Category: Everything Else

First and foremost:

Please, please tell the Bush Administration to leave the damn wolves alone already. This request comes directly from my son Maverick the wolf boy. It’s a vicious cycle: wolf numbers get low, they gain protection, numbers increase, protection is lifted, the strongest and best are most hunted. At the same time we encroach on their habitat. We are killing this species.

Learn more about wolves here.

Comments from the public accepted here.

Now they are saying #5 plastics are maybe not as safe as they had once thought. Wonderful.

I had tried to stay away from these anyway, as they aren’t recycled in my area, but Maverick’s Laptop Lunch is definitely #5, and probably all of our sturdy Tupperware as well.

But, sending the kids lunch in glass containers? That feels like looking for trouble…

Hey, remember how badly I wanted to make my own Muppet? Turns out I can design a Muppet online and have it delivered!

Ohhhhh….the temptation…..

They say you can’t judge a book by its cover. ( Well, via Design Crush, maybe you can.)

I do believe in judging books by their titles, and I Was Told There’d Be Cake was almost as awesome a read as the title promised. If you came of age in the 90s, get thee to a library.

I like this idea: Why Not Ask Bill Gates to be Secretary of Education?

Equally pleasing: Obama daughters: Role Models for Girls Fashion. Cassidy is four and fashion-conscious, and I would love to see girls’ clothing trend towards tasteful and age-appropriate.

I am finally nearing the end of my Planet dishwashing powder (hurray!) and thinking about what to try next. Treehugger says this one works as well as Cascade. Excitement!

I’ve mentioned before my recent foray into the world of Facebook, so I totally identify with How Facebook Status Updates are Ruining Your Post- Election Social Life (thank you Kristin for sending me the link). Anyone else sympathize?

Another article today about rising SPAM sales. A particularly horrifying quote:

Invented during the Great Depression by Jay Hormel, the son of the company’s founder, Spam is a combination of ham, pork, sugar, salt, water, potato starch and a “hint” of sodium nitrate “to help Spam keep its gorgeous pink color,” according to Hormel’s Web site for the product.

Because it is vacuum-sealed in a can and does not require refrigeration, Spam can last for years. Hormel says “it’s like meat with a pause button.”

People, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Spam is not the answer. Pass it on.

I love lists: 100 Essential Life Lessons from Marelisa @ The Abundance Blog.

And I very much liked Small Notebook’s post on Simplifying and Stewardship.

Finally, today is America Recycles Day, which feels like another of those nonsensical, redundant days like Earth Day, Mother’s Day, and Take a Child Outside Day (shouldn’t we be caring about these things on all days?).

I think too much emphasis is put on recycling as opposed to reduce and reuse, but it’s a good “gateway to green”. So go ahead and take the pledge and let’s get everyone through that gate, shall we?

And you? Read anything good lately?

Conversation about the weather
is the last refuge of the unimaginative.

-Oscar Wilde

Yes, I get what Oscar is trying to say here, but this weather is really very strange.

I woke up this morning and the windows were all steamed up and foggy, like those of an old Caddy on Lover’s Lane.

I went outside and it was like walking through a cloud. All my photographs looked as though I was shooting through gauze.

That’s because my lens was all fogged up. I wiped it clean and things went better.

If you go to the Baltimore Aquarium, you can ride an escalator up to the glass-enclosed roof, which houses a tropical “rainforest”. Birds and monkeys swirl and chatter above you in a thick canopy of green. It is supposed to be interactive and awe-inspiring and fun, but in reality it is hot and humid and oppressive and crowded and noisy and you just want to get out of there.

It is similar to this outside (may be a side effect of just having watched Cloverfield). It is 70 crazy humid degrees out of doors today, the air is thick, it is super windy; the leaves whirl all around overhead.

I have never been in the eye of a storm, but I think it must be like this: windy, with a strange light filtering through multiple layers of cloud, an overwhelming sense of waiting for the other shoe to drop. A house at the end of the world.

The ground underneath is totally saturated; thick and spongy and sucking hungrily at your feet as you walk. It’s not a nice feeling.

But wait! What is this?

I think… I think it’s the sun trying to break through. I’m not sure. It’s been so long.

Oh, my gosh. Would you look at that. Blue skies.

And large masses of turkey vultures, surfing the air.

I counted nine. I went back inside. I do not like the turkey vultures.

UGH. I guess the break in the rain combined with the warm means I have to help with the leaves. But I’m so damned happy about seeing the sun I don’t even care. I’ll take what I can get.

I leave you with music. FYI, this was the first record I ever owned, and remains to this day an anthem of my childhood.

Anyone else experiencing freaky weather today?
And out of curiosity, what was the first album you ever owned? (My first tape: Bob Dylan, Blood on the Tracks; my first CD, The Cranberries. Feel free to mock me.)

There are as many nights as days,
and the one is just as long as the other
in the year’s course.

Even a happy life cannot be
without a measure of darkness,
and the word “happy” would lose its meaning
if it were not balanced by sadness.

It is far better to take things as they come along
with patience and equanimity.

-Dr Carl Jung

Rain.

I grow weary of the rain.
In particular, this chilly, windy rain,
making each trip to my car a physical comedy, ice skating in well-oiled banana peels.
The wet leaves are treacherous.

I don’t actually think I have Seasonal Affective Disorder. FYI. At least, I hope not.

I think that the change in weather encourages some primal need for hibernation, and that I’m doing my body an incredible disservice by wresting it from its warm cocoon of blankets and forcing it to perform menial tasks: the making of lunches, the doing of dishes, the taking of pictures, the brushing of teeth.

It’s unnatural. All I want is to burrow back in. It’s like some sort of obsessive fantasy. Soon I will get back in bed….

I baked a lot today, creating warmth and comfort while being productive and remaining in an upright position. Cookies and bread.

As you can see I cheated on my daily nature photos, taking them from the kitchen window… didn’t even open it, not wanting to invite in the bluster and the chill…

We will pretend they are intentional and artsy.
I look at them and I think, I’m melting, I’m melllllting……

On the other hand, I am beginning to look forward to the holiday season.
Time, perhaps, to come out of hibernation.