Tag: God’s Green Earth

Drowning

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So last night I had to be in the bathroom long enough for a woman to dye her hair. I’m not saying I dyed my hair, I’m just saying I was in the bathroom that long. While I was in there, I removed mineral deposits from the shower head. Soak, scrape, soak, scrape.

After picking at white rock cakes with metal prongs for 45 minutes and then getting into the shower, something glorious happened. Large, soft caresses of water fell down upon me like rain drops. I could actually determine the water temperature because I wasn’t focused on the icy burn of a singe drop of water shooting out at a zillion miles per hour straight into my eye.

My rejoicing was short lived. For one thing, I don’t get nearly the exfoliating I had previously. Additionally, I relied on that bullet of water to blast out hair dye from under my fingernails. I mean, it sometimes happens when my friend asks me to color her hair and, oh, point is that sputtering drop magically removed grime from under my fingernails. Also, we lost the low flow feature of the crusty shower head and my hands pruned up. All that work to make something great just back fired.

That’s how my karma works out at the moment. As with last night’s shower, I had early indications today that my labor may bear bitter fruit. After a series of frustrated errands, tasks, and obligations, I found myself this morning in a public restroom. The automatic flushing toilet provided me with an unwelcome bidet experience as I reached for toilet paper.

I quit.

No Waste Day Wasted

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I started out No Waste Day with the best of intentions. I put my coffee in a jar and the jar in a sock. My son’s soccer water was also in a jar. My daughter drank her soccer water out of her expensive and cute SIGG thing. But that’s not really “no waste” as we always drink out of thermosesesi and to go mugs and such. The sock had a wintery theme to bring cheer to the dreary 70 degree temps Tucsonans are forced to face.
Post-soccer we went to lunch and partook in much waste, but the girl collected leaves for later use in a front window Fall display. I tied the leftover food and harvested leaves to the top of the minivan along with the kids since the interior of the minivan can only hold so much junk.

Upon arriving home, I cleaned out my minivan. H.O.L.Y. C.R.A.P. I pretty much had to cart No Waste Day to the curb with the trash at that point because there was such a paper blizzard I considered shipping it to Aspen to improve skiing conditions. Then, I collected all the food from the floor and sent it to Pilgrims Pride to compliment their reduced lunch for kids program.

Afterward, I did a bunch of laundry, but only hung one load to dry. A girl likes soft skivvies, you know. Blah blah blah worked for pay, which may never get done. Then packaging for dinner was unwrapped and trashed. Oh, hey, I have a solar oven on loan that cooks potatoes like silk.
So, today was Best of Intentions, Recycle, Trash, Use, and Think of How I Once Did Something Good for the Planet Day.

“Recycling is Bullshit” – Hey, Oh!


I’ve not been visiting TreeHugger as much as I used to. I don’t know. Do I think I know it all? Do I think I’ve evolved? It seemed like I had already internalized most of what I could do. My energy use is relatively small – relative to other Americans. I use gray water for the backyard landscape. I eat locally and not much meat. I carry around my own coffee mug. Plus, it’s not like I’m going to mount solar panels on a rental or participate in a greenwash by buying new goo-gaws. Even I have a bottom line.

Recycling is Bullshit is the blog that brought me back. I do still have much to learn. I remember that it was quite exciting to return bottles of Coke for quarters when I was a child. Not too many bottles could keep my brother and I in Ms. PacMan/Space Invaders/Centipede for quite some time or fund our sugar fix. That joy was stolen from my children by big corporations and their Indian-tear inducing trashy bottles? YIKES! Who knew? And for years I participated. Man, I love radicals. Thanks Lloyd! You scare me and make me feel like a loser, but YAY you!

So, anywayz, I don’t guess I’ll be able to change much about our recycling output in the short term. I’ll still have to participate in the wasteful society, but on November 15th I’ll also participate in NO WASTE DAY. I can’t find any official shadow movement other than TreeHugger’s, but I’m going to do it anyway. Care to join me?

Ballengers Biking

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Now and again, between soccer practices and music lessons, we’ll take to the streets to revel in the freedom of two wheels and no particular place to go.

(Production Note: 1) Grrr! I tried saving this in a zillion formats. Quicktime was the only one that actually displayed the movie. 2) I had an aged film effect going, but what were static-y, scratched images at first became simple, elegant black screens. No cute hubster and children biking. My intent in attempting aged film was to pretend that this ride was filmed long ago – before little girls on their bikes were made to wear helmets. Clearly, I need more experience with the iMovies. And I need to remember helmets for BOTH the kids.)

Know Your Farmer

Oh, okay. Well, does this AP story bother anyone else? Makes you want to know your farmer. If you think you might like, you can read the FDA draft and then make public comments for the next couple of months.

And as a refresher, you can read labels on your produce too to see if you are consuming genetically engineered food.

Just so you know how this came to my brain, I was reading Nature Moms Blog and this item was mentioned in one of the comments. I followed the story to get to an “unbiased” news source.

Can’t Win For Losing

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Oh, how my head aches as I write this.

I had big plans for the day, but they were sidelined for multiple “right now” needs. I decided to go with it. Besides the only thing I MUST do today has been stalled by YELLOW HIGHLIGHTER. Point is, I found myself at the grocery store because the cupboard was bare and I happened to be driving past. I needed gasoline too.

So I do my grocery shopping child-free. That NEVER happens. It was nice. I bought less junk and didn’t have to say “no” a single time. I am a bring-my-own-bags gal and for the first time ever they noticed that one was insulated and put all my cold stuff in it (it’s still hot in the desert). I didn’t even have to repack. YAY, lady sacker! The guy after me had a single jar of salsa. The sacker asked if he wanted a bag. “Yes,” he replied, “double it.” Asswipe. I had four bags, he should have quadrupled it. Such inspiration am I.

Then I went to get my gasoline. The tanks were being filled and I know that I don’t want all that stirred up crap in my tank. I also know that the light is on in the van signaling I have no gas and if I don’t use my coupon, it will expire. So I fill up. I fill up so much that I just pour it all over the ground. The little automatic lever, which I put on the first divit for a slow fill, didn’t click off. Gas on the ground, gas on the car, gas on my shoe.

Anyway, I’m an ecological disaster with a headache.

School Houses Rock!

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Get past the Border Patrol Ad, okay?

This was my son’s teacher last year! This was her! Teachers are so way cool. Molly is so way cool. Molly can teach AND double dutch. And guess what, she’s going to have a community garden WITH CHICKENS at the school. I miss Molly.

I’ve been concerned about my son’s teacher this year. She’s more traditional and worksheet oriented. As it turns out, she is also empathetic and her students like her. She also lets us parents come in and knock around whenever we want. She’s letting me teach the students about current events. This week the 3rd graders READ THE CONSTITUTION as it pertains to the presidency. Can you imagine? All that language? But they did it and they know what qualifies a candidate for the presidency and what the duties are. Of course they were mostly interested in the part about forgiving their buddies and throwing parties for foreign dignitaries. Toward the end of the lesson, we touched on the electoral collage (S + R = E, did you know that? The presidency is not just a history/civics thang, it’s also math/geography). Next week are going to go into campaigns and eventually we will look at the current candidates. I’ll keep you posted, because I’m sure you are on the edge of your seats to know what the kids are saying.

On Friday, another parent is coming in with her bassoon to help the kids with their sound studies. Yet another parent has made tons of homemade playdough to help the students better conceptualize city, state, country, etc. And yet another parent is bringing in tons of related texts and may start an art project. So, it’s still cool this year, though it’s hard to top Molly. I wish every child could experience a classroom where the teacher and a large number of parents frequently indulge in active learning and engaging children.

One thing I should learn is how to post a video that doesn’t immediately start playing every time the website opens. Sorry about that. I hope next time you visit, you won’t mind hitting the pause button.

Smörgåsbord

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Smörgåsbord my style isn’t exactly Swedish or buffetish, but I like the word anyway. Those Sweds just use cool words. I’m attempting a more enriching daily kitchen experience through the preparation of one inspired foodstuff creation each day. Sadly, today’s effort fizzled with an applebutter sandwich. I should have recognized my own culinary incompetence, but I have had some successes.

George and I made the muffin recipe again only we used organic blueberries and lemon juice instead of chocolate chips and vanilla. Next time, I would set my blueberries in sugar like my great aunt. In fact, I really need to get that recipe. The muffins were drier than I would have liked. Also, I tried to save them for a potluck lunch, but in just two short days a swamper/plastic bag combo set them to mold. Not exactly inspired, but attempted.

Starting 15 or so years ago, it became impossible for me to think of summer without thinking of tabbouleh (tabouli?). The tomatoes and cucumbers are just too good to be true in the summer and the two in any combo makes my stomach go mad with anticipation. I tried a new recipe and it worked. Only I didn’t stick to the recipe. This is something like a cup of bulgar, a cup and a half of boiling water, some olive oil, and some lemon juice sitting for an hour. I added salt at this point. Also, I used table salt instead of kosher salt. It was too salty. Once the bulgar soaked up all the juicy goodness, I added tomatoes, flat leaf parsley, spring onions (or whatever you call them), cucumbers, and dry mint. I didn’t like the tabouli at this point, so I put in lots more lemon juice and more onion. It worked and was eagerly received at a potluck lunch. Is potluck the new fondue?

Olive oil has been central to my attempts in the kitchen. My girlfriend Anna brought some to me from her husband’s folks in California. I used it to make my favorite garlicky mustard vinaigrette. I stole this recipe from my friends the Cojeens. If you are ever in Oklahoma and in need of archaeology, guitars, or salad dressing, they are your peeps. I don’t know that it would be appropriate for me to publish their recipe, but to give you an idea of why I like it so much, this small half jar took eight cloves of garlic. Luckily, we had just been to a garlic and onion festival at Agua Linda Farm.

I put up some blackeye peas in the freezer some time back. I needed to cook them up. Nothing fancy here. Peas, water, bacon grease (I didn’t want to wait for hamhock to thaw), and after 45 minutes, salt. Now we are full circle because this food reminds me of my mother and her family. It goes super yummy with my great aunt’s tomatoes and cornbread.

After all this eating, I need to jump on a stationary bike at the kids’ school to exercise and generate electricity.

Parrish’s former teacher got a sentence write-up in today’s paper:

● $994.74 to help second-graders at Borton Primary Magnet School see energy being produced by pedaling a stationary bicycle linked to a generator.

Read the full article here.