moving is teh suXX0rs!

mark! the nature is touching me!

i am a foodie...

my heroes are people like MFK Fisher, James Beard, Ina Garten, Nigella Lawson, Anthony Bourdain, Giada De Laurentiis. chefs and cooks, authors and entertainers, very different personalities with one thing in common – a deep love of food and its creation… aside from romance novels, one thing that i will always be excited to read is food writing, be it memoir, cookbook or restaurant review… a recent article linked off of Brendon’s blog made mention of a few things that made me wonder about the term foodie (this is a tangent, not a statement about whether wine or beer is better – i say, if they are good, give me both)… it spoke of “the rise of pastoral chic” – as though a return to local, sustainable food sources and a lack of chemicals in our food was, at best, a marketing ploy, if not a figment of the collective imagination. i have to say that i disagree with that thought… while it may not be a mainstream truth in America, it is a growing desire to have good, natural food – if this were not true, the marketing wouldn’t work… the rise in this trend was not brought about by hippies, but by foodies (though a lot of foodies are hippies at heart, just as many are irresponsible over-consumers, as well). and while the health benefits were considered, the main goal behind the call for fresh and chemical-free was, and is, taste – fresh food tastes better and a reliance on local availability calls for a greater creativity, because you have to work with what is there. i do think that this rise in popularity of fresh, organic food has brought about a support of farmers who may have otherwise not been able to maintain business, but i don’t think that the majority of the consumers with a desire for these products went out and bought a farm… they did not even follow the example of the early 19th century poets speaking out against the industrial world in which they lived, and extol the virtues of a pastoral life… they mostly just want their food... like me - mostly, i just want my food... but after watching the way in which food affected my mother’s cancer fight, am also way more concerned about things like antioxidants and vitamin content… lucky for me the taste goes well with the health benefits =)

yay for food!

aging...

i don't know why i have been thinking about getting older so much recently, maybe the frequency of birthdays in my vicinity maybe just random... anyway, when i think of getting old, i think of this poem...

When I Am Old.

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat that doesn't go, and doesn't suit me,
And I shall spend my pension
on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals,
and say we've no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I am tired,
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells,
And run my stick along the public railings,
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick the flowers in other people's gardens,
And learn to spit.
You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat,
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go,
Or only bread and pickle for a week,
And hoard pens and pencils and beer mats
and things in boxes.
But now we must have clothes that keep us dry,
And pay our rent and not swear in the street,
And set a good example for the children.
We will have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me
are not too shocked and surprised,
When suddenly I am old
and start to wear purple!
Jenny Joseph

thoughts...

Have you noticed since everyone has a camcorder these days no one talks about seeing UFOs like they used to?

In the 60's, people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.

How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?

Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, "I think I'll squeeze these dangly things here and drink whatever comes out?"

Who was the first person to say, "See that chicken there? I'm gonna eat the next thing that comes outta its butt."

Do illiterate people get the full effect of Alphabet Soup?

Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?

Why are there interstate highways in Hawaii (or Alaska for that matter)?

I used to eat a lot of natural foods until I learned that most people die of natural causes.

Garden Rule: When weeding, the best way to make sure you are removing a weed and not a valuable plant is to pull on it. If it comes out of the ground easily, it is a valuable plant.

The easiest way to find something lost around the house is to buy a replacement.