Not that I expect anyone to actually watch this whole thing, except possibly my mom if my niece isn't there, but as this is a journal type thing, I just want this for myself. It's a thunderstorm. It was pretty.

Whoa. Usually we spend $20-30 at the farmer's market. Today we spent $62.30. We maintain that it was worth it. And that's all our grocery shopping for (at least) the week. Plus, much of what we got will carry over into next week. And we splurged - we got sweets and goodies like we have never gotten before. Here's what we got:

-A loaf of fresh-baked multi-grain bread, a loaf of fresh-baked sourdough bread, half-dozen brownies, and half-dozen chocolate-chip chocolate crumb cookies, all baked by Brian Hernon of Slow Rise Bakery in Lancaster, PA.

-6 big ears of corn on the cob

-A jar of homemade blackberry jam and a dozen big pods of okra, from the Martin Luther King High School Urban Garden

-2 bunches of light green curly kale and 1 bunch of dark-leafed kale

-3 garlic... things (not cloves, those are the individual things, right? the bunches of cloves, I guess... unless those are called cloves)

-2 quart-baskets of sweet potatoes (I've been making sweet-potato fries almost every day)

-2 small, slender eggplants

-fresh catnip for the babies, and a thing of chili powder for our cooking, from the lady who brings homegrown herbs

-a quart-basket of green beans

-a quart-basket of sweet onions

-10 carrots

-half-dozen tomatoes

-2 cucumbers

We got there right at 10 today, when the market opens. Sometimes, we don't go until right about this time of day. Usually we go around noon. Getting there at 10 makes a big difference in selection - we couldn't believe it. Last week, I put the corn on the cob in the crisper drawer - this week it won't fit! :D

I came home and had a slice of bread with jam, then made a sandwich on sourdough with onion, tomato, mushrooms (the only thing that doesn't come from the farmer's market), kale, and homemade dressing of olive oil, vinegar, and herbs from previous weeks at the market. Also had some sweet potato fries with that, as usual.

We still have squash, zucchini, cauliflower, and broccoli from before. I feel like we just eat constantly and never run out of food. We are going to be so spoiled, when winter comes I don't know what we'll do. The market is year-round but of course, nature does different things year-round. It's nice to have our food reflect the seasons so closely.

[Pat] Buchanan is right. This white man is full of resentment.

Excerpt:

I am a proud product of a public kindergarten, public elementary school, public junior high school, public high school, two land-grant universities, a government graduate fellowship and a decade's work treating the seriously mentally ill for the government. I spent half of my life on the educational dole, and I resent seeing rich kids with half my brains and a tenth my work ethic waltzing into Ivy League schools because they have the right name and the right private school background. I resent that Buchanan has no problem with THEM taking seats from deserving poor white men.

I like it when people brag about their public education.

So I was hit by a pedestrian this morning. I was riding my bike to work, near the colleges. Here's something I think I have told you before: College students lack the ability to cross a street competently. I have complained, I have explained, I have warned, I have begged for understanding. But they refuse to look up unless there is something like a delivery truck with an air-horn coming at them. Anything smaller is beneath their notice. There's a stretch of Chestnut Street where I always have to slow down and make loud noises ("Yoohoo!" "Look out, folks!" "Beep! Beep! Beeeeeep!" "TRAFFIC!") because there are frequently large groups of students moving stupidly across the street with their little thumbs just moving a mile a minute on their little phones and Blackberries, no doubt keeping up with Very Important News Of The Day.

Well, this morning, I was practically crawling down Chestnut Street, as some of the students did not appear to be slowing, even as I sang loudly at them - I think it was a Spoon song. One tight knot of youngsters cut it particularly close, and I was almost stopped, just as a precaution, when they finally looked up and caught my eye, looks of abject terror and surprise at finding themselves suddenly on a busy city street at rush hour and not wherever they had been thinking they were. As I said, I was almost stopped. But I was still moving, thankfully slowly, when one of the more reality-challenged children, a poky little bovine girl of about twenty-three or so, who had been traveling with this small wad of friends, failed to follow their lead, plodding from behind them just as I passed the group, and - without ever looking at me for one single moment - walked into my bicycle. She gasped - shocked, no doubt, that someone else was using the world right at the same time she was. I screamed. I fell onto the sidewalk, catching myself on the heel of my right hand. "JESUS CHRIST!" I commented. Poky looked at me. Blinked. Spoke.

"You ran into ME."

?? Really? That's your comment?! I was riding my bike just now IN THE BIKE LANE of a busy street that you chose to cross without the aid of light, crosswalk, or traffic cop, perpendicular to moving traffic. Your goofy friends FINALLY ripped themselves off of auto-pilot and stopped walking, right before they would have walked into me. You, however, are not the fittest, and you should not survive. You walked into a moving bicycle! You watched me fall to the pavement. And THAT'S the first thing you say?!

"IT'S A LANE!" I screamed. "IT'S A STREET! YOU SHOULD HAVE LEARNED HOW TO CROSS IT BEFORE YOU MOVED OUT OF YOUR MOMMY'S HOUSE!"

Poky had stepped onto the sidewalk and was turned as if walking away from me, but was hesitating. "You ran into..."

"LEARN HOW TO CROSS THE GODDAMN STREET!"

Poky Princess started to prance away from me up the sidewalk. I turned my attention to my bicycle. The chain was off. After at least 20 paces, she turned and hurled one last, "You ran into ME," at me, at which point I decided she would be publicly shamed. Pointing at her as she scurried across campus, I gave an impromptu lecture about the various competencies that I believed should reasonably be expected of a.) people of her age and b.) anyone who attends an Ivy League school. I further offered evidence that the general student body of both Penn and Drexel (the latter of which is not Ivy League, but honestly, street-crossing should be covered even at sub-par institutions), overall, lacked the various competencies I had laid out. There were a great many students milling about. None of them offered to help me with my bike chain or offered use of a cell phone, which I do believe exhibits a level of survival instinct that is above average for their demographic.

It took me probably 15 minutes to get my bike chain back on. My wrist was starting to ache. I finally got back onto my bike, covered with black grease, and started to ride on down Chestnut Street. I was approaching the bridge into Center City, and my bike gears kept slipping. And my wrist and arm were aching. Fuck it, I turned back and headed home. I didn't want to start across the bridge, get into traffic and have my chain pop off. I rode home slowly and called in sick. Got on the phone with Aetna and changed my primary care provider in case my wrist continued to swell and I needed to have it looked at. As it turned out, the swelling went down after keeping ice on it for a couple hours and keeping it elevated. It's still sore, as is my ass, which I hit on the edge of the sidewalk.

Today we were supposed to actually observe our business casual dress code (usually, my bosses don't care what you wear) b/c we were having some special guests. So I had worn my final pair of khaki pants that don't have bicycle grease on them. I was so careful carrying my bike down the stairs and rolled my pant-legs up all the way to my knees to keep them off the chain. As I was falling toward the sidewalk, one of several thoughts in my head was, "There go the pants. There goes my last decent pair of pants." But actually, they don't have a speck of dirt or grease on them. All in all, this was not a bad bike wreck. I'm proud of myself for slowing down so much to accommodate the morons, and for my audio-warning system/rendition of "I Summon You," which probably kept me from bumping into even more of them, bigger ones perhaps, who wouldn't have been so pliable, who might have caused a more abrupt stop and greater injuries. I'm proud of myself for the way I landed, and for how calmly I was able to plan my landing, minimizing damage, even as I worried about my pants. I even had my eMate in my bag, and it wasn't damaged. I'm a teensy bit embarrassed about the aftermath of the accident - not at the content of the impromptu lecture, but at least at its volume. But yanno - how else are they gonna learn?

So I've pretty much chilled out for the day, listening to Sotomayor's confirmation hearing Day I, reading David Sedaris, and holding ice on my wrist. It's amazing how fast the day goes by when you're not at work.

I hope Princess at least has a bruise from my handlebars. She knew she was wrong. You should have seen how she ran from me. I'm not sure anyone has ever run from me before. Is it really that easy to intimidate these people? Hmm.

Update, next day: OK, typing that out was a bad idea. I ended up keeping ice on my wrist on and off for the rest of the day. Since my job involves typing and other office-related small movements of the hands and wrists, I'm staying home again today. May see a doctor this afternoon when the clinic has walk-in hours. And today my whole body aches, not just my wrist.

We got the kitties a toy that is a clear plastic ball with a little blue plastic fish, unattached, inside it. You fill it halfway with water and close it up and roll it around. The sloshing of the water makes the ball roll funny and the little fishy bobs around in there. Right now, the kitties are more into the birds at the window but just you wait.

I wanna go. I wanna go to the House healthcare markup.

Former health-care executive admits Michael Moore was right in Sicko. And that they spent a lot of money trying to tell you he wasn't. That Canada and England have great health care. That insurance execs don't even realize what's going on on the ground (which I don't believe for a second, but I'm sure he's probably convinced himself that's true.) That the companies you pay for health insurance have an explicit goal of spending as little as possible on your health care and if the amount they spend on health care goes up by 2 percent they could go under. And other very incriminating things. Cigna is in Philly. These folks live around here.

Asked about the report, Marine Corps Col. David Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman, said that since U.S. military forces were not involved in the killings, there is nothing the Defense Department could investigate.

*raises hand* Would there be a possibility they could investigate whether U.S. military forces were involved in the killings? Isn't this like if someone said, "Your Honor, since I didn't rob that man, there's nothing you could convict me of. Therefore, you must let me go."

Reacting to the Times' report, human rights group Physicians for Human Rights called for the Justice Department to begin a criminal investigation into whether the Bush administration blocked inquiries into the Taliban deaths.

Hmm. Whether inquiries were blocked. That sounds like something that could be investigated.

A former U.S. ambassador for war crimes issues, Pierre Prosper, told the Times that the Bush administration was reluctant to investigate the deaths, even though Dostum was on the payroll of the CIA and his soldiers worked with U.S. special forces in 2001.

Gee, "even though"? You don't say. You know, even though it looks like we're guilty, I'm just not that into investigating. It's tempting, since it looks like we're guilty and all, but I'm gonna take a pass.

I want you to have this video so that you can have the words "skin squares" in your minds. Cause that's fun. The words "skin squares" are in this video.

Caution #1: This video depicts the process of making pork rinds.

Caution #2: Everyone in this video looks like they make pork rinds for a living.

Please listen to this if you care whether people lie to you, if you have respect for yourself and your country, if you are not a sucker. Go to the following link, look under the picture, kind of in the middle, where it says Listen to the Conversation, and select your preferred way of listening.

Fast forward to the 14:00 minute mark. You're looking for the story about NPR's 'language policy.' In this story, NPR ombudsman Alicia Shepard explains why NPR does not use the word "torture" to describe the torture performed by America on our prisoners of war. She also explains why they do use the word "torture" to describe torture performed by other countries on their prisoners of war. Yes, she admits there's a different standard. She says it's because other countries do it for bad reasons and we do it for good reasons. I'm barely oversimplifying her statement; that is very nearly exactly what she says.

She also says that it is not up to journalists to say what words mean, but that it is instead up to "the Bush Administration or the Obama Administration" to say what words mean. 1984, anyone? You have to hear it in her own words. It is surreal. And then a communications professor whose name I didn't catch and Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com come on and tear her a new one. Thank goodness for them. My favorite quote from the rebuttal: "There's no shame in using words that are in the English language in a way that is roughly approximate to their understood meaning."

Please listen for yourself:

The Conversation on KUOW (fast forward to the 14:00 mark)

Ya'll know they're my favorite, favorite, very favorite people. Love 'em. I can't join them. I'm afraid I'm going to have to beat them.

This happened near my city:



Here's the story on Raw Story.

Here's the diary on DailyKos.

God, I love rich people. And my favorite thing, I think, about rich people, is how good they are with children. I just love that about them.

3 carrots
5 leaves dark kale
2 leaves collard greens
1/4 small beet (beet juice is serious stuff)
tiny bit of ginger root (also very serious stuff)
a few stems/tops of cauliflower

Mmm. That'll wake you up.

Put some of the green pulp on the cats' food.

I'm ready for a bike ride.

I've been up for an hour and a half. My alarm clock stopped working. It's battery-operated and I woke up this morning to daylight and the clock said it was 12:30. It was really 6 a.m. but I had to get up to know that, so once I was up, I stayed up. I made breakfast. Like, a weekend-style breakfast: fried potato w/mushrooms, onions, and whole-wheat gravy, tomato slices on the side, iced tea, and hot coffee. I uploaded some photos from my camera.

When I lived in the country, or in a small town, it was always refreshing to go out to "civilization" - to go to a place with more stores and whatnot. There's a shopping center we've gone to a couple times to go to Lowe's and to get pet supplies, and it gives me the same sort of "reset" feeling. While I'm there, I feel like I'm not in Philly. Because it's a shopping center with cars and a big parking lot, and actual drive-through windows on the fast-food joints, I always feel like I'm in WV or VA. It's like going to an alternate universe. And to get there, we go through another alternate universe. We walk just blocks west from our house, catch a bus and ride north. It's too far to walk, and while bike-able, it's not a practical bike ride, especially with shopping. I took a few pictures.

( taking the 52 bus to shopping world )

And there was a house that reminded me of West Virginia. Walking along Cedar Avenue, west of here, one block, is where it changes from feeling like West-University City to feeling like West Philly. In fact, I wouldn't mind living just a block or two west. One block between here and there feels wild. It is overrun with foliage, mostly on purpose but not all. Someone has an exotic pink bird for a pet, who sits on their shoulders and talks while they play cards on the porch. That's the block where this house is. It's for sale. It feels like it could be up a steep road outside of Richwood, WV.

( pictures of West Virginia house on Wild block )

I have some other pics from these few blocks from another day, but it's getting late right now. I'm going to grab a quick shower and get to work.

Clark Park

$1.75 - basket of white, yellow, and red small onions
$2 - bunch, salad turnips
$2 - 4 large potatoes
$2 - head of cauliflower
$6.85 - many tomatoes, both ripe (for now) and unripe (for later)
$3.50 - basket of blueberries

total - $18.10

Nobody had any greens, but there are greens on the beets from Thursday and on the turnips.

( pictures of the farmers' market )

Am I losing my mind?

It is only just now Saturday morning, the Fourth of July, early in the morning, correct? Read this screen-grabbed story from KYW1060.com:



Is this future-news? Do they know other things, or just about the parade?

It can't just be a typo, because there are four separate past-tense words in those three paragraphs ("kicked," "got," "included," and "was.")

Then the article gets normal. Except for the typos, poor writing, and vapid content. (i.e. all-the-ice-cream-you-can-eat should actually have been more than one word, none of which should have been uttered.) Well, that is normal:



Very weird.

In other news, Mark called the Mike Malloy Show last night and got on the air playing Bush-quote trivia. That's not a regular feature. Mark correctly finished Bush's quote that said Saddam Hussein was a threat in the war on terror because he terrorizes himself. In so doing, he won a one-year free subscription to the show's podcast. He also made Mike Malloy crack up for a couple minutes just by being Mark. He was probably the most excited radio call-in winner ever. When he won he put on a little show for the folks, whooping and yelling "Yeah, baby!" Malloy was like, "When was the last time you won something on the radio?" It was funny. Plus, when Malloy was introducing him he read the name off the paper wrong and goes, "Marie in Philadelphia. No. It's not Marie, it's Mark, I'm sorry Mark! Mark in Philadelphia, welcome to the show." Mark goes, "You can call me Marie." He took a long time to think about the answer and talked through it out loud, he even made Malloy repeat the question. Mark doesn't half-ass things.

Happy Fourth of July. Celebrate the revolution.