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Dearly Neglected...

2008-12-25T22:45:00.000-08:00

Dearly Neglected Blog,

See you soon.

<3

L

The Last Inner Freedom

2008-10-02T12:19:00.000-07:00

I get little messages in my inbox each day from thinkArete.com (which advertises itself as "wisdom for the busy self-actualizer." Is that an oxymoron?).

They are often rather timely for what is happening in my life, but not due to magical universal synchronicity. It's good common sense that floats into my inbox each day to remind me of what I already know but tend to loose sight of.

The past few have been about strength and attitude.

This was today's:

"...Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

~ Viktor Frankl from Man's Search for Meaning

Frankl, a survivor of concentration camps, reminds of the powerful truth that, no matter one's circumstances, we ultimately have responsibility to choose how we will perceive any given situation.

This message is echoed among the great teachers:

From Marcus Aurelius: "Your mind will be like its habitual thoughts; for the soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts. Soak it then in such trains of thoughts as, for example: Where life is possible at all, a right life is possible."

To the Buddha: "Our life is shaped by our mind. We become what we think."

Are you owning your attitude?

…

More…

"Even though conditions such as lack of sleep, insufficient food and various mental stresses may suggest that the inmates were bound to react in certain ways, in the final analysis it becomes clear that the sort of person the prisoner became was the result of an inner decision, and not the result of camp influences alone. Fundamentally, therefore, any man can, even under such circumstances, decide what shall become of him -- mentally and spiritually. He may retain his human dignity even in a concentration camp. I became acquainted with those martyrs whose behavior in camp, whose suffering and death, bore witness to the fact that the last inner freedom cannot be lost."

I especially like the last bit because the holocaust is a great example of the depth of human nature: the inner strength and determination for survival and the sheer ugliness that tries to break it down.

"What does not destroy me, makes me stronger."

The last inner freedom.

Dancer

2008-04-09T12:29:00.000-07:00

Try this!

From the website:
"The Right Brain vs Left Brain test ... do you see the dancer turning clockwise or anti-clockwise?

If clockwise, then you use more of the right side of the brain and vice versa.

Most of us would see the dancer turning anti-clockwise though you can try to focus and change the direction; see if you can do it."
LEFT BRAIN FUNCTIONS
uses logic
detail oriented
facts rule
words and language
present and past
math and science
can comprehend
knowing
acknowledges
order/pattern perception
knows object name
reality based
forms strategies
practical
safe
RIGHT BRAIN FUNCTIONS
uses feeling
"big picture" oriented
imagination rules
symbols and images
present and future
philosophy & religion
can "get it" (i.e. meaning)
believes
appreciates
spatial perception
knows object function
fantasy based
presents possibilities
impetuous
risk taking

Click on the dancer to go to the site.

I cannot make her spin "anti-clockwise!" Some people can watch her spin one way and then the other. The brain is amazing.

How does this work from a technical point of view?

What I've Been Listening To

2008-04-08T23:04:00.000-07:00

I've loved reading since I was little. I remember the first "novel" I read. I was laying on my parents bed in the evening and the book was called "Star." It was about a girl named Star and that's all I remember.

The first books I read in school were about Buffy and Mack and the sun being up. Did you read those too in first grade?

"The sun was up. Buffy was up. Mack was up."

I read all the time when I was younger. It must have been when I started college that I stopped reading so much. During this time, I would go on binges of reading, once I started I had a hard time putting the book down. I love fiction, and I started to feel like fiction wasn't much better than TV. I should be learning something! I should be productive.

Recently, I've decided that reading is just fine, even if it's fiction. I'm learning about writing. I'm learning about myself. I'm using my visualization skills. I'm expanding my imagination and mind. I'm learning about the minds and imagination of others. And if I want to spend hours on the couch absorbed in a book, that is a-okay.

One way I have gotten around this obsession to be productive but still satisfy my reading "tooth" is listening to books on cd (or, as I can't help saying, cd's on tape). I spent much of last month on my love seat wrapped in a blanket crocheting hand warmers and listening books on cd from the library. It was wonderful.

Audio cds are awesome because you can multi-task: you can take them with you, "read" while doing tasks you need eyes for, your hands are freed to do things like dishes, and you don't have to sit still if you don't want to (although I find it hard to fully absorb a book while doing too many things at once). The unexpected benefit I found with audio cds is the reader's interpretation of characters. These are wonderful!

The books I have been listening or reading to really resonate with me and the current state of my life. I find this especially interested because I picked them out somewhat at random (is there true randomness?) by visiting the library and seeing what was on the audio book shelf. Perhaps I am especially sensitive to the parts that relate to my life, or maybe...there is a magic fairy world I can find if I crawl around on my hands and knees at Forest Park looking for the opening! The audio book shelf at my neighborhood library is awesome because it's relatively small (so not overwhelming) and changes frequently.

I've been listening to:

Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami

This was a great book. It's about a man who's girl friend suddenly leaves with out a trace. He spends six months in his apartment alone without speaking to anyone. His cat dies, and then he reenters the world. He realizes the woman is calling him in his dreams from the hotel she left him in. He searches for her and is taken through a strange world and connects with interesting people.

The first winter/early spring I lived in Portland I read The Wind Up Bird Chronicles by the same author. It was a great time, and a great book. I drank mate in a lawn chair in our grassy yard, obsessively read, and at lunch time I rode my bike to the house Wyatt was working on to bring him lunch, which we ate in the alley together. This was totally fulfilling. I remember making soup and biscuits. I dreamed of being a housewife.

Both books resonated with where I was in my life at the time.

The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

This was an excellent book, and a serious tear jerker. There were so many incredible quotes that I reserved the book at the library (a book is one of those paper things with printed words and you have to read it) so I could write them out. I'll share them here.

The book is about the author's experience with grief caused by the sudden death of her husband. She talks about the full experience of grief and love in a poetic and succinct way. It is an incredibly useful book. I especially loved balance between scientific research and personal experience.

Whale Rider by Witi Ihimaera

The book is so much better than the movie. I remember the movie as good, but the book has so much more depth. It is very different on many levels from the storyline of the movie. The book talks about Maori legends, sexism, racism, and the threat to indigenous existence. I loved that the reader had a Maori accent. It made me miss the islands, want to visit New Zealand, and throw my lot in with the Maori.

The reader makes all the difference. I love hearing them impersonate different characters. In this book, I especially loved his reading of the character "Nanny Flowers", the grandmother. When I am old and grandmotherly, please call me Nanny Flowers!

various books by Judith Orloff

Some of the books on cd I've heard are read by Judith. I like these the best because she has such a great, warm, grounding way of speaking. She seems very genuine. She's great. I wrote about her in a previous post.

Next I'll tell you what I've been reading with my eyes (instead of my ears), cuz I've been doing some of that too.

Wise words from a pre-preschooler

2008-04-08T21:01:00.000-07:00

"It's good to cry because you cry and then you feel better afterwards."

Then curl up in a chair baby-kitty-style (pre-preschool?).

Earth Hour: Were your neighbors celebrating?

2008-04-01T15:02:00.001-07:00

I was at my parents' house when the world observed Earth Hour. The idea behind Earth Hour was to bring attention to global warming by turning lights out for one hour at eight o clock with people around the world to reduce carbon emission with. 24 cities got involved by turning lights off in places that were normally left lit all night like the Golden Gate Bridge.

I will admit that my first though when I heard about earth hour was "One hour? Come on people, it's going to take more than that." I also originally thought people were refraining from using all electricity, not just lights.

Going without electricity (or running water) is familiar to me having grown up on an island. Electricity went out with high winds, storms, hurricanes, car accidents, and frequently for no apparent reason. Once we spent three weeks during Christmas without electricity. Once we spent a week boarded up in our, house huddling in the bathroom during a hurricane with out lights or running water and the imminent fear that the roof could be blown off at any minute. But that is a different story.

My parents loved the idea when I told them about Earth Hour and were excited to participate. We turned all the electricity off (including heat) and also our cellphones. When eight rolled around, the ritual of lighting lamps, turning on the battery operated radio, and gathering around the table to do art projects in the dim light with my parents was warm and familiar.
We were actually disappointed when the hour was up because it was so pleasant!

The most interesting thing that happened during Earth Hour was noticing which neighbors were also participating. My parents live in a small town and are probably on the fringe politically speaking. My mom believes it's possible she lost her job at the school in town (or rather, was forced to transfer districts) because of an anti-Bush sign they had in front of their house on the highway.

It was very cute to see my parents jumping up and peering out of their windows to see who else around them was participating. Maybe they had something in common? Maybe their neighbors were sympathetic? Maybe there were other people concerned about the plight of the environment around them? Then again, maybe that neighbor wasn't home.

I thought this was an interesting and unexpected outcome of Earth Hour. Although I expected to feel a wonderful simplicity with spending time without electricity on, I didn't foresee the possible community building and political camaraderie.

I still feel that an hour is almost an insult. It's like driving a hybrid SUV: close, but still so far away. I think it would be nice to integrate this practice into my life more by turning my electricity off one hour each night, perhaps before bed as a way to end the day and prepare myself for bed. This act really could make a difference environmentally, and perhaps have more profound impact on my life in other ways.

I have yet to do this, as much as I love the idea. There is just so much to do on that magic computer box that doing something by candlelight never seems to make it onto the list.

Excuse me, I'm turning my electricity off now.

"You had blood on your hands and I had blood in my eyes"

2008-03-25T04:50:00.000-07:00

What happens when we stop becoming a "we" and start being an "I"?

"Last time I saw you
We had just split in two.
You were looking at me.
I was looking at you.
You had a way so familiar,
But I could not recognize,
Cause you had blood on your face;
I had blood in my eyes.
But I could swear by your expression
That the pain down in your soul
Was the same as the one down in mine. "

"Relationships carry the whole universe with them. They can be everything, nothing, here, then gone. One moment, loving someone makes you shine; the next it feels like matter and antimatter colliding. The glory of loving a person over many years is learning his or her individual phases - and blending together, watching who you both become." - Judith Orloff

I have been spending a lot of my time lately thinking about friendship, relationships, individual self, boundaries, and what happens when you stop sharing time and space with someone who was so important to you, someone who was part of you. How do you deal with that hole in your life? How do you reconcile who you are without this person? What happens when you get close? How do you maintain your self and space while surrendering yourself openly to another person? Why does this hurt? Why do we hurt each other in the process of learning to love, and how do we avoid this?

How do you put your joined life aside and walk in your own direction?

How do you unblend?

I started going to a therapist to help answer these questions, but I didn't like her. I left thinking "Why did I just pay that person $13 to talk about myself for an hour? I can do that with friends for free, and they have more invested in the discussion! They give interesting feedback." I think I just didn't connect well with her and am interested in finding someone else. I think I need some skills and an unbiased view point.

So instead of therapy, I am doing lots of yoga and listening* to Judith Orloff. Oh, she is great! Judith Orloff is an intuitive and a phsychiatrist. It doesn't get much better that that. I love her work because she is so grounded. She also has a very comforting way of speaking. She is warm, practical, and down to earth while talking about what could potentially be some really woo-woo stuff.

Judith talks about how everyone can access their intuition and that we can all use it to help guide us, make decisions, get over our personal shit, be our own leaders and doctors, and find our own path. Instead of looking to someone else for answers, she's into teaching people how to look inside themselves. How fabulous is that? She also talks about how we are all intuitive beings but are not taught how to deal with this while living in a linear world. She gives solutions. It's very interesting.

As far as the hole I mentioned above, I think some holes you can't ever fill. You have to learn to work around them. People are not replaceable. But how do you begin working around them, what does this look like? I think grief is an essential part of this.

I have been thinking a lot about this topic of grief. I bought the January edition of Sun Magazine, which coincidentally was all about grief. What great timing.

One of the articles talks about how in our society we don't give ourselves proper time to fully experience grief. When we do experience it, we are essentially told to buck up, push through it, and not feel it. But grief is a natural and essential part of the healing process, and to not experience is just pushing it away to fester. Being alive is feeling. Judith Orloff writes (about the death of her father):

"The portal stays open only so long, then the nature of grief changes. This was holy time. The waves of exhaustion I felt, my body coiling into itself, hibernating, my endless tears, were prerequisites for healing."

In dealing with grief recently, I sometimes feel like I need to be exorcised. This is not because the events related to the grief caused me great harm; this person was caring and loving to the best of their ability, as I was in return. It is a sadness at the absolute tragedy of the whole situation.

It comes in waves, this grief, sneaking up on me, and I feel like I need to just step aside and let it whoosh through me, to experience and release it. It has a mind of it's own, it's so interesting to watch.

What is love? I was cocky enough to think I kind of had it figured out. How silly is that? People spend lifetimes working on this stuff. I think love is too vast to be defined and contained within words. It's not something you can understand with words, it exists as an expansive, multifaceted feeling.

Even if love can't be defined, maybe I can just figure out how to disentangle myself from it's grip so I can move on.

My sister used to ask my mom if she still loved her. My mom would respond "Love is not like a light switch. You can just turn it of and on again." I don't want to turn the light off, but I wouldn't mind dimming the light so it's not so painful. Why is there pain in love? So we can have a more full experience of joy?

I was also comforted by this idea in the Judith Orloff book I am reading: "Love doesn't disappear, it multiplies." I love this idea that you take love you built in the past and carry it on with you, spreading it out so it is something larger than before that effects more people than just two, like the wind carrying seeds. This means you also carry all the people you've built it with within you. They are there, they are part of you.

I have been doing a bit of "Yin" yoga lately. With all this thinking and feeling going on, I don't seem to have the energy for much beyond a beginners class. Yin yoga is about relaxing, everything is done on the floor, you hold poses for five minutes, and there is a lot of hip opening, meditating, and stuff like that. They say you hold emotions in your hips. Yin yoga is about learning to surrender. It's about unearthing deep stuff in your body, smoothing and expanding the connective tissues.

I have been working on surrendering. It is not comfy stuff.

How do you say good bye? How do you reconcile longing for that missing piece? For now, my answer is to just let the longing be inside myself, even if it is howling loudly, and hold on (breathing very deeply, of course) through it.

*audio books are great.

Dumpster Diving Tips From HoboStripper

2008-03-25T03:03:00.001-07:00

Yet another great post from HoboStripper detailing how to successfully dumpster dive and some fond memories.

I especially like the image of kids cooking over a wood stove at night in a bookstore with dumpster keys on their belts.

http://hobostripper.com/491/how-to-dumpster-dive/

If you don't already subscribe, do yourself a favor and start now!

Hemp Milk Recipe

2008-03-25T02:25:00.000-07:00

I think this is so much easier to make than other nut milks because you don't have to plan ahead and soak nuts. You are also getting an amazing dose of magnesium, essential fatty acids, and a fabulous array of minerals. Hemp is the shit.

Sophie taught me how to make hemp milk.

Hemp Milk

2 T hemp seeds
2 cups water
2 T lecithin
pinch of salt
1 t vanilla
sweetener to taste

Blend the hemp seeds with one cup of water until very smooth. Strain this, rinse out the blender, and pour the cup of hemp milk back in. Put the rest of the water and everything else in and blend it to combine.

That's your hemp milk. I usually double this recipe and use the milk in tea, smoothies, or sippin from the bottle.

Chia!

2008-03-25T01:56:00.000-07:00

In addition to sprouting, I have been adding chia into my diet because of it's low cost and fab nutrient profile. This is seriously one amazing little seed and quite yummy. I can't believe it's taken me this long to get into it, as I have been reading about it's virtues for about a year now. Here are some highlights:

Chia:

Is quick and easy to make. It takes about one to five minutes of actual work depending on how fancy you get with flavoring, and ten minutes of waiting.
Can increase energy because it is packed with nutrients and absorbs slowly into the body.
Levels out blood sugar, so you can eat it with sweet things and not get a crash. From the Chia Cheet Sheet: "Chia slows the impact of sugars on the system, if eaten together. Chia gel creates a physical barrier between carbohydrates and the digestive enzymes that break them down, which slows the conversion of carbs into sugar. That means the energy from the food is released steadily, resulting in more endurance."
Absorbs a tremendous amount of water when it's made, and this helps with hydration and retaining electorltes.
Helps swish out your digestive system, meaning better poops! Everyone loves pooping. From the Chia Cheat Sheet: "Chia seeds bulk up, then work like an incredible digestive broom, sweeping through your intestinal tract, helping to dislodge and eliminate old accumulated waste in the intestines. Many people find their stools also become more regular once they eat chia."
"Chia seeds typically contain 20% protein, 34% oil, 25% dietary fiber (mostly soluble with high molecular weight), and significant levels of antioxidants (chlorogenic and caffeic acids, myricetin, quercitin, and kaempferol flavonols). The oil from chia seeds contains a very high concentration of Omega 3 fatty acid - approximately 64%." (from: www.omega-3-chia.com/chia.cfm)
Is low calorie but high bulk.

Angela Stokes has created the great little Chia Cheat Sheet I referenced above. It has more information on this yummy and amazing seed.

Chia is a little black and white seed that looks like teeny weeny dinasaur eggs. To eat it, you soak it in water or some flavored liquid for ten minutes or more. The longer is soaks, the more soft it gets. Soaking the chia seeds creates a clear gel around the seed/dinosaur egg looking part, so when ready to eat they look like fish eggs or tapioca or bubble tea. It is fun watching the chia "grow".

Chia could be the raw version of beans and rice or oatmeal because it is cheap, filling, a little bit goes a long way, and it is so easy to make. I am very excited about this!

So far I have only been having sweet chia, but I am interested in some savory recipes. Surprisingly, the chia tastes really good (to me) just plain soaked in water even though there is not much flavor to it.

Here are some recipes I've been enjoying.

Vanilla Mulberry Brain Tapioca

Chia Seeds
Hemp Milk (see the recipe here)
Lecithin
Vanilla
Mulberries
Cardamom
Honey

First soak the chia in water for ten minutes or more. Then add the rest of the ingredients to taste. Sika came over for some pre dinner dessert and we had this. She said "Oh my. You've really outdone yourself."

That was very nice.

Apple Chia Super Bowl

Blend together:
apple 1 1/2
ginger 1/2 inch section
vanilla 1/4 t
honey 1.5 T
lecithin 2 t
pollen 1 t
mesquite 1T
cinnamon 1t
salt pinch
water 2 cups or so

Pour over 3 T chia seeds, leave to set. This recipe comes out bright yellow!

Also check out my Apple Cinnamon Chiameal recipe, published in another post.

Finally, I leave you with a not very amusing video about chia. This video is mostly for the "someone really spent their time making this?!" factor. It is from the site: chiabritney.com where you can buy a chia pet that looks like Britney. Umm, no thanks.

Chia Britney - The Movie - video powered by Metacafe

Sorry Britney, you got nothing on Mr. T.

Mr. T Stuff

Sprouting Update

2008-03-25T00:28:00.000-07:00

My sprouting experiment is going great! I have already harvested and eaten my first batch of sprouts. It is very easy to do once you get a good system going.

I found that the jar method didn't work well for me because the washing was cumbersome, so I tried something different. Now it is just a matter of washing the sprouts twice a day which, with my new system, takes about one to three minutes depending on how many sprouts I have going.

It's kind of like having a pet: I have to make sure the sprouts are taken car of twice a day otherwise they get dry or smelly.

This is a sprout mix I made with radish, clover, alfalfa, and broccoli. Broccoli sprouts are supposed to be very good for you. I did a whole tray of broccoli sprouts but they got kind of stinky and I threw them in the composter. I didn't want to risk it. I think they had a bad start in the jar.

I soak the sprouts in a big bowl to get rid of the hulls.

I use my stove as a sprout drying rack, since I don't cook much. It works pretty well. I also use my stove as a dish drying rack since I seem to have lost mine along the way. It's a multipurpose surface.

I got sick of the jar method. Mainly, it is difficult to drain. It also bothers me that the sprouts grow all jumbled up together and don't get a chance to green. I started experimenting with different containers to grow sprouts in.

In this picture, the sprouts are in a corn based container I got salad in, and my plastic mousie is watching over. I punched some holes in the bottom to let it drain. This is the radish/broccoli sprout mix after I freed it from the jar.

Because of my concern for the sprouts' living conditions, I decided to try sprouting on dehydrator trays. This is working very well! I start the sprouts in jars until they are big enough to put on the sheets without falling through. I am also researching different store bought sprouters, although this dehydrator tray system seems to be working well. I like reusing things I already have.

I am planning to set up a metro rack so trays can be set up outside of the dehydrator. I would like them to get more sun. I also think it would be wonderful to have a whole rack of sprouts. I have some great ideas for the metro rack sprout center and I will post them here later.

This method seems to make washing go a lot faster because I don't have to worry about propping the jars up, making sure the bulk of the water gets out of the jar, or fretting over the living conditions of the each little sprout. It also gives the sprouts room to stretch, grow, and (most importantly) GREEN!

I wash the sprouts in the shower. I have a filter on my shower head so chlorine is filtered out. I have also read it is good to wash them with a spray and some pressure so the hulls are pushed away.

These are clover sprouts growing on the tray.

This is the sprout mix after being harvested. Nice and green, huh?

Yum!

Eating Cooked and Red Lentil and Rice Borscht Recipe

2008-03-24T21:29:00.000-07:00

Note: This posts contains some personal thoughts about eating cooked food which may or may not interest you. The recipe is at the bottom. Feel free to skip to it.

I have been eating a bit of cooked food to save money (beans and rice, but other things too), although that's not why I started putting it back in my diet a month and a half ago. It has been an interesting experiment.

It started when I was visiting my aunt in California, and she made this beautiful vegan pot pie/shepards pie/something like that. It was the first vegan thing she'd ever made, and I was so touched by it. It didn't really seem like a big deal to eat it, so I did. I felt fine, which surprised me. I felt my senses getting a bit dulled down (that could have been the wine), but I didn't vomit or anything. It was just cooked vegetables, no flour, tofu, or grains, so I think this helped. Before this, I was eating all raw for quite a while.

I felt fabulous pretty much all the time when I ate all raw. My moods leveled out, I had tons of energy, I didn't need too much sleep (although I never got to where I was sleeping four hours a night. I think I need all that dream time), and physically my body didn't get fatigued as much and recovered from exercise rapidly. I biked everywhere carrying tons of stuff on my bike, stood for 12 hours straight, hiked, ran, all that kind of stuff, and my muscles were rarely sore.

Although I wasn't sick before I went raw, I felt like I was almost on the verge of getting a cold quite often. I felt right at the tipping point of being unwell, and emotionally, I didn't feel too great. I just knew I wasn't living at my potential, so I thought I would try this raw thing out. It worked.

I didn't start eating cooked food again because living on just raw food wasn't working for me. It was working great! I didn't even crave or miss anything (not even Thai food. Okay, actually I missed beans and rice, but that's really it).

I think this foray into cooked food it is really about experimenting. I think of this time as slipping my big toe back in the water, to compare and remember what it is like to have cooked food in my diet. I think it's about making sure I'm making the very best choice for myself, rather than just nodding along with the popular statement "cooked food is poison".

It has been very interesting to observe how my body feels after I eat things like canola oil, tofu, bread, grains, and any cooked oils. It doesn't like them. Especially with bread, my eyes and face get very puffy, and my little glands in my neck get huge. I also find if there is nothing raw, I eat till my belly is uncomfortably full and then still feel hungry. This is really a drag.

I miss the way I felt before, so I will probably stop eating cooked food again (except maybe beans and rice :). Besides, I honestly feel like you can't beat a good salad.

This is the first cooked recipe I've posted on my blog. It is yummmy! When I first made it I could hardly stop "mmming" as I ate it. It is very simple to make, uses only a few ingredients, and packs a big feel good punch in the tummy. It is great the next day. After I ate this for breakfast as left overs, I felt great and had tons of energy. I don't know if it was the beets or B&R, but it worked for me that morning.

This soup is awesome for three reasons:

it has a great color,
the red lentils disintegrate nicely to create a creaminess which I think is cool,
and it is super cheap.

I have made it with both olive and coconut, and they both do different things to the soup. I like both, but might prefer the coconut because my little glands seem to like it better.

Red Lentil and Rice Borscht:

one onion
2 T oil (olive or coconut)
two beets, with beet greens
1/2 to 1 c red lentils
1/2 rice
water
salt
caraway
miso

Slice the onion. I like half rings. Cook the onion in the oil at the bottom of the pan. Add some salt and caraway seeds, and stir it around until the onion wilts. Then add the beans and stir those until they are coated in onion and oil juice. Add as much water as you want, around 6 cups or so, and cook the beans and rice until they are soft. Half way to three quarters through the cooking time, add chopped beet root, but leave the greens and stems out. Once the rice is cooked, turn the burner off and add the beet greens and stems.

I served this with a spoonful of miso in each bowl. This way the soup is cooled enough so the good bacteria in the miso don't get killed.

The New Oatmeal

2008-03-21T16:41:00.000-07:00

Cinnamon Apple Chiameal

There are three parts to this meal, so it looks complicated, but it's really not. You can make this in about the same amount of time as real cooked oatmeal, if you have hemp milks already made (milks is so much more fun to say than milk singular).

If you don't have the hemp milk, then you can make this in the same amount of time as it would take you to make cooked oatmeal and milk a cow (or hempseed).

If you don't have hemp milk you can leave it out and it is still yummy.

Here are the directions:

First, make the AppleSauceyLiquid in a blender.
Pour this over 2 tablespoons of chia in a bowl.
Put it in the fridge and let it sit for about ten minutes to overnight if possible. The longer it sits, the softer and more oatmealish it gets.
Deck it out with flava.

When you eat it in the morning, pour that hemp milks right over it and stir. Then get ready for a big day on the farm.

AppleSauceyLiquid

Basic:
one apple
cinnamon
ginger
lemon
vanilla
pinch of salt (optional)
1/2 cup water or so

Optional Additionals:
honey or agave (try it without this, you might be surprised)
lecithin
mesquite
green powder like VitaMineral Greens or Greener Grasses
cardamom

Hemp Milks

2 T hemp seeds
2 cups water
2 T lecithin
pinch of salt
1 t vanilla
sweetener to taste

Blend the hemp seeds with one cup of water until very smooth. Strain this, rinse out the blender, and pour the cup of hemp milk back in. Put the rest of the water and everything else in and blend it to combine.

That's your hemp milks. I usually double this recipe and use the milk in tea, smoothies, or sippin from the bottle.

I think this is so much easier to make than other nut milks because you don't have to plan ahead and soak nuts. You are also getting an amazing dose of magnesium, essential fatty acids, and an array of minerals. Hemp is the shit.

"I am molecular life with manual dexterity and a cognitive mind"

2008-03-14T15:29:00.000-07:00

This is a fascinating talk by neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor in which she describes the stroke she had caused by an aneurysm in the left side of the brain. She talks about the disconnect she experienced between the right and left hemispheres of her brain during the stroke.

What I find most interesting is her description of having the left brain completely shut off. She says it was nirvana: a silence of the internal monologue, a heightened state of awareness, and a greater understanding and dissolving of individual self.

In her book, she writes "peace is only a thought away, and all we have to do to access it is silence the voice of our dominating left mind." (source) The quote in the main title is also from the same source.

The move is 18 minutes, but worth it.

Try this:

2008-03-12T16:35:00.000-07:00

http://www.dothetest.co.uk/

eeeeeeek!

Cheap Eats and Sprouts

2008-03-07T01:15:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm not making enough to cover my rent. This means I also don't have enough to buy food, although I do get food stamps now that I'm not werkin. When you eat only vegetables, food stamps don't go quite as far as you'd like because for some reason they are more expensive than packaged food filled with fortifications and food coloring.

I don't go out drinking, spend money on a car (although I have used Flexcar for work), buy drugs, pay a health insurance policy, have kids, go shopping, or any other money sucking habits or addictions, so food is pretty much all I spend money on. (Unless you think health falls into that category...)

I feel that my health is top priority and the best way to be healthy is to eat good food, specifically fruits and vegetables. But fruits and vegetables cost a lot more than beans and rice, which I consider to be super cheap eats (unless you don't mind eating Alpo, which is what my mom predicts she'll be living on in old age).

Being all poor and stuff, I thought shopping at the year-round People's Farmers Market on Wednesdays would be a smart thing. So I went. I was wrong. I accidentally spent $15 on a bag of bok choi and some salad greens. This was not an impressive amount of bok choi. It will probably last me a few days.

I am not complaining about the price. I think farmers should get a fair wage and I would of course rather eat local than something trucked in, but I also think it would be nice if buying local was affordable for everyone. While we're at it, I might as well go all the way and say I wish everyone could just eat out of their back yard instead of choosing to mow it.

Some things in our society are really off. Everyone should be able to eat "the best food ever."

After the trip to the farmers market (and scouring my house for things to sell) I decided I needed a new solution to this issue. Clearly I can't continue to buy and consume only local organic produce as I have been.

My goal for this month is to spend just $30 for the rest of the month on food. If you know anything about my food bills in the past, you are laughing at this goal because I have easily spent this much on food meant to last three days or less.

But I have a plan! Sprouts!

I am going to spend my $30 on the following items:

a bag of sunflower seeds
seeds for sprouting, such as alfalfa and clover
lentils and mung beans

The seeds I am going to soak and make milky-type stuff out of, pates, raw breads, and stuff. The beans and seeds I am going to sprout into greens. For fruit I will eat Larabars I have at the house and occasionally indulge in an apple or bananas. For added greens I will eat the rest of the Vitamineral Greens and Greener Grasses I have. I already have some basics like oil and sweetener, plus a fridge full of recently purchased greens ($15 worth of bok choi, in fact). I imagine I will go over the $30 to purchase fresh things occasionally like carrots or onions, but I will aim to keep that at a minimum.

In addition to this I am also going to start a container garden, harvest edible weeds, and will leave my magic plastic money cards at home so I am forced to find new solutions to getting food besides purchasing it in the store.

I am actually rather excited about this new plan. I'll let you know how it goes.

Determination

2008-03-06T21:53:00.000-08:00

Today I had a little freak out session. Here's how it played out.

The freak out occurred when I was looking around my house for things I could sell. I was thinking about how I probably didn't need my juicer, could return the bike trailer, and sell my mountain bike (yes, all are in the kitchen). Something about seriously contemplating selling the mountain bike sent me to very-upset-hiccuping-so-much-you-can't-breathe land.

The mountain bike is new. I've never owned a new bike, except for the pink Barbie bike I got when I was like 5 from my grandparents, and I bet it was not nearly as nice to ride as this bike is. It has disc brakes that work real good, a front shock, it switches gears smoothly, and is a totally sweet ride. It's like...a fancy car or something, but with a better view.

What made me sad was everything the mountain
bike represented. I got it so my best friend and I could go mountain biking together. He'd been wanting someone to go riding with for years. I was recently rich with financial aide and it was a chance for me to do something new and to stop being afraid of riding up big hills.

Although still learning, the times we'd been out mountain biking were pure fun and some of the best times I've ever had in my life.

Once, we tried to find a way for him to bike through Forest Park to work. We started at a trail near his work and biked up it towards Leif Erikson Drive in Forest Park. The trail was over grown and unused, with blackberry bushes blocking the path and branches in the way. We stopped and ate black berries. He was ahead and cut vines out of the path with his pocket knife. There were some very steep hills. It was absolutely beautiful.

After a while the trail got very steep and we had to carry our bikes. I think we'd both realized riding this everyday to work wasn't really an option. We got to a point where the trail either sort of stopped or split into two. Suddenly some guy appeared and told us we couldn't continue in the direction we wanted to. He said the trail ended, but I think it ended because he had a fort built the way we wanted to go. It was so steep that I don't think we could have turned around and walked down with our bikes, so we headed in the other direction.

Besides, we were determined to find a way up. Going back down the way we came was not an option. This determination is what I love and miss about our friendship.

We ended up forging our own path through the woods with our bikes on our shoulders. We had no water or food because we didn't think we'd be gone very long. We went straight up the hill for about a mile or so until we got the Leif Erickson Drive in Forest Park. This was no easy stuff. We crawled up one handed at times using ferns to steady ourselves because it was so steep. When we got to the road we pulled ourselves over and up on to it. We were bleeding, sweaty, late for a potluck, but so hardcore. This is what I mean when I say pure fun.

If I sold the bike I wouldn't even get enough to cover one month of rent. This is not because the bike is cheap, it's because my rent is high (although it does include utilities, which I do appreciate.) Considering the opportunities I'd be losing, I think it would only depress me more to know I sold something that was a vehicle of so much exhilaration and enjoyment for a little bit of rent money.

Chicken Pimp

2008-03-06T20:24:00.000-08:00

This is an awesome video where a chicken pimp goes after a Colonel Sanders looking guy. The end is the best part.

Courtesy of Ecorazzi.

"I think I'd be a bit bothered by this guy"

2008-03-06T19:56:00.000-08:00

From Utne Reader Blog:

"This deceptively simple video from Current_TV is nothing more than a split screen shot of people describing each other. The reality, though, is that people’s first impressions and hidden biases are exposed."

Oh, the joys of living alone.

2008-03-02T23:28:00.000-08:00

I recently moved into my own place and I love it. Before this I lived with people continuously for about 8 years, often in close quarters (I'm talking about two people in a small studio, on multiple occasions, once lasting for almost a year).

In addition to having total control over the whole space, I'm enjoying the control I have over my own time.

Socializing is an option. It's like a deep breath, to realize that. The silence is amazing.

It's hard to describe this silence, since the wall and floors in this place are poorly insulated. I can hear my downstairs neighbor's alarm clock and dinner conversations. By silence I mean something different than actual quietness. Perhaps it's more of a quietness in my mind now that there is not the constant option of interaction.

I get to decide when I want to see people. Once last week I canceled plans with a friend because I decided I wanted to be alone for the evening. She understood because she also likes to be alone.

I've noticed that I'm more tidy and organized, almost obsessively. I'm finishing things. I'm getting more done. I do the dishes immediately. My clothes are organized. I do my laundry when it needs to get done, rather than ignoring it (and I don't leave it sitting in the machine). I'm getting rid of old stuff in the fridge instead letting it rot. There are no piles of jars left by the sink and constantly overlooked (ooh, this is a good one). I'm working on the clutter thing. And now that I have an almost operational compost pile, I'm sure that will be taken out on a regular basis.

This place is big. It's the most space I've ever had command over. I have three large rooms to myself, not including the bathroom. Everything is roomy.

Maybe it's the space that creates this feeling of silence.

The privacy is wonderful. I can get involved in things and be involved as long as I want, without interruption, without critique, without someone looking over my shoulder. I have always been someone who likes to operate in private, preferring to unveil things once I have mastered them to perfection. I can make decisions about my living environment and aspects of my life without having to discuss them with someone else. No one else is directly affected by it as I am. When people come over, they are guests.

The control of my time, space, and person is so freeing. Is this the silence?

Have I mentioned that I love it?

If only I could pay rent.

Bloggy Switch Over

2008-02-28T23:18:00.000-08:00

I am moving my blog-ness to blogger. The reasons for this are:

My recipes will be searchable, which isn't something I could do with the previous blog
I can update it from my phone, which I think is kinda cool
Umm, cuz I wanna, and this is MY blog.

All previous blog posts can be found here:

Raw Vegan Recipe Blog

ShortSleeves

Eventually the recipes will be migrated over to the new site.