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An exciting Sunday for Aparna Nancherla is a Sunday without much excitement. \u201cMy cortisol runs high without anything happening, so I\u2019m trying to get it down,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
Eliminating stress was part of the reason the comedian moved back to Los Angeles in 2023, after over a decade in New York City, where she wrote for \u201cLate Night With Seth Meyers\u201d and \u201cTotally Biased With W. Kamau Bell,\u201d appeared in TV series like \u201cSearch Party\u201d and burnished her stand-up comedy career.<\/p>\n
In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m a little bit of a hermit, and just wanted some more trees and a little more space,\u201d Nancherla says.<\/p>\n Nancherla\u2019s book of essays, \u201cUnreliable Narrator: Me, Myself and Impostor Syndrome\u201d was also released in 2023. In it, she examined her emotionally fraught relationship with stand-up. After a break, she recently brought her understated approach back to the form and her new special, \u201cHopeful Potato,\u201d is available on the comedy streaming service Dropout starting Dec. 15.<\/p>\n She likes to spend her Sundays mostly engaging in familiar routines, though she\u2019ll pursue a little bit of discovery around town.<\/p>\n This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n 10 a.m.: Late riser<\/p>\n I would like to be someone who wakes up around 7 to 8 a.m., but I am waking up probably in the 9 to 10 a.m. vicinity. I would wake earlier, but I think in a past life I was a two-toed sloth or something because I\u2019m nocturnal and I move very slowly. It takes me a lot of time to ease into a different state of being \u2014 sleep to wake, wake to sleep. Pretty much any transition I\u2019m bad with.<\/p>\n Being a stand-up doesn\u2019t help. A lot of my job is oriented toward night, but even before comedy, something about the night called to me. It\u2019s not necessarily the healthiest behavior, but thus far I haven\u2019t been able to change my ways.<\/p>\n 10:15 a.m.: Morning rituals<\/p>\n I\u2019m someone who falls into doing rituals for a while, almost obsessively, until I replace them with different ones. Lately my ritual is as soon as I get up and brush my teeth and wash my face, I will put on a song and dance to it and do some stretching. I tend toward depression and anxiety, so dancing is an easy way to immediately get your endorphins and it doesn\u2019t feel like as much of a demand as going for a jog.<\/p>\n It\u2019s literally three minutes of a song and then I will try to meditate. My mom recommended doing 20 minutes of meditation, but I feel like 10 is where I\u2019m landing. My attention span is so bad lately that it really is just me closing my eyes and composing emails that I\u2019ll forget to send rather than attuning to some higher power.<\/p>\n 11 a.m.: Chasing waterfalls<\/p>\n I\u2019m lucky in that I live near three botanic gardens, so I really have my pick, but I got a membership to the Arboretum<\/a> because I like that they have peacocks.<\/p>\n They also have a giant waterfall. I\u2019m trying to form a walk where I will eventually end up there. They have a few really nice spots where you can chill out near the waterfall, so I\u2019m probably just sitting, maybe journaling, kind of enjoying the ambience.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t know if there\u2019s a word for someone who\u2019s in love with waterfalls, but I really like them. Apparently there is among [the cable channel] TLC\u2019s vast array of offerings, a program where people are in love with inanimate objects, like cars and bridges, and they want a romantic, sexual relationship with these things. I just want to say that that\u2019s not how I approach a waterfall, but I do deeply care for them as a friend.<\/p>\n 1 p.m.: Aspiring regular<\/p>\n I really like Lemon Poppy Kitchen<\/a> in Glassell Park. Every time I\u2019ve been there, I\u2019ve seen the same people, so I don\u2019t know how many times it takes for you to become a regular, but I guess I\u2019m an aspiring regular there. They have a scramble I really like. It\u2019s not too crazy, it\u2019s a Cali scramble. They also have some Eastern European-y things. They have some kind of polenta dish with eggs. It has a little bit of sauerkraut. I like what they\u2019re doing with their brunch direction.<\/p>\n 3 p.m.: Reading is fundamental<\/p>\n I\u2019m a big books person. There are so many independent bookstores I want to mention. I really like North Figueroa Bookshop<\/a> in Highland Park. They feature a bunch of independent presses.<\/p>\n I love Sierra Madre. It\u2019s such a walkable neighborhood. They have a bookstore called Fables and Fancies<\/a>. They have a tree inside \u2014 who doesn\u2019t like that?<\/p>\n There\u2019s also one called DYM Books & Boba<\/a> in North Pasadena. The owner, Desiree [Sayarath], is so sweet. It\u2019s not a huge bookshop, but they feature a lot of authors of color and queer authors. Then it\u2019s got a full coffee menu, and you can add boba to pretty much anything. They have gulab jamun-flavored matcha, which I have never seen anywhere else. Gulab jamun is this Indian dessert. It\u2019s like a rose water and cardamom flavor.<\/p>\n 4 p.m.: Gifts for the unknown<\/p>\n I would love to go to a craft fair. There\u2019s one in Pasadena called the Jackalope Art Fair<\/a> that\u2019s there periodically. I already buy things that I maybe don\u2019t need, but I do like a craft fair because you\u2019re making eye contact with the creator as you\u2019re buying their thing and it feels like you\u2019re getting extra dopamine from that.<\/p>\n The worst thing is that I\u2019m like, \u201cThis will be a great gift for someone later.\u201d I have bags of gifts for people, and I don\u2019t know who these people are, but someday they\u2019re going to be getting a bag of buttons.<\/p>\n 6 p.m.: Feeding schedule<\/p>\n At 6, I have to feed my cats. They\u2019re very strict about their mealtime. They eat at 6 and 6. My partner feeds them at 6 in the morning, but I feed them at 6 p.m.<\/p>\n They\u2019re sisters. They\u2019re 5 years old. They\u2019re pretty demanding in general. They\u2019re pretty vocal about what they want and when they need it.<\/p>\n 6:30 p.m.: Fitness to fight depression<\/p>\n Lately, I\u2019ve been doing a lot of workouts at home. I\u2019ll do a kickboxing thing or yoga Pilates. I tried to get into the gym and, I don\u2019t know, something about the gym environment really bums me out.<\/p>\n I\u2019m not like a Peloton girlie. I\u2019m joining some of your more avant-garde platforms. I don\u2019t think they think of themselves as avant-garde, but there\u2019s this platform of African dance called Kukuwa<\/a> these women in Africa started and I love their workouts. Then there\u2019s free stuff. There\u2019s Move With Nicole<\/a>, which is a Pilates account on YouTube that I do a lot. I\u2019m looking for your smaller businesses.<\/p>\n As I\u2019ve gotten older, my mental health has plummeted for various reasons. I feel like exercise is one of the only things that helps regulate it to some extent, which I hate saying because when you say you\u2019re depressed, people are like, \u201cJust go for a walk.\u201d And it\u2019s not like the walk cures depression, but it does help to get some vitamin D or just be like, \u201cOh yeah, I have these muscles, I should probably sometimes use them.\u201d<\/p>\n 7 p.m.: A new dish<\/p>\n I don\u2019t mind a dinner in, but I feel like given the chance, it\u2019s always nice to eat at the restaurant. I discovered this vegan place in Highland Park that does vegan sushi that\u2019s pretty new called Tane Vegan Izakaya<\/a>. I\u2019ve also been meaning to check out this vegetarian place in Echo Park called Men & Beasts<\/a> that I keep hearing about.<\/p>\n I like trying a new place, but then once it works for me, I\u2019m probably hitting that up a bunch of times. If a restaurant clicks where the food is great, the service is great, the atmosphere is great, then I\u2019m happy to support them as much as possible.<\/p>\n 9 p.m.: Puttering toward bed (eventually) <\/p>\n I\u2019ll come home and watch something. I\u2019m trying to scroll less on my phone, so maybe I\u2019ll watch \u201cThe Great British Bake Off\u201d or something that\u2019s not too taxing on the brain.<\/p>\n I usually make myself a big cup of ginger tea at night because my stomach has been more temperamental as I\u2019ve gotten older, but what usually happens is I make the big cup of tea and then I forget about it, and it kind of watches me while I scroll on my phone.<\/p>\n Every day, I want to be in bed by 12:30, and then it ends up being 2 a.m. and I cannot account for how that happened. I think I\u2019m just a serial putterer, in that I putter around and I don\u2019t know what I\u2019m doing a lot of the time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An exciting Sunday for Aparna Nancherla is a Sunday without much excitement. \u201cMy cortisol runs high without anything…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":91802,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[50692,1472,7281,50695,24714,48,52,51,50694,479,47,50,49,1741,4284,50696,224,592,4610,315,50693],"class_list":["post-91801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-aparna-nancherla","tag-dance","tag-depression","tag-exciting-sunday","tag-gift","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-late-night","tag-little-bit","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-lot","tag-love","tag-north-pasadena","tag-p-m","tag-people","tag-thing","tag-time","tag-waterfall"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91801","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91801"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91801\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91802"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91801"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91801"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91801"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} <\/a> <\/p>\n
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