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Continue reading →: March 2022 Reading RoundupHow did I manage to read THREE books this month? (Don’t scoff, you ten-books-a-month-readers) Oh, I know! I read fast, page-turners. Here we go! First up is Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing. I had bookmarked Jeremy from Hong Kong’s recommendations, and boy howdy, am I glad. I was…
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Continue reading →: February 2022 Reading RoundupThis month all I had time for was one book, but it was 672 pages, so that counts as two novels, right? In January, I summarized the Red Queen story, so if you’re interested, I’d definitely have a look. But here’s my quick version once again if you don’t want…
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Continue reading →: January 2022 Reading RoundupHappy New Year and Happy Chinese New Year! Year of the Tiger and a year of dropping all of the reading challenges. Maybe when I’m no longer working full-time, I can try them again, but until then, I’ll read with no goals in mind. One Book Lane truly summarizes this…
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Continue reading →: What is your favorite quote? and other questionsLike many other #bloganuary participants, I’ve struggled to connect with these daily prompts. But since I joined to connect with other bloggers, I’m getting on the dance floor when I like the song. 💃🏽 What is your favorite quote and why? “The voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new…
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Continue reading →: What do people incorrectly assume about you?As an Asian American in Asia, I’m mistaken for either the local population or a Chinese tourist. This even happened in Ecuador! I was seen as an Asian Latin American, and not even having a fellow gringo as a sidekick changed their perceptions. But I think this incident best summarizes my experiences (because…
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Continue reading →: What do you like most about your writing?In the 6th grade, we took a statewide test that assessed our writing abilities, and I scored high under having a strong opinion. But in college, I received papers back that said “too idiosyncratic”. Looking back, I feel those two moments define the evolution of my writer’s voice. And I like…
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Continue reading →: What is something you wish you knew how to do?I wish I knew how to climb into storybooks and try on different life. Could I be like Nora in The Midnight Library and see what would have happened if I had made different choices. What if I had stayed in archaeology? What if I stayed in Durango, Colorado? What…
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Continue reading →: What is a road trip you would love to take?Australia was never on my radar. After all, I left Hawaii to get away from island life (sounds absurd now, doesn’t it?). My first brush with Australia was through the 1986 hit movie Crocodile Dundee, and while it was entertaining, it didn’t exactly make me want to hop on a…
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Continue reading →: What advice would you give to your teenage self?None. She wouldn’t have listened anyway. Because:a) teenagers always know bestand have all the answersb) words can change lives, but would it have made a difference?and would I have wanted it to?c) the older we get, the more regrets we harbor, so it’s best to let those ships sail out…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: December 2021Did the pandemic change the way we read? You bet it did. Physical, electronic, and audio books sales all increased. And just like everyone else, I read widely, deeply, to escape, and find comfort, too. This became particularly noticeable after I started working full-time. Dark and depressing could no longer…
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Continue reading →: Non-Reading Roundup: November 2021It has been known to happen, although, like this month’s solar eclipse, it’s rare. Nothing will hold my attention, but what’s super annoying is I’ve read several books halfway before giving up on them. Even my gal, Agatha Christie, couldn’t satisfy me, and in the past, she was ‘ol reliable.…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: October 2021How fast is this year flying by? The witch’s broomstick is already in the distance, past Halloween’s moon. This month I read another long book and a children’s story that I read to my third grade class. That counts too, doesn’t it? First up, The Widow Queen by Elzbieta Cherezinska,…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: September 2021Another one-book month, but it was over 400 pages! That counts for something, right? After a string of serious books, I needed something different. But like a lot of things, we don’t know what we need until we go looking for it. Somehow I found this list The Best Science…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: August 2021A busy month = just one book and a trail of abandoned books. Do you give up on novels? As a child of the 80s, I grew up during the Cold War, which sounds dramatic, but this simply meant that the enemy in films and television were almost always the…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: July 2021This month I read Australian, American, and British. Breath by Tim Winton was recommended by my husband who remembers reading it many years ago. Since my 14-year old student, Mark likes surfing he thought it would be a good read. But what he forgot was that the story has some…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: June 2021This month I finished four books and share a big announcement. My student, Mark, and I read this together, and boy howdy, am I glad I had a reading buddy because this is a long book. There were times when I wanted to give up because it’s not a conventional…
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Continue reading →: 👸🏽Why I’m a princess: an essay about sleepMany Thais have this uncanny ability to sleep anywhere and at anytime. On piles of rocks in the middle of a construction site. On a straw mat over a bundle of bamboo poles under a tree. Between loud speakers at a party. Or on a motorbike perfectly balanced and relaxed…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: May 2021Just two books, but updates, and a couple of scams to be aware of are included in this month’s roundup. Books read in May At the recommendation of Jeremy (who at this point should be receiving a commission) I read Shadow and Bone in 2019 and then binge-read almost all…
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Continue reading →: Has social isolation due to lockdown made us dumber?According to this study, it has. What I know, as we endure our third lockdown in Thailand, is that cooperation and progress is slow in an internet age of fiber optics. The strengths and weaknesses of cultures feels like it’s been on high-res display during the pandemic because while Thais…
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Continue reading →: A to Z Bookish QuestionsThanks Rebecca at Rust Belt Girl for this fun idea, who got it from other groovy bloggers. I hope you find the prompts as amusing and thought-provoking as I did. And please share your answers, too! Author You’ve Read the Most From: Probably Agatha Christie. I started reading her in…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: April 2021Whoa. April is almost over. The year is 2021, the coronavirus is still outwitting governments, and AI has juuust about taken over people’s abilities to think independently. What’s a girl to do? Well, you do what you’ve been doing ever since you were 13 and realized the world was going…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: March 2021A groovy month of beautiful books, my StoryGraph, and how to get out of your literary echo chamber. In January’s Reading Roundup, I shared StoryGraph, an alternative to Goodreads that puts your reading into these colorful and interesting graphs and charts. Now that the first quarter has passed, I thought…
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Continue reading →: 💻 What’s your work style? ✒️I used to work for a management company as an administrative assistant. There were a bunch of us, underlings, who were assigned to different managers (who were in charge of fancy condos and gated communities). I started off as a temp downstairs, but as often was the case, after head…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: February 2021Short month means short books! Ha! I read four books this month. Three were fairly short, under 300 pages while one was over. Two of the books I read with my teenage students, who are studying literature with me online, which means the other two were for my nighttime reading.…
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Continue reading →: 📚 Reading Roundup: January 2021Current status: reading obsessed! Since I enjoyed reading about other people’s reading lists from 2020, but reading challenges are a bit too much to commit to, I thought it would be fun to start a monthly reading roundup (let’s see how this goes). I’ve also signed up for The Story…
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Continue reading →: 🥦 What I eat as a vegan[or how to eat more fruits and veggies!] It’s actually pretty easy and fun, but I enjoy cooking, being creative, and learning new recipes. Trust me though, you can be a lazy vegan — oh, and I hardly eat salads. For some out-of-character reason, I recorded what I ate for…
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Continue reading →: ✨ New Year, New BeginningsAnyone else being forced to adapt and change during these times? Days before we closed 2020 and pulled out 2021, our apt manager announced that the pool and gym were closed due to a new wave of COVID. We howled over the lack of logic. Never mind the chances of…
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Continue reading →: 🎄 How to have better interactions this holiday seasonMy colleagues joked that we had to get all of our COVID conversations out of the way before our Christmas dinner due to an anti-vaxxer coworker. But I had already decided I didn’t want to talk about work, politics, or the virus. And after we said good-night to everybody, my…
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Continue reading →: 🇹🇭 Reflecting on a year of veganism (in Thailand)A year ago my partner and I decided to become vegan. We did it for health reasons even though neither of us have any obvious health problems. While I can’t speak for others, it’s been a positive change for us. We feel better, it’s good for the planet, and I…
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Continue reading →: The Changing Seasons – Nov 2020November was the month that technology and I battled it out. Not exactly to the death, but it came to blows. The fieriest dogfight was over my OS or operating system. When I bought my Aspire All-In-One, I thought this one looks good enough and it’s cheap. (It’s how I…
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Continue reading →: Icebreakers, awards, and the antidote to small talkMy friend Kathy’s husband HATES small talk. We all got a giggle out of it, but I did try to have more meaningful conversations with him during social gatherings. And recently, I read an essay by David Sedaris on a scathing conversation he had with a taxi driver because he…
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Continue reading →: 🎥 Film Fridays – The Social DilemmaThe Social Dilemma was not what I expected. Therefore, I put off watching it because I thought I knew what it was going to be about – how social media harvests and controls our populations. It is, however, much more. How do you wake up from the Matrix when you…
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Continue reading →: The Changing Seasons – Oct 2020One of the advantages of being disorganized is that one is always having surprising discoveries. ― A.A. Milne October was a month of discoveries. When we moved here about two years ago we were disappointed that transportation was challenging. In other words, there weren’t any Grab cars. But with the…
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Continue reading →: ✈️ What kind of traveler are you?“They’re saying you need your passport.” “Don’t you have a copy?” “Yeah, but they need your visa page.” “Why?” “Some stupid COVID thing.” I turned away from talking to the BF, back to the front desk clerk. “I promise you he hasn’t left the country in three years.” “Sorry, it’s…
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Continue reading →: 🎥 Film Fridays – Xanadu (1980)The combination of my partner playing ELO in the gym and reading The Seven Sisters series by Lucinda Riley made me think of one of my childhood favorites, Xanadu. Considered a truly awful movie by many, but a cult classic by Oliva Newton-John fans like me. While the soundtrack went…
Hello,
I’m Lani
Welcome to Life, the Universe, and Lani. I’ve been blogging about my experiences living abroad since 2009.
At this point, this site serves as an archive as I’m mostly active at No Girl is an Island 👉https://lanivcox.substack.com/ 🏝️where I have been both newslettering and continuing to craft personal essays on finding freedom in the fringes.
Thanks for stopping by, have a look around, and hope to see you over at No Girl is an Island.
Life, the Universe, and Lani 
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