We're All Mad Here » 2008

08-07-08

Holy Sh*t! I crashed my blog !!!!!1!one

…I puke a little there. And my heart stopped. But no worries. It just stopped talking to SQL. Apparently SQL stole PHP’s boyfriend or Hannah Montana shirt or something and now they aren’t friends.

So if you came by last night and it was down (hint, hint Mr Google Search Bot)…that’s why.

08-05-08

From Bad, to Worse.

I just got off the phone with my mom checking on my grandmother’s doctor’s appointment. She was diagnosed with Leukemia. My grandmother’s dying and I can’t stop crying. I never wanted to have my family with me more than right now. I need large drinks.

08-04-08

On the Road

Imoms

Leaving in a few hours for the Imoms conference in Knoxville. I hate flying. In theory the hotel has internets. If not I’ll be MIA until Saturday. I’ll try to keep twitter updates coming.

08-04-08

Reusable Grocery Bags and “My Cold, Dead Hands”

Plastic Bags with...Plastic Bags inside.hm part2
Plastic Bags with…Plastic Bags inside.hm part2 by scottwyden

I was going through the list of bloggers who will be at this years BlogOrlando Conference in September and came across Lorrie Delk Waker’s Banning Plastic Bags Article. Amused by the way people are associating (scapegoating) plastic grocery bags with civil rights, I gave my two cents which I’ll give here (it’s more like 20 cents…a bit long and warranted a blog entry more so than a comment.) Read the comments on the original post above including:

I would have to disagree with the ban on plastic bags. I understand your points, and I agree with your anecdotes as sort of egregious examples of waste, but I personally feel the government has absolutely no business telling me what kind of *grocery bag* I can use.

The old standby (paper) has always been there, and many stores are offering the new, reusable bags, and that is about as far as you can go without crossing the line. You can educate, you can offer, but God help you if you force. ~C. Rhode

“I don’t want the government telling me…” seriously? How many areas in your life, big areas does the government influence you in what you should and should not do? You seriously need to be kidding me if you are going to overlook those and get spiffed on a bag. Pick your four favorite months of the year…those four months you work your wages go straight to them, and that doesn’t make you a bit angry?

I mean, god forbid you be inconvenienced a few minutes each shopping trip to grab your own bags. And you can find great bags out there. Lacoste and Marc Jacobs make shopping bags upward of $200 if you are worried about the big green bag crashing your style.

The reality is… Think about how much junk we are leaving behind for our children. Look at your daughter, son, grandchildren…you wouldn’t consciously feed them poison but the waste of not only the bags themselves but the manufacturing process is building up in the air, soil and even the kids bodies.

If you don’t want to relinquish your precious bags because you don’t want people telling you what to do your a moron, or lazy. Neither of which I think is true. The real reason is you are afraid. Change is scary but it’s required or we will self destruct. You touch a stove, it’s hot and you get burned. Touching the stove doesn’t work. You know that now. You don’t do it again. This is where we are at now. Have you heard of the Pacific Vortex? Look at this map, it’s huge! 10 million tons of trash, mostly plastic in our oceans. Plastic that does not decompose. And plastic has only been around for less than 150 years. 10 million tons (and plastic is light, how much takes up a ton?) in less than 150 years. And it’s not going anywhere.

I love this article, seeing how San Francisco just passed a ban on them. The youth (and young at heart) are really taking to living responsibly. A lot of people don’t understand that the “modern conveniences” so readily handed to them are products of commerce and not necessarily of sustainable interest. If we keep pushing this idea from a marketing objective that the young are going green, eventually in our desperate pursuit of youth and beauty it will catch on. Probably with less hostility than “the government will pry my plastic bag from my cold, dead hand.”

08-03-08

American Beautyberry and the Not So Jelly Adventure

American Beautyberry, originally uploaded by pellaea.

I blame you.

The American Beautyberries have come into…berry? Seed? Bloom? And I decided it would be AWESOME to venture out to the local berry picking haunts and pick some. Ever since the blogosphere ignited with stories of Freezer Jam and photos of perfectly ripened berries last month…I’ve been itching to try a new recipe I found for these gorgeous wild berries in our area (reprinted below). And now they were here! So I hit the tubes to find out how much I would need (1.5 quarts) along with a few other odd bits of information I didn’t think relevant at the time and off we went.

Mutant, Crazy Blood Sucking Zombies
So we got to the place, shut off the car and ventured off…all lathered in Skin So Soft and armed with baggies. To my dismay, the berries still weren’t completely ripe. So I snatched a cutting to see if I could grow it (yay foldable embroidery scissors…perfect for sneaky snipping) picked a few palmetto berries from a near by palm and headed back to the car. RAN back to the car make that. Sorry avon but your skin so soft might work on those Northern Skeeters, but we have super skeeters here. Mutant, crazy, super skeeters that followed us into the car.

After swatting the dozen that snuck into the closed car, D dug out the keys. Usually this is the point where the key…in the ignition starts the car. Ckick, click, click, click is NOT the sound of a car starting. The car wasn’t starting. Sitting in the middle of Mosquito Forest, in a dark car with no air conditioning, we realized the battery was dead. It was like a bad horror move…with ittsy-bittsy tiny Romero zombies with wings.

Existential Conversations
Iz and I sat in the car, trading the increasing temperatures for the potential West Nile virus as D waited for our designated jumper to arrive. Finally, soaking wet and on the verge of heat stroke I realized something I had read online today. American Beautyberries are a natural insect repellent. But which part? I couldn’t remember. Anything was better than this, so I hopped out of the car, grabbed a few handfuls of the berries and smooshed them into the baby after hesitating a second to convince myself they were safe:

Bad S: birds eat them…

Good S: but birds get drunk on fermented fruit too.

Bad S: Yeah, on college campuses. Everyone gets drunk in college.

Good S: Good point. Besides, the whole jelly thing. And you ate them a few times and didn’t get sick

So on to the smooshing.
Iz looked at me shocked. Shocked gave way to WTF which eventually gave way to a giant smile and feet flailing. After rubbing ourselves down with tiny purple balls we sat in the shade and waited. The mosquitoes never came. The berries actually worked. American Beautyberries are an excellent all natural insect repellent, and they smell great too! Now I might have used the wrong part of the plant, you might be sitting out there going “your doing it wrong”. But it worked…who knew?

American BeautyBerry Jelly
Found via Biosphere Buzz
via Florida’s Incredible Wild Edibles, by Dick Deuerling and Peggy Lantz (a book I’ve read from the library recently, but it’s here on amazon for 6 Bucks (p.s. affiliate link: support the madness, or freegan it from the library like us)

1 ½ qts. of beautyberries, washed
2 qts. water

Boil 20 minutes and strain to make infusion
Use 3 cups of the infusion, bring to boil, add 1 enve-
lope Sure-Jell and 4 ½ cups sugar. Bring to second boil
and boil 2 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand until
foam forms. Skim off foam, pour into sterilized jars, cap.

P.S. Check out this recipe for Beautyberrie Jelly Rolls…nom.

08-02-08

Oops…Urban Homestead Garden on Craft Zine…in May

Googling today, I found I overlooked a small thing…just our FEATURE ON CRAFTZINE! Totally Rock! My bad, how did I miss that one? Click the pic below to see the feature.

I am super surprised that our little ole’ Urban Homestead has made such a splash the last few months. It’s so peaceful and does wonders for the spirit of the backyard.

P.S. I found a copy of Bartholomew’s book over at Amazon. This is a must add to your collection. Buy it. Now. (Affiliate link…help support the madness)