It’s a new month and a new moon. Mercury is no longer in retrograde so I’m not sure what to blame my problems on anymore, but work started today and very soon it is November again.

I am semi-OK with returning to my routines (not saying anything about work), which always get inordinately messed up during a vacation. This summer I completed an interesting reading project, more of which later, as it deserves its own post (I did the complete works of Lorrie Moore, literally on a whim, but very glad I did).

I also started an early morning pilates-habit, which I’m still keeping up. Life in a Cold Climate wrote a recent post about the benefits (and in our case the sheer necessity) of pre-office workouts in the morning. I had moments of self-flagellation about the expensiveness of private classes, but did a spot of reflection, and came to the conclusion that my actually attending these classes is money much better spent than the countless gym memberships, exercise classes (includes tap, step aerobic (I’m very old), Zumba, aquabic, barre, Latin dancing, you name it) I paid for but rarely attended over the past decades.

I used stew in my office starting, at lunchtime, thinking of the approaching evening class and figuring out excuses for not having to sweat with people I don’t know. As if by miracle, something would always come up. Waking up earlier than absolutely necessary is a bitch, but the momentary feeling of omnipotence following a morning class – priceless. Not having to tell several people how I am doing at 7:30a.m. and then having to remember to wish them all a nice day afterwards are definite bonuses of exercising solo.

Otherwise I have been drooling over Bottega Veneta leather goods (shoes and handbags) that have been populating my instagram feed for some time now. The Pouch is spectacular, as are their sandals. Somehow the rather stuffy label has managed to totally get its groove on this season, dare I say filling a teeny bit the void Phoebe Philo left as she departed from Céline?

The woven, blood-red version of the Pouch is a classic made iconic by Lauren Hutton in the seventies film American Gigolo, in which she famously paired it with a trench coat. Hutton modelled the bag in 2017 when Bottega Veneta was celebrating their 50th anniversary. It seems that their brand revamp got a kickstart then.

One of the surprises of the summer was that Vanity Fair included an EU-bubble -related novel in their Best Books of 2019 So Far –list. This is surprising on many levels: Robert Menasse’s The Capital is a workplace comedy with a bit of murder mystery thrown in, which rarely catches my interest. But the books really is mainly about very meticulously described intrigues from the Brussels bubble. I’m yet to finish the entire novel, and I frankly thought it would only really be enjoyed by people who are familiar with the insider geekery of the EU-institutions.

While I know to appreciate the office politics of the EU-Commission corridors (admittedly an acquired taste), I never would have thought there’s an audience outside Brussels for that. Ever. Especially not in literature. The Capital won the German Book Prize last year and has been translated to several languages.

I did read other (more) interesting stuff as well, and as promised, will revert. Now, enjoy the start of a new season. Spiced pumpkin lattes are a breath away.