Today: My Kitchen Utensils Get Some TLC

Noooooooo!!!!!!!

Yes!

Oh, yes!

My boyfriend jokes that our kitchen drawer was like the "NO" picture in some infomercial advertising a better way to store your cooking utensils. We had two "organizers", but they were big and had amorphous shapes that did nothing to inspire us to relegate certain utensils to specific spots. Instead, everything was sort of swimming about haphazardly. As a result, we had to dig through the entire drawer to find the measuring spoon, vegetable peeler, or any tool we desired,. Another annoying thing is, more often than not, it was a hassle to get the drawer to open or close.

Determined to correct this, I set out to find something huge to toss all my larger utensils in. At Fishs Eddy, I found this really cute Brooklyn Crock. Fortunately, an exceptionally helpful salesperson intercepted when I told her what I would be using the crock for. She suggested I use wide mouthed Ball jars of various sizes. This would help me better organize the utensils by size and possibly even by color and material (steel, black plastic, wood). I was so grateful for her help because 3 jars were a faction of the price of the crock and seemed to be the perfect way to avoid bringing the chaos that existed in the drawer up to my counter.

I ended up needing only two of the jars (pint and quart sized) because I had so many other suitable containers at home: A large vintage green glass vase and a smaller vintage purple vase (both from Salvation Army), three adorable Moroccan themed glasses from a dollar store in Queens, and two cup sized Ball jars. All this stuff has been just hanging around my various apartments for years awaiting their destiny beyond holding the occasional flower or breakfast juice. I now feel like I could stare at my counter forever. Everything on it is beautiful and orderly. It feels almost just as good to open my utensil drawer and look my knives and backup cutlery who, if they could speak, would surely say how happy they are to have some breathing room.

I can't clean or organize without it being a party so I let Pandora play DJ. I heard Erykah Badu's The Healer for the first time. She is so fantastic! Watch this video to hear the song performed live, and to see her fantastic afro! I need to find that wig!!!!!

Crow Hill Community Association Mural Project

This weekend, I participated in a mural project organized by the Crow Hill Community Association. I was one of over 30 community artists chosen to paint a panel on an 8 foot high board that had been bordering a vacant lot on Franklin Ave and Eastern Parkway for a couple years. The project was a superblast for my self-esteem as both an artist and as a community member. I am grateful to have been part of this.

Me, at my mural.

 I will post more photos of the project soon. Lots of folks were taking photos, so it's just a matter of time before they are shared.

Today, Monday August 24th, as best I can remember it.

Today I slept until 10, then I lounged on the couch while eating a bagel, watching a little of Ms. Wendy, and surfing the internets. Before I knew it nearly two hours of my day had gone by and I had nothing to show for it. Yikes!

Cloth Mops: Simply the Best!

So I did what I normally do when I have no idea what else to do: I cleaned. I swept and mopped our entire apartment for the first time since July. Yuck, I know! July was nearly two months ago and since that time we have had a huge party and have cooked lots of tasty, sticky meals, so our floor was good and dirty. My only excuse is that it's too effing hot to do any hardcore cleaning in the Summer. Today offered some relief thanks to a crazy windy rainstorm, so I was happy to seize the opportunity to return our apartment floor to its former shiny glory. After two hours of pre-scrubbing and re-scrubbing to the tunes of Modest Mouse, our floor looked fantastic and felt just as great to my bare feet!

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful: Richard and I hung around Sit & Wonder for about an hour. I went to work at AK and shuffled some hungry weird people. I also drew a weird monster with nads on my hostess pad. I've never drawn anything with nads before, so it made me giggle like I was in middle school. Gotta draw more nads!

Today, as best I can remember it.

Today was your typical lazy couple's Sunday. Richard and I slept in until nearly 11. We skipped showers and headed out for a light brunch at Milk Bar. I got the avocado toast. It was simple and delicious-- a thick slice of hearty multigrain bread covered with the perfectly ripe meat of an entire hass avocado and dusted with chili powder. I also had a fantastically refreshing glass of freshly squeezed oj. I am always surprised by how little fresh oj tastes like the gross stuff sold in cartons. It's almost hard to imagine both were extracted from the same plant.

After brunch, we headed over to Duane Reade, where we picked up snacks for the half-price matinee screening of The Kids are All Right at BAM. Before the movie, we stopped into the Brooklyn Flea. I love the flea because its positively inspiring to see smaller local businesses and individuals selling their art, junk, food, and more directly to the people. And all this just a few steps from a mega mall  featuring Target, the soul- and local economy-draining ubermart.

At the flea, I bought a hunk of soap from the bargain bin at Australian Scent for $1.50/oz , $.50 cheaper than the packaged soap and just as deliciously herbal smelling and moisturizing. I don't even need soap but the salesperson was so genuinely delightful and friendly, as was the company's owner when I met her at the flea months ago, I couldn't resist indulging the both of us. Besides, it's nice to have another bar of soap around for when I tire of the oatmeal scented bar of Sappo that I use everyday.

Two other vendors worth mentioning are Charlie and Sarah and Ghost Pepper. Charlie and Sarah is a Brooklyn-based company that makes hipster British themed clothing for children. Don't really care about that, but what did interest me were these great color prints of quirky, creepy drawings, many illustrating characters from fairy tales. I loved them, but the salesperson was so pushy: looming over me and reminding me of how they aren't online and wouldn't be at the flea after next week. All this while I quietly tried to decide which one of the several dozen I liked the best. It was a mood killer. As much as I liked the art, I couldn't stand to shop under such high pressure. The Ghost Pepper stand was hot, literally. The Ghost Pepper is the World's Hottest Pepper and the stand sold not only hot dried peppers in cool packaging, but Spicy Hard Watermelon Candy. The sweets, which are handmade in Brooklyn, had many sumultaneous flavors- sweet, sour, and spicy. It was an oral adventure! I only wish it wasn't $5 for a tiny bag. Oh well, I wish them luck.

The Kids Are All Right was every bit as awesome as everyone says it is. It had really strong characters who were performed excellently and the plot managed to both surprise me and make sense. I loved it and so did Richard.

After the movie, we went to Moe's and drank a couple pints of Kelso pilsner while watching the rain. We left and made out on the street before attempting to do some drunk shopping at Green Light. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the book I wanted on my own, so I had to ask the staff for help. I described the book as "photo portraits of people from around the world" and as being featured in the store the past winter. I think it was pretty clear I was drunk, but I tried to not make a total fool of myself. Sadly, they didn't have the book. (I just found it on Amazon using those same search words in like seconds. It's called 6 Billion Others: Portraits of Humanity from Around the World. I think it'd be a helpful reference for portrait drawing, so I'll order it from the store now that I know what it is.) So, we left empty-handed to Hot Bird, where we ate lunch from their food truck. There's something kinda silly about a food truck that is always parked in the yard of a bar. Is it still street food and therefor cool or are they just so obviously, and offensively, banking on a hipster trend? Either way my veggie bratwurst was awesome, so I won't hate.

Back at home, we had an even awesomer evening: A little bit of-- okay, a lot of-- afternoon delight. A homemade dinner of pesto pasta with local veggies, paired with local wine from the farmer's market.  A marathon of 30 Rock on the couch.

I love Sundays!

It's 2010 bitches! The past two years, as best I remember them.

Me,  drawn by my classmate Diane

 Hopefully this post's title doesn't alarm anyone since it's already August of 2010. The title is just in case any of you readers happened to be on a life-support system that was powered by my blogging. Surely, if you are not dead, you must be in a state of shock to awaken from your coma to find that not only is it more than two years since you were last conscious, but that America has a Black president.

What else is new? I currently share an apartment in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn with my ever supportive and loving supernerd boyfriend Richard and our soul-survivor cat Lucy (a.k.a. Big Lu). Our landlord Jacob Lev is a total slumlord, but thanks to Abraham Hicks I am appreciating the contrast. Besides, we have so much. Our apartment is spacious and has roof access, which we take advantage of at least a few times a week by lounging with cold beers. We live minutes away from the central branch of the Brooklyn Public Library, Prospect Park, Grand Army Plaza and it's awesome farmer's market, Brooklyn Botanical Garden, and Brooklyn Museum of Art. There are tons of vegan and vegan-friendly eats nearby. There is Stumptown Coffee served one block away at Sit & Wonder. There's LaunchPad, the best community center EVER! I can easily walk to Park Slope, Bed-Stuy, Clinton Hill, Crown Heights, and Fort Green. I can hop on the subway; correction: I can walk for 10 minutes then get on the subway and visit friends in Brooklyn Heights or my favorite riverside park in DUMBO. I can see why they call this neighborhood the Heart of Brooklyn!

For cash, I have been hostessing at Angelica Kitchen for almost three years and I've been a salesperson at Sustainable NYC, an eco-friendly boutique, for nearly two.  I love working at places that are in sych with my woman warrior battle cry of "defend the planet and equality for all inhabitants!, "still I am growing bored with only using my vivacious personality at work. I have so many other talents and gifts to share, and with more people! I just read Jonathan Mead's amazing- and free- eBook Zero Hour Work Week and am inspired to indulge my passion for creating art, creating poetry and prose, and conscious-consumerism and living. The idea is to just do the things I am most passionate about and talented at in a creative way that can give unique value to others, and this value will be rewarded in profits. Sounds like it is worth a shot to me.

What about SuperVegan? Well, it's a great website, but I am not sure if the work I was doing there was fulfilling. Actually I am certain it wasn't. I enjoy writing, but there came a point where writing entertainment and lifestyle content for an audience of committed vegans (many of whom were holier than thou-- not to exclude myself) seemed like such an utter waste of time. People (rich people, crazy people, ignorant people, powerful people, disenfranchised people, mean people) were out there kicking the shit out of all kinds of innocent animals and people and the planet in a million different ways and not only did I have to deal with knowing about this and figuring out what I could about it, I had to deal with ten million promotional emails a day. Some events and products were more important than others, but oftentimes it was hard to tell since I was drowning in a sea of requests to write about books, benefit parties, art projects, adoptable kittens, and meat analogs.

WHINE ALERT: Most of the emails and calls were from Karen Dawn demanding that I read Thanking the Monkey in its entirety before writing the positive review I said I would write after skimming it. She seemed to think it was the most important book ever written, though further examination of the book suggested to me that it was your classic animal rights introduction book. Not bad, but far from exceptional  and likely to end up as the kind of coffee table book one uses as a coaster without even thinking twice. Having said that, I'd like to add that I am a fan of DawnWatch and I wish she had directed her energy toward that project, rather than pestering me to read her mediocre book. Grrr...

Some people can withstand this kind of pressure and information overload. In fact, they get off on it. In the end, I discovered I am not one of those people. I realized that my interest in vegan culture is not infinite. I can get enough of all things vegan, and limited interest-- no matter how far expanding-- is no substitute for pure passion and infinite love. So this explains why Karen Dawn can be in the vegan/ AR media game since the dawn of time and I couldn't last even two years. I may still write the occasional SV post, but I'm not cut out to be a major player there anymore.

Again, I am pursuing some passions that I have infinite interest in. This summer I took a portrait drawing class at the Educational Alliance. It was great! The instructor was engaging and engaged, it was affordable-- only about $30/ class with free figure drawing open sessions on Sundays (I never went though), and my classmates were a mix of pretty cool older adults and fledgling youngsters (ha ha!) like myself. Pictured here are some of the my own favorite in-class drawings (all done in compressed and/or vine charcoal), but you can see more student drawings on my teacher's blog. It is all so exciting!