A Little Discretion, People

I am not the least bit original in writing a post that complains about F**ebook.    And actually, I’m not even complaining about the site itself, but about the moronic way people choose to use it.  But I’m going for it anyway.

Do you not realize, “Friends”, that when you post something, pretty much everybody can see it?  It doesn’t matter if you’ve made it private, or not allowed it on your timeline, or limited it to the first 400 people whose names start with “C”.  One of those idiots is going to comment on your post/picture/video/share, and then all of their friends will be able to see it.  And it all just goes downhill from there.

In the last week, I have either experienced or witnessed four major* social faux pas, all courtesy of careless posting on said social network.  Three have happened to me personally, and I have simply chosen not to be offended (though I have to admit to being slightly so at first blush.)  First, I noticed a friend RSVP to a wall post inviting her child to another friend’s child’s birthday party– to which my children were not invited.  If you’re going to use F**ebook to invite someone to something, why would you post it on their wall where everyone (including those of us who are NOT invited) can see??  Rude, rude, rude.  And rude of the RSVPer to reply in kind.  Can’t you just send a private message and keep it between yourselves?  I don’t judge you for not inviting my children, but please don’t rub my nose in it.

This morning, a similar occasion happened, except this time the parent created an Event and selectively invited people.  The Event is private and closed, but RSVPs, somehow, are not.  I saw another friend RSVP to the Event, which is titled “R’s Karate Birthday Party [and you're not invited]“.  That’s what I read, anyway.

Last week, another “Friend” posted about her upcoming trip to her MIL’s house.  She does not particularly care for her MIL and moaned for days leading up to the trip.  It was pretty obvious that she was not looking forward to spending time there.  I really didn’t know what to say to her, then, when we were all gathered in the MIL’s living room together.  The MIL is a good friend of ours and, in our opinion, deserving of a much nicer DIL.

The best (worst), though, is a tragic story.  I was visiting a friend (in real life) and we were talking about a family tragedy that had just occurred.  Her nephew had taken his own life, and the family was just devastated.  My friend’s daughter was sitting in the room with us, checking her phone, and I saw her face go white.  She whispered furiously to her mother: “Aunt Joyce doesn’t know!” Apparently, my friend had posted a link to the newspaper story before the entire family had been notified. Poor Aunt Joyce got the double blow of the loss and being out of the loop.

While these are single instances of good intentions gone bad, there are other habits of some of my friends that are persistently obnoxious.  One is the propensity of a certain few to check me in to places.  Whenever I go somewhere with one of these people, they feel the need to tell everyone they know that I am there with them.  Friends, maybe I don’t want to be seen with you.  Maybe I would like to just keep that between us, eh?  Or maybe I don’t want other people to know where I am.   It really creeps me out when I meet a total stranger and she says, “oh, hi!  Nice to meet you!  How was the concert last week?”

I keep thinking I should just delete my account, but I do use it for things like keeping up with local news announcements, getting updates from educational programs and places where we have memberships, and other local events and happenings.  It is useful, even if it is annoying.

Maybe I should just delete all my “Friends” instead.

*in my small, petty opinion, of course

Nature and the Typewriter

Yesterday we went to our local metroparks with friend G, who I met years ago when she taught me and my SIL how to bellydance.  G had invited several friends to join her for a nature party at the park, with the idea that we would do some birdwatching, beading, seed trading, and get in a little hike.  As it turned out, we were the only ones able to attend, so I guess it was more of a nature “date” than a party.  No matter.

The girls and I got there in the early afternoon to find G on a lawn chair, with a nearby picnic table laid out with items for our afternoon.  She had brought a beautiful laminated bird identification guide, which helped immensely since my guide was an unwieldy National Geographic tome that was not particularly novice-friendly.  We had binoculars, and took turns watching a female blue jay and a few robins hard at work.  The girls also spotted several butterflies and damselflies.

After a quick snack, we got out our beading materials and made necklaces and bracelets.  I never knew how to attach the findings properly, so this was a fantastic little lesson for me.  G was generous enough to send us home with not just our jewellry, but also several crimp beads which I never understood how to use before (and therefore didn’t have any in my collection of supplies!)  As I have come to learn, crimp beads are pretty much essential to making jewellry you can actually wear.

We also traded some seeds; I had several extra packets of basil and borage, while she had some interesting baby zucchini and some coriander/cilantro.  Then the girls were insistent that we went on a little hike, so we put our things into the cars and walked down the asphalt trail.

It was really hot out, although the shady path and breeze made it bearable.  But the girls were thirsty, and after just a short while of walking they started complaining.  We kept encouraging them to keep going, and bribed them with the promise of a big, cold drinking fountain a little further down the trail.

The drinking fountain ended up being a lot further than either G or I remembered, however.  And just as we were about to wonder if it was a figment of our collective imagination, we rounded a little bend and saw the familiar kiosk area of Halfway Point.  Water!  Benches!!

We also saw something in the middle of the path that piqued our interest:

“Write Yourself Here”?? We went closer to find out what it was about, and discovered a typewriter in the middle of the trail. Yes, a typewriter– a real one, with a ribbon and the little “ding” that chimes when you reach the right margin. A manual carriage return. No backspace key.

We discovered the typewriter belonged to a woman named Maya, who calls herself the Type Rider. She is riding her bike, while trailing this typewriter and its host table on a little trailer behind her, from Massachusetts to Milwaukee. Along the way, she is stopping in smallish towns and talking with people and asking them to poke out a few words or sentences on her turquoise machine.

Maya was talking with a few other ladies who had stopped to Write Themselves Here. She was very gracious and asked the girls, who were practically jumping to try out the machine, if they wanted to type something. S8 wasted no time in sitting down.

She tried out a few keys by typing her name. It was work for her to press them hard enough to get a good impression on the paper, but she managed. She wrote:

I love thiis typewritee r!111!!!

3

Then O6 had a turn. She was a little unsure of what to say. Poor kid had a serious case of writer’s block.

Finally, she wrote:

O6 was he re.

(Of course, she didn’t call herself “O6″, but that’s beside the point.)

After that we talked with Maya and a friend of hers, whose name I have completely forgot. The friend had been talking with G while Maya and I were discussing the project, and now she asked me how G and I knew each other. When I said she had been my bellydance instructor long ago, everyone’s ears perked up and they started asking lots of questions. So G ended up doing a very impromptu lesson in the park, and a few other people gathered around, and pretty soon about eight of us were doing (bad) hip circles in the middle of the path. It was quite incredible, actually.  And I would have taken photos, but I can’t do hip circles and operate the camera at the same time.  Pity.

Safe travels, Type Rider.

First Bouquet of Spring

The girls picked these for me today.

Encore Performance

Two years ago, I bought this “Bleeding Heart” from a community plant sale.  I dutifully took it home, put it in a shady garden spot, and watched it wither away to nothing.  The following year brought neither hide nor hair of this cool-weather plant, and I assumed it had been lost forever.  However, I spotted something pink in the shrubby brush that is my main shade garden this spring.  Lo and behold, the bleeding heart has come back!  Its blooms are now gone, since this picture is about a month old, but the plant looks lush and green.  Maybe it was just lost among the weeds.  In any case, welcome back, little plant.  Hope to see you again next year.

Bluebells

Bluebells are blooming! The girls and I took a quick hike through the woods and enjoyed the brilliant display.

They are beautiful, dainty flowers, but en masse they are stunning.

They’re so pretty we had a spring in our step as we followed the Bluebell Trail.

And then we stopped to play Poohsticks at the bridge.

The End.

Reproduction According to Children

The girls are playing with a bucket of plastic wild animal figures.  From the other room I just heard this:

S6: When the rhinos want to mate, they put their horns together!

O5: When the giraffes want to mate, they put their necks together.  Then they kiss, like this!  mwah, mwah, mwah!

S6: When the cheetas want to mate, they run in opposite directions, really fast!!

O5: When the elephants want to mate, they throw water on each other!!!

CSA Box 7

No picture again (I suck) but last week we had the following in our CSA box:

• 6 ears of corn
• 1 large-ish eggplant
• 4 small-ish red tomatoes
• bunch of kale
• medium head of cabbage
• 8 small white potatoes
• 6 small red potatoes
• 2 cucumbers
• 2 peppers
• bunch of radishes

I traded L my share of the eggplant for her pepper, which worked out nicely for each of us (since I don’t care for eggplant and she doesn’t eat green peppers).   Yay.

The corn was gone that very night, the tomatoes and cucumber went into a faux-Greek salad (that had no olives, hence the complete non-Greek-ness).  I made halushki with the cabbage, shredded the potatoes, and put the peppers into salad and stirfry.  I’ll confess, the kale is on the compost pile.  I left it go too long in the fridge and it got limp and scary looking.  The radishes are still hiding out in the crisper drawer.

Summer’s Flying

It’s the start of the main harvest season already.  Holy cow, where does the time go?? I just wrote about cherries and now it’s late July already.  I must have blinked.  Or napped.  Or something.

We’ve been getting our CSA boxes (and promptly NOT blogging them – gah!) each week.  I should take a moment to catch up on those before it’s time for Thanksgiving.

Unfortunately, I have lost some of my pictures.  Er, temporarily misplaced them, anyhow.

CSA Box 3- June 30

• 10 cucumbers (4.75 #)
• 3 yellow UFO squash (we later discovered they are sunburst squash), 1 # 4oz
• 3 large yellow squash, 2# 4 oz
• 2 cucumbers, 10 oz
• 6 oz yellow beans
• 6 oz green beans
• bunch chard & other green, 8 oz
• 8oz broccoli
• 3 tomatoes, 1 # 12 oz

CSA Box 4 – July 7

• 2 large zucchinis
• 3 yellow squash (1 large, 2 small)
• 2 yellow squash of undetermined name
• 5 beets
• 5 radishes
• green beans
• 2 large cucumbers
• 2 onions (1 large/ 1 medium)

CSA Box 5 – July 14

• 2 heads garlic
• 5 fat cucumbers
• 4 narrow cucumbers
• 2 white onions
• 4 sunburst squash
• 4 tomatoes
• bunch of beets
• large bunch of green beans

CSA Box 6 - July 21

• 1 small head cabbage
• 6 ears corn
• 1 white onion
• 3 medium and one super-baby zucchini
• 5 cucumbers
• 2 large, 2 medium red tomatoes
• 5 green apples
• bunch radishes
• bunch kale

You may notice that it’s not my kitchen counter in these photos.   My friend L, with whom we are splitting the box, is obviously much more on top of things.   Somehow we have all the pictures she took, and none of the ones I took.   Now that’s pretty embarassing.

CSA Box 2

This week’s CSA box contained quite a few surprises.

We received an email on Tuesday reminding us of our pickup the following day, and suggesting that we could expect the following:

Cabbage
Peas
Beans
Table onions
Lettuce
Oregano
Radishes
Carrots

What we ended up getting was

• Cabbage
• Peas
• Beans
• Table onions okay, we did get green onions, but they were insanely large
• Lettuce
• Oregano
• Radishes
• Carrots

But then we also got

• 3 large tomatoes (almost 2 # total)
• 3 medium fennel bulbs with fronds
• a 2.5 # zucchini plus 1# 6oz yellow squash (3) and 1 # 6 oz zucchini (2)
• 2 small heads of broccoli

Hence the surprises. We really shouldn’t complain.  But now you see the problem with this new CSA: it’s not that the product is faulty, lacking or otherwise bad.  It’s that no one has a freaking clue what’s going on. But they tell you things anyway.  And they say it in such a knowing tone that we believe them. And then they turn out to be wrong, which leads to confusion and frustration. But they haven’t disappointed, actually, so it’s even harder because we *want* to be mad but there’s not really anything to be mad about, other than general discombobulation. Argh.

I’m trying very hard not to be biased.  The food is darn good and that’s the whole point of the thing, right?

For reference, last year’s box (6/25) included:

• bag of noodles
• 6 green onions
• head lettuce
• head cabbage
• cauliflower
• large zucchini
• 18 eggs
• pint of cherry tomatoes

Peas Please

I had a very modest but very delicious crop of peas this year.  We planted a row of about 15 plants on St Patrick’s Day, and another row two weeks later, on my birthday.  I can’t say it was financially worth the effort, but it was fun to pick our own and shell them.  And we definitely had more success than last year, so that’s something.

This is the second harvesting.

I think we averaged about one or two pods per plant. Not particularly bountiful, but the peas are still tasty. The kids had fun shelling them, and that was also a good “job” for them to help with. They did all of them on their own.

We counted how many peas were in each pod. The fewest number of peas was two. The most was five.

I was very impressed that the kids stayed on task and finished the whole bowl. O4 started to get a little bored at the end, but S6 and I helped her finish the last three pods. All three of them had exactly four peas inside.

Some of these went into my salad for dinner, and the rest are about to go into alphabet soup. I’m also toying with planting a fall crop in a different place, to see if they do any better.