Glibbertysmidgeon

I don’t think anyone would be surprised to hear me say I’m an idealist.

Though it may be impossible to live up to my ideals entirely, I don’t see that as an excuse not to do what I can.

One of the things that keeps me here in New York is the subway system. I can’t remember a time when driving didn’t make me feel guilty. I must have learned that carbon monoxide is a bad thing before I was old enough to drive. Back home, I did my fair share of driving to the grocery store (.25 miles away from home) and the laundromat (across the street from the grocery store), but I also avoided driving when I could. I biked to school and to work all through college, and generally mooched rides whenever possible.

Despite all of the things I do that I know harm someone, somewhere, for some reason- like wasting the paper cup that holds the latte I’m sipping right now- I tend to choose certain battles and stick with them.

They’re specific, often quixotic choices, but they’re mine.

For example, I only buy soda from a fountain. This is because bottled soda and water are created by privatizing access to water in small towns or poor countries, and then denying local residents access to their own water. In some locations, the results of this behavior are deadly.

Except Orangina, which I order from FreshDirect by the gallons.
I have never seen Orangina at a soda fountain. If I ever do, I suppose I’ll be forced to consider having a fountain installed in my house so that I can create Orangina myself using local water.

For now, I just give Orangina a pass.

Being a parent has created a whole new generation of idealism compromises.

On choosing organic, parenthood scores well. There are wonderful baby foods out there that are completely organic- we use Happy Baby, which is also frozen instead of canned, so it tastes great and has more vitamins. Also, they’re do-gooders (or claim to be) so that helps ease the guilt of not making my own baby food at home.

Scarlett sleeps on an organic mattress, covered by an organic wool absorbent pad, topped by an organic cotton sheet. Of course, lately she’s taken to sleeping with a pillow to help her sinuses drain. That pillow, stolen from her parents’ bed, is made of some unidentified synthetic fiber, and is wrapped in a case made from non-organic cotton. It’s a temporary solution, and one I’m feeling, suddenly, like I’d better fix right away.

I am deeply ashamed of my failure to move from disposable to cloth diapers.
These insidious little landfillers are so effective, so convenient, so AVAILABLE that I have been able to put off learning the essentials of cloth diapering, such as which style to buy, how to use a “doubler” and what kind of cover is best. I cringe inside every single time I change a diaper, and every time I need to order more, I hesitate. “Shouldn’t I call a diaper service instead?”

Then the baby poops, and I set that thought aside and rush to order another case of Pampers.

For years I have resisted the disposable cleaning products trend. I use environmentally friendly spray, real sponges and washcloths, and a real broom and mop to clean my house. I even have a squeegie to for cleaning my windows. Why use a paper towel when a real dishrag will work just as well? But it’s a short hop from disposable diaper wipes to disposable anti-bacterial wipes.

To me, the Swiffer has long been the poster child of disposalism.

A cheap plastic handle and a cheap plastic swivel head, designed and constructed to make me buy box after box of textured napkins that cling to the dirt, and go into the trash. You don’t even have to bend over!

Today, I have reached a new low.

I started off blameless enough…I know that the Swiffer handle itself was abandoned in the apartment when we moved in. But I bought that box of toxic chemical sheets myself.

With Scarlett starting to crawl, I have started to get desperate about the dog hair situation, and nothing clears out the fur faster than a quick Swiff before work.

I am on the horns of a serious idealistic crisis.
The evil empire! A Swiffer in the house!

Thankfully, I wrote this blog entry.
While Googling to find out what they call those chemical paper napkin refill thingies, I came across this eco-friendly Swiffer-like thing.

Now I face a new dilemma.
If I buy the eco-friendly Swiffer-like thing, what will I do with the Swiffer I have?

Do I throw the evil chemical patches in the trash to go poison a landfill? Should I use them first?
Do I give them away so someone else can throw them into the landfill?

I cannot unmanufacture these things.
There’s no easy way to win back your soul once you give in to disposalism.

I have been trying to figure out how to listen to This American Life at my desk for three weeks.

I listen to the radio online, but I have to get through the corporate firewall to do it. Normally, when I go to an external website, I get a login screen, where I type my user ID and password, and then I’m allowed to view the site.

But This Life is wily.

When I click on the link to their free streaming content, the link spawns Windows Media Player without triggering the firewall login. Without that login, Windows Media Player falls into the black hole of doom.

I had to find a way to trigger the firewall login.

For a while, I solved this by right-clicking on the link and copying the URL from the Properties dialogue box. I pasted that URL into a new browser window, and voila, the login.

Then This Life struck back.

They created their own, proprietary media player, which spawns automatically when you click the link. Now, when I try my right-click trick, all I get is the URL to the lousy .gif.

Damn you This Life!

I realized that it was time to come out to my friend, James.
I had to confess that I don’t know how to Podcast.

It was a humiliating moment, but also a liberating one.
After an informative half hour with James, I found Odeo.

Now I can subscribe to my favorite shows, then log in to Odeo and listen to them at my leisure.

This whole adventure made me realize that I’m not the geek I thought I was.
I guess I have to accept that I’m just a smart girl who likes to hang around with the geek crowd.

I’m a geek hag.

So I was looking at this site, and I started to feel jealous. How come there’s no site dedicated to my people?
Then again, maybe there is. But who are my people?

My grandmother liked to tell me stories about Gideon Detweiler whom I’ve dubbed The Original Ancestor, because he’s the oldest character in any of her stories. Gideon was my grandmother’s father, the first of her family to come to America. Grams liked to tell me how his tools were confiscated at the border and he had to start again from nothing, but I preferred the story about how Gideon was kicked out of the Amish church for wearing orthopedic shoes. Resilient ancestor that he was, Gideon went on to marry a native American woman named Melissa, and helped found a whole new church. Presumably a more liberal church that tolerated the use of orthopedic shoes. Grams never mentioned where Gideon lived before coming to America, but at least I know he was Amish.. before he was not Amish.

I Googled the phrase “Amish Rock”, but all I got was this interview with three shunned Amish boys who formed a rock band, and a bunch of ads for this Amish Rock Shatter Candy.

I don’t know much about Melissa. Besides the frowning sepia toned pictures in the family photo album, I only have this one story about her.

When my grandmother was born, Melissa named the baby after her very best friend, Minnie. Sometime after little Minnie Detweiler was born and christened, Melissa discovered that her friend’s legal name was actually Mary, and that Minnie was only a nickname.

“Then SHE’S Mary too!” Melissa exclaimed. In the end, my grandmother’s legal name was Minnie, and her nickname, Mary. The reverse of her namesake.

That was the story my father told me in response to the question, “why do you call Grandma Forty Dollar Minnie?”

According to Dad, Grams’ real name was a great source of shame, which made it an excellent topic for his constant teasing. (The forty dollar part is a whole other story). I have never seen Grams’ birth certificate, and can not verify that her legal name was, in fact, Minnie. Although my dad is a famous tease and an occasional liar, several of his brothers also call their mother Forty Dollar Minnie (Forty for short), so I’m accepting it as fact.

There are lots of geneology buffs in the Detweiler clan. I’ve seen their charts at the family reunions, but they all begin with Gideon.

So I started thinking about Grandpa’s side. I’ve heard that the Aro name is very common in Finland, which is convenient for me, since I’m very pale, with blue eyes and blonde hair. I often tell people that my heritage is Finnish, and they never question it at all. Maybe it’s true!

There is controversy among the Aros on that point. Some say the Aros are from Finland. Others say the original Aros were French. They claim these French ancestors migrated to Finland where they took the name Aro before moving to America. Grams, who was a Detweiler by birth and an Aro by marriage, claimed that Aro was an Ellis Island edit of a name more like Hairo. Origin: Unknown.

There are no geneology people that I know of on the Aro side, so I can’t verify any of that.

My Grandfather’s family on Mom’s side had a very industrious geneology person who is now, apparently, dead. Mom once showed me a thick book with brittle paper as thin as bible pages. Each translucent sheet contained hundreds of names and birthdates of my family going back many generations. The book ended abruptly at my mother’s generation, so my name does not appear. Mom claims that there is German and Dutch in our family from her dad’s side, and some Irish on her mom’s. I’ve never really known how much of each or from how far back. The dense book of names did nothing to clear things up.

So, based on the evidence at hand, I might be a Faux Finnish French American with a blush of Native American and Irish. Or, something else entirely.

When I look in the mirror, I just see me.
Farm girl from Oregon who went to college, got a job, and moved to the big city.
A typical American story.

“I think it is fair to say that I believe we’ve got a great chance to establish a Palestinian state,” Bush said. “And I intend to use the next four years to spend the capital of the United States on such a state.”

CNN

What is this “capital of the United States” that he intends to spend?

It can’t be money. With our 4 trillion dollar deficit, the correct word would be “credit”.

Perhaps he’s talking about political capital, like the international goodwill and co-operative spirit that America experienced in the days following the attacks on September 11th. Sadly, he already spent that on the Iraq war.

I’ll just leave that first sentence alone.
Next time, Mr. President, just say this:

“I believe we have a great chance to establish a Palestinian state, and I intend to support that effort fully.”

Thank you.

I have worms in my kitchen.

Technically, they’re in the utility closet, but when they die, they always end up stuck to my kitchen floor.

It’s not an infestation, it’s a worm bin. When I was in Hawai’i on my honeymoon, I learned about Vermicomposting from my brand new sister-in-law, Piper. You read that right. I learned composting on my honeymoon.

Piper owns a little business called Hawai’i Rainbow Worms through which she teaches composting workshops to her fellow islanders. Vermicomposting is about letting worms eat your kitchen scraps. Ever the tree-hugger, I’ve been wanting one of those big, plastic backyard composters for a year now, but have been reluctant to spend the 150 bucks to buy one, particularly in a year when I was too busy choosing bridesmaids’ dresses to bathe my dog or dust the furniture, let alone tackle any major landscaping projects. So I was excited to see how a real pro uses worms to turn used paper towels and papaya rinds into rich feed for plants.

Within a week of our return home, I was at the Bargains R Us store down the block, buying the big plastic containers I would need to start my own worm bins. It was easy to drill the necessary holes in two of the three bins, but somewhat more difficult to purchase the spray paint. After three bargain stores shrugged at my request, I went to a real hardware store, where the cans were stored in a locked display case. The paint guy winked when he asked me for my I.D. I suppose it makes sense that you have to be 18 to buy a can of spray paint in New York City. Once we had constructed the bin, added the damp paper and the worm food (kitchen scraps) I headed out into the yard with a hand trowel, a plastic bag, and a Maglite. By shuffling through the dead leaves in the yard, I was able to collect a good fistful of red wrigglers which I ceremoniously introduced to their new habitat.

It was hard those first two weeks, when I wasn’t allowed to feed the worms. Perfectly good banana peels had to be thrown in the trash! Now I’m allowed to feed them every other day, and they’re getting egg shells, coffee grounds, tomato stems, and broccoli stumps. MMM MMM good.

But my worms are not thriving. I’ve checked my worm bin troubleshooting list once, then twice.
Too wet? Nope.
Too dry? I’m pretty sure it’s not…
Too acidic? No citrus in there…
Too much vibration? Uh uh.
Too hot? Not yet anyway. Once the landlord turns on the steam boiler, I may have to worry….
Too cold? Definitely not.

And yet, each time I open the bin, I find another dead soldier. Not enough Oxygen? We drilled more holes. We added new worms. We gave them some of their native backyard leaf food.

Whatever the problem, it seems to be getting worse. Now they’re not just dying, they’re committing suicide.

Three times I’ve been unhappily surprised to find a drying little worm body stuck to the kitchen floor just outside the closet door. They must be forcing their way through their little air holes, but where were they going? Were they making for the back yard?

The papers Piper sent me say that worms will stay with their food unless they’re really uncomfortable, so the conditions in my worm bin must be severe. Whatever is going on in my utility closet, I have to assume, can only be worm torture.

Tonight I’m going to call in the professionals to attempt an emergency worm rescue. If I can’t contact Piper, I may be forced to release the worms back into the wild. It is the only humane thing to do.

Wish us all the very best of luck.

Worst storm in three and a half weeks! Thousands Dead.

The evening commute Wednesday was the scene of mass carnage as New Yorkers ventured into hurricane conditions, umbrellas ahead of them, bending into the wind. No one was prepared for the force of the winds, or the sheer mass of the rain beating the buildings, the streets, or the hapless umbrellas. I saw the first victim of the storm as I rounded the corner of 9th and 15th.

Glistening wet, the black umbrella crouched in the corner like a broken batwing, spiny bones protruding from its vinyl skin in unnatural angles. As I struggled to make my way to the subway station, I began to notice more and more carcasses. Carelessly tossed aside, they washed down the swollen gutters, piled up against buildings, tumbled into the subway stairways.

As the rain began to beat apart the garbage bags piled on the sidewalks, I saw their spiny forms outlined through the plastic. Their inside-out skeletons pierced the bags, reached out like spidery hands. I was forced to turn my head.

Like a plague of locusts, these umbrella husks descended upon our city, and were gone as quickly as they came. This morning as I ventured out of my apartment in my still damp wool coat and hat, I saw a few survivors, red and plaid, gamely keeping up the good fight as their comrades disappeared into the backs of the groaning garbage trucks.