lies spread around the world before the truth has a chance to put its pants on. isn't that great. that was thought long before the interweb. so now lies get to be catastrophically worse than they were, and the truth is still dreaming about chocolate yogurt.

I am excited to get the big box from the shippers....and hopefully a house to store it!

Days were that I would not eat meat. For about 12 years I was either vegetarian, vegan, macrobiotic or plain too poor. Then came Lousiana and J. And meat. I have never had an issue with handling meat as I have spent much time on and off of farms. I also do not think that eating meat makes you evil. I do think that the proliferation of cows is evil, but not hamburgers per se.

Before leaving for NZ, Dada T asked about NZ pine. As in "why is there so much pine from NZ?" Well. That is interesting. It seems that the colonial mentality that dropped pines onto the SAfrican fynbos and decimated the water table on Table Mountain worked out how to establish pine forests all over NZ too. Now, however, that the Chinese have developed a penchant for beef, the pine forests are being cleared for cattle. So, as a species, despite the cries of evil and abuse from their hominid friends, the bovines are doing great. In NZ they are doubly praised as dairy farming is heavily subsidized. And here we were ready to chant "rack of lamb and a pinot." Instead, it should have been "halfcase of monteith's and a burger."

And somewhere, the admonition not to worship the golden calf (read:arches) springs to mind, though I am not sure of that is relevant......

Oh, and speaking of beer. J and I had a good laugh at the NEW beer that is springing up all around NZ - complete with NZ grown cascade hops. And J thought he would be missing his IPAs.....

What exactly is considered work worth praise? In finally just responding from the gut to mrs. asshat - in written tirade, of course - I tried to let her know that nagging and constant praise seeking for minimal and/or crappy effort is a shit-tastic combination. The response was to list all her efforts - which is hilarious as the efforts she lists are, for the most part, the ones I know for a fact she performed poorly and is claiming reward for.

So, though mrs. asshat is considerably older, she is none the wiser to all the things my mom used to tell me. Namely, doing something and working on something are worth doing and working on for themselves or their purpose, not because someone will clap from the sidelines. Doing something and working on something should be done and worked on to the best of one's abilities, and not in some half-assed manner that makes it so the doing and working has to be done and worked again.

Which leads me to changing mrs. asshat's moniker from mrs. asshat to mrs. half-asshat. What a self-congratulatory nincompoop. A whole bunch of people having been striving conscientiously without having anyone yell "hooray!" when they show up at a meeting.

I think that I used to not care whether people did what they were supposed to or not because I learned that they usually did not do as they should (despite mrs-be-done-by-as-you-would's admonitions). I learned this early from having to work in group projects. Now, I have come to realize that this is a complete generalization whose truth is only in the context of my western culture. Other cultures have no (or less) problem with the enormous ego problem that constantly yells INDIVIDUAL (meaning: ME FIRST!!!). Instead, they say: autonomous, please....and wait until we are all together...it is obvious that we are individuals, why do you insist on screeching the obvious in an overly competitive fashion? (Or whatever they really say internally that ousts the insane "you must observe my (often minimal) accomplishments NOW" behavior that is so prevalent in the US.)

I believe my early and deep exposure to a non-"me first" culture has screwed me over for any participatory venture in the US sphere. That and my complete inability to keep my hands off the keyboard or my mouth shut when confronted by self-aggrandizing schmarm. I am getting better though (according to some inane self-metric that usually tells me that I am only just not failing, but anyway...). I kept my mouth shut and acted very politely - if not always entirely kindly - until this last three months. It was hard, but I don't think I should get a freaking medal for it.

Also, I read recently that parenthetical remarks are unnecessary. What nonsense! If I didn't run parentheticals in the thought balloons above my head I would get really confused. Whoever wrote that must not have a problem keeping the multiple threads of whatever they are thinking straight. Or, they only have a few threads. Let me tell you, I have a whole yarn factory tumbling out behind my face just trying to parse out simple phrases. ( I am sure that someone will insist that I need medication, and I wouldn't disagree if the medication didn't also cause drooling or paralysis.)

I like people well enough (for all of their people-ishness), but I dislike having to divulge myself to them in some culturally proscribed manner. Having no definite culture that I can cling to so that I know that what I am saying is acceptable or unacceptable, I often just blunder my way through most situations and hope for some compassion.

I have no emotional filters to give me the "thick skin" or the "water off a duck's back" qualities that I admire in many people. While that is entirely another topic, it is closer to what I have been thinking on my back-burner brain today than the slow cultivation of zen-like compassionate acceptance of all life paths (which is often what I think about when wandering through any metropolis setting).

What is funny is that I want to have a thicker skin to deal with my own inadequacies and not someone else's - or my perception of them.

On the front burner has been a wonderful spring squall and lots of sail boarders and windsurfers. If I had a 3mil suit I would be out on the surf faster than Ceres can cover the sofa with chocolate sauce. And that's damn fast.