This stuff really works!

While I was at the newspaper, I tried to sort of promote the things I was interested in through the stories I pitched. Really, this practice isn't all that uncommon, seeing how writers have to write so much so often. Might as well make it something I'm interested in, right?


So, aside from being educated about global warming and the damage of littering (the crying Indian was burned into my mind while I was still in preschool), I still didn't really get behind green lifestyles until I went to Alaska in 2007.


This was still light years ahead of Sussex County it seemed, when I proposed the idea of a Going Green section in my paper and my editor looked at me like I was a silly hippie as she drove off in her Jeep XXL Durango Wrangler Denali Beast Commander with a pink hawaiian lei hanging from the rear view.



Anyway, I did manage to slip in some articles about how to live a more eco-friendly lifestyle. I managed to slip some stuff into the real estate section over the spring about making your spring cleaning green. A new all-natural cleaning business opened in town, so I could slip that into the business cover. I wrote 8 covers for about 6 different sections each week, so with a little creativity, I finagled some stuff in.

I also wrote a piece about cleaning green for a web site I regularly contributed to after leaving Alaska, Life More Natural, but I so rarely clean that I had very little opportunity to try too many of these natural remedies.

I have, however, been pleased to find the market is filling with natural cleaners produced by large companies so there is a wider variety without the need to mix it up at home. Lazy as it sounds, I just don't have the ambition to not only acquire all the common household items (ie: baking soda, vinegar, lemons, squirt bottle) but mix up the solutions these natural remedies call for. If I have those items, it is for a purpose already. Like, if I use all the baking soda from my fridge, how will I keep it from getting stinky sometimes?

Before you chastise me for my laziness, you should be happy to hear I am changing my ways. With these new mass-produced items, I can clean green without making a kitchen laboratory. I just tried it tonight with some Clorox Green Works, which kicked the Lysol Kitchen's ass at cleaning my stove. Even though the green works was meant for bathroom usage (not like I stuck it directly in the crapper before I cleaned my stove. I just figured a cleaner is a cleaner, right?) it still delivered a shining, almost spotless stove (I've done some damage to the flat-top with my inadeqacies as a chef- take out is always a little safer with me.)

The all-natural stuff worked wonders! I mean, I had been slathering that lysol chemical configuration of (probably) carcingoens over my surfaces to sorta-clean them (but leave all the residue and reminants) but the stuff made with coconut extracts and lemons gave me the sparking stove you see here.
On the other end of the spectrum is the traditional Lysol kitchen cleaner. I'm working with only my phone for my art on this thing (and the stuff I snag online), so this picture is pretty fuzzy, but the warning labels on traditional products make you really unsure why we ever believed this was the best way to live.

Though you probably can't read this, the Lysol said "do not keep in close proximity to humans or domesic animals"

And this is a "household" cleaner.

Obviously, if you keep on using this stuff, you might want to relocate to the garage, like my dad or your husband.

Falling into places

Big news today! I got hired in Alaska!

I talked to one of the guy who runs the kitchen today and got really psyched. It is just so different there. Magical. The place I worked is the only bar in Denali with live music regularly and independent ownership. I love it there. They have rules that make sense and they are all very strict, but not without reason.
They have a rule that employees can't have alcohol 8 hours prior to their shift. 10 or 12 if they are driving. I love that.
How wonderful. Alcohol is my biggest vice, though I have six other "close seconds."
I like working at this place (and the money is good enough), I don't even mind living in a shack all summer with no heat, electric, water, plumbing inside. Just a couple mattresses on a thin carpet and a sleeping bag.


What am I talking about? I can't wait to get there! I might switch shantys this summer, I scouted them out when I was there before. I might not. It doesn't matter when you are living in Neverland.

In other news, the plan to drive is out. It would be a wonderful stunt, yes, but in all, it was an expensive and time consuming endeavor. Too much to be classified as a stunt.

Dark Side of the Moon

What a weekend. Good, bad, ugly, sad.



I lost a friend. I used to babysit this guy. RIP Andrew Geyer. Tragic.


I dressed for prom, but didn't go. That was on Valentine's Day night. A bar was hosting an 80s prom party so I went to the Salvation Army, bought a dress and teased my hair. I also drank most of bottle of wine. I lost my nerve and woke up on Sunday to a beam of sunlight that found its way through the crack in my blinds and into my retina.


Really, I'm not too bummed about missing prom. A girl I used to work with is hosting an 80s prom party of her own this weekend. Round two, ding ding.


This girl who is hosting the prom party is also largely responsible for another episode of my weekend. I got FIRED on Thursday. Fucking Fired. I've never been fired, but I don't really care. Now I will have more time to write and will just have to cut costs so I can live within my means: unemployment.


In brighter news, I decided now that I have no job in addition to unemployment, but I am still being paid to do nothing, I will dedicate myself to writing with renewed vigor.


I attended my first freewrite with the Rehoboth Beach Writers Guild. If was awesome. They have 5 of them each week and now, they will be my workshops.

I think I have an idea for a book. They were really receptive to my Alaska stories at the freewrite. I want to write a novella of short stories based mostly on my own stories and experiences, mixed in with a little dramatic irony.

The book will be titled Dark Side of the Moon and the door to my shanty in Alaska will be on the cover.