Wordless Wednesday

The plopping of the peonies

I don’t have a particularly green thumb, especially when it comes to growing flowers in the garden. Over the 10 years I’ve lived in this house I’ve spent hundreds of dollars on perennial flowers (I don’t even bother with annuals … planting flowers each spring isn’t a chore I want anywhere near my radar) and in the end they all just … go away. Whether I plant them in the wrong place, whether they get crowded out by weeds, or whether they get eaten or trampled by my pet tortoises I do not know. But I plant them, and they disappear.

Luckily my land did come with some established flowers. There are some fantastic batches of lillies in a couple areas, and I also have about a half dozen peony plants. I really enjoy the peonies. The large plants grow without any help from me, and all I have to do is keep them under control.

My peonies are the really large double hybrids. They’re big and fluffy and very, very heavy. So as soon as the stems start filling up with blooming flowers, the plants (bushes, really) start to flop over. And before long, all their petals start to plop onto the ground. The aftermath of a beautiful double hybrid peony flower is a gruesome mess.

This year I decided I would take better advantage of these beautiful flowers by clipping them and bringing them inside. I figured this would help keep the stems just a little bit lighter, and then, of course, I could enjoy their beauty indoors. So last weekend I brought in a few and placed them on my coffee table.

This morning, I awoke to the plopping peony petal carnage:

Luckily, there are always plenty more waiting for me outside:

I wish I had more white peonies to mix with the pink, but the pink far outnumber white. Plus, I moved the white plant last year so it’s still working on growing back up to its previous state of glory.

It just needs a name…

Thank you for visiting again. I know things have been a little sporadic and all over the place around here lately, but that’s why this blog is called “Mad Mad Life!”

It’s time to reveal my “because everyone needs another personal project that they don’t have time for” idea. If you recall my tease from the other week, I’m going to spin a new web site off from this one, one with a more concentrated direction, so I can go much more in depth with a topic that has probably meant more to me over the past couple of years than almost anything else. It will tie together interests that I’ve visited here such as backyard vegetable gardening, conservation, environmentalism, and even facial scrub (really!), and bring them all together into a resource that will be useful to people form all over the globe who are interested in living in a way that has a less negative impact on the earth, with a focus on self-reliance. And the topic is something that I (and 1,790 other web page authors call) “backyard sustainability.”

Backyard sustainability is the term I use to describe what we can do as individuals as a matter of course in our daily lives, to ultimately reduce carbon emissions and the destruction of our environment (ecocide). It’s basically as simple as that. As individual citizens, particularly in the cities and suburbs, we are faced with probably 100 choices each day that can result in either a greater or lesser impact on our environment. From the container we use to hold our morning coffee to the method we choose to dispose of that container (or the choice not to dispose of it at all) to the place we buy our food and the products we use on our lawns, in our kitchens, and even on our bodies, it is amazing how many seemingly small things we can change that can ultimately not only reduce our carbon emissions but also result in a far less destructive impact on the plants and animals on this earth, and ultimately, on ourselves and our children. This site will focus on actions that we as individuals can take to have a direct impact (or, direct negative impact) on the environment, as opposed to things that corporations or whole societies could or should be doing. Thus, my idea is that each of us in our own little corners of the world, in our suburban or city homes, can all make little changes to ultimately have a cumulatively positive effect on our earth.

I’ll go into more detail when I launch the new site, which should happen soon. The main hangup at this point is deciding on its name. I have several ideas that I’m excited about except they bear the usual web site naming problems: 1) The name is too long for a URL, or 2) The name is already taken by another site. So, since the site can’t have a home until it has a name, I’m holding off until that’s all finalized. Meanwhile I’m getting some of the content started so that once it goes live, it’ll have something to say for itself.

Naturally I’ll announce its grand opening, and I hope you’ll tune in.

(If you have any ideas for a great name for my new site, please feel free to do some brainstorming in the comments section, or send me an e-mail!)

When is YOUR Month of Awesome?

I am very happy to report that there is someone to carry on Month of Awesome — a month-long event designed for individuals to set and achieve their personal goals, even if for only one month — after mine ends on Thursday. My Twitter friend KianaB is the first to do so, and is using the month of May. It sounds like she’s trailblazing so far.

With my Month of Awesome coming to a close, I’ve been taking a look at what I’ve accomplished. And it’s a little hard to judge at this point. My personal goals centered mainly around self discipline: eating better (eating less), exercising more (4-5 days/week), sleeping according to a better schedule (fewer naps, no days starting at 9 or 10am), accomplishing more during my work day. All of these things happened. But the first two weeks were such an improvement over the days leading up to Month of Awesome that the last two weeks feel like nothing more than a plateau. And nobody wants to plateau; moving up is the goal.

So with my month winding down and with this nagging feeling that I don’t have enough to show for it, I’ve felt like making this last-ditch effort to add something on, to do something drastic, just to somehow quantify the awesomeness. And the main thing that I keep thinking of doing is to sign up to participate in the 2009 Chicago Marathon. I ran the 2005 marathon and at the time I had wanted to continue to run it yearly, but the long runs burned me out in 2006. So here I am in 2009 in the middle of this month of personal improvement, and it seems like something I could do. Regular registration for the race has been closed for some time, and the only way to join is through a charity team. I ran with a charity team in 2005 (Inspiration Corporation), so running with a charity seems like the obvious choice anyway. (PAWS Chicago has become my default charity in the Chicago area, and they would be my choice this year.) It would seem as if the stars are aligned. I’ve become comfortable with running again (my base run is up to 5 miles now), PAWS still has openings, I’m looking for something to do to punctuate my Month of Awesome, and the window to register is going to close soon … so what am I waiting for?

I just remember how burned out I got in 2006. I love running for fitness, but 8 hours of running per week over 5-6 days, which I’ll have to be doing in just a few weeks’ time … it’s a lot.

So I think that committing to this event just so I can feel better about what I achieved during Month of Awesome is a case of doing a good thing for a bad reason. It’s not something I need to decide just yet. So I’m not going to sign up between now and May 7, my last day of Month of Awesome. I’m going to give myself until June 14, or until I can comfortably run 8 miles, whichever comes first, because according to Hal Higdon’s Marathon Training Schedule, June 14 is the day I’d first have to run 8 miles.

And so Month of Awesome ends on Thursday, and the rest of May will be just a normal month for me. I look forward to seeing if my good habits from the past four weeks stick. And I’ll revisit the marathon idea from time to time, seeing how I feel about that. I’m definitely considering making June into Month 2 of Awesome, but again, it’s not something I have to commit to just yet. Month 2 will always be there, waiting, whenever I need it.

Thoughts on influenza A(H1N1) (swine flu)

I’m as opposed to media hysteria as the next halfway rational person. Members of the media have a job to do, and that job is to make money for their network/media corporations. Picking up an exciting little piece of news and turning it into a media blitz is good for business. And it’s partway sport and partway art to make fun of this phenomenon. We all do it. I myself have laughed at and sent along all the swine flu jokes, quips, and quotes.

To wit:

I forwarded Junior Minister Sion Simon’s quote: “I’m not saying Susan Boyle caused swine flu. I’m just saying that nobody had swine flu, she sang on TV, people got swine flu.”

I linked to the Visual History of Flu Pandemics, a graphic clearly showing how insignificant the swine flu is compared to pandemic influenza strains throughout history.

I circulated this 1976 Swine Flu Propaganda ad:

On Twitter I linked to a quote on a blog that I read on another blog, which was subsequently picked up by my Twitter followers and circulated around the Twitterverse for a day or so: “90 people get the swine flu and everybody wants to wear a mask. A million people have AIDS and no one wants to wear a condom.”

And there’s more, but I’ll spare you.

Yeah, it’s funny. Because 36,000 people in the U.S. die from the “regular flu” every year! And most of them are little children and the infirm elderly, not us, the normal, media-consuming demographic. Besides, all the mortality is mainly confined to Mexico. We can live without our vacation south of the border this year. So we’re safe, and taking all these ridiculous precautions is just plain silly. Silly, silly, I say! I mock your face mask.

But seriously now, a 22 month old child has died, right here in the United States. (I don’t want to hear that the child was from Mexico. It’s irrelevant.) Just because we already have and seem to accept a constantly mutating strain of influenza virus that kills 36,000 individuals each year doesn’t mean that we need another, whether it kills one, 100, or 10,000. Killers do pop up. Our regular influenza isn’t pandemic, but it’s an organized killer. HIV is another one: we’re lucky that HIV is transmitted only sexually. Sure, the media hysteria surrounding swine flu has been entertaining, just like the shark attack hysteria that pops up every once in a while. But H1N1 is a pretty new pathogen and it does deserve a little attention before we dismiss it as a mere disorganized, unprofessional killer.

Thoughts on the 135th Kentucky Derby

If you watched the Kentucky Derby yesterday, you treated yourself to a great race.

After the favorite I Want Revenge bowed out early, the first time the morning-line Derby favorite scratched on the day of the race, the top contenders were thought to be horses such as Friesan Fire, Dunkirk, and Pioneerof the Nile (no typo there). Friesan Fire was ultimately the favorite for many, owing to the sloppy track the horse is said to love.

But it was Mine That Bird, running as a 50-1 longshot, that stole the show. Despite having Belmont and Travers Stakes-winning Birdstone as his sire, despite having previous Derby-winning jockey Calvin Borel (Street Sense) on his back, Mine That Bird didn’t have a lot of respect going into the Derby, receiving such high praise as, “As good as the top few are in this race, some of the bottom feeders, like this guy, are really weak.”

Indeed, nobody seemed to have any faith in this plain brown horse, not even NBC’s Kentucky Derby announcer, who doesn’t acknowledge Mine That Bird’s move into the lead until he was already a few lengths ahead of the rest. Here is the proof (the first two minutes comprise the race):

I can understand how it was difficult to see Calvin Borel lead Mine That Bird out from the depths of the pack to squeeze past Join in the Dance at the rail from the low angle we see on NBC. But the announcer clearly has a love for star jockey Garrett Gomez and Pioneerof the Nile, enthusiastically calling his name as Mine That Bird poises himself to take the lead. Eleven seconds later, now many lengths ahead, Mine That Bird is finally acknowledged to have taken the lead, seven seconds before he wins in an “impossible result.”

If you go back up to the video and tune in at 7:27, you can see a much better aerial view of the last part of the race. (An added treat: at 8:26 you can see the aerial view of Borel’s similar Derby win on Street Sense in 2007.) This view makes a much more exciting race, as you can see Borel make his move from near the way back of the pack, passing 13 horses to take the lead and win the race.

Had NBC’s announcer been calling the race from that angle, I don’t imagine he would have been able to wait until Mine That Bird was several lengths ahead of the rest before noting his move.

The call of this race reminds me a bit of the quiz show scandals from the 1950s, where the contestant gives the correct answer, “Emily Dickinson,” and the show’s host replies, “I’m sorry, Jim. (pause) Did—Did you say Emily Dickinson?”

Sorry, Pioneerof the Nile, we know that you were supposed to win, but in the end, Calvin Borel and Mine That Bird had the right answer. A stunning, but not impossible, victory.

A new direction

I know many of you are wondering when I’m going to post my latest vegetarian recipe. Pictures … I know you want pictures! And I’m sorry that I haven’t been doing much of that recently. I have reasons that I’ll blog about later, but I promise, you’ll get more photos of eggplants and escarole in time.

However, there is a very important point that I need to make to you first, one that I think I’ve let go unrecognized for some time. And that point is this: This is not a food blog! I am not a food blogger. This blog was not started for the sole purpose of sharing food discoveries, photos of food, or my long-winded stories about what happened when I made food. No, this blog has never had any direction at all, and it was never meant to. Not food, not dogs, not health nor fitness, not even history, travel, the environment, or love. It’s just been something that’s here. As a random outlet for whatever’s on my mind. And it has worked well for that purpose.

And you may rest assured that it will continue to do so. You’ll be seeing your foodie photos again, right here on this blog, in time. Along with whatever other random musings come to mind.

But wait! It turns out that I have found a new direction. This is something that’s been brewing for the past year or two, but I haven’t known where to go with it. But thinking about it recently, and thinking about this blog and how I could work it into this blog, I finally decided that I would not work it in with this blog, but create a whole new website to devote to it. Within the next few days (or weeks, or however long it takes … you know how I roll) I’ll post again and let you in on the new project. I may want some help with it, so you may be able to contribute. For now I’ll just tell you that it’ll be a sister site to this one, a much older sister who knows who she is and where she’s going, and her focus will be on some of the things I’ve touched upon over the lifetime of this blog.

Tune in again for all the details.

Spin music

As a part of my routine, I go to spin class on Saturday mornings at Bally’s. I go to the 9:30am class. You can either show up at 7:00 (when the gym opens) to get a seat for the 8:30 class, or you can show up at 9:30 to get a seat for the 9:30 class. So 9:30 is my class.

I show up around 8:30 anyway just to warm up on the treadmill for a while and catch up on news and stuff on TV. People-watch. Wake up. It’s Saturday morning, after all.

Last Saturday I was not in the mood. Walking on the treadmill for 45 minutes was fine, and I had a TV with captioning that worked, and life was fine. But by the time I got situated on the bike, I started to think, “It’s beautiful outside. Why am I not riding my bike outdoors? I could have ridden into the city. I’m not into this class today. They already made us rearrange all the bikes. What a pain. I’m not in the mood to sprint. Now that I think about it, I haven’t eaten since yesterday at 5pm. Maybe I should leave now, before class begins.” Of course, that would never happen, so I decided to grind my teeth and bear it.

And then class began, with a guest instructor.

And if you’ve ever attended or witnessed a spin class, you know it’s all about the music. And this spin instructor couldn’t have tailored the music better for me even if she had known I was coming.

The first “Oh my gosh I can’t believe they’re playing this in SPIN class, let alone at ALL” song was Cutting Crew’s “(I Just) Died in Your Arms Tonight.” I’m still not sure which is weirder: that it was chosen for a spin class, that I had coincidentally heard this song 3 other times on the radio this week, or that I still remember all the words from 1986.

The second oddity was Bryan Adams’ “Summer of 69,” which I’m sure you’ll recall, has already made an appearance in this blog. Very strangely, I was one of three people in the room who hadn’t yet been born in 1969. Strange in a different way, the instructor didn’t seem to understand that the song was not written in the summer of 1969, as Bryan Adams was 9.

The third notable song was not odd, but amazing in an “Oh my gosh this is another 80s song and it’s awesome and it’s kicking my ASS” way. And, come on, listen to it. It’s so me. Bonnie Tyler, “Holding Out for a Hero.”

Needless to say, by the end of spin class I was glad I stayed. Not that that ever varies.

Today’s spin class did not sweep me off my feet with its music, but I was quite surprised at the choice of Fleetwood Mac’s “I’m So Afraid.” Such a long, slow song. Until I remembered that “I’m So Afraid” also means a big, badass guitar solo by Lindsey Buckingham. The day is saved.

Happy birthday, Maple

Poor Maple.

Maple happened to be born on a day that, eight years after her birth, her mom would be too busy to pause to celebrate.

TurboTax gave me a surprise and I ended up spending about six hours completing my tax return instead of one or two.

I encountered an unexpected snag in a project I was working on and I spent the balance of the day debugging code.

It was a stressful, full day of work.

The good news: I finished my taxes on time and even paid both Fed and State in full. I also finished my project for work. At around 6:30pm, I took all the dogs out for a nice birthday walk.

A wheelable feast: Happy Easter

Not an uncommon occurrence in my family (and I do not exclude myself), we made our Easter plans at the eleventh hour yesterday. My mom and I decided to spring my grandmother from her nursing home and take her out to Easter lunch. Gammy (my grandmother) is in a wheelchair, having lost one leg to diabetes last year. So she doesn’t get out much, and we thought she’d like to venture out into the real world for a while.

And so we also recruited my cousin, and the three of us had a nice visit with Gammy in her room before signing her out and driving toward the nearest restaurant. But first, we decided to stop at Walgreens so she could pick up some supplies. I decided that while the ladies were shopping I could drive across the street to the restaurant to put our name on the list and find out how terrifying the wait would be. We’ve never even considered going out for Easter lunch, as we always have it at a family member’s home, so I had no idea what to expect.

Well.

Just inside the restaurant I was greeted by a person dressed in a bunny suit. There was a sign pointing to the right that read, “Egg Hunt –>”. Children in dresses, carrying Easter baskets, swarmed everywhere. I pressed through, and almost made it to the hostess desk before I was accosted by a woman asking me for my name. I explained that I had just arrived and hadn’t put my name in yet. She said, somewhat incredulously, “Ohhh.” She apprehensively approached the desk and asked, “We’re all full, right?” to which she was told, in unison by a gaggle of hosts, “Yes!” Apparently one must make reservations early to Easter lunch. Apparently everybody knows this but me. To everyone’s credit, everyone was very nice and turned me away with a smile. I turned and walked out, still in good spirits, but the terror was building inside as I tried to imagine where to go next, considering I didn’t even know the area.

And then it happened.

As I walked to my car I heard, “Miss! Miss! Wait, miss!” I turned around, shocked to find that I was the Miss being sought after. I began to return, nervously, to the restaurant. It was the incredulous hostess, followed by the restaurant manager. “How many are in your party?” I was asked. “Four,” I replied. “Well, we have a cancellation so it looks like we can fit you in.” I beamed. “That would be wonderful, but I have to go pick up my grandmother who is in a wheelchair and then come back … will that still work?” “Yes, any time you can get here.”

Ahhhhhh. My karma was good today. I returned to Walgreens and suggested that the shoppers should pick it up a little bit so we wouldn’t lose our good fortune. Before I knew it, we were back at the restaurant and we were taken straight to our table. This was an outcome far better than I had expected possible. No reservations, no waiting. How often does that happen? Especially when there’s an Egg Hunt going on?

Our only surprise at that point was that the lunch was a buffet. An interesting proposition with a wheeled diner, but we guided her through and a nice holiday meal was had by all. Happy Easter.

(Note: This is Day 5 of Month of Awesome. Not bad, huh?)