wow

Boingboing posted about this new website, Atavist, where people make visual stories. I guess some people call these movies. This is an excerpt from a new one. Fascinating.

Here is a link to the whole story shown above, if you are interested. Via The Atlantic.

woman in a box, left to die

I ran across this photo in these photos from Stéphane Passet. It keeps haunting me.

I found this about the photo on the internet:
"The image shown is of a female Mongolian prisoner. Passet recorded that she had been imprisoned for adultery but historians have cast doubt on this, as Mongolian culture of the time was thought to be tolerant of adultery.

The purpose of imprisoning people in a box in this way was to allow the nomadic people to transport prisoners from place to place. It was 'portable imprisonment'.

People who took pity on prisoners were allowed to leave them food and water and small bowls can be seen in the photograph, just beyond the reach of the incarcerated woman."

A different website said she would be left there to die...out in the Mongolian steep.

What was she thinking? What did she do? How could you just take a picture of her? How long would she last?

the hurricane took down a tree

right next to our house...fell onto the neighbor's car that the building is constantly arguing with...good times. poor tree.

hurricane

hurricane passing over...leak in roof found...old law & order's on the TV. Good times.

today's art project: light box photo

i have been meaning to put this project together for years...literally. DONE!

what I read

I read a lot.

Currently we read:
New York Magazine, weekly
The New Yorker, weekly
GQ, monthly
The Atlantic, monthly
boingboing.net, daily

I have started reading the back posts of:
blog.sethroberts.net

I like to read magazines on the day I get them...otherwise they can languish.

I also try to read a few books a week...hence my reviews you get to read.

I don't want to hear from anyone else that having a baby will mean I will never read again. My good friend Tania told me I will be able to read while I breastfeed. I believe her.

I am feeling a bit militant about this...If I could keep reading during law school, I can keep reading after a baby.

Thanks for reading...and being supportive of my habit.

rethink nyc

I love this thought experiment...what if the city was all smashed inside Central park, and the rest of the city was the park?

the atlantic: hit or miss...and tea cup kids

I read this article, "How to Land your Kid in Therapy" about teacup kids in The Atlantic recently. The article, by Lori Gorrlieb, of Marry Him fame, chronicles the end results of helicopter parents who insist on being friends with their kids rather than parents. Colleges have taken to calling these children "Teacup Kids" because the first time something goes wrong in their life they break like a delicate teacup.

Really worth a read. Would love to hear what you mom's who read my blog think about the article...

blogging down...inability to sleep up

Ok, so I am having problems sleeping at this point...between the baby and acid reflux, I really sleep best during the day...which is silly.

Anyway, I have stumbled upon a new blog that I just love. You all know I love boingboing.net, but now there is blog.sethroberts.net, a blog by Seth Roberts. His posts are endlessly fascinating to me. I have made my way back to the beginning of last year, and will continue working backwards. I did this for boingboing too...

Roberts engages in a lot of self experimentation. He does different exercises everyday to monitor how well he is doing that day. For example, he takes a math test everyday and records the amount of time it takes him to compete the test. He has found that eating half a stick of butter a day and eating flax seeds makes him feel better and improves his math test scores.

Maybe instead of reading his blog I should write...but I haven't.

baby shower pictures...

:)


Click here to see the pictures!

Thanks Erica, Pam, Keith, Jordan, and Erin. It was a great time!

too many dinosaurs

This talk by Jack Horner has been stuck in my brain...I just found this idea so compelling: instead of lots of dinosaurs, there where many fewer and the paleontologists have been finding babies, juveniles, and adults and thinking they were different species, when really they weren't.

In high school I got to go to Egg Mountain in Montana as a Girl Scout and work on the dig there for two weeks. Jack Horner's son was there, John. He was HOT. And I remember finding a big bone and asking him what it was. He asked me. I asked back. He raised his voice. I raised mine. Finally he was shouting at me: WHAT IS THIS BONE? I finally guessed and said a femur? He said sure. I then realized he had no clue either.

Anyway, watch this video and ponder. Good times.

juicing

Anyone out there ever gotten into juicing? Brent and I watched this pretty great movie (Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead) about juicing to lose weight and regain health and just bought a juicer to give it a go.

The apple juice was good...but earthy. Very interesting taste. Preview of the movie below:



I liked the idea of resetting your food pallet. When we discussed this with my brother and his wife, they did not really buy it...but I think there is some merit. These guys were not eating any fruits of veggies...ANY...so they really needed to reset things. And it worked. I will be trying the juices Brent makes, because of my delicate state...but not actually only drinking juice...that seems a little crazy. I could see Brent just drinking a juice for breakfast everyday. My uncle has a smoothie for breakfast everyday.

Thoughts?

cook books v. the internets

Do you use cook books to find recipes or the internets? I kind of go both ways. We have quite a few cook books now and I enjoy reading them. I have a friend who collects them. She does not cook though.

However, when I am looking for a specific recipe I tend to go to the internets. Grammy used to make a wonderful strawberry bread, and I thought I had the recipe, but I could not find it.

I found this one online:

Fresh Strawberry Bread

Ingredients
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 cups strawberries, rinse, dried and chopped

Directions
1. Grease and flour a 9×5 inch loaf pan.
2. With electric mixer cream butter, sugar and cream cheese until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time. Mix in vanilla.
3. In separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Blend flour mixture with butter mixture just until blended. Add buttermilk and only stir until just combined; do not over mix.
4. Carefully fold in strawberries. Dough mixture will be thick.
5. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 50 to 60 minutes.

I will let you know how it works out!