This is the POWAH of love!

Recent astonishing updates from friends and family have sparked this blog. A best friend with an aunt in stage four ovarian cancer with a tumor in her stomach making her look like she's carrying a full-term baby and hopes an prayers floating to her from everywhere in hopes that everything is successful, who is worrying about having this disease herself. Another best friend lost her grandmother, not to cancer, and I'm not sure what the final diagnosis was but I want to be there for her emotionally to make sure she knows that I'll be there for her and her family if they need anything at all...at all.

I just want all of my friends and potential friends to know how much I love you. If something ever happens to me or my loved ones I know you would be there with love and prayers and support. I have had the worst day of inwardness I've had in years today...and what a day to have it, huh?

I just wanted to put my thoughts and deep feelings for you into this blog because, as we all know, disaster comes in threes and since it was two of my best friends dealing with death and serious illnesses I figure the puts either myself or another one of my best friends in the cosmic line of fire. This might sound like mumbo jumbo to many of you, but I've found these things to be truths in my life.

I'd just like to say hold on to me and know that someone will always be there to hold your hand, wash your hair, stroke your face, attempt to heal you with love and prayer, help pay your bills, comfort your families, sleep next to your children when they have a bad night, help you or your next of kin prepare their/your body and their/your funeral, wash your clothing, handle your estate (if the need arise), clean your house, be a parent in your absence, write letters and/or emails for you, and to basically do anything you need me to do at any time in your life providing I am physically/financially able to. Because I know that you would do one or all of these things for me in my time of need. I have seen the outpouring of love and attention when my (three month preemie 1lb 13oz.) Nixie was born and I had been so close to potential death.

Having also seen the open neglect to recognize our dyer situation and instead feel the need to pile your life drama onto our already over-filled basket (and no I'm not talking about potential illnesses and death in the family because I'm not going to be there to shield you from the ongoings of life because that is unfair to everyone) I will refrain from talking about any less serious drama in my life in the heat of the moment. I will give a grace period before I decide to unload my life crap onto your already heavy soul. I love you all, thank you for being in my life, thank you for caring, and most of all thank you for staving off drama and living to the fullest!

Blessings,
~Candi

Book Swap!

OH YEAH! I just found a wicked cool way to lose those extra ten pounds books that I've been trying to drop recently. www.paperbackswap.com !!!

You can sign up in like 30 seconds including email verification if you already have that up in another window. Then you just list ten books you'd like to get rid of if someone requests you ship it (at your shipping expense) and then start requesting books for yourself right away! You get two books to start with. You can select from a HUGE list of books people are willing to ship off to you. With each additional book you list or send off you start accumulating credits you can spend on "free" books. I put the free in quotes because you will be getting credits by listing and sending off old paperbacks to others who are also participating. Generally about 3 bucks to ship these so you'll end up saving hundreds, if not thousands in books each year!

There are a few rules, like must be readable and have both front and back covers, but it seems generally relaxed and awesome! I'll have more on this bit of WIN as soon as I receive my first book! I joined yesterday, I'm putting my books in today, and I'll write the follow up to this blog as soon as I ship or receive my very first paperbackswap.com book! UBER excited!

Have a wondiferous night ladies and gents!

Holy CaCO3 Batman!

I recently stumbled upon the coolest eco friendly gift bags at The Container Store. I know what your thinking, recycled paper right? But NO, these bags are made from stone fiber! It's a process using Calcium Carbonate mineral powder, a bit of non-toxic resin and a unique waterless paper making technology. The creation of this "terraskin" involves no chemical bleaching and produces no toxic gas emissions or hazardous waste.

This paper can be used to make gift wrap, to write on, and to make into gift bags. The coolest thing about writing on this treeless paper is the fact that it takes 20-30% less ink than regular paper because it is less porous. The ink doesn't bleed so the images/writing left behind looks crisp and cleaner and the paper is stronger. It doesn't require any additional layers or lamination because it's naturally water and oil resistant! Talk about the ultimate resume paper!

There is less waste and quicker breakdown of this product as well because it is photodegradable. Take this product out back and put into your compost heap or throw it away to let the elements handle because in three to nine months all that will be left of your once structured bag/box/paper will be a pile of mineral powder! How's THAT for Earth friendly?

An average of 4 metric tones of wood chip – or approximately 23 large trees – is utilized to produce a metric ton of traditional wood-pulp paper. Stone paper uses no wood-pulp. As an added bonus you can purchase these babies in all different sizes for less than you can a traditional paper bag. Awesome sauce!

So: No water in creation, only using renewable resources, completely non-toxic, less ink to write and print on, as strong as paper, less waste in the landfill, breaks down in less than nine months, takes no wood at all to make, AND it's cheaper!? No brainer? Yeah, I think so. I'm going to look into this a little further and I'll keep you abreast of the treeless paper and treeless boxes/bags! TTFN!

Green acres is the place to pee! (3)

Final part in the greener living trilogy:

7.) For the smokers: Smoking is bad m'kay! I know, I used to smoke from time to time myself. What is more harmful than the millions of cigarette butts stinking up the air around the globe is the millions of cigarette butts adding to the stink factor of landfills in our backyards. The best thing as a smoker that you can do for the environment is ask someone else for a light...who knows why, just do it! But seriously, if you're going to smoke, you're going to smoke. I know, I know, I hate those damned commercials just like the rest of you. The easiest thing to do as a smoker is to switch from a disposable to a refillable lighter. Think of how many lighters the average smoker loses/throws away in just one month. I counted 2 for me each month when I last smoked (like a year and a half ago) and I smoked maybe 8-10 cigarettes a month. I do tend to use lighters for lighting incense and candles as well. I'm switching as soon as I save up for a nice engraved Zippo. It'll make me want to keep using it. I suggest you go out and buy a beautiful new refillable lighter as a treat to yourself right now! 

 

As of right now I am not smoking for health reasons...AKA an eleven month old who was three months premature. It's just easier to not smoke in the world we live in anyway. Oh, and much better for your lungs! LOL

 

8.) Use bar soap instead of body wash. I can hear you protesting this one right now. I have to tell you that the average bar of soap only lasts for 16-20 showers while a 16 oz. bottle of body wash lasts for 80 showers. Even though the liquid soap lasts longer it is comparably more expensive than the bar soap. So save yourself some money and 2.5 Million Pounds of plastic waste being deposited in the waste stream every year.

 

9.) On fabrics and fiber arts: Buy recycled or recycle it yourself! This gives us all a chance to use and reuse what we don't want to wear anymore! See that perfect yarn for your winter hat/glove/scarf ensemble already made into a hideously designed sweater from the 80's hanging on a thrift store rack? Snatch it up! In the long run you could save yourself 100's of dollars a year! I'm serious. A garment from a thrift store that you can take apart yourself is going to cost you approx 3-5 dollars. How much is just ONE hank/skein of that same wool blend going to cost at any "yarn-mart?" About the same amount right? And how many hanks could you potentially get from that sorry excuse for a sweater that would make a beautiful winter set? 2, 3, 5? More? You won't know until you try it! What are you waiting for? You know you want some!

 

10.) I'll leave you with one last money/time/environment saving tip: Don't use more than you need, and don't forget that you have neighbors. We have been taught since birth that it is our right as an American citizen to eat, drink, drive, fart what and when we want. The fact of the matter is when you waste that ten pound bag of potatoes...there's another one waiting for you at the store...but wouldn't it be nice to offer it to the nearest food bank or women's shelter instead of watching it rot on the counter?

 

That's all the tips for Greener Living I have for you today. They're fast, they're easy, they're greener! There is really no excuse for you not to be able to do ONE of these things at some point this year. I know I try, I'm not better than anyone, but I try to do what's right for everyone.

 

I'll leave you with this:

 

I'm sure you know that local churches are accepting donations all the time. Give your clothes to Goodwill or hand them to that little old lady down the hall that's about your size. If you see  a homeless person on the street don't just keep walking (unless threatened or alone). Use your senses, hand them a blanket, go back to your car and dig out your change and buy them a damned sandwich from Wendy's.

 

 

The moral of this story is: If I've got it and you need it,it's yours. I won't do without, but neither will you. Remember your manners, remember everything you were taught in mass/temple/service/ritual and do the right thing for the environment...but most importantly for yourself and eachother.

Green acres is the place to pee! (2)

Now continuing...part deux:

4.) Of great concern to women, at least we SHOULD be concerned with what we put in our bodies, is the sort of tampons we use. It is becoming increasingly more difficult for women to purchase organic tampons. Check out Health Foods Unlimited and other health food stores for more information on the cancer causing agents used in the bleaching process of those lovely little cotton plugs. Of greater concern to men and women should be the amount of waste women generate every year just because we're women.There are always moon pads which are awesomely soft cotton and flannel fabric liners filled with disposable cotton or cleanable fabric inserts. They are washable and create less than half the waste that normal pads create. And, because the inserts are 100% unbleached cotton they are much safer for the environment. If you can not or do not wish to carry your used moon pads around in little plastic baggies...or you're on the go too often try the organic tampons. 

The pesticides and bleaches used in conventional cotton tampons are pollutants in air, water, soil, and in your vagina! If just 1 in 20 women switched to organic tampons, we could eliminate a whopping 750,000 pounds of pesticides annually. And cut down on the number of cervical cancer cases a year (a prediction as made by me, but can be backed up by looking at when they started bleaching tampons and comparing that to the number of women with cancer per capita just a few years afterward).

5.) Here's one for the guys: Electronics. I know, you want to stop me now. But here's the thing, I'm on a computer right now...a fairly new one...boy it's shiny! I love it. If I could have bought one used in this condition to the right specifications I would have. The choices are ours to make. The impact every year that new boxes of plastic with harmful metal pieces leaves is traumatic. Just be sure that your next DVD player purchase is energy star certified! If every DVD unit purchased this year was certified we would save an amazing 837 kilowatt hours-equivalent to the amount of power generated at a nuclear facility over a 40 day period. Isn't that just amazing. Buy used, save some money, save the whales...just kidding, but it's a step in the right direction!

6.) When it comes to veggies I love mine fresh. And when bought in season it can save you a tons of money over canned food items. Not too mention the countless gallons of water and hours of electricity it takes to make those canned veggies. This is a simple tip: Eat In Season! Eat Locally! I admit difficulty with this one. Especially difficult are winters in Ohio. What do we have growing in Ohio in January? Evergreens and weeds. Since most of those aren't edible what DO we eat? Try to grow your own if you have the land and remember to hold back the last of your harvest for canning (try to resist the urge to purge or force upon your neighbors). Canning takes some time, I'll admit more time than most Americans claim to have. But, if you can find 10 hours over a two week period at the end of the growing season you may not have to purchase veggies until mid-march, just before the regular growing season commences. To sum this up: Try to refrain from buying Bananas in January...it's just bad news bears...for more information talk to Aaron or myself. We can tell you why the worlds economy has been wrecked and rests on the fate of bananas and banana growing countries. I <3 Jamaica.

To be continued...

Green acres is the place to pee! (1)

Part One of Three.

 

I know that not everyone can build a yurt on 1-20 acres and live sustainably, creating their own food, electricity, clothing, and collecting their own water. But, everyone CAN do a few things to save what is most important to them...their lives.

Here are a few easy tips that I've learned over the past few years that will cut down on waste in the landfill, water usage, and the use of electricity:

1.) Turn off that light, unscrew it, then replace it with an energy saving light bulb. I know there has been some media hype about these bulbs containing mercury (they do) and in the long run being more harmful to the environment (they're not). My grandmother was watching this new story with me not long ago and then said "That's bullshit, when I was 8 or 9 we used to bust thermometers so we could play with it. Whatever amount that was in that thermometer far outweighs the amount in that light bulb and, as you can see, I am not a mutant." I know this story is a little scientifically useless but when common sense kicks in everyone will see that energy efficient bulbs last 5 to 7 times longer and have a less devastating effect on our already fragile environment. {Not to mention the amount of mercury in the bulb is virtually harmless, the government has a tendency to overreact to anything the FDA (or other shiftless layabouts) have deemed harmful}

Bliss Tree

2.) Carry a refillable water bottle. Come on now, they cost all of 99 cents at the local five and dime. How many bottles do you think get heaped up on "Mt. Dayton" daily because we are too lazy to unscrew a cap and drink from the tap? Hundreds or thousands of these bottles in ONE CITY a DAY!? Yes...that is correct. More go to the dump than to the recycling center. Don't get me wrong, I'm practical like everyone else...when I go out to Starbucks (a guilty pleasure of mine) I buy the Ethos like everyone else. I'm not trying to come off like a snooty von snoot here, I'm just trying to get everyone to do a weee tiny little bit for the state of our planet. So, if you know you're going out in the hot hot sun or on a run, walk, or jog...remember your water bottle is your friend and you can buy convenient carriers to clip on your belt loop or waistband!

3.) Buying jewelry sounds like something completely unrelated to the Earth for most people. The unfortunate part of that mistake is that our jewelry making material COMES from the Earth. Buying recycled or vintage jewelry saves so many resources it's not funny. Buying gold or diamonds for example. To produce your typical .33 ounce 18k gold band (think wedding bands here) requires 13,000 gallons of water and leaves a residual 20 TONS of cyanide-laden mine sludge. If only 1 in every 1000 people bought antique or vintage jewelry it would save a total of 2 MILLION TONS of mine waste and 1.37 BILLION GALLONS of drinkable water! (a precious commodity as only 3% of all the water on Earth is fresh water) For more information on the distribution of water go to this website: http://ga.water.usgs.gov/edu/earthwherewater.html

More to come tomorrow!

We'll have a magick tea party...with...

pink tea for me and you! That's right! My Buddy, my buddy, my buddy and me! Kid sister, kid sister, kid sister and me! Ahh, the good old days. The days before I cared what I looked like before I ran outside to serve tea to my younger siblings and my doberman, Samson. When I would ride the largest bike down the biggest hill I could find, which happened to be our back yard hill. When I did things that were "dangerous" today that were just labeled "harmless fun" in the way back machine.

Times sure have changed...am I even old enough to say that? What I'm getting at, folks, is the fact that the world is a constantly changing place and the change so constant that as you get older and loose some capacity for learning...much of it just flies by without a word, nudge, or notion. I try to take a moment out of every evening (AKA 3-5am EST) to tell you folks something I know about and have recently rediscovered or something new I learned that day. And sometimes it's so hard just coming up with something. So, on days like these I lean to the little things in life and expand from there. Because, from little things, big things grow...or so the saying goes. This includes ideas and inklings.

So, today...as I'm Asmo (Asmodians or the dark half) ganking (killing) in the MMORPG "Aion"  and they're begging for thier lives so they can just go complete a quest or collect something they need back "home", or even to kill one of our little lowbies, a thought occurs to me. My thought is collected and shuffled to the back of my head until I'm out of danger, of course. But once the scene is clear, I start thinking about my tresspasses against those poor lowbie asmo's...and then I suddenly come to my senses. WHAT was I thinking?

This is me in game form. My name is Nanehi, they call me Nani, I heal...and kill.

This is a game. I remind myself. I tell myself this every day. It is important in the world of online gaming to remember your place in the real world. Even if you think the only friends you have in life are in this little box you need to get your head out of your bottom and really take a look at your life. Take a look at how young you are and know that in a few years your life will be SO different you won't know why you wasted so much time in that world. Not that it's not enjoyable...and not that you can't have real friends there (as they are real people on the other side of the screen.) But the game was meant to be played!

Take a moment or two to realize that having sympathy for the enemy means certain death yourself and moments of revenge. Via online gaming in a Vs. style, many young people can learn a much safer feeling of what the charge of war must be like. It's more an empathy than an understanding...but it develops good hand-eye coordination and keeps some part of their (otherwise TV watching) bodies moving. But, it's just a game. Just a game that needs no other place in your life.

Remember when they tell you you've been playing for an hour, please take a break...please do, really take a break. Go pee, grab a drink, turn around and look at the TV...it really helps to escape your daily grind...but it doesn't help to get so engrossed you're ignoring your family. So with that, I bid you a beddy bye. I must go out a shopping with my Grandmother in the morning...errrr later today lol. It's my husband's birthday celebration this weekend. Also a terrific friend Anna's B-day! We're so lucky to have three pairs of friends share their B-days. It makes the parties so much more manageable! lol

NIGHTY NIGHT! ERRR GOOD MORNING!

I squeel, you squeel, we're all a feel...for...

BACON!

I was just  CRAVING a pizza from the area "Hut" tonight...and I wanted an onion'y mess...with pork. The two pizza toppings I require if I am to eat pizza. Please forgive me little piggies and thank you for giving your lives up for my family's consumption. I just require this particular cut of this animal as it is possitively irresistable to me and there is no real close substitution. At least none that has the amount of grease that makes this tasty once in a while snack worth the guilt factor.

So I've ordered and settled on the deliciousness when my telephone rings. They tell me they don't have any bacon. This isn't the first time they've been out of a product recently. I'm starting to think they recently changed or lost management. I've been ordering from this place for the past two years and have been relatively happy up until a few weeks ago. Lodging a complaint, as I have learned from my downstairs neighbors who are slowly driving me to the ege of madness (quite literally), does absolutely nothing. I mean, the police do not even respond to this gross display of lack of respect for other human beings. So, I suck it up and eat it. It's not too bad...but not the same without the whole reason I ordered pizza in the first place.

What I learned from this experience:
Even things that have been perfectly stable for several years in your life, from the minor to the major, can come crashing down with one tiny decision made miles from you for which you have no input and can do nothing about. Life isn't fair (period).(period)

I'll go into my very depressing and distressing neighbor situation later. No one on the planet should have to endure such cold, ill tempered, loud, annoying "people" as these. They are the first set of neighbors that I have not been able ot resolve a situation with. They might not be the last, but if this happens in the future and if you out there in blog world notice a strange aquatic and rotton mayonaise smell when you turn on the air in your car...you might take a look around and make sure you don't see me smirking out at you from my front porch. BUT if you do happen to see learing at you, you'll want to reevaluate how you treat other people and watch out for chemical warfare should that devestating behavior continue.