Drink Deep from the Well of Knowledge

I just flipped through a Newsweek magazine on the lunch room table at work today and scanned (quickly) an article about Hilary and why women apparently don’t like her. True? Of course I didn’t actually READ the article, so I don’t know what the conclusion was, but it sounded like a good topic for me to extrapolate on with absolutely no facts of my own.

 

Do women hate Hilary? Yes, my female coworker hates Hilary. My mother in law hates Hilary. My husband hates Hilary, but he’s not a woman. If everyone hates her, why is she winning?

 

Women are in a tough place these days. You’re damned if you do, you’re damned if you don’t, you’re damned if you try to do both. Career? Family? Beauty? Brains? Feminine? Masculine? Powerful? Meek? We try to do it all. And all the thought we put into it all (should I have botox? Should I get a boob job? Does my ass look fat? Should I ask for that promotion? Should I get pregnant? Is he trying to kill me? Should I report that time I got sexually harassed? Should I make cookies for my coworkers? Or would that be perpetuating the myths that have had us downtrodden?) just makes most of us too goddamn exhausted to actually accomplish anything in life. So when someone like Hilary comes along,  we wonder to ourselves, how did she have the time to do all that stuff, like become a Senator and presidential frontrunner? So then we call her ugly and bitchy and think about how she should’ve been putting her time into thinking about botox and boob jobs like the rest of us.  

 

I know men have it hard too. They don’t know what their role is either. So they just give up and let us do it all. It’s all a big mess if you ask me. I personally would sell my soul to the devil to see a woman be president. I keep saying that out loud but I haven’t gotten a response. I don’t know if Satan hasn’t heard me yet or if he just plans on collecting on election day. I’ll keep you posted.

Well, daylight savings time is here, which means in Maine it gets dark at, oh around 4:30. So to keep myself busy through the winter, I’ve singed up for mind games at lumosity.com. These are supposedly scientifically proven games to keep your mind sharp to battle those lovely things like age related decline (other known as the “crazies”). It tracks your progress and I’m happy to report in the 14 days I’ve been doing this, I’ve gotten exponentially smarter.

I’ve become a bit addicted to one game called “Word Bubbles.” My husband and I battle continuously for the high score. I thought I’d never beat his 2710, but I just  hit 2980. YES!!! My eyes are red and burning, so I may be blind as a old timer, but hopeuflly my mind will still be active. The only problem is that as I’m trying to sleep I can help but think of words beginning with random sets of 3 letters like:

exp
exponent
exponential
expatriot
expatriots
expatriotic?
expire
expired

ant
ants
anteater
anteaters

sle
sleep
sleepy
sleeping
sleepyhead
sleephyeads
sleepyheaded…

There’s also a site called mindhabits.com that was recently featured on yahoo. They have the advantage of having anti-stress and mood enhancing games, but I thought it was less user friendly. Plus, no word bubbles.

I was thinking today about how removed we are from the food we eat. Do we even know what half of it is? If the corn lobby, nabisco, and kelloggs went out of business tomorrow, would we have any idea what to do? Could you recreate them at home? Let me think of what I ate today:

Granola - what the heck is granola anyway? Some type of grain, I guess, but I’m not sure what kind or what’s been done to it.

Soy milk - how the hell does that happen? Someone plants a soybean seed, it grows, someone picks it… I’m lost after that step.

Chicken noodle soup - I think I can handle the chicken part, and I have made homemade pasta, so I have a good idea of how that happens (flour, egg, water, salt?)

How about a saltine? How would you make one of those? cheese?? It just seems sort of sad how out of touch I am with this basic human function - gathering and producing (or even understanding) food.

Which leads me to the subject of this post. What is vinegar? Well, like wine, it’s basically fermented whatever. It can made from wine, or grain, or other things. It’s basically a type of acid. I will never forget the day I asked my mother in law if she had any wine and she pulled out a bottle that they had opened a year previously from her cabinet. As I sceptically said “I’m not so sure that’s still going to be good….” she uncorked it and the very pungent smell of vinegar wafted through the air. That was.. as they say.. an aha! moment.

As with all matters, I will refer you to the good folks at wikipedia for more information on the subject, but I did want to highlight a few uses for vinegar (I’ve become less ambitious since I first named this post 5 minutes ago):

 – salad dressing - mixed with oil (ok, you knew that one, right?)
 – way to get cat pee smell out of stuff (I’m trying this tonight so I’ll let you know!)
 – the Chinese use it for all kinds of interesting things… including stopping the spread of SARS… who knew?
 – a great way not to catch flies? (or so the Southern saying goes)

Just FYI - as a way to get back in touch with my own personal food chain, I’m making attempt #2 at making mozzarella this weekend. I’ll keep you posted. So THAT’S what curds and whey are. : ) So gratifying to finally be able to understand nursery rhymes (at the age of 33)!

When I was about 12, I somehow got addicted to Hostess Lemon Pies. I was kind of a picky eater and I didn’t like cherry flavored things or strawberry. I ate lemon flavored everything. I’d only eat lemon flavored yogurt (which back them was pretty hard to find). I was addicted to the suckers, even when we lived in Japan and you could taste every nautical mile of the frozen/melted/refrozen/melted journey over the ocean. Yummy. Sort of like lemon flavored wet cardboard.

That was back before nutritional labels, and like all good neurotic American pre-teens (or tweens as I’m told they are called now), I was obsessed with my weight. I actually wrote to Hostess (with a pen and paper…yeah… old school!) and asked them to send me the calories and fat grams. I got this Xeroxed sheet in the mail that informed me that they had an obscene amount of fat and calories…more than I could have ever imagined. In my mind it was 900 calories and 20 grams of fat (though now they say it’s only 500 and something calories). 

Anyway, so I gave up my beloved lemon pies. Lately though, I’ve been thinking about them. I’ve gotten into 2 random conversations about Hostess pies. When my sister came in town and the topic somehow (was it fate? synchronicity? karma?), we decided to go find some. I didn’t even know they still sold them. I guess I don’t frequent gas stations much..which is true, as I’m a big fan of pay-at-the-pump (or anything else that can help me avoid human interaction). First gas station we went to… pure gold. Slightly different wrapper than I remember, same great taste. Yum-E. Then we repeated the exercise the next day. I’m trying hard not to make it a habit. One day clean so far.

So what this post is really about is that there are a whole boatload of flavors out there. I, of course, am still going to stick to my refreshing lemon, but you should know that there is also pineapple (only in Hawaii…no, just kidding… ha ha, like they use fresh from the Dole plantation pineapples…hee hee), blackberry, apple, French apple, strawberry, and the ever popular cherry.

Their website (http://www.hostesscakes.com/fruitpies.asp) also has some tasty serving suggestions…like heating them up and serving them a la mode. Now, I never thought of that. Honestly, I’ve never thought about eating them any other way then peeling off the wrapper and stuffing it in my face as I peel out of the gas station parking lot. But it’s certainly a thought. Maybe for thanksgiving dinner… paired with a Drake Funny Bone perhaps? 

to not buy cheap crap from china? Or even expensive crap from china? Food from china? Hopefully NOT cat food from China.

Well… according to a new book by Sara Bongiorni (as reported on cnn.com), pretty darn hard. She and her family tried to go a whole year without anything from China. I looked around my bathroom this morning just to see (though I really knew the answer)…toothbrush holder (yep, china), q-tip holder (china), very expensive electronic toothbrush (china)…my pretty Eddie Bauer skirt… doh! It’s kind of eye opening. I’m not opposed to China or the people of China personally, but don’t you think it’s wrong that the greatest country in the world (IMHO) can’t seem to make anything for its own people? Come on, now, this can’t be a good thing.

So, I’m on a kick. Instead of buying the Smith and Hawken patio set I was looking at (couldnt’ confirm country of origin, so I chucked it), I decided to redo the cheap crap from china I already have….I’ll make slipcovers (with fabric made in the USA if I can find it) for my resin chairs, so something creative with the table. I bought a rug from LL Bean (that still has a FEW things made in the US… but not many.. .don’t be fooled by that vague phrase, “imported,” … yeah, we know what that means. The rug was made in North Carolina. And I’m looking at one nice piece of furniture to add…maybe a nice chair from nagsheadhammocks.com.

This is part of something bigger than just economics and the global economy. We’ve become a disposable society. We rationalize to ourselves “why get the vacuum repaired when I can buy a new one cheaper?” Well sure… that makes sense on some level. But wouldn’t it be better to buy something of quality and stick with it. Stop filling up landfills, stop encouraging US companies to outsource to China. Yeah, maybe what they say is true.. Americans won’t do the work. Yeah, not for the amount of money they pay children in china… How about this idea. Buy something good that will last and that you actually won’t want to throw into the landfill.

On a related note, Susan Susanka, who wrote “The Not So Big House” is on a real kick. She’s on to something. Her deal is to spend the money you were thinking of spending on a McMansion and build a smaller, higher quality house. My humble house is actually based on a house featured in her book. I noticed at the bookstore lately, “The not so big life” and “The not so big garden.” Something to ponder…

 

web site analysis

Well, having lived in Maine for 2 and a half years, I finally got tired of the tourists having all the fun. Each summer I watch the cars, trucks, and SUVs from Massachussetts, New Hampshire, and New York going north on the highway, laden with bikes, kayaks, canoes, boats…off to have fun in Vacationland. Now, I’m having fun too. Every weekend is like a vacation for me - in the summer anyway. But I finally decided to find out what all the fuss about kayaking was about.

I’ve had some bad experiences with water. I have a theory that everyone is cursed with an element…earth, air, fire, or water. It’s a popular cocktail hour conversation for me. I am cursed with water. From early childhood memories, to plumbing problems in every apartment I’ve ever lived in, to a disastrous canoe trip in West Virginia — yeah, I’ve been burned. But this year, I’ve decided to start conquering fears and curses, so I signed me and my husband up for a half day LL Bean kayaking trip. We went last Saturday and I loved it! It was a day custom made for novices… 75 degrees, party sunny with a nice breeze, calm waters. 

We started out at Bean’s Paddling Center site in Freeport, just past Wolfe’s Neck Woods Park (another great place). It’s a gorgeous site, and well organized, as you’d expect from Beans. They provided all the equipment and went through a quick demonstration of basic paddling strokes. Then we got situated in our tandem kayaks and we were off. My husband got rudder duty and I got brute strength duty. We went across Casco Bay and over to one of the islands to get out and stretch and have a snack. We saw a bald eagle (gorgeous!), osprey, and seals. This really is a gorgeous area. I was sold. I think it’s basically a requirement that if you live in Maine, you own a boat, and as I have no interest in the trouble of a motor boat, I think a kayak might be up my alley.

Anyway, so my point is… <drum roll> at the end of the trip, they gave out a brochure for the Maine Island Trail Association, mita.org that protects and preserves the islands. It encourages safe use, etc. etc. and when you become a member you get a guidebook that describes which islands you can go to, information about currents and tides, and stuff like that. I know I have a long way to go in my kayak education, but I’m excited, and this organization sounds like a great resource. Check it out. Membership starts at $45.

 

Well, summer’s finally here. I was working in my garden this weekend and happy to see lots of earthworms aerating my soil and making lush compost for my vegetables. Then I suddenly wondered, what do earthworms eat? And even more intriguing… do they have sex? I did some research and found earthworms to be pretty fascinating. Here’s the scoop (for those who don’t already know):

 

 

This information is from wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_worm.

 

 

Earthworms eat undecayed leaves and other plant matter. After it’s gone through processes in the worm’s stomach, it comes out as rich organic matter that is great for the garden.

 

 

And now for the juicy stuff. Earth worms have sex! Who knew? They are monoecious, which means they have both eggs and sperm on them. They have sex by laying on top of each other and exchanging sperm, which they store. Later on, when they’re all relaxed and smoking a cigarette (ha, just kidding), they form a cocoon and insert their own egg and the sperm they got from their “friend” into the cocoon, and then back out of it. At some point later, small but fully formed little worms emerge (though without their sexual parts, which come later – you know, at worm puberty, when they get crabby and irritable).

 

 

They can also regenerate, which is good news, since I’m pretty sure I’ve severed many an earthworm’s back side while hoeing the garden. That assuages a lot of guilt. Whew!

 

Here in Maine, the trees are leafing out… even the oaks are halfway to green. It’s a great time of year to get out exploring and find some new trees to put on the National Register of Big Trees. They take nominations…

Last year, me, my husband, and sister, went out to find Herbie, the biggest living elm tree in New England. Located in Yarmouth, Maine, it’s a short 30 minute drive from home. I expected Herbie to be on the main drag in Yarmouth, and it took quite a bit of driving around, getting lost, and even giving up, before we actually found Herbie. We were discouraged and trying to find our way out of a Yarmouth neighborhood to go home when we all sort of had the same realization at the same time “wow, that’s a big tree.”

Herbie is inconspicuously located in a regular neighborhood in someone’s yard. A plaque marks its girth and age. Herbie survived the Dutch Elm epidemic that wiped out a good portion of the nation’s elm trees in the 20th century.

In America, the “land of big,” big trees are somewhat of a rarity. We’re used to seeing big buildings, big spaces, big plates, and big people..but one trip to Europe can convince you that our trees are downright puny. The big trees that we do have are majestic, inspiring, historical, and rare. They remind you that not everything is new in this young country. Some trees predate white people by hundreds of years.

So now that I’ve seen Herbie, my next trip is the giant redwoods in California.

What big trees are in your neighborhood? In your state?

I’ve always been drawn to Edward Hopper’s paintings. I’m generally more of Renaissance girl – I especially love Botticelli. And the pre-Rafaelites too. I guess I like the mythical/romantic qualities to them. Realism is ok, but since the invention of the camera, why not just see the real thing. And I guess I’m just not abstract enough for most modern or contemporary art. Though I do have an open mind.

But Edward Hopper appeals to me. I like how his paintings are straightforward, and you may not even think there’s anything to them, except they always make me feel a certain way. Usually lonely. But not in a bad way. I have a picture of Two Lights in my cubicle at work. I’d be tempted to say I like him because I live in Maine and know some of the scenery. I’ve been to Two Lights and actually bought the print there, but I liked Hopper before I even thought of Maine as a place I might live.

The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston has a Hopper show till August 19. I think I can make the 2 hour jaunt for this:

www.mfa.org 

I’ve been on a healthy diet for the last few months…very little meat, dairy, sugar, processed food. Now when I eat anything very sugary, or very salty, I really feel ill. But one thing I haven’t been able to give up is molasses. I love it! Especially on vegan pumpkin waffles.

Sugar has been blamed for all kinds of things. First ,there are the obvious culprits…diabetes, heart disease, ADD. Then there’s the “Twinkie defense,” and, no worse, my 3:00 p.m. slumpies. Sugar is indeed a powerful addiction, but did you know that it, along with its byproduct, rum, was a major player in the slave trade?

I always thought sugar cane was found in the Americas, but it actually came from India and was brought to the Americas by the Europeans. The climate in the Caribbean proved perfect for sugar cane and, thus, the sugar cane plantation was born. Sugar cane, and its delicious byproduct, molasses, was used to make rum. The rum was sent to Africa to buy more slaves to be shipped to the Caribbean to make more sugar – creating the “triangle trade.” Read more at http://www.slaveryinamerica.org/history/hs_es_sugar.htm.

Now, what remains is the impact of slavery on the world. Sugar addiction and the obesity epidemic. And the fact that molasses is the best thing since sliced bread. My favorite is grandmas. And remember, black strap molasses has many important vitamins and minerals, so take a teaspoon every morning. No better way to start the day!

Oh, and if you’re looking for rum recipes, here are some good ones using Cruzan rum from the Virgin Islands . Our bartender at the Westin St. John made up a drink called a Silk Shark’s Fin…very good, but unfortunately he wouldn’t give up the recipe.