Category: Object-ification

In which I moan and whinge about “things”– purchased, consumed, drunken, and otherwise.

Vampire Power and the Money We Lose

When I started dating my hubby, I owned the following electronics: A cheap, 3-disc changer stereo that was roughly the size of a large breadbox A CD walkman that ran on AA batteries (rechargeable) A Sony Dream Machine clock radio A laptop A small point-and-shoot film camera A cordless phone One cellphone and one charger…

On Loving Things

Thanks Tara! It’s Another We Scout Wednesday great topic. I have talked often here about how we should all de-stuff ourselves. Get rid of everything and just stop the consumption train. It’s no secret how I feel about that. I am the anti-packrat. At my house, if you leave your sh*t on the counter too…

Whispers in My Ear

Or, Distinguishing Random Life from Serendipity People keep giving me things to read that are telling to SHUT DOWN. Books about Machu Picchu. Books about moving to the country in Vermont. It always seems so hard to distinguish between what is the universe whispering in my ear and what is just an act of random…

Disney Princesses Have Ruined the Color Pink

Being politically motivated and standing up for my beliefs had an interesting side effect of making it difficult to choose a straw for my iced tea this morning. At my favorite locally owned coffeehouse, I purchased organic tea in a recyclable cup. Being the artful sort, I paused as I reached toward the cup of…

Striving for Balance

A Guest Post by ‘Shiny Bits’ blogger, Paul Merrill I love quirky products. It’s fun to cruise our local Whole Foods Market on a Saturday and taste samples from a variety of sometimes local small companies. Occasionally I take the plunge and buy one of their toothpastes or boxes of cereal. But for the most…

Taking the Bagel

The truth about life lies in this pat of butter. We can ask for what we want. We can even PAY for what we want. We can desire and expect it. But we won’t always get it. Here’s the bagel I had for breakfast at my favorite Milford cafe. I order it in this way.…

Untangle Me

My desire to untangle runs deep right now. In savasana last night, I imagined myself going “technology free” suddenly. Saying goodbye to the phones and the televisions, the blogs, Twitter and Facebook accounts that hang on me like screeching monkeys. I imagined what an evening would look like– the savanna of night time from washing…

Hipstamatic, and Other Faux Nostalgia

I’ve fallen in lust with Hipstamatic on my iPhone … All made possible because the iPhone 4 has a decent camera. Hipstamatic is the app that allows previously young people like me (who refuse to believe that status has changed) to believe that we can still be the great photographer we dreamed of being when…

All These Distractions

I recently joined a Facebook group that is a group and a game where points are awarded for posts, pics, links and comments, based on their wittiness and hilarity. The group’s moderator however, really prefers somewhat crude jokes, so I have to dip deep down in the barrel of my wit repertoire to get points.One…

Please Accept This Spider Drawing as Payment

Artists are basically fucked in America. They work their asses off, often all day and all night, spend heaps of money and thought on their craft and at the end of the month, they still have nothing with which to pay their water bills. So can they flush their toilets? NOOOO! One of the offspring…

Time, Sculpted and Consumed

We have time, and we use it up. It is the ultimate commodity in a temporary life. In a creative space, it seems to waiver in form: great gaping hours of fearful emptiness, or ultra-thin slivers of panicked release. Between reading Jon Kabat-Zinn’s “Wherever you Go, There You Are” and Scoutie Girl’s latest post on…

First Pesto Of the Season

From our organic garden… Well at least the basil is. The recipe is “Classic Basil Pesto” from a great new cookbook called “Put ‘Em Up” by Sherri Brooks Vinton. Makes me really admire the makers of all organic foods … Timing of foods, storage and transport is not easy!

Getting the Olivetti 33

I just went ahead, finally, and dished out the $$ on the Olivetti 33, because every writer should own a manual typewriter and this one is so lovely. I did what Mom told me and thought about it for awhile– like two years. Restored to oily perfection by Dan, aka “Mr Typewriter,” from Florrisant, MO,…

Why is “Local” so Weird?

My kids reallyreally like bananas and I am reallyreally glad about that. As some of you know, we are greeny-greensters, so we grow our own veggie garden, make compost, and buy organic and local. Well, sometimes. If we started to apply the “locally-grown” condition to our food (250-mile radius), what would be have to give…