Teabaggers...

...They make it so easy...

Wooden Radios...

I was hanging out on Design Sponge earlier and reading about their contributors when I came across Alissa Parker-Walker and Ryan Walker. They run an online boutique out of Philly, so I decided to check it out. Unfortuately, the coolest things they sell are not within my price-range, but I would really love to own this clock.

A Beautifully Delicious Site

I love food.

This site makes me love it even more.

Essentially, it displays photos of various recipes that food bloggers post. Most of the time I don't even click through, I just drool over the photos.

Some of my favorites that I will eventually make:

Zucchini Boats

Green Bean Salad

Coconut Cupcakes with Pinapple Filling

(Uses coconut oil instead of butter!)

Herb-infused Asparagus Baked in Parchment


Who's hungry?

The Love of Running

Lately I've been reading "Born to Run, A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen" by Christopher McDougall. It was given to me as a Christmas present, and I started it soon after the new year but have just recently gotten serious about reading it (mainly due to all the plane trips I've been taking lately). I am so sorry that I didn't get into it earlier. The usual take-away from this book seems to be that we should return to the way humans used to run, the way we were built to run, with little or no footwear. I however, am being incredibly inspired by the description of the pure love of running. As I'm waiting for my running partner to get here, I'll jot a few of my favorite excerpts:

That's the real secret of the Tarahumara: they'd never forgotten what it felt like to love running. They remembered that running was mankind's first fine art, our original act of inspired creation. Way before we were scratching pictures on caves or beating rhythms on hollow trees, we were perfecting the art of combining our breath and mind and muscles into fluid self=propulsion over wild terrain.

No wonder so many people hated running; if you thought it was only a means to an end -- an investment in becoming faster, skinnier, richer -- then why stick with it if you weren't getting enough quo for your quid?


Posted on the wall of Vigil's office was a magic formula for fast running that, as far as Deena could tell, had absolutely nothing to do with running: it was stuff like, "Practice abundance by giving back," and "Improve personal relationships," and "Show integrity to your value system." [...] "Eat as though you were a poor person."

Off for a sunset run!

Fashion is Bullshit. But it is fun.

So in a few different avenues I've recently ended up in conversations about fashion, clothing, and the stupid things that women (have to?) do for fashion. Heels, waxing, hair color, going into debt for the latest style, etc. Not that I'm not guilty of a few of those. I have come to the conclusion that fashion is inherently shallow (not exactly ground breaking, I think most people feel this way). But I realized that I really do negatively judge people who are all about what they're wearing, who designed what, and what the latest trend is. That being said, I think with a healthy balance, fashion can be fun. Then there is the whole angle of how obsessed our culture is with fashion... that might be where the real harm is done...
But the whole reason I am even posting about this is because I think this song by David Bazan is a good representation of how ridiculous it can get. And I really like David, so an excuse to post one of his songs is reason enough for me.

Green Design

While I was working on the trivia questions for CIEB's Earth Day "celebration" (which I am in charge of) I was poking around on one of my favorite sites, www.Treehugger.com and I fell in love with these Armadiature cupboards by Renzivivian.
It's made up of old discarded furniture and recycled into a beautiful high end piece of furniture. I wonder if I could make one...

Click here if you want to see the whole slide show of green design.

HIV/AIDS and Beer.

Last night I volunteered at the Delaware HIV Consortium's WOW Award Gala. This was my second year and certainly not my last. My friend John works for the consortium and essentially plans and runs the whole event. Each year is themed, and this year the idea was that you were in the plane on the way to Vegas. John thought of every detail. The volunteers dressed like flight attendants, people were passing out the airplane peanuts, there were red flamingos as center pieces, craps and roulette, and the best part: there was THE BEST Frank Sinatra impersonator singing all night. I mean this guy was so good, it sounded exactly like old blue eyes himself. ANYWAY, after I volunteered for a few hours, I was able to partake in the event as a guest and helped myself to plenty of sushi and a few tastes of the Moores Brother's wine. Yum. Afterward, all the volunteers decided to go to Logan House to hear Spokey Speaky. Well one of the guys (forgot his name already) had a Dinkel Acker shirt on! Loved it so much that I ordered one online today for myself, after I googled it and found out it's a German brewery.