In Vicar of Dibley--a hilarious if often crude British TV series--there is a character who starts almost all sentences with "No, no, no, no." (Although once he said, "Yes, yes, yes, yes, no.")
LW has caught the bug.
When asked any question, he answers "Nuh-no" (accompanied by a finger wag and several shakes of his head). That, however, is not necessarily the answer. If "Nuh-no" is followed by silence, then he was really saying no. Usually, though, "Nuh-no" is followed after a slight pause by "Shee," which is LW's word of assent. (As near as we can tell, he is combining "Sure" and "Si.") "Shee" is accompanied by jumping up and down, throwing his arms in the air, or both.
It's pretty darn cute, if I do say so myself.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Books
Last weekend I finished reading This Organic Life: Confessions of a Suburban Homesteader by Joan Dye Gussow, who grows all of her own vegetables in her yard on the Hudson River, 20 minutes north of NYC.
It's part memoir, part cook book and part treatise on eating locally. The ideas are challenging, but the memoir aspect makes it an entertaining read.
Like Farley Mowat, the Canadian naturalist who consumed field mice to prove that wolves were living on rodents rather than endangered caribou, I realized that I would need to eat locally myself to prove that a human being could do so. I never meant our food growing to be a demonstration that every New Yorker could feed herself entirely from her own land. That would have been naive. The effort was always intended to demonstrate what could be grown locally, provided consumers encouraged farmers to grow all the variety they could for their neighborhoods. I wanted to prove that eating locally was feasible, healthy, and even tasty--if northeastern eaters would learn to enjoy living on what nature allowed.
I think she makes a compelling case.
It's not only more delicious to avoid summer foods in winter, it's also more interesting to build meals around different foods at different times of the year. As anyone knows who has had the chance to feast in parts of Europe where the locals still eat seasonally, eating only foods that are in season can be a delicious adventure. . . .
Meal planning is simply more exciting and less bewildering when you wait for fruits and vegetables to come into season, east them steadily when they arrive, and say a reluctant goodbye for another year when their season has passed. When you've done this for a while, you lose your taste for out-of-season produce.
Now, we are far, far, far away from eating only foods that are in season. But she has convinced me to try parsnips--although I think I'm leaning more towards the parsnips sauteed with butter and not so much toward the parsnip pancakes with maple syrup. And I am eagerly awaiting our CSA (Community Sponsored Agriculture) vegetables this summer.
I also finished reading Labyrinth by Kate Mosse, which was loaned to me by a friend. It takes place in Carcassonne, which we visited on our trip to France. My friend described it as a "like Davinci Code only better written." It's also far less controversial theologically. A very enjoyable read.
It's part memoir, part cook book and part treatise on eating locally. The ideas are challenging, but the memoir aspect makes it an entertaining read.
Like Farley Mowat, the Canadian naturalist who consumed field mice to prove that wolves were living on rodents rather than endangered caribou, I realized that I would need to eat locally myself to prove that a human being could do so. I never meant our food growing to be a demonstration that every New Yorker could feed herself entirely from her own land. That would have been naive. The effort was always intended to demonstrate what could be grown locally, provided consumers encouraged farmers to grow all the variety they could for their neighborhoods. I wanted to prove that eating locally was feasible, healthy, and even tasty--if northeastern eaters would learn to enjoy living on what nature allowed.
I think she makes a compelling case.
It's not only more delicious to avoid summer foods in winter, it's also more interesting to build meals around different foods at different times of the year. As anyone knows who has had the chance to feast in parts of Europe where the locals still eat seasonally, eating only foods that are in season can be a delicious adventure. . . .
Meal planning is simply more exciting and less bewildering when you wait for fruits and vegetables to come into season, east them steadily when they arrive, and say a reluctant goodbye for another year when their season has passed. When you've done this for a while, you lose your taste for out-of-season produce.
Now, we are far, far, far away from eating only foods that are in season. But she has convinced me to try parsnips--although I think I'm leaning more towards the parsnips sauteed with butter and not so much toward the parsnip pancakes with maple syrup. And I am eagerly awaiting our CSA (Community Sponsored Agriculture) vegetables this summer.
I also finished reading Labyrinth by Kate Mosse, which was loaned to me by a friend. It takes place in Carcassonne, which we visited on our trip to France. My friend described it as a "like Davinci Code only better written." It's also far less controversial theologically. A very enjoyable read.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
He Can Jump!
Yesterday LW figured out how to get both feet off the ground at the same time when he jumps. He's very proud of himself. It's exciting to see him reach new milestones, but I'll miss seeing the funny one-leg-at-a-time hop.
It was nice to have a new milestone, because he was very . . . uhm . . . challenging yesterday.
It was nice to have a new milestone, because he was very . . . uhm . . . challenging yesterday.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Been Playing at the River and I'm Tired to the Bone*
Temps were in the 80s yesterday and today, so the kids and I headed down to the river when they got home from school.
There are a lot of things that frustrate me about our living situation here at the inn. Two bedrooms to divide among four kids, three of whom want their own room. One bathroom for a family of six. Having to constantly tell the kids "shush!"
But one thing I love, love, love about living here is having the river on the property. It sits down in a valley within the Valley as it passes through our property, so the river and banks are shaded in the late afternoon. Even my very fair baby can play without needing sunblock.
I pull a white plastic chair into the river and soak my feet while I read, keeping one eye on the kids. EM and IM cross to the large rocks in the middle of the river and imagine. (This alone makes the river valuable. These two have the most difficult time enjoying their siblinghood and I treasure any time they spend having fun together.)
NB, who is a little shorter and more cautious than IM, is nervous about wading out as far as the rocks, and usually plays in the shallows where the river slows down a bit. There's good mud there.
LW throws rocks in the river and wades along the edges. I'm a bit nervous about the way he was eyeing EM and IM toward the end of our time today. The river is shallow enough for the three older kids to cross safely, but it's definitely too deep for the baby.
In fact, it was LW's fussiness at not being over on the rocks with his brother and sister that brought us up from the river. Otherwise I think we would have stayed until Michael called us in for dinner.
* Thanks to John McCutchin for the title.
There are a lot of things that frustrate me about our living situation here at the inn. Two bedrooms to divide among four kids, three of whom want their own room. One bathroom for a family of six. Having to constantly tell the kids "shush!"
But one thing I love, love, love about living here is having the river on the property. It sits down in a valley within the Valley as it passes through our property, so the river and banks are shaded in the late afternoon. Even my very fair baby can play without needing sunblock.
I pull a white plastic chair into the river and soak my feet while I read, keeping one eye on the kids. EM and IM cross to the large rocks in the middle of the river and imagine. (This alone makes the river valuable. These two have the most difficult time enjoying their siblinghood and I treasure any time they spend having fun together.)
NB, who is a little shorter and more cautious than IM, is nervous about wading out as far as the rocks, and usually plays in the shallows where the river slows down a bit. There's good mud there.
LW throws rocks in the river and wades along the edges. I'm a bit nervous about the way he was eyeing EM and IM toward the end of our time today. The river is shallow enough for the three older kids to cross safely, but it's definitely too deep for the baby.
In fact, it was LW's fussiness at not being over on the rocks with his brother and sister that brought us up from the river. Otherwise I think we would have stayed until Michael called us in for dinner.
* Thanks to John McCutchin for the title.
What's with the Name?
I'm a little paranoid about Internet privacy and security. I wanted to make sure no inn guests (for example) could Google my name and find this blog. So I resurrected my high school and college nickname. I don't have much contact with high school or college friends these days, so it feels a little weird to have the nickname back.
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Keyboard Puzzle
Tuesday afternoon, while EM was at karate, I went to the garden center to pick out plants for the window boxes in front of the carport. As I'm loading up the impatiens, I patted myself on the back for leaving LW at home with Michael. It would have been challenging to keep him out of trouble while carrying the plants to the cashier.
Hah. Little did I know.
When I got home, Michael said anxiously, "You like puzzles, right?" And handed me a small glass bowl containing the keys to my laptop. The one that belongs to work. The one that was still on (because it had been working on a large file transfer).
I had carefully locked the computer via Windows XP, because I know LW likes to type on keyboards and I didn't want him, say, deleting files from the network. Or emailing my boss. But it never occurred to me I needed to close the lid.
While the rest of the family ate dinner, and Michael told me about combing through Sammy's fur to find all the pieces, I matched up parts. Each key on the laptop has three parts--a tiny rubber knob, a small plastic frame that snaps around the knob, and the key itself, which snaps onto the plastic frame. The frame holds the key in place, and the rubber knob transmits the pressure from your fingers pressing the key to the sensor that registers the keystroke.
LW was sporadic in destruction--some keys had plastic frame intact but knob missing, some had knob intact but frame missing, and some were missing both. After a good bit of frustration and some tears (but no yelling--I'm very proud of that), I managed to get almost all the keyboard working. The A and D keys stick a bit, but I could probably fix that if I pried them up and snapped them on again. But the E key and the Shift keys are broken. You can make them work by pressing directly on the rubber knobs, but that's not really a long-term solution.
So yesterday morning, I loaded up the laptop and LW and drove 40 minutes to Staples in search of a USB keyboard. We tested it on the spot (hence the need for the laptop).
My boss and the computer tech at work have been very understanding. Since the laptop's warranty expired in March (so close!), the Dell tech won't come to my house. So I am awaiting arrival of a new keyboard, which I will then install into the laptop following directions given me by the tech from work over the phone. I'm good at following directions. Really.
I was not laughing at the time, but now I dearly wish I'd thought to take a picture of the dismantled keyboard.
And Michael and I have decided that LW is now firmly in first place on the family's naughty list, having vaulted over NB's stripping of the dining room wallpaper. (Fixing that was a lot more work, but at least it was something I'd been wanting to do anyway, and it looked great when it was done. This was completely unnecessary--and involved confessing to people at work.)
Hah. Little did I know.
When I got home, Michael said anxiously, "You like puzzles, right?" And handed me a small glass bowl containing the keys to my laptop. The one that belongs to work. The one that was still on (because it had been working on a large file transfer).
I had carefully locked the computer via Windows XP, because I know LW likes to type on keyboards and I didn't want him, say, deleting files from the network. Or emailing my boss. But it never occurred to me I needed to close the lid.
While the rest of the family ate dinner, and Michael told me about combing through Sammy's fur to find all the pieces, I matched up parts. Each key on the laptop has three parts--a tiny rubber knob, a small plastic frame that snaps around the knob, and the key itself, which snaps onto the plastic frame. The frame holds the key in place, and the rubber knob transmits the pressure from your fingers pressing the key to the sensor that registers the keystroke.
LW was sporadic in destruction--some keys had plastic frame intact but knob missing, some had knob intact but frame missing, and some were missing both. After a good bit of frustration and some tears (but no yelling--I'm very proud of that), I managed to get almost all the keyboard working. The A and D keys stick a bit, but I could probably fix that if I pried them up and snapped them on again. But the E key and the Shift keys are broken. You can make them work by pressing directly on the rubber knobs, but that's not really a long-term solution.
So yesterday morning, I loaded up the laptop and LW and drove 40 minutes to Staples in search of a USB keyboard. We tested it on the spot (hence the need for the laptop).
My boss and the computer tech at work have been very understanding. Since the laptop's warranty expired in March (so close!), the Dell tech won't come to my house. So I am awaiting arrival of a new keyboard, which I will then install into the laptop following directions given me by the tech from work over the phone. I'm good at following directions. Really.
I was not laughing at the time, but now I dearly wish I'd thought to take a picture of the dismantled keyboard.
And Michael and I have decided that LW is now firmly in first place on the family's naughty list, having vaulted over NB's stripping of the dining room wallpaper. (Fixing that was a lot more work, but at least it was something I'd been wanting to do anyway, and it looked great when it was done. This was completely unnecessary--and involved confessing to people at work.)
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