Category: Life, the Universe and Everything

You know what’s great about blogging? The network of friends who know me and my bloggy style well enough to send me links to really quirky articles like this one about — are you ready for it? — human cheese.

Yes, you read that right. People are taking human milk, mixing it with goat or cow milk, and turning it into cheese for human consumption.

*pause while you all wince and shift uncomfortably in your chair*

I know, major ick factor, right? Me too. Until you start to think about it. On a biological level, it’s way more weird that we drink the milk of other animals — really, cows are disgusting, slobbery, unpleasant animals, and goats give me the willies — so why do we shudder at the idea of consuming human milk? The Globe and Mail article gets right to the crux of it with a quote from Miriam Simun, who is offering her human milk cheese online. “Many people feel uncomfortable because they don’t know the woman, or what she is eating – but how often do you know the cows of your cheese, and what they are eating?”

It’s funny, a couple of years back I blogged about the Lactation Station Breast Milk Bar, an art installation in Toronto that welcomed passers-by to consume 3 oz of the breast milk of strangers, and my reaction at the time landed somewhere between distaste and disturbed. Maybe I’ve mellowed over the years, or maybe another year and a half of nursing softened me up, but I think this is a kind of neat idea.

But as much as I’m trying to be open-minded, I have to admit that this bit also made me squirm:

Ms. Sumin mixed the women’s milk with cow’s or goat’s milk, and offers several spirited reviews on her website: “This spreadable deliciousness is a human-goat blend, made from two wonderful milks. A playful Vermont mountain goat herd milk tangos with the milk of a sweet lawyer’s assistant who hails from Wisconsin and is excited to become part of what she considers a ‘more acceptable and personal’ cheese. Her mostly organic diet full of meat is rich in flavor and spices – and boy does it come through in this darling little cheese!”

Too much information, methinks. (Although I did snicker at the fact that the milk supplier was from Wisconsin. They really are cheese people out there, aren’t they?) I think I’d be open to the idea of cheese made from *my* milk, but — and please don’t take this personally — I think I’d pass on yours.

Of course, you know I wrote this whole post just so I could ask you: what do you think? Would you eat human cheese?

So here’s the thing. Lately, I’ve been feeling like crap. My head is cob-webby and I’m feeling so dragged out and tired that it’s making me cranky. I’ve been trying to get a little more physical activity in, but I’m also freezing cold all the time lately, which combines with the tiredness to make me reluctant to go outside. And there’s only so much exercise to be had walking from the sofa to the kitchen and back. And did I mention the cranky? The lack of focus is killing me, too. Oh look, something shiny over there….

*crickets*

In an epiphianic moment (can I just turn a noun into an adjective like that?) I decided that my iron is probably in the basement, so I should start taking my supplements again. That will help.

That got me thinking about vitamins again, something I keep meaning to look into and never quite get around to doing. I think someone mentioned to me that B vitamins help smooth out the, um, rough edges in your mood. Um, I kind of need to know more about that. Now! I read a couple of labels in the vitamin aisle of the grocery store, but nothing was particularly helpful. I saw a couple of bottles labelled “stress busting” and thought that seemed like a pretty good idea, too. (Who me, stressed? What, just because of the way I’m clenching my jaws until my ears ache and you can see a little too much of the whites of my eyes you think I’m STRESSED?!? *breathe breathe*)

I have never really taken vitamins. I took folic acid when we were thinking about conceiving, and pre-natal vitamins on and off throughout my pregnancies — but mostly off. I was taking vitamin D for a while, because the whole universe seemed to be telling me it was the Right Thing To Do, and I know I need to top up my iron. What else should a 40-ish woman of relative (*touch wood*) health and stamina be taking for preventative and bolstering measures?

So what say ye, Dr Bloggy Peeps? Do you take vitamins? If so, what and why? Medicate me!

I was poking through my blog feeds and found a link to this neat iPhone app that lets you create a ring tone from any song or sound clip.

I love this! The ring tone I have now is the old nostalgia ringing phone, which I like well enough. I have never been particularly inspired to get a funky ring tone, although I do love the fact that my brother programmed his phone to play Darth Vader’s Imperial March whenever his wife calls. A friend of mine also has the “yip yip yip, brrrrrrrring” guys from Sesame Street for his iPhone, which is what I planned to get when and if I ever got around to it.

But the idea of using ANY song? Wow, that’s an intimidating amount of choices! (Well, technically it’s any DRM-free song, but for the purposes of speculation, let’s assume we can have the rights to anything we choose.) In fact, it’s so much choice that I’m paralyzed by the possibilities and experiencing a complete creative blue-screen-of-death meltdown.

If you could have any song as a ring tone, what would you choose and why?

A day that starts with fire trucks in the driveway is a pretty exciting day for a toddler. When you get to the part of the day that has a boy-sized carton filled with packing peanuts? You’ve hit Nirvana. Such is the day Lucas is having today.

It started innocuously, and early. It was just before 7 am. Lucas and Simon were watching TV, Beloved and Tristan were still sleeping, and I was two sips and four pages into my morning coffee and newspaper routine, when I heard the chirp. I cocked my head, listened to the silence for a minute, and then went back to my paper. When it chirped again. I let it chirp two more times before I finally resigned myself to tracking it down.

I figured it was a smoke detector, but when I followed the aural trail, I ended up in the furnace room. I looked all around for the smoke detector with depleted batteries I was expecting to find, but saw nothing. Well, nothing except the 19 year old furnace and the five week old hot water heater. I watched the flashing LED on the hot water heater for a while, and tried to decode the rather unintelligible translation of the signal. Greek. So, I picked up the phone and called the gas company who installed the hot water heater on the day we moved in to the house.

The attendant I spoke to was perplexed. “There’s nothing in the manual for a chirping alarm,” she told me. We chatted as I walked around the hot water heater, trying to figure out exactlly what was emitting the sound. She was just reassuring me that it was likely nothing of concern and getting ready to book a service appointment when I looked up from my squatting-between-the-furnace-and-hot-water-heater-in-my-pyjamas position and saw it.

“Hang on,” I told her as I peered at it, trying to read the writing beside the red flashing LED. I had to stand on the tool box to resolve the label. “Um,” I said, “it’s not the hot water heater that’s chirping. It’s a carbon monoxide detector.”

“Oh,” she said, and in that syllable I heard a complete about-face in her demeanor. “Well, that’s a bit of an emergency, then.” Before I knew it, she had me conferenced-called in with the fire department, and the fire department and the gas company were on the way, and we were supposed to ventilate the house and go wait outside. My first thought was for my coffee, waiting patiently on the side table. My second thought was for Beloved, still snoring in blissful oblivion.

And then we were all five of us outside, sitting on my grand verandah, watching the fire trucks pulling up. Cuz nothing says good morning like fire trucks in the driveway at 7:07 in the morning. The boys, of course, were delighted with this spectacular break from our morning routine. Me, though, I’d begun to feel a little uneasy. The adrenaline rush of, “You must evacuate your family from the house” had begun to wear off, and I had a niggling little worry I was trying to suppress.

Sure enough, when the rescue truck driver did his walkthrough of the basement, he detected no measurable levels of carbon monoxide. He did, however, detect a detector with failing batteries.

Yep. The fire department and the gas company came for a pre-breakfast visit to help us change the batteries in the carbon monoxide detector. In my defense, it was actually the gas company who called the fire department. Had I not been on the phone with them and panicked by the sudden onset of their sense of urgency, I would likely have thought to test the batteries before calling in the civil authorities.

Heh. At least it makes for good blog fodder, right? My humiliation for your entertainment.

And THEN! As if that weren’t enough excitement for one day, a REALLY BIG BOX arrived mid-morning. I’ll save the story of what was in the box for tomorrow, but look how much enjoyment a curious toddler can derive from one box and a whole shitload of packing peanuts.

“Hmmmm, what are these things?”

“Hey! This big box is FULL of them!”

“They squeak when you walk on them!”

“Get these things out of my box!”

“Wheeee, I’m upside down!”

“Yeesh, who’s gonna clean up this mess?”

And at naptime I carefully picked up each damn one of those styrofoam peanuts and put it back in the box to save for another day. If you’re looking for Christmas gift ideas this year, you might want to check the packing supply aisle in the post office!

I’ll be back tomorrow with a post about what was inside the box!

It was two months ago today that I saw a real estate listing on the ‘net that would change our lives forever. Two months later, I find myself the owner of that house, with a tiny bit of time on my hands waiting for the delivery of our new fridge, washer and dryer. And with my iPhone in hand, I took this little tour to share our joy (and kick-ass new house!) with you in the form of an iPhone house tour and virtual housewarming party!

C’mon in!!

Our new home has lovely curb appeal, don’t you think?

The porch view from the front door:

Through the double doors, and up a few steps and you’re in the living room.

Around the corner is the dining room, between the living room and the kitchen.

The kitchen, as seen from the dining room (and just before they put our honkin’ big new fridge.)

A quick aside: I spent most of the day Saturday and a good part of Sunday sanitizing those kitchen cupboards. I started out trying to simply scrub them clean, but there was the most awful mactac shelf paper that I simply could not get clean, so I started peeling. And peeling. And peeling. It was four layers deep in some places, and I had to laugh when I excavated this layer. I call it “The 1970s were good to this house!”

Isn’t it awesome? Yeah, so not staying. I peeled that up, too, and then scrubbed and sanded until my arms were numb, and then coated the whole shebang in a couple of thick layers of pristine white semigloss paint. Those cupboards are cleaner than they have been since the original owner now, I’m quite sure!

And now, on with the tour! Here’s a vaguely blurry view of the master bedroom, with it’s own patio walkout to a private porch.

The view from my bedroom. (Did I mention the lilac tree directly outside the window nearest my bed? June is going to smell delicious in this room!)

And! The private porch!

Ensuite in need of a shower (file under renovation plans!)

One boy bedroom:

Another bedroom:

Another bedroom:

And another bedroom!

(There’s a family room on the other side of the basement that looks a lot like this bedroom. Also not seen: laundry room with about $8K worth of new water softeners, filters and pumps; furnace and storage room; two more bathrooms; and, honkin’ big 2.5 car garage with 15 foot ceiling!)

And, of course, the back yard:

If you ask him, Tristan will tell you that we just spent the best part of $400K on a tree house that just happened to have a gorgeous house in its front yard for the rest of the family. 🙂

Pretty great, eh? (The house, not the resolution of the photos. Now I know, low-res iPhone pix are REALLY low resolution!)

Welcome to the virtual housewarming party!