Just kidding… I’m probably the only person who noticed what eventually became a tiny white dot in the sky as four helium balloons, twirling and tumbling, drifted over the small community in Surrey, a lost relic of some child’s birthday party. One red, one white, and possibly two pink balloons, fatefully joined by ribbons (one would guess), destined to land in a yard somewhere, or on a street. Hopefully it won’t land on someone’s windshield and actually wreak havoc. It was moving at a good clip when I spotted it, and by the time I realised it wasn’t about to disappear out of view in the time that I could get a camera, it had moved upwards into the sky and seemed to stay in the same spot awhile. Really, it was making a journey westward. Anyway. I thought it was an odd but delightful sight, and I stared at it for awhile with my binoculars after snapping some photographs. I also captured one of some birds.
a close-up crop
Continue reading Unidentified flying object wreaks havoc in Cloverdale »
all i could do
was feel
feel like i needed to honour him
somehow i knew he was listening
watching
knowing that he would not be forgotten
while mourning i told someone who did not know him
who he was to us, who he was to his family,
who he loved (his wife and sons, the center of his universe)
what he loved (oh he loved his cars so much!)
and how his strong will to live helped others fight
the same battle
he won
though it claimed him in the end,
he won
for us all.
goodbye, old friend. we’ll see you soon.
——————————————————–
after his memorial and on the way home, i found a penny on the floor of the bus. that morning a friend had dropped one and didn’t pick it up, so i thought, alright, i’ll pick this one up; it looks old, too. i turned it over and discovered it was a rare find indeed, then stopped short. it said 1940, his birth year. i think it was a parting gift from him. so thank you, old friend, for making that moment special. i’ll treasure that little item forever.
i miss you.
I’m making my lunch.
Orange cheddar cheese — my favourite, but it’s dyed orange and I don’t know why.
White sourdough bread — I think you get the point.
Finnish mustard — really good.
Honey ham — sodium nitrate and smoke. Good luck finding any deli meat that isn’t.
Tomato — here’s the fun part.
I realised my tomatoes need to get eaten up. My boyfriend grabbed the usual, tomatoes-on-the-vine. That was on Wednesday. They’re… not as red as they should be, and still very firm after 3 days. I did a test and dropped one on the counter. I hucked it against the kitchen cupboard, and then it fell on the lino-covered cement floor. Not a bruise. It incurred a slight slit to its skin, but that was it. I cut it, and listened… a slight crunch as I broke the skin, then I looked at it… “Oh my god, he’s right,” I said out loud, referring to author Thomas Pawlick. “I have to photograph this.”
The Dole brand tomato has a thick, fibrous layer under the skin that is pale and gross-looking. Inside, it’s watery, not juicy. It’s big, and looks exactly the same as the other 3 in every regard.
Finally, a taste test: I bit into the beautiful red tomato from my boyfriend’s granddad’s home-grown tree. MMM… oh yeah. So good. Now for the other one… crunch, chew, chew… YUCK. It’s BITTER! Not sweet, not soft, not yummy.
And I’m having second thoughts about putting it on my sandwich.
Photo documentation
large Dole tomato versus small homegrown tomato
see all that pale pith? that’s not good.
less pith, darker. a RED tomato. juicy, not runny.
After lunch thoughts:
The Dole tomato’s “juice” ran down my arm… every single time. I wasted a kleenex just cleaning it up (I wasn’t about to drip all the way to the kitchen!). I enjoyed my sandwich with homegrown tomatoes much more.
I was just at Two EEs Farm Market getting my usual produce. It was raining and the water was dripping, or spraying, through the canopy, giving the produce a nice wash. I stocked up on apples (mostly golden delicious at 49c/lb and some gala apples), mostly for making apple crisp. I like having fruit for snacks at school as well, and grapes are good for that. I usually get green seedless grapes, nice and crispy and sweet. They were from California this time, so I eyed them suspiciously and decided to take a second look at the purple ones outside. The darker ones were from Arkansas… uh… I can’t even find that on a map. The other ones were locally-grown lighter purple grapes. Small and seedless, and round.
Oh my gosh.
Continue reading Locally-grown grapes a delicious treat »
I got an add on MySpace from Conspiracy Clothes, which makes t-shirts with messages the government doesn’t want you to know. One of them is about the dangers of fluoride, which I knew about, but the references outline way more problems than I knew.
Continue reading Why I use toothpaste sans fluoride »
Notice of Submission for Approval of Novel Food, Livestock Feed and Environmental Safety for Alfalfa Genetically Modified For Herbicide Tolerance from Monsanto Canada Inc. Date Posted: September 7, 2004
It was approved.
The CFIA and Health Canada (HC) have received a submission from Monsanto Canada Inc. seeking environmental safety approval, and livestock feed and food use approvals of alfalfa designated as Events J101 and J163, which have been genetically modified for glyphosate herbicide tolerance.
Continue reading Monsanto’s alfalfa »
Andrew V. Uroskie, Assistant Professor of Film and Contemporary Art at Georgia Tech’s School of Literature, Communication and Culture, wrote his own post accompanied by some great letters-to-the-editor.
“Who Knew International Police Cooperation Would Work Better than Big Armies Against Terror? Oh yeah- the ENTIRE PROGRESSIVE COMMUNITY SINCE SEPT 12th!”
Let me quote U2’s Sunday, Bloody Sunday here: “There’s many lost but tell me who has won?”
Recently, Canadians mourned 23 dead soldiers. Only 23, no problem, keep fighting, boys! Next thing you know it’s, what, 34? And how many children now have no father? And how many Americans, British, Iraqi, Afghan, and other people have died in near-futile causes?
Continue reading How to defeat terrorism »
I’m reading this article about efforts in Florida, and US-wide, to make children’s lunches more nutritious and (hopefully) reduce obesity. Well it sure doesn’t hurt, even if it’s not working that well.
It got me thinking, though, about kids whose moms or dads take them grocery shopping. Supermarket checkouts all have candy, gum, and chocolate bars from the floor to about 4 feet up — SMACK DAB in the reach of children’s hands. Even if parents try to raise their kids without candy and nasty chocolate bars, what’s to stop them from getting them with their allowance on the way home, or at friends’ places, or at school? (I remember spending $15 one month on a Reese peanut butter cup addiction in high school.) Anyway, it’s pretty easy for a kid, bored, waiting there for mom to finish up to just grab something and say “Pleaaaase can I have this?” or just put it right on the belt if they’re tall enough. If mom is distracted by the tabloids and magazines, she might just brush it off and say “mhm,” or maybe she’s not concerned about it at all. Maybe it’ll keep the kid occupied while she loads everything into the car.
Continue reading Supermarket check-outs & childhood obesity »
This one tells me that people DO want to discuss the issues and the book, which is good news for me, because my grad project will have an emphasis on discussion.
I like how each interview and each article are different. Will We Ever Eat Well Again?
I love this comment in response to a vegetarian’s response to the original poster:
Truman,
Your story brings back another one from the early postwar years.
A missionary went to a cannibal tribe and was preaching them the horror and sin of eating human flesh.
The chief spoke up : “You’re telling us Father that it is a sin to eat human flesh, yet you white people just had a big war, where you killed and ate lots and lots of people!”
“Oh no, my son – said the missionary- it is true that we had a big war and lots of people were killed, but we didn’t eat them!”
“White man big fool- said the chief- if you don’t want to eat them, why kill them?”
So they ate him.
Cheers, Ed.
(Truman, unfortunately, can’t simply take a joke for what it is, so you can stop reading then!)
I just tried getting my feed to show up in NetNewsWire Lite and, um, it doesn’t work. Is it working for anyone else? Will try to get a different format going…
*UPDATE*
As far as I can tell, it will NOT work for users still running NNW 2.0. I upgraded to 2.11 (Lite) and it works now, woohoo.
