beware food science

I am less and less able to buy food at the grocery store. This is partially my problem, I got used to having our CSA decide what we were eating (and when) but then the end of February came... and the winter share is over, and the summer is just in planning... nothing growing yet.

So I warily re-entered the grocery store, which I don't like to do for meat, dairy, vegetables or fruit. (yes, that is pretty much everything except grains, isn't it. Oh yeah, and CRAP which is mostly what stores have--and what I also buy-- chocolate covered pretzels, etc., we all know the crap list.) But, we are still eating, even though our farm is done sending us food, so off to the store I go.

I read Joan Dye Gussow's book, and laughed at her, (it was before February) because she accurately describes going into the grocery store, buying a few things, wanting to ask if the fruit is local, etc, and realizing you are just the crazy lady. I just wish I could garden like her, then it wouldn't be as much of a problem.

ANYWAY. I know tomatoes aren't growing right now in CO and i've gotten very very picky about my tomatoes actually being real. (meaning taste and act like tomatoes do) And it didnt take long for that to happen, just one plant in the garden, and then i knew.

but, after a few months of going o the grocery store, and refusing to buy almost every vegetable in it for reasons like it was grown in chile, or isn't organic. or isn't in season, or or or... I saw these tomatoes. They weren't organic, but they kind of looked real. and they felt real too, kind of full and heavy, slightly soft, a slightly bit irregular. I went gonzo and bought two. At home I took some of my favorite sliced french bread from the freezer. (really fresh when toasted) and thought i'd make up some Pan con tomate, sevillano style. But minus the garlic.

There, you get toast, and if it's a really good place, some quarter chunks of tomato and a few cloves of garlic. you smear these on your bread-garlic first-which is hard and sort of tears the tomato and garlic apart and oozes them into the delicious bread, you usually just have the tomato skin left, the rest you get to eat. Then you top the whole thing with olive oil and salt and VOILA. heaven.

Well, I cut open the "tomato" and then toasted my bread, and then attempted to smear the "tomato" onto the bread. But this apparently ripe thing maintained its shape entirely. the seeds did come out, but no juice, it was an IMPOSTOR!!!!! It almost fooled me except then I tried to EAT it!@!!!!!!@

Bastards, who did that to food? who made that look so real? WHO bothered, when the taste is what is important?

catchup

First, I wanted to report that Rowan went to the cabinet where we keep recycling, opened the door by the handle, and shocked, said!!! I can reach the HANDLE! I opened it by the handle!!
My boy is growing, that's for sure.

Second, you know the kind of person i am, I keep hearing the phrase, "not so much" from professors, pretty much anywhere. I was certain it was well known because of someone on TV, and because we don't have one, I looked elsewhere to educate my ignorance. I did a little searching, and lo and behold, a language health advisory from the The New Yorker says:

Language Health Advisory No. 3
“Not so much”
This catchphrase has not yet fully crossed over into the hot zone, but the danger signs are mounting. Its Google Repetition Index of 9.1 million is misleadingly inflated by its orthodox uses, which are not so much common as ubiquitous. (A better metric might be its Google Blog Repetition Index, a relatively low but still ominous 1.12 million.)
Its precise origins have not yet been definitively pinned down, although one researcher has traced its popularity to its repeated employment by Jon Stewart and the writers of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” It is still fresh enough for Stewart to wring a few dozen more laughs out of it, but bloggers and feature writers should be wary, as it is beginning to smell a bit ripe, à la “Duh!” and “Not!!”

the_new_yorker:http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/hendrikhertzberg/2007/10/language-health.html

In my estimation, since this was written, it has only become more widespread, even appearing in my casual speech... I guess it's better than "like". Which I can't shake, despite my best intentions. I remember a linguist at CU studying the multi-use-ness of "like" when I was studying there. It is useful, but certainly I should be able to use something a little more descriptive, right?

Dirt Clod Delicacy

yummy!!!

Rowan turned Three! Three short years ago our lives were permanently altered and we became lucky parents to a wiley sharp chatty lovely sweet rascally little boy. We love him beyond recognition and thank our lucky stars for this boy shining light on our path. Here he is working at the sink.

Here is my Milo boy, in all his nine month glory, crawling pulling up and really only protesting when he is hungry.

He has a big voice, this guy, and a great sense of humor. He adores Rowan, and thinks George and I are okay too. We are so lucky, and so thankful

My friends Jade and Lyle need you to send her love and hope for her little girl. I haven't posted about her, but I think about her all the time. She's getting ready to have a large operation in Minnesota and we need to rally the forces and shower her with all the good we can. She's got a rough go of it, and her parents too.

This struck me today like a lightning bolt when I read it: from "dalai mama" a regular feature in Wondertime Magazine. It is a surprisingly good publication most of the time. I have my beefs, but if you know me, you know I always have my beefs. Anyway.

She's writing about her daughter being sick, again. "I try to remember that there are parents everywhere, wheeling and dealing with God over their children's lives, for whom a garden-variety virus would be something like a gift."(WT, May 2008)

My friends are these parents.

The other line that comes to mind is from Tim O'brien, who sang, in There Ain't No Easy Way "I prayed to the father to the moon and the sun, I prayed to anyone or anything that could get the job done."

And we do too, for them.

Fur producing dog and cat free to any home

We should know better, but apparently we needed one more lesson from our animals. We (all four of us--RARE) went out together to look at helmets and bags for DR and DH after a nice meal of salmon and rice pilaf. We carelessly left the half a piece of salmon on the stove, (of all the places) and a loaf of bread on the counter... (of all the places!)

We arrived home from our fun little excursion to three remaining slices of bread on the floor (i bought the loaf yesterday.) And the SALMON on the FLOOR, nibbled on. Because the container was still intact on the stove we believe that the cat is guilty for the salmon, and we know the dog who wouldn't come out of the room is guilty for the bread.

Damn animals.

Okay, now it's spring-

I got to ride my scooter to the library today, and when i filled the gas tank it cost me 3.20. Used to cost two bucks way back in 20o4 when I got it, before I had two children! I love that scooter, and today is gorgeous, probably 70 degrees out front. If I wrote poetry I would write an ode to my Kymco, how awesome to tool down the street

Rowan chipped a tooth last night by swinging on a swing and colliding into part of the swingset. I missed it of course, and he came crying with blood coming out of mouth, (not a lot) and I just feel so terrible. If you know me at all, you know how my interactions with the dentist are never pleasant. It's not the dentist's fault, its just my terrible teeth. In any case, since I found out I was pregnant with Rowan, I have continually begged the powers that be that these children get GEORGE's genetic makeup for teeth. And my heart just sinks thinking about taking him to the dentist and his tooth getting rotten or something because he damaged it swinging into a pole.

The zinc paint/color on the pole is on two of his teeth (!) blech. I have been planning to take him to the dentist now that he's almost THREE!!!! on Friday, and I am just so unhappy to have a real reason to go there.

screen time

Thought I'd pass this along to whoever is interested, I don't have the energy to give a good summary, just click on the link and see where it takes you.

http://www.screentime.org/index.php?id=1

The city of Denver offers free "how to compost" classes, and every one of them in MAY is already full. there are plenty still open in June July and August!! yikes.

We got our peas planted in the ground. It was my goal this year to have pea plants, and I did it! now, hopefully they'll grow. I guess I'll sign up for a class in June for composting. I feel grumpy since it's the first week in April, and that feels so far away.

off to bed, we had a great pizza night with Helen, Annika and Aunty Rachael. No pics because the camera is with G in Fruita.