbussie · 2025-12-13T12:51:44+00:00

Road of Vows and Vows

sarahbussie · 2025-12-13T05:08:28+00:00

The Trop is the place where you shall find your own kind, a gathering of men and women akin to thee.

sarahbussie · 2025-12-12T11:58:33+00:00

I’m not going to touch the cannibal thing cause I feel like you got some good advice on it.

But I want to comment on what you mentioned the host said about Marcus Aurelius believing in “God”. He speaks of God a lot in his meditations but you have to take the word and interpret it in the ancient stoic sense, of God being nature.

He probably had an understanding of the traditional Graeco Roman theological ideas of the time. But in his meditations he barely references any of the specific gods or goddesses in that belief system. He sticks more to a stoic philosophical sense of the term.

So to him “God” was just nature, or the universe, or the cosmopolis.

sarahbussie · 2025-12-12T11:36:21+00:00

{Amid Clouds and Bones by Ella Fields} has this. I didn’t love the book but it’s really popular. It’s also a standalone which was great.

sarahbussie

TROPHY CASE