Pickles: Learning 6

Phyl is a good cook (usually he is the one making dinner). However, he also likes to play around with weird food combinations, which leads me to this post. He made cheeseburgers, and as usual his had many more additions than mine. Then I did a double take. "Did you put cucumbers on your burgers?" I asked, as though he were crazy. "Yes," he replied, as though this were perfectly normal. "Cucumbers?"  I repeated, still with a you're-crazy undertone. "What, they're just like pickles," he replied.

Which led to a further conversation about how pickles are made from cucumbers. He said it was just vinegar. Turns out it's vinegar plus lots of pickling salt and different spices to make the brine. So that's what I learned.

But the real question is, should one put cucumbers on their cheeseburger? Chime in in the comment section.

SCOTUS: Learning 5

I'm going to do a quick and blatantly obvious learning post today, since everyone who isn't under a social media rock should be aware of this learning today.

The Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act! Hooray! I learned that while this doesn't make gay marriage legal across the country, the federal government now recognizes ALL legal marriages as defined by the states. So if you live in a state where gay marriage is legal and get married, you can file your federal taxes jointly and your spouse won't be deported if they're from another country and take advantage of hundreds of other benefits as well. Presumably the federal government will also recognize your marriage if you get married in a state where gay marriage is legal and then move to one where it isn't. Which will cause all sorts of interesting legal logistics, I am sure.

The Supreme Court dismissed (that may not be the correct legal term, as I'm going by paraphrased memory here) the Prop 8 Case, which means that gay marriage is once again legal in California, because it reverts to the lower court which already struck down Prop 8! Hooray! I learned that if the Supreme Court had actually issued a ruling striking down Prop 8, gay marriage would now be legal all across the country no matter what state you live in, which would obviously be ideal. However they said the private citizens group that was fighting the not-so-good fight to uphold Prop 8 didn't have the legal grounds to bring the issue to court because they could not demonstrate how the law harmed them (EXACTLY! My gay friends getting married does not harm my marriage in the slightest!). So there is still a lot of ground to cover, but significant historical progress made today. And I learned about it.

Kroger: Learning 4

Today I felt like I'd spent too much time cooped up inside at home, so I decided to walk to the library and post office (have I mentioned lately how much I love being able to walk downtown from our home? because I do. That is my absolute favorite thing about Bloomington and a major factor in not moving to a nice apartment, because the ones we can afford aren't as close to downtown as our trailer is. but I digress). Anyway, I passed by Kroger as I walked down the B-Line and learned that it was finally open again! I say finally as if this Kroger being closed for a few weeks has greatly inconvenienced me, when really there are three other Krogers also in Bloomington within an easy ten minute drive. I just got spoiled having a Kroger right down the street.

So I stopped in and looked around. The construction isn't done yet, but we're allowed inside again. The store is a little bit bigger and the layout has been changed to be more like the modern stores. What struck me most though, is how pretty the store is now! The walls are all painted pretty colors and have graphics and modern signs. The outside of the store also got a paint job, covering up the old graffiti on the wall. Of course, there are already a couple new graffiti tags up. I generally disapprove of such, but this one made me laugh and I thought it was rather clever.

Also saw this cute little bunny nibbling on sidewalk grass by the courthouse.

UnPlugging: Learning 3

Many of my friends are able to honestly say that they do not check facebook very often - maybe just a couple times a week. I admire that and must admit that I check facebook constantly every day. It is my go to website on my computer. If my computer is next to me and I have nothing else to check online, I check facebook, even if I just checked it 5 minutes ago. No lie, I have been on facebook, realized there was nothing new to see, and then typed facebook.com into my address bar while I was still on my newsfeed in the first place!

So when I came across an article on unplugging at one of my favorite blogs, A Practical Wedding, I was intrigued.* I did give up facebook for Lent one year in college, which was an interesting experience. I have a hard time giving up facebook altogether now, because even though a lot of what is on there is nonsense, I do legitimately communicate with family and share pictures through it. So it's not all bad, but the amount of time I am on facebook is definitely bad. I don't like the fact that I waste hours on the internet mindlessly, but it's a hard habit to break. I learned that I am far from the only one who feels this way, and that while there are wondrous things the internet can do, unplugging can do wondrous things for you as well. 

Alexander Nazaryan described his Internet usage in a way I can definitely relate to: “I don’t want to call it addiction, to trivialize the suffering of alcoholics and compulsive gamblers. It is more like reliance, a psychological craving that will only be satisfied by the calming swipes of my finger across the smooth, shimmering screen of a device." Yes, my current websurfing is mostly out of boredom as I'm on vacation, but when I am checking facebook every 5 minutes after school despite having a ridiculously long and super stressful to do list? That is exactly why (although he described it in a much lovelier way than I could). 

So what's a person to do? I can't, at this point, bring myself to entirely give up the internet and ipad games every weekend altogether, the way Meg is doing over at APW. However, I am trying to be more intentional about taking time away from the computer. We gave up internet and cell phones during our cruise for 10 days out of necessity and that was wonderful. When we went back home for a very short weekend trip yesterday I left my ipad at home and didn't worry about checking facebook in between seeing friends and family. I'm taking time out to read books instead of mindlessly read my facebook feed (for some reason this is much easier to do on summer vacation than during the school year). I'm trying to actually cook some of the new recipes I'm finding online instead of just admiring them on pinterest. And when I feel like I just need some sort of 'noise', I put pandora radio on my ipad instead of playing a game or searching for a video on youtube and go do some organizing project or something productive around the house. I still spend a lot of time online and usually check facebook just under a gazillion times a day, but I'm learning, slowly, to try to make my internet time a little more intentional and a little less mindless. 

* [Sidebar: You may be asking yourself, why does Sarah still read this wedding blog when she got married 2.5 years ago? or, why does a wedding blog have a fascinating article about unplugging? I'll tell you why. This blog is not just about making favors no one cares about and giving you frighteningly unrealistic budget templates *cough*like theknot.com*cough*. This blog, while it does talk a lot about sensible and practical wedding planning advice, is also about marriage, life, and starting a business. They even talk about divorce. It is also written by a fabulously sassy, independent, smart, witty feminist and is one of the only places on the internet where I can click on the comments and actually get a thoughtful, caring, considerate, smart conversation with various viewpoints and advice. Okay, end sidebar.] 

House Flies: Learning 2

Since my earlier post was what I learned yesterday, I thought I'd post again with what I learned today. The past couple days we have noticed a housefly buzzzing around our home (I was going to correct that extra z, but then decided I liked it). It's only one, so at first it wasn't super annoying, it just buzzed angrily around the windows while I sat on the couch. But recently, it has become more fond of us and keeps landing on us and following us around the house. This morning Phyl left for work at 6:30 and I went back to sleep (yay summer and going back to sleep!) but it was made more challenging by the fact that the fly suddenly appeared and kept buzzing around my head. I'd sleepily swat at it, it would leave for a minute, come back, repeat. I covered my head with the sheet but even then I could hear the buzzing. Mr. Fly is still buzzing around (he was waiting for me on the bathroom mirror, and then he kept landing on our legs this afternoon) so I decided to research house flies to learn more about him. Here are some things I learned:

1. House flies can carry diseases. Like leprosy. I hope Mr. Fly doesn't turn me into a leper.

2. House flies have tiny hairs called tarsi on the end of their legs that work like taste buds. So when Mr. Fly keeps landing on us, what he is really doing is tasting us. This is slightly disconcerting.

3. House flies can only ingest liquid food because they can't chew. If they want to eat solid food like a grain of sugar, they regurgitate saliva and digestive juices to dissolve their potential meal. Apparently this is the real reason you don't want flies to land on your food while you're eating, because if they decide they also like your meal, you may end up with regurgitated fly juice on your food. Ew.

4. House flies can live up to 3 months, but their average life span is 3 weeks. So Mr. Fly will be leaving us by September at the latest. Hopefully we will swat him long before then.

5. House flies are not entirely useless creatures. They break down decomposing materials in the ecosystem and provide protein to birds and lizards that eat them. Some scientists also think larvae can be used to make cancer medicine, and apparently there are housefly farms in China for this purpose.

6. Some ancient civilizations had fly gods that they made sacrifices to in order to keep houseflies out of their homes and temples.

Apologies and Learning 1

Ok people. I think we have all learned that I still cannot be trusted to regularly update any sort of blog or journal device. I have not given up on the project 365 photo idea even though my track record isn't great (although not as abysmal as my blog would lead you to believe - check facebook, I'm slowly uploading pictures there). However, I think we can agree that at this point, project 365 entries are not the best idea, namely because I have a ridiculous amount to catch up on. SO, I am switching focus to Lee's blogging challenge about learning.

Last night I learned that if you replace half the flour in a chocolate chip cookie recipe with cake mix and add a bunch of sprinkles, you get SUPER delicious cake batter flavored chocolate chip cookies. These are seriously delicious. Dangerously so. I've had 6 already today for breakfast. I also learned that if you are following a recipe for oven baked fries and it tells you to coat the baking sheet with oil, make sure you use a sheet with RAISED edges. Otherwise the oil will drip onto the bottom of the oven and make your eyes sting with smoke. Heh.

You can find the recipe here. You really should go make them. Like right now. I ate two more while uploading the photo and linking the blog. They're that good.