Happy Friday.

I like to end my week on a positive note. Pure entertainment, ladies and gentlemen. Say what you will about Jimmy or Justin, but try to say this isn't highly amusing.

The sad truth is that nothing is the same.

I'll preface this post by saying that I was lucky enough to spend a week in Norway in 2005. I was taking tourism marketing classes abroad outside of London when a few friends and I decided to visit my extended family in Oslo and another little coastal town.

Oddly enough, the day after classes started in London on July 5, 2005, the city erupted in a terrorist attack of its own. I wrote a little about that here and also wrote a column when I was still in college about it, in The Plainsman. I'm going to post the clip as soon as I find it.

Aside from Norway being an obscenely cheap flight on Ryan Air, and the lovely family I had to visit there, another big draw to visiting the city was its relative safety. With London and Madrid both experiencing devastating attacks within a year of each other, Scandinavia seemed blissfully off the grid. And it was - absolutely lovely.

We went sailing in beautiful weather to different spots on the coast. We stayed up until midnight with with brightly lit skies and went sailing in the middle of the night. We ate seafood stew and amazing cheese and caught up with relatives. One of the absolute highlights of my trip was visiting downtown Oslo. My cousins - aside from looking like European royalty - were incredibly welcoming hosts. They took us all over - we saw the government buildings that were attacked Friday, the national museum, the royal palace and lots of gorgeous parks and green spaces with the most amazing public sculptures.

I hate that this happened in Oslo. Just like I hate that it happened in NYC and London and Madrid. Regardless of whether it's Norway's Oklahoma City (which it clearly was) or Norway's 9/11, the fact still remains that we live in trying times. No country is immune and no population is safe. It's a bit of a dark thought, but true nonetheless. Norway, I am thinking of you and remembering the amazing experience I had.

I hate it that there are so many bitterly opposing (and alarmingly drastic) opinions at play there - and in so many places, in Europe, here, everywhere... I hate it that this happened to your beautiful country, and mostly, I hope that this doesn't change the overall open, accepting nature of your people.

I want to be in your gang!

Do I really need to SAY anything more after that?!

Things that glow

One of my absolute favorite things about summertime in the South is the lightning bugs. We had them in Southern California, too - they were called fireflies there - but I don't think they came out at night en masse like they do down here.

Last weekend I was in D.C. celebrating the fourth. We were on the way to a cookout when we drove by an empty lot between houses that was completely alight with the incandescent insects. I love phosphorescence in all of its forms, and that's what this post is all about.

Also handy because then I don't have to talk about my job search or the fact that J currently lives hundreds of miles away...
Synchronized fireflies (ahem, lightning bugs) in the Smokey Mountains of north Tennessee and North Carolina.
I originally saw this piece in Southern Living yesterday in the dentist's office (heh) but since I couldn't find that article online, here's the phenomenon covered in the New York Times.

Basically, a whole slew of male lightning bugs blink in unison in order to attract females. Apparently it's like a symphony of lights. Not sure if it impresses their women, but I would love to see this. The NYT piece covers the bugs in Elkmont, Tenn., during the first two weeks in June.

The Dismalites of Dismal's Canyon outside of Phil Campbell, Ala.

Dismal's Canyon is also where they filmed the backdrop for When Dinosaurs Roamed the Earth on the Discovery channel

I actually have seen the dismalites before. We had a group trip in 2009 to see them and enjoy the canyon for a weekend. They have campsites as well as a couple of lovely cabins and a swimming hole. The canyon (and the dismalites) are the major attractions, though.

You go on a guided tour after dark in the summertime to see the tiny bioluminescent worms. Gajillions (this is an official count) of Dismalites light up the sides of the cave walls like a starry sky.

image via

Also, Dismal's Canyon is home to Burr's Hideout - apparently where Aaron Burr hid out for days after he shot Alexander Hamilton. Lots of old graffiti on the rocks too. Definitely worth a visit.

Cave graffiti at Dismal's dating from 1936

Phosphorescent plankton on the beach at Dauphin Island, Ala.
I've been fortunate enough to see this one, too, as a part of a field studies class I took my senior year of high school to Dauphin Island Sea Lab. My friend, Dustin of Spawning is Imminent (why can't I find your blog anymore, Dustin? Please explain this to me) was lucky enough to study there for a summer in college.

At any rate, it was amazing - standing in the complete dark and kicking up the sand in the surf. The entire area surrounding your toes lighting up as you disrupt the plankton.

Dauphin Island is a barrier island and quite remote - not very many city lights. So serene, and the glowing sand makes the experience otherworldly. I'd love to go back. No photos, unfortunately.

This completes my shortlist of favorite things that glow. I have no idea why I found it necessary to write this post.

Hi, I'm 27 and I live with my mother.

It's not so bad, really. She brings me coffee every morning with frothed almond milk. I actually get to work on time because of the coffee-in-bed ritual.

She's an excellent cook and great company. And she helped me clean out three years of abandoned hobbies and detritus friends have left behind from house parties and get-togethers. I feel guilty about that, but am so thankful that she was here.

So, it's been a while since my last post, and definitely not for lack of activity. Life activity increase = blog productivity decrease. C'est la vie.

I've been up to a lot! J finished grad school in December (yay!), schlepped through months of unsatisfactory work (boo) while searching for a satisfactory first-career job. He got an offer in May (yay!) right around our first anniversary. Who can believe I didn't blog about that one?!

J gave me some truly gorgeous anniversary flowers - birds of paradise, lilies and others - pictured here in case I never get around to dedicating a post to our anniversary... which is entirely possible.

Anyway, after months of anxiously awaiting news, a company that makes yogurt offered him a job! After ages of waiting, the usual "we need you to start... YESTERDAY." occurred. Chaos ensued.

Our anniversary trip to New York City turned into a frantic apartment search. We found a place; signed the lease; came home; rented a 22-foot Penske truck (her name was Penny) with a tow dolley; loaded almost all of our worldly possessions to said rental; drove in lightning storms and heavy construction maxing at 55 mph and listening to a crappy suspense book-on-CD through Tennessee, Virginia, D.C., Maryland, Delaware and finally Jersey; unloaded in the rain in New Rochelle, N.Y. (27 minutes by express train to the Big City and home of Dick Van Dyke on his show, apparently - things you learn from old people); unpacked; visited with our friends Christina and Daniel; and proceeded to sleep through three alarms and two phone calls from the airport cab driver at 4:45 a.m. on a Sunday morning.

Penny

I eventually made it home, exhausted, just in time to work on Monday to a cat on hunger strike. At my mother's house.

It's only temporary.

Holy hell, I need to find a job. I'm working on it.

It's only temporary.

More to come...

In the meantime:

• this is hilarious
• J started a blog! About food! We can blog together. Because, obviously, we don't live together right now.
• It's only temporary.
• I'm looking for work. if you're hiring.
• Charles is eating again. Her backbone still feels like a xylophone, but she is definitely perkier and eating her nom again. Phew.
  

Did you know that there are mobile truckers' chapels at certain truck stops?

I want to walk Scotland.

I just have to find the vacation time to make this happen.

I have been completely absorbed in the Outlander series about a time-traveling British woman from WWII era and her life with a 17th century Scottish highlander. Sensational? Bodice-ripping? Yes and yes. But also really absorbing and quite historically rich. I've learned all of this stuff about 17th century Scottish uprisings and early American colonial history.

Anyway, now I've romanticized the Scottish highlands and want to visit. And then I see this in my Washington Post travel email. I need to go. I need to take 18 days for vacation and walk this. They say walk, not hike. I may not be the most outdoorsy, but I can walk for millions of miles. Just don't ask me to jog or run and I can go forever. AND you don't even have to camp - there are B&Bs, self-service cabins, hostels and inns all across the trails.

Courtesy of the Washington Post - check out the rest of the slideshow (!!!) You'll want to come on this adventure with me.

This reminds me of another incredible book I read quite a while back - It's Not About the Tapas (hm, by the looks of that Amazon link, Ms. Polly Evans writes a whole series of travel books. I will be checking those out...) - that made me want to bike Spain. But walking seems a bit more accessible. The author of the Post piece is a food writer for crying out loud. That makes him like me. If he can do it, so can I. I mean, the hardest bit on the trail only has a two-hiking boot difficulty meter. Out of five. This is doable.

I'll even compromise. the first leg of Brian Yarvin's trip is the long-distance West Highland Way that only takes eight days (or stages), according to my the impressive Scottish walks website.

The West Highland Way was Scotland's first long distance route and remains by far the most popular. Stretching for 150km from Milngavie on the edge of Glasgow to Fort William at the foot of Ben Nevis, the route offers a fabulous introduction to the Scottish Highlands. Those wanting to add an extra days walking could even begin in the heart of Glasgow, reaching Milngavie by following the Kelvin Walkway.

I can take a ten-day vacation. I'm thinking anniversary trip. Thank you, Outlander series, in your historically titillating excessiveness, for reigniting my wanderlust. I'm going to make this happen. Just give me time. And help me figure out how to somehow include a kayak excursion to further pique J's interest in this enterprise...

If you're into this travel fantasy (hey - it'll eventually become a reality!) stuff like I am, this WaPo newsletter had a Europe guide that also featured renting a house in France, cycling through southern Portugal and exploring Ukraine's ancient walled city. I have some more article reading to do :)

Oh! Also - A Town Like Paris. Another travel daydreamer's must-read. The author moves to Paris to work a Parisian government job (sadly, probably not so cushy anymore...) and totally immerses himself in la vie Francais.

Time to roll up those Snuggie sleeves!

I love Airfare Watchdog.

If I recall correctly, I started using the website because it's what our bustling Huntsville International Airport (International - ha!) uses for fare alerts. It's great - I have a ton of alerts set up for fabulous places and three times weekly, I get email pings about especially low fares from Huntsville to a number of my preset, specified locations. New York, San Francisco, Chicago, anyone? Yes, please.

Anyway, like many of the new web-based offerings, the Airfare Watchdog crew are pretty witty writers. I received an email this afternoon that made me want to shut my mini blinds extra tight when I get home tonight.

Hi there Melanie,

Gosh, is it March already? Time to roll up those snuggy sleeves, get off the sofa, and start planning your big spring getaway, if you haven't already. So where will you be thawing out come May? Take a look at our latest finds from the Huntsville area and see what's up for grabs...

Their "insert contact name here" email marketing campaign got me dead on this time. Thanks for calling me out in front of everyone. I'll forgive you this time, low fare finders. I will suffer a lot for you letting me know that there are $138/rt fares from Nashville to Chicago right now.

Maybe it is time to shed the Snuggie and venture out of hibernation.

Charles likes the Snuggie too.

the water pilgrimage.

I just had the weird sensation of realizing that someone has been observing my daily habits, finding them unusual and trying to help me be a little more normal.

Let me explain.

I work in a really really super nice building.

The nicest building I've ever worked in over the (short) span of my working career thus far. When I move and continue working other places, it'll still probably be the nicest facility I'll have ever worked in. There's glass everywhere. Shiny marble. Fabulous modern furnishings in a four-story atrium and a little cafe serving breakfast and lunch.


There are scores of support staff that man that cafe and clean the building (including the bathrooms, all of them, at least three or four times a day.) It's ridiculous. But I am not complaining - it's also lovely.

Anyway. I have these habits. I think they're good ones. I drink a ton of water. Possibly a gallon a day; not entirely sure. I used to go fill up my trusty plastic cup at the water fountain right by my office. One day, or operations director saw me and said (I kid you not), "WHY, pray tell, are you drinking out of the water fountain?! You do realize that we have nice, filtered, refrigerator water in the break room across the atrium, don't you?"

Well, no I didn't, actually. But I guess since the water fountain is off limits (except for guests - they don't get the good stuff?), I'll start walking across the way for my many times daily fill-up.

So, for the past year or so, I've been trekking across the atrium, from my office to the break room across the way to fill up my water cup. I've really started to enjoy it - my office is nice as far as offices go. I have a secondary window that looks out on to a hallway, through another office and finally out an outside window. I get light of day, indirectly. I have a door. But the atrium. You saw the photo. Now, it's a break I look forward to - getting up, stretching my legs, checking out the action in the atrium (that's where visitors come) and enjoying the full sunshine you see in the fully glassed-in area. Plus, I walk like, half a mile a day, to and fro between office and break room.

This morning, my little routine was interrupted by a really pleasant lady who works in the cafe.

"I see you walking way over there at least 25 times a day," she says. "You know the cafe water is triple-filtered, right? And cold? Why don't you just come get your water from the kitchen?" She says this all very patiently, as I'm obviously a tad slow to be walking a half mile per day just for water.

So anyway, I feel obligated to explain to her that I skip the water fountain because I was encouraged to drink the filtered water. I'm not a water snob, I insist. A little fluoride is good for a person.

In summary:

• Water fountain (is less than) filtered breakroom water (is less than) super awesome triple filtered chilled cafe water.
  
• I am a weirdo who drinks way too much water, walks too far for it and thinks she's too good for the water fountain.
• We have entirely too many water options. I mean, seriously.
  

Sigh. Sometimes I wish I could just be odd in peace without people noticing my little quirks and trying to help me out. Although, it is kind of touching that they care.

And, I apologize for sharing the weird again. I do think this little exercise will help dissolve the writer's block I've been experiencing while writing pages for our annual report. So this has been beneficial after all. I think I need a water break first, though...

OH! And so this isn't a total loss. I give you, Barcelona:

EF - Live The Language - Barcelona from Albin Holmqvist on Vimeo.

Hm. This isn't my favorite of the series but it still makes me insanely travel-jealous. We wanted to go here for our honeymoon but realized that there was a bit of a cash flow issue for a weeklong (or more) Euro trip. We had the best vacation we've ever had in Vegas, thanks to a family friend. But Barcelona is still on the bucket list. And it sure would be nice to go there while I still look decent in a swimsuit. Although, I'm pretty sure I never looked like the girl in the video. Seesh.

Bejing

EF - Live The Language - Beijing from Albin Holmqvist on Vimeo.

(By the way, these all came from the ModLife blog, which is almost always interesting reading.)

I am fairly sure I'm more of a Europe girl than an Asia one, but this does make me want to explore the asian side of things as well... Can you study abroad for work? Sigh.

Oh, to be a study abroad student again...

EF - Live The Language - Paris from Albin Holmqvist on Vimeo.

And there are more... I believe I'll share them one at a time since I am the worst blog poster ever lately. This will give anyone who happens to look at my blog something to daydream about :)

Voyage

I love the holidays. But, as I'm sure is the case for many people, they are bittersweet. In addition to the joy I feel being around loved ones and eating food and looking at lights and glittery paper and ribbons, I also reflect on those lost. Bittersweet. On my way into work this morning, I heard this poem and it rung so true. Anyway, not much more from me today, just this:

Voyage

by Tony Hoagland

I feel as if we opened a book about great ocean voyages
and found ourselves on a great ocean voyage:
sailing through December, around the horn of Christmas
and into the January Sea, and sailing on and on

in a novel without a moral but one in which
all the characters who died in the middle chapters
make the sunsets near the book's end more beautiful.

—And someone is spreading a map upon a table,
and someone is hanging a lantern from the stern,
and someone else says, "I'm only sorry
that I forgot my blue parka; It's turning cold."

Sunset like a burning wagon train
Sunrise like a dish of cantaloupe
Clouds like two armies clashing in the sky;
Icebergs and tropical storms,
That's the kind of thing that happens on our ocean voyage—

And in one of the chapters I was blinded by love
And in another, anger made us sick like swallowed glass
& I lay in my bunk and slept for so long,

I forgot about the ocean,
Which all the time was going by, right there, outside my cabin window.

And the sides of the ship were green as money,
and the water made a sound like memory when we sailed.

Then it was summer. Under the constellation of the swan,
under the constellation of the horse.

At night we consoled ourselves
By discussing the meaning of homesickness.
But there was no home to go home to.
There was no getting around the ocean.
We had to go on finding out the story
by pushing into it—

The sea was no longer a metaphor.
The book was no longer a book.
That was the plot.
That was our marvelous punishment.

"Voyage" by Tony Hoagland, from Hard Rain. © Hollyridge Press, 2005. Reprinted with permission. (buy now)

Interestingly enough, my granddad was a ship captain. So was my uncle before he retired. My dad was in the Navy too. In her early twenties, Mom sailed from L.A. to Australia on the beginning of her great adventure that eventually led her to my dad in Spain.

My uncle posted this photo on his Facebook sometime this summer... it's of him on his ship in Vietnam. He met up with my dad there - he's in the reflection.

Granddad had Alzheimer's and many of my more vivid memories of him were in this state since I was old enough to remember. He told this amazing story about when he first left Norway to work on a ship, they still sailed on masted sailing ships. I'm sure it was part of some sort of hazing ritual, but when he was young, they dared him to climb up to the uppermost mast and balance there, entire ship and ocean below, on his belly. Crazy. Crazy what you remember when everything else is gone... Crazy how many life-changing moments in my family, on both sides, began with a ship.

It's beer-thirty

Did you know there was such a product?


I had no idea. I saw them at a quickie-mart last Saturday in Nashville.

You learn something new every day.

Hope they're not as nasty as this beer/malt liquor caffeinated concoction. Yikes.

Spoiled rotten

Marrying a cook has its perks. Sure, the hours are unforgiving and after his slow Monday and Tuesday we pass like ships in the night most weeks, me trying to stay up to see him when he gets home and him waking up earlier to have some coffee as I bolt out to work.

But sometimes, he pulls out all the stops and cooks for me. And a girlfriend. At his restaurant. I'm talking a multi-course fiasco here, complete with sorbet palate cleanser and full wine pairings.

How 'bout a course-by-course review of last Saturday's epic tasting menu to end all tasting menus?

Like an idiot, I forgot to take pictures of the first two courses, so you'll have to use your imagination...But here is a nice sunset one overlooking the putting green and the rest of south Huntsville I got before I was distracted by our first glass of prosecco:

Course one:
Six fresh shucked oysters on the half shell - three Island Creek (tiny and fatty and briny - in a GOOD way, these were my favorites) and three Savage Harbor (also delightful, larger) - with a champagne mignonette, which is quite possibly my favorite condiment ever. Can I call it a condiment?

Course two:
Butternut squash soup, drizzled with a lemon agrumato and garnished with fresh parsley. Hey - this was a learning dinner as well... Did you know that agrumato is made when olive oil presses are cleaned with fresh citrus and the cleaning oil? Well it is.

Course the third:
A lovely, palate-cleansing lemon sorbet with mint leaves.

(Hey, guess what? I finally remembered to take photos starting... now!)

Course four:
Warm purple cabbage salad with goat cheese, walnuts and chicken sausage. I had a version of this salad at Mezza Luna last fall and let me tell you, it embodies everything that is the best about fall. Perhaps Mezza will feature it again this fall? You should definitely go check it out if this is the case. Purple cabbage reminds me of this Norwegian side dish my Grandma used to make (and my mom does now... surkal... better believe I had to look up the spelling on that one. Amazing dish.) The goat cheese/walnut combination added some delightful creaminess to the dish and the chicken sausage tasted homemade. Mmmm.


Course five:
The most amazing fried fish I've ever had in my life. This course reminded me of a fish fry, but the best possible fish fry ever. The flounder itself was everything I love about fried food (crispy, lightly bread-y, crunchy) but underneath the crust was amazingly cooked fish. Like, perfectly cooked. With the amazing fish was a honking hunk of grilled cornbread (the hush puppy), some super tart slaw with julienned granny smith apples and shaved fennel keeping the green cabbage company and some surprise sugar snap peas hidden under the flounder. This may have been my favorite course. Maybe.

Course six:
Braised short rib with fried gnocchi (which, as it turns out doesn't have to be made of potatoes can in fact be made of any sort of starch... who knew?) and roasted root vegetables, including turnips, parsnips, carrots, rutabaga and some other rooty veg. The whole thing was topped off by an amazing gremolata (another new food term for me) and the best, most concentrated jus you've ever tasted. The jus was everything that made the short rib amazing, combined with red wine and reduced down to its most intense form and drizzled all over the plate.

Remembered to take this photo before I demolished the short rib. Not in the most pristine state, but Kris give it thumbs up nonetheless.

Dessert course (course seven):
Pumpkin cheesecake. I'm not gonna lie. For me, sweets are typically an afterthought. If I get to eat an amazing meal, I'm usually so stuffed by the end that I don't have an intense desire for dessert. But as they were only six courses into a seven-course tasting, the dessert was inevitable. And wonderful. The cheesecake was incredibly light and airy and whipped. Not like the heavy brick-like ones you find sometime smothered in cherry goop. We got tiny little pieces and ate every last bite because we had to be polite. Naturally. The final glass of prosecco made those last bites go down quite nicely.

Hello there, Kris (and pumpkin cheesecake). The bubbles were the best.

I concur.

Since J will graduate in December, we hope that he will transition from cook to some sort of 8-5 food scientist position. I will miss the restaurant ambiance and J in his starched white chef coat (complete with embroidered name... le sigh), but I hope this will bring about a new round of experimentation in his free time that he's never been able to attempt previously due to a rigorous work/school schedule... I'm thinking charcuterie, bread making, at home canning and pickling. If all goes according to plan, there will still be plenty of ways for me to remain fatter than I would like to be. But happy. Yum.

Here's one of the man in action, making ravioli (not from tonight, but some other time. See what I mean about the starched white coat?) He's on the right.

Thanks J!

And because ALL I have been doing this fall is eating, stay tuned for my Taste of Atlanta recap.

Is it tomorrow yet?

I am beyond ready for "The Rocky Horror Glee Show".

'Glee' Does The 'Time Warp' @ Yahoo! Video

BEYOND. READY.

And I thought the treadmills were cool

Found this in my daily design blog reading, oddly enough. Apparently a reader was reminded of this video thanks to a weekly "pets on furniture" feature they have. I love that pets on furniture feature. They all look pretty happy in their situations, and a lot of them look like rescue critters, too. From the slammer to the couch - what an excellent turn of events for them. Perhaps we'll take one of Chuck chilling when we get our new couch!

Anyhow - O.K. Go is the best, I've decided.




Also, some other things to make you happy -

Hyperbole and a Half: ever heard of her? Me neither. So I visited her about pageS and continued to die laughing. How completely, awesomely, unhelpful?

Seriously, the best -
Sneaky hate spiral. (this about sums up my last week.)
The alot is better than you at everything.

Frankenfish

Looks like the FDA is about to approve the country's first genetically-modified animal. We've been consuming modified corn and soybeans for years, but never an animal, until now.

Before I get into the fish, let me back up to one of my favorite outreach exercises our education team has created here at work - G-MOD. High schoolers are given a lab in a box that contains everything they need to determine whether their favorite snack foods - Cheetos, Doritos, Oreo cookies and others - have been genetically modified.

• Students break open popular snack bags, pulverize the contents,
• Extract the DNA, amplify the DNA using PCR technology (which I like to refer to as a photocopier for DNA, giving you a larger sample of a specific part of the DNA to refer to)
• And finally, use a flash gel to determine whether the product they are analyzing has been modified.

Why do I like this experiment so much for high-schoolers? News flash! Every. single. processed. snack. food. we. eat. was created using "Roundup Ready" corn, created by a company called Montsanto.

Scary modified.

The concept was great - rather than farmers tilling their land for weeds, they use this special corn, douse their entire crop with Roundup (a Montesanto chemical product), then watch the weeds whither away as the corn crop thrives. Fantastic! Until the weeds cross-bred with the corn, creating super weeds. No joke. Read about it here.

O.K., now back to the fish:
AquaBounty Technologies is in the process of introducing a modified salmon to U.S. grocery store counters. According to their Web site the AquaAdvantage® fish -

Advanced-hybrid salmon, trout, and tilapia designed to grow faster than traditional fish. AquAdvantage® Salmon (AAS) reach market size twice as fast as traditional salmon. This advancement provides a compelling economic benefit to farmers (reduced growing cycle) as well as enhancing the economic viability of inland operations, thereby diminishing the need for ocean pens. AAS are also reproductively sterile, which eliminates the threat of interbreeding amongst themselves or with native populations, a major recent concern in dealing with fish escaping from salmon farms.

So, theoretically, they have all of the answers to the issues faced with Roundup ready crops. No worries! All problems solved! And apparently the FDA agrees, stating in pre-meeting documents that the studies conducted by AquaBounty show that the gene is safe for the salmon, safe for humans and safe for the environment.

Oh my - an AquAdvantage salmon behind a non-transgenic Atlantic salmon sibling of the same age. (via)

Critics primary problems with the fish include food safety concerns - primarily to do with allergies - and, like the Roundup Ready crops, cross-breeding with conventionally grown salmon.

AquaBounty has answers to all of these concerns, but many scientists maintain that the data to back up these claims of safety does not yet exist.

So, what to do? This topic is so fascinating to me because I actually don't know where I stand on the issue.

We want to reduce our dependency on foreign oil. We want to be sure all of our population is fed and healthy. We want to keep our farmers solvent... but some become outraged at the idea of modifying our crops to grow faster, more efficiently and in more places. How do we expect to use corn or soy to power our vehicles if we are growing only enough to eat?

Same goes for animals - We have a seafood watch list a mile long of fish we are not to eat because we have over-fished and these populations are dying out. What if we could enhance the growing of these fish. What if this advance in science enhanced the diet of families in countries who eat only rice, because that's what they can afford? Hell, what if this advance offered families here the chance to eat fish instead of fast and processed food that are typically the only offerings they can afford?

I can definitely understand the looming risks of mega corporations pushing their brands of herbicides and perfected DNA strains for world domination in their products, pushing out the little guy and ruining the environment in the process...

But I can also see an opportunity for millions more mouths to be fed with corn that grows in harsher environments, due to genetic modification. I can see a faster-growing fish not only feeding hungry families, but feeding them a product that is not over-fished and endangered.

What do you think? Panic? Celebrate? Wait?

For now, I go with wait. See what FDA says about AquaBounty. And hope they decide to label the GMO salmon at the store so I, and others, can make the decision to consume for ourselves.

so i guess this is growing up...

Channeling that Dammit this morning... it's an angsty, why won't anything go right, why can't I get a leg up, why don't the grown-ups understand me, Blink-182 kind of a morning.

Hmphhh.

Car is overheating... just had to take it to the repair shop. Looks like my trusty Camry may be biting the dust. As much as I'd love a new (to me) Mini Cooper, I was truly hoping that I could make the current car last quite a bit longer. You know, save up for something nice. Jonathan suggested holding off till we figure out where we'll be when he graduates in December. If the new locale is urban, we forget cars altogether and get a set of Vespas.

Also, if you'd like to call and commiserate, or perhaps to offer to meet for drinks to drown my sorrows (and yours, if you're having any) don't bother! My phone doesn't work either! That's right. iPhones malfunctioning are actually quite humorous. Very "Danger Will Robinson! Danger!" short. short. buzz. blink. flash. blank screen. I would be chuckling a bit more about it if I didn't actually need my phone.

So, anyway, here ends the whiny portion of this blog post. I've come up with a solution. I'm going to simplify my life.

If you would like to talk to me, please invest in a fire pit for your back yard and brush up on your smoke signals. I'll also be accepting telegraphs and telepathic messages.

If I need to get in touch with you, I will be using the Pony Express. Or telepathic messages. Maybe I'll just show up at your house. I'll do my best to judge when you might be home, but if you're not there, I'll hang out in your neighborhood Starbucks. Or make friends with your neighbors. I've been meaning to be more friendly with neighbors, too...

I still plan to go to work, when I can hitch a ride, or when I feel up to biking. I've been meaning to take this getting into shape thing more seriously and biking 10 miles to and from work every day (weather and mood permitting) will really expedite this process, don't you think? The days I really can't stomach the ol' bicycle and nobody is headed my way on I-565, I'll just work from home. You know, with my quill and ink, since my personal computer is also from 2002 and going the way of the dinosaur.

I think that this plan should work out really well for me. Why do we need to constantly upgrade, anyway? What if all of these things breaking at once is actually a sign from above that I should slow down, simplify, be more green?

I'll start growing a garden with seeds that I'll take from my neighbors' plot (we'll be on speaking terms since I'll have taken the time to introduce myself after two years.) I'll cook like a locavore, i.e., I'll cook using what I can buy from Star Market (it's walkable!) and what friends bring to my house. I'll learn an instrument in my free time since I won't be rushing all over town to meet friends places. Hell, I might even save that gas money I'd have been using and take a big air trip every year or so. J can come too.

Well, good. It's decided then. Should my car cost more than, oh, $300 to fix, I'll just put my blinker on and turn out of the fast lane to start living my life as I've detailed above.

You'd all still be friends with me if I looked like this girl, right?


She's kind of cute in a "let's sing folk tunes by the fire" sort of way...

And again, if you need to contact me, please write down my coordinates for future reference: 34.745955,-86.555981. That is all.

Miss now Mrs.

"Are you sure you want to change your name to 'Melanie Sollid-Penton'?" says Facebook.

Guess so... The name change process has begun.

Happy birthday, baby. This is definitely a big step, not a baby step.

Well, this basically sums up my writing mentality...

I saw this via Frank Chimero via someone else on Twitter. I just read a few of his posts today and am already quite enjoying what he enjoys. And how he writes about what we both seem to enjoy.

Anyway, there was a link from a completely unrelated post of his (which contained someone else's description of a meal at el Buli, I don't even know what the post was about, I was completely beside-myself distracted by that description...But I digress! Whyyyyy is the internet so convoluted? If you already struggle with tendencies that could be alarmingly similar to ADD, it's quite difficult to finish even one article or post (or, ahem, action item) without falling into a rabbit hole of other fascinating information.)

Here's the link that I liked. This is how I write, and I had been feeling sort of like a lazy grammar slouch for not caring more about keeping up on that stuff. But now someone on the internet has vindicated me. Post below:

‘That’s not what I was taught at school’ are words we hear a lot. We’re always using our unrules to undo the things people were taught to do (and not to do) in the classroom. It’s strange, writing at primary school is all about stories, being creative and enjoying what you write. By the time you get to GCSEs you're clinically unpicking why a poem works instead of saying why you like it (and you're living in fear of red pen). Writing at school should get your brain buzzing, not be a chore. So things are changing starting here.

Five Unrules:

5. Write short or ‘fragmented’ sentences. Ignore Microsoft Word’s green squiggly line. A sentence can have seven words. Or two. It’s up to you. Play with the length of your sentences to add pace and rhythm to your words.

4. Split infinitives. They can be clunky but they’re not grammatically incorrect.

3. Use contractions (eg that’s instead of that is). They’re a good way to make your writing sound more personal.

2. Don’t sign off letters with ‘Yours Sincerely if you know the person you’re writing to or ‘Yours Faithfully’ if you don’t. ‘Yours Sincerely?’ It’s 2010. You don’t need to use stuffy formality like this anymore (or start letters with ‘Dear Sir’ or ‘Dear Sir / Madam’ for that matter).

1. And you can start a sentence with ‘and’ or ‘but’. We just did.

And a bonus rule from Kurt Vonnegut:

‘Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college.’

I totally agree that you should write how you speak. That is, if people find you funny or interesting in the least. If it ain't broke, why fix it?

Nobody puts Baby in a corner!

But apparently Dancing with the Stars will be putting Baby in a spray tan and a series of increasingly sparkly (and flesh revealing) outfits. Who cares about Bristol Palin?! The original novice-turned-awesome ballroom dancer is going to see if she can recreate the transformation from ugly duckling to glittery swan she played in her one mega-hit...

This will be epic. And if it's not, I will be highly disappointed.

I hope they don't make Baby wear this:

Not even a super-uber hot Pussycat Doll can pull that shiz off...