If it’s brown, put it down!

I don’t like a meal of brown food. I won’t eat it.

Wait, is that a sliver of yellow I’m seeing?

This morning, while looking through my feeds on FB, I saw two photos of meals consisting of brown food. One image was a meal at local, popular restaurant by the harbor. I do see token green and miniscule orange and purple, but not worth considering.
Wait, there’s yellow in there!

The second meal was a tofu scramble, vegan sausage and hash browns.
If a person chooses to become vegan, why make the effort to create a brown ‘sausage,’ which obviously resembles a slab of meat in taste or texture?

I’d rather not eat, than pretend to enjoy this brown meal. 

Just the look of it makes me feel kind of oooky.

Brown ‘sausage’ poser. ^^^

What are you hiding, little blue foil?

I wandered into the recesses of my mind and found the classic school lunches, in brown.  Brown school lunches have always troubled me.  I understand that bread can be brown, baked beans can be brown and some other select foods.  But the whole meal?  Brown?

If the school used a brown tray, then nothing would be visible,

except for the hidden brown treat dressed in a pretty blue.

A half dozen blues with a shadow of white.

There are some school lunches that add some support  or interest to the brown food. 

Probably pesticide laden, but prettier to look at.

Cafeteria lunches are equally brown.  You can add a little color to your brown meal by picking up a banana or other fruit.  You can also buy artificially colored fake foods, such as jello.

This one has some whitish yellow in it.

Who eats this?  And where’s the napkin? 

Catered food is often brown, or contains an overload of brown food. 

There’s that yellow and white thing again. I have to check my color wheel to see how this works.

There are quite a few brown foods, clean and natural. 

I can select one of these to accompany colorful foods in a meal. 

choose well, my friends

Some of these brown foods need this to help them along.

Doing my part to add color to the menu.

 

Still, the best brown foods are brown naturally, and not man made. 

I proclaim this day, August 19th, GOOD BROWN FOOD DAY! 

Have a colorful day!

 

Whoa, Nelly!

My, oh my, oh my! How much things have changed here on WordPress.

It’s time to resurrect my blog. Has anyone stayed with the classic mode or moved forward into the new and exciting WordPress?

Darylann

Art-ificial Flower

 “I’d rather view a corpse than an artificial flower.”

Decades ago, having read that quote, (author unknown) I thought it odd, glib, even morbid.

In a contest between a corpse and an artificial flower, the corpse reigns supreme?

  The meaning of the statement can be applied far beyond the simple components – ‘corpse’ and ‘artificial flower.’

Here, they serve perfectly for points of discussion.

An artificial flower:  imitation of a living flower, the essence of a natural flower, a stand-in for longevity.

  When I read the quote decades ago, flowers were plastic and wire and a poor copy of living, fragrant flowers. They looked cheap, manufactured, pitiful. They smelled like plastic and lasted for as long as the dust could be washed off if their limited colors didn’t fade.  They were placed by gravesites, in permanent arrangements at home and even in public gardens.  The artificial flowers were a small indicator of a very large lust for longevity.

Though we see the hopeful creation of real flowers essence in paper, silk, ribbon, fabrics, more delicate plastics and other materials of the art-ificial flower art-ist, there is no equal for a living or even a cut, dying, genuine flower.

The volatile components of a real flower, incomparable, the optical spectrum, brilliant.  Bees and birds dance on real flowers, our sense of touch, should we so wish to summon it, evokes delicate, unequaled perfection on our fingertips. Wind moves flowers, shuffles the leaves, immersing us in a glistening hush.

What of the child who sees in the dandelion, flower or seed head, the love of Mother?  The child selects the living flower, crushes the stem with eager little hand and offers the gift?  The flower becomes more than a living thing, more than a dying thing, and is further saturated by love.

How, then, does a corpse become more remarkable than an artificial flower?  In all cases, the corpse, having once lived, all the fragility, beauty, strength, uniqueness and complexity of a human being parallels the simple, natural flower.   No artificial flower could be nearly as memorable as a life, of any kind.

Another day at the (prehistoric) beach

Breaking from chores, we went to the beach a few days ago to breath the clean, moist sea air.  As we walked a short distance ahead, I was attracted by color –  a dark yellow and brick red and somewhat circular form on the sand.  I approached, witnessed movement and gathered the creature into my hands.

The creature closed into a more rounded shape.  You can see that the outside edges of this creature are ruffled.  It was heavy, dense and about the size of my two fists, combined.

I know, it appears to be smiling…

I wanted to look inside again, but the creature was uncooperative, and this was as far as I could open it using my own strength. Once I let go with my right hand, the creature slowly closed up again.  No hurry.

It’s one mass of muscle!

When our dog wasn’t looking, my husband threw it back into the ocean.

Here we have a Giant Gumboot Chiton, or, Great Pacific Chiton.  I didn’t see any of the typical plates on it’s back, but then, I may not have noticed.

What’s most fascinating is that this creature hasn’t changed for 50 million years!  A chance happening with a prehistoric creature – thrilling!

A Measurement of Self

At six a.m., I woke to hear noises of splashing, thrashing in water.  As it continued, I became concerned that one of the rabbits had escaped, found her way into a large bucket of water in the bathtub.  We use the bucket to collect water while it warms, for our showers.

I didn’t interpret the sounds to be life threatening, but I decided to get up and make sure all my creatures were safe.

It’s cool in the early mornings and the horses were running, playing, as the sun had already risen.  All the little creatures were in their proper places, and the water bucket untouched.  Likely, my daughter’s cat had found an activity in the next bedroom which sounded quite the same as water play.

I went back to bed, to rest my weary back.  The price for weeks of gardening and yard work is terrible back spasms.   The warnings are waning, and for the rest of the season, I hope to be smart enough to pace myself.

Surprisingly, I fell to sleep again and dreamed a theme I’ve visited throughout life, for as long as I can remember.

I walked into a large, crowded restaurant.  For the large number of people present, it was fairly quiet.  I looked around and decided to fly above them, to show them, perhaps, that it can be done.  

I used my take-off technique –  a little bounce to get off of the ground.  I felt gravity release me and as  I moved forward, covering about 15 feet,  kept my legs bent behind me at the knees.  Successful on my first attempt, I  gained altitude and sailed above the crowd, under my own power of thought and technique.  I was aware that I could crash down at any time, and had to hold my technique in the forefront of my thoughts.  I recalled other times I had flown for long periods or could not get off the ground at all.

Most folks didn’t notice or, if they did, they remained quiet, unchanged.  Though it was a restaurant, I noticed no food on any of the tables during my flight.

Time to come down, I suppose.  I decreased my altitude and came down to the ground/gravity in a somersault position, with a slight bang. I didn’t execute the somersault, simply used it for protection upon landing.  The entire process, quite fluid. 

The restaurant continued in quiet status. 

As I was back on my feet, I felt pleased that I was able to fly, so effortlessly this time. 
I experienced a sense of peace, knowledge of self and power.

Have you ever dreamed of flying?

If so, what did your dream say about you? What was it telling you?

What do you think of my dream?

I would enjoy hearing from you!

Opinion: A Case for Cruelty-Free

Please consider going cruelty-free. The PETA site has a very good list of companies. Even the big box store has its own brand, though not labeled as such.

MODA Magazine

by Jen Anderson

What if I told you that the eye shadow you’re wearing was tested directly on the eyes of innocent bunnies that reacted so badly to the product their sight was permanently affected? What if I told you that the product was still put on the market despite this outcome? Though this is a fictional example, very real and often very worse results are a horrific industry norm.

Animal testing is a troubling reality, and especially scary given that more and more cosmetic brands are choosing to test their products on animals in order to expand their reach to other countries and customers. Animal testing is not safe. It is not painless. And it is certainly not valid. It is unjust to raise animals for the sole purpose of testing, to make naive animals suffer in the name of beauty.

Recently, I became very concerned when I discovered…

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They call me the Pusher.

I’m a comfort pusher.  Comfort is a sense of physical or psychological ease.

While raising my children, comfort was an integral part of the unrelenting nurturing.

When I receive guests, their comfort, as well as mine, is paramount.

How do I assist folks in being comfortable, when they exhibit discomfort, squirming, tension, dis-ease or lack of peace?  Start here –

• Take up the chatter.  Fill the empty, awkward space with friendly, softly spoken words.

• Offer a seating position in which s/he can see everything.  Be sure there are no surprises from behind.

• Smile a lot.  Put the twinkle in your eyes.

• Give the person something to do with their hands and thoughts.  A beverage or snack is fine for some. Don’t ask, just give.  I may shove forth an ice-breaker, such as a polished stones or a small, framed, antique photograph from my collection.  Occupy the mind, and the dis-ease will dis-appear.

• Keep it intimate.  By focusing on one person or small group, you can quickly build rapport.  Everyone becomes comfortable, secure.

• Touch.  A touch on the shoulder or arm, lets ’em know you care.

• If things seem sticky, take the spotlight off of him/her and share something of yourself.  I may offer to visit with my horses or look at the something wonderful in the garden.

Wondering what brought this on?

While at the Farmer’s Market, I noticed that half the vendors don’t acknowledge my presence, look me in the eye, seem interested in a sale, or even know I exist!  I wonder if the problem is their discomfort with me, or some kind of misplaced uneasiness with the selling process!

If the mood strikes me, I test, or play little games.  I’ll stand at the booth to see how long it will take for the vendor to acknowledge me, or even make eye contact with me. Some never do!

If I really want something, I’ll wave their vegetables around in the air – “HELLO!!”  No one can ignore a crazy lady.

Mind you, I’m not uncomfortable when someone ignores me, and it’s kind of amusing when I get ignored for more than 30 seconds.  That may not seem like a long time, if we two are the only ones standing there! Tick-tock, tick-tock…  I’m staring at you!!

Did I say I was big on comfort?  I’m also big on entertainment.

I’m planning on becoming a vendor at our local Farmer’s Market next year and everyone who takes the time to stop by will be comfortable. I’ll have a chair ready for those that need it, recipes, smiles, clean food, and cool stuff and someone who cares about the customer’s comfort.

Come on in!  We’re open!

Out the door, and all around me

About a month from now, the red huckleberry will be waiting for picking. Our small fruit orchard is growing beautifully and we are planning to cover most every inch of space with trees, flowers, fruits, vegetables, and so on. The horses now have a small pasture to graze on for an hour or two each day, until the rainy season returns. We’re all very happy here.

seapunk2

 

A wonderful place to live, this!  It’s berry picking season, and the varieties numerous!

Red huckleberries aren’t for everyone, being tart, and hard to reach.  I spent an hour or two recently gathering some.  You can see how tiny they are, and every berry I gathered is in that small bowl.  Crushed them, mixed a bit of organic sugar in, and served it warm on ice cream.  Wow!  What a punch of flavor!

Seems that the spiders and moths are more active and visible in spring and fall.  It’s not fall yet, but it’s coming, as the nights are cooler and the fog and mist are back in the mornings.

This little moth resembles a bit of redwood bark!  Clever camouflage and astounding what Mother Nature can do with even the tiniest of creatures.  But wait!  What of this?

Every insect, creature, plant seems so perfectly formed! Beautiful symmetry!

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There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home…

English: Woman sewing on old treadle machine (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Miss me?

I missed you.  I’m due to write my monthly blog post about writing, and feel a bit lost without you.

Being active in the non-GMO movement takes time, as if I had any extra to begin with.

The garden has kept me very busy, and I’m working on saving my neighbor’s old greenhouse.   It’s a small one, will need new fiberglass panels, but I’ve cleaned it out and it’ll make a great seed starter for next season and many more.

We haven’t moved it to our place, yet.  Dry summers push us outside most every day, wet and soaking winters, indoors.  Today, it’s about 68° and sunny, with humidity around 80%.  It’s a fine day, though very windy. I wouldn’t mind a bit of rain, though.

I’ve started practicing hand quilting again, and though I’m no master, I find it quite relaxing and challenging.  Quilting and sewing are both hobbies I’ve learned on my own.  With my new vintage sewing machines, I’ve figured out that each one is good at something, much like people.

I’m ready to start on my genealogy again, a month long break is enough.  My mind is fresh and my shovel is ready to dig.

See you soon!

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