It's cold inside, hot outside

These days I generally feel too tired to write, hence the lack of entries.
Working 6 to 7 days a week does that to you.

Two things I can say however.

Rainbow swiss chard is very pretty. I spent all day Tuesday weeding swiss chard fields and the pink, orange, yellow, red and purple stems of swiss chard are undeniably lovely all sitting in a row.

Twilight Saga's Eclipse was not as horrible as was expected. It was actually rather well done. Sadly, there won't be as many scenes for me and my friends to make fun of.

Baby Field Mice

Yesterday I brought two orphaned baby field mice to the local wildlife rescue center. They were so tiny, only a week old when I found them at work, stuck in a tarp on the top of one of our greenhouses. Their eyes and ears have yet to open and they walk all wobbly on their tiny feeble legs. I had spent five days caring for them. Feeding them milk from a dropper, massaging their bellies with cottons swabs so that they could digest and poop. They were the cutest little things. But after five days, they proved too much for me to handle. I cared for them well, but did not feel capable of continueing to replace a mama mouse. Now they are being cared for by people better prepared than I, and they will be released into the wild when they reach maturity. For anyone who finds an orphaned or injured wild animal and finds themselves unable to care for it, call up your local wildlife rescue center or bring them to one. You may not even know that their is a wildlife rescue center nearby, but their probably is.
The staff at the wildlife center was pleased with the way I cared for the baby nice and asked me to apply to work as a volunteer there. A four hour shift once a week. I very well may apply to volunteer there on my day off from work. I love animals, and it is greatly rewarding to care for them. Plus, it would be a great learning opportunity.

Music of the afternoon: Devil Makes Three (Thanks to Nat for turning me onto this sweet band)

For the love of reading

I have just purchased two books on betterworldbooks.com and will be awaiting their arrival in the mail.

The first is Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change by Elizabeth Kolbert, which I will be reading over the summer as partial preparation for the environmental ethics course that I am taking in the fall.

The second is Odd Girls and Twilight Lovers: A History of Lesbian Life in Twentieth-Century America by Lillian Faderman. I had been eyeing this book in a bookshop in Princeton a couple of months ago, but the price tag was too hefty for purchase. I tucked the title away in the back of my mind. Luckily, betterworldbooks saved the day and I was able to purchase the book for a mere $3.98. Success!

While I wait for these two books to arrive, I will attempt to finish my current reads. Anarchism by Daniel Guerin and Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo. My bf highly recommended the latter and lent it to me months ago, so I am compelled to read it quickly and let him know what I think.

Summer reading! One of my favorite activities. Keeps my mind moving and my imagination going. All things I need when working six days a week, not engaged in academics. Books are the escape, the destination, reality and fantasy, neither here nor there and every place in between.

She's my world, she's so rad, she's the best ride I ever had

I know that material possessions, consumerism and capitalism in general are unnecessary evils...but I pine for one of these babies.

Eating Organic

Until I started working on an organic farm, I had not in truth put much thought into eating organically grown produce. It always seemed like the clearly better choice, but was it worth the money? What did it really matter, what did it really mean? I was already a long time vegetarian, surely that was enough?

But now that I go out into the fields every day, dig into the soil, harvest, handle the produce, I have realized how important the distinction is between organic and not. I can not imagine working everyday in a field polluted by pesticides and herbicides. Handling chemically laden produce. Breathing in toxic air. Having acid water absorbed into my skin. If I can not imagine working in those conditions, than why can I so easily eat food produced in those conditions?

Thankfully, as I work at an organic farm, there is nothing to fear. The air is as clean as any New Jersey air (how clean is that...?), the soil is natural, the produce healthy.

I am now going to make a concious effort to eat organic as often as possible. At this point in my life it is far too expensive to eat solely organic, as well as nearly impossible when one considers eating at restaurants, on campus, and at friends houses. But as often as possible. Put as few of those pesticides and toxins into my body as I can manage. And I will continue to work to make this a reality for those around me as well. First by working on an organic farm, and by one day operating my own organic farm. It's better for the environment and it's better for your body. It's the way agriculture existed for thousands of years before some giant corporation decided corporate farmers could maximize profit by spraying toxic chemicals all over their produce.

JSRG!

I have officially passed the WFTDA minimum skills requirement test for roller derby!
It took 7 months of intense practice (plus 2 months of having mono and not skating)
I passed a written test, a safety test, a skills test.
Wednesday pork roller practices, Monday night endurance practices, and open skate in between. There was outdoor rink practices, huge bruises and crazy falls and collisions. A lot of sweat and laughter. And now I am offically a full league member of Jersey Shore Roller Girls! I will be drafted onto a team this summer.
Now the real work starts. I've gotta keep up the hard work. Skate at least four times a week and exercise in between. Practices Monday and Thursday nights and volunteering at Saturday bouts. This is what I have been working my ass off for, this is what all the JSRG girls work their asses off for. Because we love this sport, we love our league, we love the teams.
June 12th! Asbury Park Convention Hall! Second Intraleague bout of the season!
Be there!

Travel Bug

So lately I have been thinking about travel a lot.
I have been thinking about all of the places in the world, and how New Jersey is so small and how I just want to get out there and see as much as possible. Mostly, I want to see as much nature as possible before it is gone. I want to see hundred foot tall trees, so large in diameter that it takes five people to encircle it. I want to see clear blue streams and the tops of mountains and the insides of caves and the dense greenery of forests. I want to see fields of wildflowers and bees and all of the animals that inhabit these lands. I want to camp, live in a tent, backpack, bicycle. I wish there was a good way to travel to other countries without taking planes, with the high emission rate and all. But the expanse of the United States is just a train ride away. So here is a list of places that I want to be right now.

Washington State and Oregon: I've heard the natural landscape in these states is breathtaking. You have it all. The mountains, rivers, forests, ocean...

Budapest, Hungary: My grandmother on my mother's side is Hungarian/Eastern European. I want to see where that side of the family is from. Plus, I have heard Budapest is a wonderful city

South America: Any country really, I have never been to the continent and the nature there must be fascinating

New Zealand: Green mountains, surrounded by ocean, Lord of the Rings was filmed there...need I say more?

I haven't left the Tri-State area in two years, and I haven't left the country in three years. I need to get out into the world again.