I’ve been noticing a lot of bloggers making comments about how their “real” lives are not perfect and they proceed to assure you that behind the gorgeous bucolic scenes on their blogs there is mad chaos and dirty dishes.  They offer this up like a gift – so that readers will not be annoyed by all the pretty they came to see in the first place.  I just have to laugh at myself.  I seem to have made a practice of constantly showing everyone the seamy side of my life, the dirty laundry.  I showed you a fucking mushroom I had growing in one of my bathrooms for God’s sake!

So I was thinking that sometime soon, (not now), I should try going for pretty and tranquil and gentle for a change.  It might not be easy to find a corner of pretty and tranquil in this house.  Most of it is liberally covered in pet fur which is only pretty when still on the pets.

I hate the expression “on the cheap”.  I can’t even say why.  There’s nothing intrinsically bad about it.

Lots and lots of nightmares lately.  Saw a head get blown off, had some usual classroom related anxiety dreams, almost becoming adulterous (these are as stressful as smoking dreams except that whereas I used to smoke, I have never been adulterous), dystopian landscapes in which people are trying to maintain some sense of culture.

I’ve only been up for an hour and a half and so far I’ve had to mop up: cat pee, coffee spills, and ice water.  Can I go back to bed now?  I can’t imagine anything good will come of the next sixteen hours.

I should mention that I have some barely hidden wishes for the human race to be obliterated completely.  These feelings rarely go completely away but are made more acute when something triggers them into renewed fury.  Such as the Penn State scandal.  I had to fight my blackberry bushes for two hours to tame my hatred for human beings.  We have done nothing worthy while living on this earth.  I am trying harder than you can imagine not to go off about this whole thing.  If it makes anyone feel better, my blackberry bushes fought back just as hard and my skin is full of tiny thorns my tweezers can’t remove.

Many animal species, when resources are scarce, stop breeding.  What do we do?  We just have more and more babies.  We hit 7 Billion people on earth last week.  That’s a fuck load of vermin.  I myself contributed one to this number so I don’t hold myself apart from anyone else.  I don’t even try because I’ve known my whole life I’m not better than other people.  I guess I can say that maybe I’ve contributed less to overpopulation than the Duggars who really, desperately, need to stop having children just because they can.  It is appalling and very much like gluttony which is a sin in their religion.  Gluttony is not just about food or drink.  Gluttony can be applied to anything you have a greed for.  Some people make a stupid amount of cakes but the Duggars make a stupid amount of people.

I wish I could see a clear way to changing things in this world.

In case not enough people realize this: it’s time to stuff your meat with more meat and whenever possible-wrap it all in bacon.  The backlash against the unpopular concept that a lot of meat isn’t healthy has reached ridiculous proportions.  I get the feeling that many meat lovers love meat so much they’d roll in it so they could smell it all day if it wouldn’t attract unwanted attention from other hungry carnivores.  I don’t mind people eating meat, but Jesus! people, take it easy.

I tried watching that show “The New Girl” and it was so bad there’s no amount of desperation that could make me watch it again.  I’d rather read a Barbara Cartland romance.  It’s supposedly a “hit” show, how is that possible with such bad acting and such a stupid plot and all that precious “cuteness” that Zooey attempts to convince us is unselfconscious?  In my experience, the girls who act like that in real life do not also look sleekly adorable in that semi-ironic ultra fashionable school-marm chic.

On the plus side of things I went on a great field trip on Saturday with my friend Nicole (which I will write more about on Stitch and Boots) to a “Fill Your Pantry” event in Shedd, Oregon.  This is the second year this event has been held.  A bunch of local grain and legume producers (with a few produce growers as well) get together and offer up locally grown and milled grains.  Best buy: I got a bag of organic locally grown hard red wheat flour – 20 lbs for $15!  As a bonus it came in an actual flour sack.  When you can get locally grown hard wheat at that price – there’s no excuse to use conventionally grown hard wheat from out of state.  There is nothing more fun than hanging out for hours with a friend who gets just as excited as I do about pantry stocking, local food, food, eating, preserving, gardening, and food.  Just thinking about it is making me less grumpy.

I should preserve this feeling by going to fetch another cup of coffee and looking at the small handsome bag of rye flour I bought as a treat.  Cheers to a cat-pee-free morning for all of you!