Sunday Reading: Sponsorships and Swag

Racked recently did a feature about how much swag they, a smaller online publication, received in the last six months. This isn't particularly surprising, especially if you watched The Devil Wears Prada (though the movie painted an exaggerated picture of what it's like to work at Vogue, employees don't actually take home clothing and handbag samples for keeps). What was more surprising is that Racked doesn't ever feature the vast majority of what they receive. Either way, it doesn't particularly bother me that big publications get lots of freebies - I always assumed that. Regardless, I generally don't get product recommendations that way. The feature didn't generate too much discussion on r/femalefashionadvice, but there was still some good food for thought, most of which went in the direction of gifts and sponsorships sent to social media "influencers."

Last year, Adina posted her thoughts about the extent to which bloggers may contribute to excessive consumption, or unrealistic ideas about how much one should buy. I left a rambly comment there and always wanted to spin it off into my own post, but alas, it takes me forever to write anything serious. Back then, I thought it wouldn't be fair to attribute my previous more excessive, and sometimes careless, consumption habits to fashion bloggers, as I had those tendencies long before blogs were a thing. Plus most of my favorite blogs were by extremely creative, dedicated thrifters (Fops and Dandies, I miss you still!), so if anything, they encouraged "good", or at least, relatively eco-friendly and wallet-friendly, shopping.

Yet the top comment on r/femalefashionadvice makes a good point about how, because social media types present themselves as, and certainly started out as "real, normal people," it can create some sense that because "normal people" consume this much, maybe I should too. Looking back, this happened for me, particularly as to beauty products. I've never been a big makeup wearer, but I've purchased much more than I needed, or even particularly wanted. (I've since gotten rid of all the eyeshadow and most of the nail polish.) Because I had no other way to learn about makeup, I relied on Youtube, though this was a lot time ago, before sponsorships, back when Michelle Phan just made her first video, and I viewed it on her Xanga. One indirect lesson I got was that, of course someone must get each of their looks from multiple palettes, so maybe that contributed to my previous VIB every year Sephora habit, which I've since put aside.

Gifts I'd Love to Give (and Receive)

Maybe in part because my family does gifts eclectically (recipient picks, giver orders item or reimburses recipient who has already ordered it), I'm not very good at selecting gifts for others. I am capable of hitting it out of the park on occasion, though usually only because the recipient once mentioned offhand, "oh I'd love it if I had x," in which case I took note and bought the item for the next gift-requiring occasion. Otherwise, I get kind of lost. I've bought a lot of things such as, say, that year's version of a Peter Thomas Roth mask set for a skin care lover, something I even thought was cool enough to buy for myself later, only to see it go utterly unused by the recipient. Alas!

Please note that this post contains affiliate links that could result in a commission, typically a few cents, for me if you click. Thank you for your support!

So maybe I'm not the best at gift suggestions, but over time, there's been a few items that I've greatly enjoyed receiving, or that I'm certain would make an awesome gift, at least from my perspective. Maybe some of these ideas will also be good for someone in your life!

Personalized Leather Luggage Tag, $12

The linked ones are by Index Urban (similar pictured), which appears to be an independent, family-owned luggage shop in San Diego that sells customizable leather luggage tags both on-site and via Etsy. They have tons of colors and options. A friend got one for me as a graduation gift, and mine has held up great through being attached to my checked bag on several international trips, some with multiple stops.

Porcelain and Stone Stud Earrings, $64

Porcelain and Stone is a woman-owned small business based in Massachusetts, where I went to college. I purchased one of her small necklaces last year, and requested a pair of her "Navigation" dangle earrings for Christmas, so I'm already amassing a small collection. These earrings are actually on my personal wishlist for this holiday season. You can follow the artist on Instagram and she has some additional selections at her own shop. She makes both larger, statement pieces as well as a few smaller designs. 

Cuyana Classic Passport Case, $95

This is one of those things I haven't tried out yet, but that I think I'd be thrilled to receive. I don't particularly need a passport case for personal travel, but because I generally opt for a throw everything in and go tote without much internal organization, I sometimes need to dig around for small but important items like a passport or boarding pass, which I'd rather not need to do when traveling for work. I prefer a larger passport case with room for both the passport and boarding pass to one that just accommodates the passport. (I actually ordered the larger Cuyana Travel Wallet to try a while back, but found it much too big for my needs and returned it. I don't need my passport holder to also serve as a wallet, I just need it for my passport, boarding pass, and maybe some receipts.) 

H&M Premium Wool Scarf, $50 

This was one of my birthday gifts a while back, which I picked mainly because it looked vaguely like that Acne scarves, though I don't know if they're similar dimensions anymore. Confession: I don't actually wear this as a scarf because my down coat zips up fully to the neck and doesn't leave room for a heavier scarf, but I've really loved having this as a wrap at my office desk. It's warm and brightens my day, and it feels luxe to me to have one in wool. While my scarf may be a little wider, I think 21.5 inches is still wide enough for it to serve as a smaller lap blanket when folded up. 

Plaid Blanket Scarves, ~$13

Total blast from the past, my first ever post was about this type of unbranded acrylic plaid blanket scarf. They're now very commonly found on Amazon, in all kinds of plaid and check designs, and well, I think that's generally the most frugal place to obtain one year-round. At the time, I was looking for designs that were first found at Zara, but had long since sold out. (I believe they were first popularized by Atlantic Pacific.) These are admittedly kind of overdone. In the winters of 2014 and 2015,  it felt like I saw as many as two or three women wearing them practically every single time I stepped out the door in NYC. Nonetheless, I still wear mine when I need a warm scarf and am in one of my wool blend coats that doesn't fasten fully up to the neck.

Happy belated Thanksgiving! This has been a sometimes tough year, but I have so much to be thankful for: my loving and supportive family, who make the difficult things as easy as they can ever be; my life with K; my wonderful friends who commiserate with me when things are hard; and my wonderful colleagues and bosses/mentors, who have made my current and previous jobs totally awesome. 

A Cup of Tea

Thank you to everyone for your kind and thoughtful replies on my previous post. She was a wonderful mother and grandmother, always unfailingly kind. Things were difficult for a long time in the last few years, but everyone has so many good memories to hold on to. She was deeply loved. My family and I are doing well. 

Today's post is about a few items I bought recently for my desk at work, or that I plan to buy soon, all in service of my tea-drinking habit. I drink tea every day at work, usually going through three to four cups a day, enough that loose leaf is absolutely the only way, and the most cost-effective way, to go. It's an important part of my every workday, so it makes sense to treat myself to a few items to facilitate brewing and drinking tea at the office.

Please note that this post contains affiliate links that could result in a commission, typically a few cents, for me if you click. Thank you for your support!

This will show that I'm absolutely terrible sometimes when it comes to the sustainability and low or no waste-preferred components of minimalism, but at both of my private sector jobs so far, I've relied primarily on... disposable plastic or paper cups for water and tea or coffee. (I know, I know, it's awful of me, and I'm totally kicking myself!) In my partial defense, most of my time since graduation was spent as a government employee, where I used real mugs. The public sector doesn't provide constant, infinite refills of, well, either paper cups, or of coffee, unlike my private sector jobs. Anyway, I'll be better now, with the help of some of these recent purchases. None of this is too exciting, but it's all things that I know I'll be able to make good use of (that tea habit is definitely not going anywhere), and that will make my workday more enjoyable, even during my busiest periods:

• Mr. Coffee Mug Warmer: This is a new item for me, but I've had it for a few days, and so far so good. The nature of the job means that I often get distracted by a call or a new task that just came up, so quite a few servings of coffee or tea that I prepare for myself get forgotten long enough that they get cold. I don't think I've ever found, or read about, a solution more elegant than an electric mug warmer, so there it goes. Reading the Amazon reviews, it seems that these tend to be a fairly clunky and failure-prone gadget, but I haven't had any issues so far, though, well, it's been a very short time. I'm going to need to be extremely careful about shutting this off whenever it's not in use and not using it for excessive periods of time, as there's some risk of it overheating. 
• Silicone Drink Cover: These are not something that would normally be on my radar, as I spent more than a year at my last job without, but most of the reviews for the mug warmer suggest that a lid helps significantly with getting a hot drink to stay warm. I see a lot of similar silicon mug or cup covers at various stores, including when I'm traveling in Taiwan, so I figured they'd do the trick, and are generally useful. I picked one of these flower-looking Charles Viancin drink covers, specifically the sunflower ones. They're four inches across, which should be good for most mugs. These are also a new item for me, but are also good so far. 
• A Pretty Mug or Two: Whatever else one thinks of Anthropologie (I feel like the clothes aren't as nice-looking as they used to be), they stock some of the prettiest and most fun mugs. Out of the current selection, I'm particularly partial to the Liberty floral printed mugs and the pretty Mimira mugs pictured above. I'll be getting something at Anthropologie in person the next chance I have to stop by, but for now I've purchased a Pusheen mug for my desk. I tend to keep both a cold and hot drink at my desk and drink, so having two reusable mugs is the right number for me. 
• Metal Tea Infuser: I've used quite a few tea infusers or filters in my time, including the little mesh ball-shaped ones, paper tea filters (bad minimalist of me, again!), and even a silicone "manatea", which is absolutely adorable, but also not the most practical, as it's a little difficult to fully clean out and the really small holes seem to prevent some teas from brewing as well. From that set of experiences, I'm thinking that a larger cup-shaped metal filter, preferably one that comes with a little lid that also serves as a drip tray, is the way to go, something like this, though this one on Amazon is cheaper. 
• Electric Kettle? This is a little more unusual, but I may also be thinking about getting an electric kettle for my office. Like at my first firm, there's a hot water dispenser at my new workplace, but the water doesn't seem hot enough to brew oolong tea, one of my go-to kinds, though it's hot enough for green tea, so I've been holding out for now. I bought and donated this basic metal Hamilton Beach kettle to my previous workplace and it was great and still going strong, though 1.7 liters is a little big if it's just me using it for single servings.

Anyone else a habitual tea drinker? Any favorite kinds? I usually just pick out one of the green teas from the fairly broad selection of loose leaf tea at a nearby supermarket, and I have a range of different oolongs from my trips to Taiwan that will take me quite some time to use up. 

The Unexpected

Photo from Gaomei Wetlands.

My maternal grandmother in Taiwan passed away suddenly late last month. She lived with us in the US for a long time, helping take care of my sister and I for most of our childhoods. She had been extremely frail and in poor overall health for a long time, with unrelenting chronic pain, likely from rheumatoid arthritis, complicated by dementia, which is why she went back to Taiwan, where she'd have readier access to medical care and assistance from our extended family. We'd been bracing ourselves for this for a long time, though it was still a great shock. I went to Taiwan for a week to attend her funeral. 

I think my offline reactions to my grandmother's passing would strike many as being rather emotionally detached. I haven't cried much. Because of when the funeral was scheduled, I had four full working days at the office between when I first heard and when I got on the plane, and well, I think most of my colleagues would have been surprised if they knew I had so recently received tragic news. I may not have come across as being sad, though I wasn't completely myself. I certainly didn't talk about it, except to the extent absolutely necessary to set up my time off from the office.

While I'm generally someone who loves to talk ad nauseum about the small problems in my life, even long after I've already decided exactly what I'm going to do about them (which might be somewhat apparent in my writing), when things actually are bad, I go into "crisis management mode." Then, I'm all action, with minimal patience for talking things through, except to put the solution in place. So I'd like to think that I'd long since shown my love for my grandmother, my commitment to family, through my actions. In college, I once spent a month of a summer caring for my grandmother while she was in a back brace after a car accident, and while my mom was at work, a job my mom previously hired someone to do when I was away for an internship earlier that summer. I played a similar role the summer I studied for the bar, after her health had taken its dramatic decline, though I never talked about it then. I don't talk about these things to the vast majority of people in my life.

Culturally, as a Taiwanese family of Chinese descent, we place extreme value on caring for family members, particularly elderly parents and grandparents. There's a profound fear of and strong social stigma attached to putting relatives in nursing homes, and I think most families from our cultural background that I know of, including my own, make sacrifices of both time and money that could come across as extreme, in order to ensure that elderly or sick relatives can be adequately cared for in a family member's home. My mom took on those responsibilities by herself for a long time, so she's the real hero. I assisted only briefly, sharing my mom's burdens only a little. Ours isn't a culture that allows for complaints about how difficult it is, but I saw how hard it was for her, and also how much pain my grandmother was in for more than two years. Acceptance as a stage of grief came remarkably quickly because, as a family, we'd been prepared for so long. It feels as if I'd already started going through the earlier stages of grief much sooner.

This was originally going to be a post that tied all this into the extent to which family, and the possibility of needing to care for family (both financially and otherwise) at later stages of my life motivates my personal finance journey. That includes going to law school (insane loans and all) because it felt like the best way to build up the necessary resources while also supporting my hypothetical future children, mainly in having the high-quality education that has been so important in determining the course of my life, hopefully without the same student debt burden. It also ties into my probably excessive emergency fund (that I may bolster even more, rather than turn that extra money towards my student debt). Part of that predilection for possibly slightly excessive cash reserves was that I don't want to be one of those "left biglaw with insufficient savings while barely denting the loans" horror stories (link one). Also, an emergency fund was critical to my handling a huge emergency dental bill recently, as well as immediately traveling to Taiwan, both in short order and without even blinking. No doubt it'd help immensely in weathering future crises as well.