A guest post from Bob, on-call photographer & wheelbarrow operator.
Results from this morning’s poll.
Working hard?
Or hardly working?
Well, shit. Let’s analyze that.
The results are in.
(Jacques, I shoveled shit today. What did you do?)
Tag: poo
Freshly Mopped
The Senior Warden and I recently marveled at how predictable our behavior can be. For example, both she and I rearrange the furniture when we are looking for new perspectives or needing to reunite ourselves with our under-the-couch pets. I also like to clean my house prior to embarking on a journey. That’s a metaphor, you know, and it’s related to the moving of furniture and my struggle for perspective because the dust bunnies can be damned. Unfortunately, my brain isn’t working that way right now.
The way my brain is working right now is that you can go on an actual vacation that leaves you feeling slimed – gooey, not skinny, because that would be “slimmed” and I just don’t care that spell check prefers not to recognize my noun verb; though you might feel slimmed, an adjective verb, if you are surrounded by of the sort of people who starve you. In either case, those are usually called home visits. Did I mention I’m going home? Well, I am and when I return, I want clean floors. I spent an hour in the kitchen on my hands and knees, first with a scrub brush (’cause it’s a hard knock life) then with a rinse mop.
Saltillo tiles really look dirty, I mean hide the dirt don’t they? Upon completion of the kitchen tiles, I did the same in the dining room (they’re going to shine like the top of the Chrysler building!). Hello, kitty.
Shut up! Those are the after photos. The kitten isn’t circling her own poo, that’s the original concrete stain showing through the peeling concrete paint. So… uhm… the moral of the story is you can shower as much as you want, some of the dirt just ain’t never going to wash away.
Todd-o’s Time in Tucson
Todd-o caught Valley Fever. His BFFs got it too; one got it twice.
His bike was stolen. The bike he found and repaired was reclaimed.
His BFF was beaten unconscious and left for dead (but totally recovered with little more than a few rugged, handsome scars as a reminder).
While running Thanksgiving errands, some thug shot Todd-o. He got a ride to the hospital and his car impounded.
He cleaned dog poo in my yard for a full year.
A ceiling caved in on his bed.
In an unrelated event, his home was struck by lightening splitting the wall and damaging his electronics.
He lived next to a Mariah Carey fan with a sleep disorder.
Am I forgetting something? Most probably, since we suspect some one of siphoning gas from his auto. Lots of exciting stuff happens to Todd-o. For example,
today,
a f- f- Friday,
he woke up to find his car stolen.
None of this ever happened to him in Oklahoma. But it’s totally okay. We took him to lunch for wings hotter than Brad Pitt.
All Well and Good
Speaking of jejune, I totally forgot the truest jejuney thing ever! I couldn’t stop picking at the imperfection. Turns out it wasn’t a birthmark, nor was it even a pimple. Nay, it flaked off rather easily reminding me of the importance of exfoliating. The routine sloughing off of dead cells is an important part of the revitalization process.
Shrugging off or heading off this invented drama helps me appreciate the hilarity of the kids who allow me to be a member of their learning community. It ain’t always easy and they frequently frustrate the bejesus out of me, but rare is the interaction that leaves me void of synaptic stimulation. Yesterday four kids and I planted tomatoes. Badly, I might add. The kids made a connection between the tomato plant and the mesquite tree. Both flower then fruit/seed. The seeds die, are eaten, or are harvested to grow another plant. They are studying cycles, so when they recognize a cycle – fireworks.
That is all well and good, but expected. The students accompany me into the garden or the bird sanctuary expressly to learn something. The fantastic part is their language. At one point a kid asked, “Can I put the worm poop in my hole?” “Not yet,” I said. “Okay. Is it time to tickle my bottom?” Right? Because everyone knows that you loosen entangled roots before planting and save the compost to sprinkle on top.
*******
My friend, the Caddo Artist, has a nascent blog focusing mostly on how she’s trying to quit smoking. You can do it! Today she offered up her experience volunteering for her youngest’s field trip to the zoo while jonesing. In part, she writes, “Isiah ate a rollypolly. He threw up in a trash can, and it gagged the other boys.”
Not Selling Girl Scout Cookies Online
Let me start off by saying we are not selling Girl Scout Cookies on-line. No, we are not. We are not because that is clearly against the rules. GSUSA prohibits internet sales of Girl Scout Cookies. This includes on-line auctions, broadcast e-mail messages, and/or council Web sites. Got that? Are we clear? Let’s face it, even if it were allowed, we’d never get to the post office to mail your order to you.
Now that we have covered how we are not selling GSCs on-line, I’d like to point out that many of you who adore the 6 YO girl and do live in Tucson may need of a source for GSCs. Consider contacting her since her personal sales goal is 185 boxes, approximately 1/4th of the goal for her entire troop. Think big baby girl!
GSCs claim no trans fats, but they do have partially hydrogenated oils in them anyway. Perhaps that would be inappropriate ingesta for you, but you would still like to help a sista out. Our church, Grace St. Paul’s, has a food ministry called Joseph’s Pantry. It is an agency of the Tucson Community Food Bank and Association of Arizona Food Banks. George and a Daisy GS sister of hers are taking donations of boxes of cookies to the pantry for their “Gift of Caring”. You could also talk to her about how to donate cookies toward that project.
Yes, I did just return from a GS meeting. At that meeting I picked up two uniforms in need of patch sewing. Some of you may know that in the process of sewing the 6YOs uni, a needle broke and flew at my face so quickly I heard a tiny sonic boom. OUCH! Sewing? Cookie sales? What the? And if you remember correctly I joined the PTO at my son’s school for a t-shirt discount. I drive, and love, a minivan with easy listening on the radio. I’m forcing my kids to eat carrots to help them poo. Fundamental shifts have occurred in my whoaminess. Where are my old lady jeans and hair scrunchies?
New Year’s Kiss Off!
You see that? THAT is how I feel about the new year thus far. It’s only puke, cleaning up puke, and being flipped off at the In-N-Out on New Year’s Eve. Okay, that latter part is actually quite funny, don’t you think? The hubster is HILARIOUS.
I spent forever on an end of the year photo retrospective. It was going to be awesome and you would have loved it. Sadly, I never saved the project and it was gone in a flash. So, too bad for all of you ’cause it would have been the bome (inside joke – too bad for you again)!
Did I mention the puke? As in clean it up with a dustpan volumes of puke. Puke from every member of the family except the person who had to clean it all up – me. Puke in the minivan, which requires 24/7 open windows. Puke on the carpet, which has had to be shampooed twice in the last two days. Puke that you slip on when you hit the concrete floors. Puke. That reminds me, I’m not feeling so well.
Speaking of bodily functions, I visited Milk Breath today. She posts about Google Analytics and requests key word search information from other bloggers. Overwhelmingly, poop brings people here. My most viewed page is the chocolate chip cookie post. It would be easier to just look at the bag of chips for the recipe. In any event, I hope poop searches have nothing to do with my cookies.
That cookie post is about accepting imperfections. Having recently returned home from home, I am reaquainted with all my imperfections past and present. If I cared about continuity in writing, I’d say it makes me feel “pukey”, but really it feels like shame. Shame, shame, everyone knows your name. I wondered about this today with a friend. I’ve done a thing or two that I can’t be proud of, but overall I’ve worked hard to be honorable. WHY do I have to feel shame and why is the shame illusive and not tied into a particular event? My friend said it’s because people have a fixed frame of reference. It’s the you 20 years ago that they can’t let go because it’s familiar. That past you was still trying to figure out how to be and they don’t know the current you. Perhaps, but that’s their problem. Why do I have to feel the shame?
Two days into the new year and here I am. Spinning wheels, puked on, poop reputed, and shamed. Pluck you 2009! I’m resolving to outlast all 365 damn days of you.
A Bird Pooped on My Head
This is regurgitated from my old blog, which has privacy settings as I still like to be saucy and only care for my good buddies to know it. For this reason, the repost is somewhat edited – okay a lot edited. I hope it still makes sense. I wanted to post it because I ran across a blog that is freakishly familiar. Of course I could change my standard template, but that requires free brain cells. And anyway, what’s really similar is the random musings of mothers. Her recent post is about PTA power trips, but my immediate connection is about bird poo.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Although Jesse and I are both unemployed, we managed to swing a new Mac Book and a shiny red Jeep. After using my new Mac Book to finish a laborious proposal to fund the position I wish I had and then jumping in the shiny red Jeep with my recently heroed husband, a bird pooped on my head. And here I go again with my fantasy/reality struggle.
In the fantasy, a bird poops on your head and it’s good luck. The reality is that you have to wash your recently “done” do. What’s lucky about that? The fantasy of the shiny red Jeep with the top down is pretty much busted at that point too. The promise of employment and a flashy computer fade into oblivion once a bird poops on your head.
Not long ago, Jesse and I witnessed a maintenance wife in her shiny black Cadillac Escalade. On every level, a well-coiffed, well-appointed trophy wife is the ultimate fantasy for both men and women. The reality is that she was driving with Playtex gloves on to protect her manicure from the inky residue of the papers she was flinging out the window of that shiny black Cadillac Escalade.
What a cruel joke. God gives us everything we ask for and then we ask for more. “Ask, and it shall be given you… For every one that asketh receiveth… Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent?” (Matthew 7:7ish if I must proof text). In His infinite wisdom, He embeds karmic contingencies for which we did not plan.
I get it. I’m a parent. I want to indulge my children. Even so, sometimes my kids insist they can go to school without a coat and I comply only for them to realize that the tank-top/sandal option isn’t all that comfortable when it’s cold outside. I allow them to find out for themselves that a moment of sunscreen in the eye is preferable to a blistering burn. Then comes their next ask; “Why didn’t you bring my jacket? Will you please go get it? Can you tell the teacher to let me stay inside at lunch?” But, come on. Humans are fallible. Everyone knows that. Why did Jesus command me to ask when he knew how tricky his dad is?
A reminder:
Jesse had just returned from a 14 month deployment in Iraq. That’s how he was my recently heroed husband. Also, don’t be scared by my God talk. I don’t think I do it all that much and I’m certainly not out to convert anyone. I’m Episcopalian, for the love of God!
And now an update:
Jesse and I are no longer sponging off savings and manage productive, tax-paying lives. In fact, we weren’t really unemployed then, but “under”employed. So, don’t start sending the checks. Though if you are so inclined, I still haven’t funded my position yet.
Happy Birthday to Me!
For some reason I dressed all in shades of brown with black and white highlights today. I likely look like a monkey, but as my big bro points out, I don’t have to smell like one too. I could shower. But I didn’t, because it’s my birthday and I didn’t want to. Happy birthday to me, I live in a zoo, I look like a monkey, and I smell like one too. Oh, wouldn’t it be awful if I smelled like “one/TWO”? Eegads! Then again, I’d fit in at the park where I cruse the homeless cliques in my never ending search for a good source of TB.
I also didn’t want to drive the kids to school so the hubster did it. I stayed in my jammies until 9:30 in the a. to the m. Then I bought myself a full-fat iced mocha from a local joint who gave me a 15% discount on account of how awesome I am (and how I rocked my Catcard). Heck, for all I know the coffee wasn’t even Fair Trade and it came in a one-time use (but recyclable) plastic cup that didn’t even drip on my shirt. Afterward, I went to my son’s school on the premise that I would train to volunteer in the library. I was really only going to hang out with Anna who was casual cool in a Japanese coy T. We went to lunch.
Food was a big part of my big dia. I got some backyard tomaters from Molly and popsicles for FOUR kids plus myself from Kathy and hung out with Cassandra and Yvonne. Then Todd-o and Jesse took me and the ankle biters out for dinner. YUM-O and no dishes bitches! Please excuse my tone. I think my husband’s near beer has gone to my head. Luckily, he limited himself at one. That was his joke, btw. He’s hilarious.
Even the chickens helped me celebrate. They each gave me a perfectly shaped and colored egg. Thoughtfully, Flower treated me to an egg from the nest and not one randomly left in cacti or the coop floor. Jesse’s aunt sent me a pewter photo frame and of course my grandmother sent me a check for $25. Kari sent me a cardi and so did the dentist and a restaurant. My dad wished me happy birthday on his blog and my mother sent me a “card is in the mail” e-mail. I live a fat life!
Finally, because it’s my birthday, I’m not going to bother with “visual interest” on my blog. Now it’s time to leave you now (right bro?).
Uses for Poo
The following is a list of uses for cow poo:
* Skeet shooting
* Fuel for cooking
* Heating greenhouses (Apparently cow poo is hot! Someone should tell Paris.)
* Mushroom cultivation (It’s my understanding, though, that mushrooms aren’t easily cultivated. It’s a fascinating niche of produce harvesting).
* Bio-gas
* AND FLOORING!
With a grant of just $5k, researchers at Michigan State created flooring made from the solid fiber in cow manure. The fiber would replace the sawdust currently used. Sad for sawdust, but good for the poo. It doesn’t stink, it doesn’t gush between your toes, and it’s equally lovely as cork flooring. Here’s a pic.
Such a much better idea than letting it fester in shit ponds and sink into aquifers.
We nurse at the teat, we feast at the shoulder, we sashay under the skin, and we live by the anus of our bovine buddies. I just read that we need less than one serving of red meat per week, but it didn’t mention RDA for dairy, leather, or bestiality. (My dad has a horrifyingly funny story about a pal who had a cow flop in his lowered pants.) Could anything be more blessed than a bovine?
Here’s the science-y part, you geeks. (From the Associated Press) Under pressure from regulators and the public, more large livestock operations are installing expensive manure treatment systems known as anaerobic digesters. The digesters use heat to deodorize and sterilize manure, while capturing and using the methane gas it produces to generate electricity. The systems also separate phosphorus-laden liquid fertilizer from semisolid plant residue. The solids have some known uses, including animal bedding and potting soil.
Scientists at Michigan State in East Lansing and at the USDA’s Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wis., are conducting tests on various types of fiberboard made with the “digester solids.” As with the wood-based original, the manure-based product is made by combining fibers with a chemical resin, then subjecting the mixture to heat and pressure. So far, fiberboard made with digester solids seems to match or beat the quality of wood-based products.
Okay, but how about we get rid of the chemical resins to be way greener? Has anyone told Ed Begley, Jr. about this?
Aside: I was flapping my yaps to a gal pal about how cool it would be to live off the grid. She said, “Oh, I know a lot of people like that. They are called Africans.” LOL. Okay, out of context, that is HORRID. She works in an orphanage in Zambia and really does know people who live off the grid. She was pointing out how frivolous my thought process is and it was FUN-nay. It occurs to me that some people live in cow poo houses that never underwent a sterilization process.
Here’s something to think about, should people who live in poo houses throw stones?