Trunk or Treat

The church's trunk or treat was last night. Alex and I made a couple of signs as our costumes; one of us was a OWS protestor and the other was a Tea Partier. Hopefully we didn't offend anyone at church. (PS Alex, I like your shirt!)

I volunteered to take pictures of families in costume, and I realized the I still need to learn a few things about my camera. Nevertheless, I got a few sweet pictures. Here are some of my favorites.

Scooby-doo and friends.

This little kid is too cute.

 The Sweets, dressed up as themselves.

The Ouskas - bunnies and a sweet little lamb.

 I think this might be my favorite picture. I don't know these people very well - they are new. Hopefully they don't mind me posting this picture and hopefully someday I will know them better. They look like they are worth knowing.

The other side of one of the posters.

Birthday Boy

Alex had a birthday yesterday. All in all, it was a pretty lame birthday. He studied all day and I had to stay late at work due to too many sick animals. Then, to top it off, I gave him a frying pan for his birthday present. 

I did write him a poem though. I thought it was pretty clever at the time but now I am not so sure. However, I am posting it on the blog because I have nothing better to blog about, the two chores awaiting me are raking leaves and cleaning house, and because I never want him to be able to forget this poem. I want it to haunt him forever. It is called Evolution.

I am not great at writing poems

Because I never do it,

And because I am just not great at it.

But I wanted to write you a poem for your birthday. 

This is what I would like to say:

I love you!!

My love for you, like life, evolves.

At first, it was hesitant and a little uncertain,

A little bubble in the primordial sludge. 

Eventually the bubble became a multicellular organism.

Then it got a brain. That was a big development.

Brains are good, but first brains still have a long way to go.

I think the organism is still swimming around somewhere in the sea.

Someday it will become a land dweller 

But it prefers sea right now.

When the sea is too acidic from climate change,

That is probably when it will move onto land.

Our little love creature still isn't perfect.

It won't ever be perfect in this life.

Somehow that is reassuring because I know

There will always be room to grow with you,

Adventures to have and things to learn to love together,

Struggles to go through with you.

I am committed baby. Survival of the fittest -

We will be the fittest and our love bubble will survive. 

At about the brain part, he asked me if it was a notochord. I said I wasn't sure. It hasn't been studied.

And now for a few Florida pictures, circa summer 2009:

Work hazards

 Alex was a little surprised when I came home from work looking like this earlier this week. I tried to pretend I didn't know what he was talking about, but he didn't buy it.

The next morning, it had already changed quite a bit. More red than purple, and perhaps slightly less swollen? I see a lot of people in the course of a day, and most of them don't say anything about it until I introduce myself and say something to the effect of "...and the blackeye is a recent development." That breaks the awkwardness over the massively obvious bruise and usually they are interested to know what happened.

The day after it happened, my boss said "I like what you have done with your makeup." A few people have asked how the other guy looks. And then there are the people that know me from church, that usually ask if Alex is beating up on me. Well, he obviously isn't or he would have a black eye too. 

So what happened? A 60 lbs. Labrador Retarded decided that she didn't want me to cut her toenails. Some dogs are freakish about feet being handled, and this one hadn't been in the past (I had clipped her toenails the previous month just fine) but decided to freak out that day. Someone was holding her, but she flung her head and her skull met my cheekbone with enough force to nearly take my breath away. That was five days ago. Today, I look like this: 

I have to say, it is cool to me that my body knew, without me telling it, how to stop the bleeding and now it is mopping up the mess over my cheekbone by quietly changing this

(heme - red)

to this

(biliverdin - green)

to this

(bilirubin - yellow)

and eventually I will be good as new and people that see me in the store won't wonder if I am a domestic violence victim and 3 year olds won't stare at me.

There is a giant eyeball in St. Louis

I once heard a radio program that listed off all of the common, every day words and phrases that were first credited to Shakespeare. "Eyeball" was one of them, and every time I use that word, I am grateful to Shakespeare for making up the word. I mean, where would we be if we didn't have the word eyeball?

Alex and I visited St. Louis over Labor Day weekend and we saw one really huge eyeball and a lot of smaller eyeballs. Down one tooth.

We somehow convinced Sydette to take care of our contumacious dog. 

Asher is a good picture poser. I think I had to bribe him for this one. 

Daphne is a natural. 

Bunnies run rampant

This is our solution to the problem we had this summer with our bunnies. The problem can be summarized in this manner: European rabbits were never meant to be able to survive hot and humid weather. There are three total "burrows" made out of sturdy plastic tubs placed upside down on top of a hole lined with bricks and then partially covered with rocks and dirt. I credit Alex with design and execution, and with humoring his wife enough to give into her hare-brained free range rabbit idea. It is still new, probably not cat proof, and not yet rain proof, and is most definitely redneck, but hopefully the rabbits will enjoy it more than their cages. They seem to have adjusted well already.

Canning outline

I decided to can some things this year. Later on, Alex got involved helping me with my over ambitious canning  projects and he also did a couple batches of his own salsa. 

To get me back into the school season, I will outline the types of jam I did and some things I learned. This will be more or less in chronological order.

I.                   Introduction

a.      Canning - so fun!

II.                Strawberry jam

a.      Why: Aldi sold strawberries for 99 cents/# all summer long.

b.     First batch: used a potato masher to mash the strawberries. Mashing muscles got tired.

c.      Second batch: discovered blender. Mashing muscles happier.

d.     Bought real canning supplies. Magnetic lid picker upper = best canning tool invented.

III.             Peach jam

a.      Why: Beachee’s was selling peaches at firesale prices.

b.     Blender a life saver.

c.      You can do six batches per night if you do 1.5 batches per pot and two pots at a time and then do it again - one arm to stir per pot. An extra person helps when you get to the actual canning part.

IV.            Salsa

a.      Good job Alex!

V.               Grape jam

a.      Why: concord grapes in the backyard begging to be used

b.     First time trying a no pectin recipe.

c.      Result: 2 hours for 2 pints of jam. I think I cooked it too long and have a feeling it will be the consistency of a hockey puck.

VI.            Conclusion: We have enough jam for 10 years.

And now, illustrations: 

 The whole shishkabob.

 Strawberry jam pre-blender.

 Post blender. 

Salsa

In other noteworthiness, the Tanners came by to share their awesome Danish tradition of Aebleskivers with us the other night. This is David using a knitting needle to turn the little doughy balls of goodness.

Yum! Thanks guys. 

Me: Did you find a ride for tomorrow?

Alex: That is like asking "do I have two eyes?"
Me: Do you have two eyes?
Alex: No
Me: Oh... did you give me one?
Alex: I gave one to Lola. She didn't know what to do with it so she ate it. I was rather disappointed.
Me: Bummer.