Heard in Bible Class

Well, not so much 'heard' as 'said'... you know, by me.

Someone raised the question of how Paul managed to keep track of so many churches. We discussed it seriously for a few minutes, and then:

Me: I just don't know how he managed without Facebook.
Someone else: He tweeted. (general laughter)
Me: Think how much longer the Bible would be if Paul had had the internet.

And that, my friends, is the full extent of today's snark brilliance.

Teaser Tuesday #18

Possession, Elana Johnson


Horrified, I watched Jag battle with himself. He really couldn't speak-- because of my command. This was so bad.

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Cries for Help

NaNoWriMo is three weeks away, my first round of grad school applications are due in seven weeks, and the end of the semester is looming just after that. Holy smokes.

All that to say: Guest bloggers wanted! Specifically for the month of November, but if you're burning to say something October-ish, let's negotiate. If you have something to say that's off-topic for your blog, you can say it here (unless it's X-rated or something). Or if you aren't a regular blogger but you have something to say that is too long for a Facebook post and too short to start your own blog, let's talk! Leave me a message in the comments, catch me on Twitter or FB, or email me at cheekysu AT gmail DOT com.

This has nothing to do with my
post. I just think it's hilarious.

So, my creative writing class. I need to nickname these people, because they are delightful-- I guess that's something to mull over. We've had our first workshop this past week, and suddenly all the awkward silences are gone as we chat and are much more comfortable with one another, thank goodness. Today's my turn to be workshopped. The problem with going in alphabetical order (and more specifically, with me being at the end of the alphabet): The comments have gotten progressively bolder as we've gone along, that is to say, less 'this is great!' and more 'fix this!' I'm a bit sensitive about my writing, just like everyone else, so I may have to go hide in the bathroom after class.

Also making my list of Awkward Things I'm Doing Today: I have a consultation this morning at the very Writing Center where I am a consultant, for that very creative writing story. It's going to be an entertaining conversation at the front desk as I explain: No, I'm not joking, look, I'm right there on the schedule. And after that, I'm going to a meeting with French Teacher in which he will clear up all my confusion about the French language so I can go forth and be fluent. Or maybe he'll just tell me how to pronounce a French 'r' and where the adjectives go. Either one.

Fortunately, my meeting with Chicago (linguistics teacher) isn't until Wednesday. Yes, it's Help-Me-I'm-So-Confused week here at Cheekyness. I'm thinking of just wearing that on a name tag on campus.

Are you doing anything awkward today? Do you want to guest blog during November? What colour should I make my "I'm Confused" name tag?

At Home

I mentioned a couple of months ago that we were in the process of changing churches, complete with a story of how we found a particular one: I was on my bike one day, took a wrong turn onto a really busy street, thought I was going to be killed, and then got a good look at a church building when I finally got to the safety of a red light. There was no particular denomination or name on the outside, so I googled them when I got home, and Chad and I decided to go visit.

Source.

Four months later, we've decided that Red River is our new church home. We have a lot of reasons for liking it, so I'm not going to bother naming them all. Suffice to say that we feel that this is a place where we can love and be loved, and where we can serve the community alongside our new friends. And where it's okay that we aren't all in the same place in our spiritual walk. That makes me so happy.

Also at the new-to-us church: They have a praise band. I've spent my entire life (minus a few Sundays) worshipping a cappella. I'm well and happy and good singing with instruments, but it should be a really interesting conversation when my grandma comes to visit. Also, they're really good and a pleasure to sing along with. The band, that is, not my grandma, who is a pleasure to sing with for reasons that are not the least bit music-related.

It was at Red River that we first saw this video, which makes me giggle every time I see it:



I asked this a while ago, but now seems like a good time to rehash it all over again: What are your favourite hymns? Do you have a preference between instruments or not?

Does anyone remember 1993?

I can't believe this, but I'm having trouble coming up with a blog topic today. That could be due to the stack of textbooks waiting to be read, the business proposal I'm supposed to be writing that I am in complete dread of (and it's mocking me, btw. I have my Google Docs tab up and I keep averting my eyes, but it is calling my name. Dang proposal), the list of French words that are still unlearned for Monday's vocab quiz (and all of French Teacher's gentle but still guilt-inducing suggestions that perhaps I could put a bit more effort into the vocab are ringing in my ears, because he is 263% correct about that), and The Help sitting on the other shelf, to be ignored until homework is done. You might say my thoughts are divided this afternoon.

So, I wandered over to the NaBloWriMo site for a prompt, but it looks like Not Hannah is having an exhausting week, so today's prompt is not up. Instead, I'm taking Tuesday's: What advice would you give your fifteen-year-old self?

Hmmm. Here's the thing: I don't really remember 15 that well. I remember 14 (freshman year of high school) and 16 (that was a fun year), but 15? I think I spent most of that year waiting to be 16. But, I'm fairly certain that 15 was the year that I discovered the not-at-all delightful combination of Sominex and Stay Awake. I've had insomnia issues since I was born (or so my mother says), but I was a teenager before I found out that I could take medication for it. And it didn't take long for me to find out that Sominex lasts longer than the 8 hours or whatever promised on the side of the package. Enter: Stay Awake.

Source.

And of course, we all know how this sort of story ends. These non-habit-forming chemicals magically become habit-forming, and have the same kind of cycle of needing more for the same effect as any other chemical. I do understand that sleep aids and caffeine are not the worst drugs in the world, and that other teens had way more destructive habits than this. I also know that I was very lucky that I didn't venture down that path, considering how easy it was to get addicted to sleep aids and caffeine. I don't remember how long it lasted, although I think I stopped using them before I graduated. And I'm pretty sure that some of my long-lasting quirks-- frequent lightheadedness, headaches, a tendency to be insane under the influence of caffeine-- date back to those days.

So, my advice to my 15-year-old self? Leave those things on the shelf and out of your body. You don't need them!

What advice would you give you the 15-year-old you?

Imperfection Allowed

The symbol is smoking because
of all the stress I've put on it. Source.

Something that bugs me about today’s public climate is the insistence upon perfection. I’m all for practising what one preaches, walking the talk, or whatever cute phrase you use to say ‘don’t be a hypocrite’. However, we seem to leave unfortunately little room for changing one’s mind, having a bad day, or just plain screwing up.

I don’t want to come across that way with my environmental-ness. I share tips that work (usually) for me or for others, but I’d hate for anyone to slink away from my blog thinking that I’m issuing booming earth-friendly proclamations from on high and that you aren’t welcome if the suggestions are impractical for you. Quite the opposite, in fact; if my suggestion doesn’t work for you, tell me what does work. That’s the sort of information that I love. And as a gesture of “hey, look, we’re all human,” here’s my own Bad Week on Earth story.

I’ve gone through two reusable water bottles this week. Two. The first one was my metal water bottle, which was actually Chad’s metal water bottle that I’ve been carrying since I lost my own six months ago. I lost his on Tuesday. Or possibly Monday. Either way, the bottle and I have parted ways. I grabbed another (plastic) one out of my cupboard, which I promptly destroyed on Thursday by pulling on the nozzle with too much force. I recycled the bottle, but the lid didn’t have any kind of number or other indication that it was recyclable, so into the rubbish it went. My coworker Triple Major was right on top of that, since I wrote a paper just last semester about how long things stay in landfills. Alas, some things are just meant to be thrown away when they’re broken.

Also making the list of “oh, crap”: Our office (I work at UT’s Undergraduate Writing Center) has a Keurig instead of a regular coffeemaker, which is all well and good practical, especially since it does coffee AND tea AND hot cocoa AND apple cider. Unfortunately, the cups are not recyclable. I thought they were, as I’m almost sure that all the people who have encouraged me to buy one have assured me that Keurig has some sort of recycling programme. Well, they do-- for the recyclable parts of the machine itself. The cups are still single-use, non-recyclable plastic and foil. Drat-- back to bringing my own compostable tea bags (or leaves) it is. And I was so hoping to spearhead the Keurig recycling effort at the UWC.

And finally, it was raining this morning on my bus ride here. I put a plastic bag on my bike seat, as it my wont, only for it to blow off somewhere along the route. Not only did I have a wet seat, but I’m also a litterer now.

How about you? Is there something that sometimes goes wrong for you, despite all your best intentions? How do you avoid it? Do you think I should wear a name tag that reads “Earth Destroyer” as penance?

Old People On Campus: Je Ne Comprends Pas

So I'm taking a beginning French course, entirely for my own entertainment. I see snippets of French in books and whatnot, and for ages I've wanted to know how to pronounce all those words. To that end, I enrolled in French this semester.

French Teacher is actually from France, which is nice, since I'm reasonably confident that he knows what he's talking about. In fact, he's such a good teacher, I feel really guilty that 1) I'm really an awful French student, and 2) I mangle his language every time I try to speak it.

This is what I'm like in French class.
I sit there and stare. With my
mouth open. Source.

We often do group work to practise speaking with one another, and lately he's been hovering near me and my usual partner, Louisiana (so named because she used to live there). Yesterday, Louisiana decided that he must be hovering because we do a lot of giggling when we're meant to be practising French, so she told him, "You need a tape recorder back here. She (meaning me) is so funny! The other day she said that she feels bad that she's bad at French because you're such a good teacher. (And it was at this point that my face went all red.) And yesterday, she said this would be much easier if she spoke French!"

It's true, I did say both of those things, but I didn't actually intend for French Teacher to hear it. Louisiana explained later that she wanted him to know we weren't goofing off. When I told Chad about it, he said French Teacher may be hovering because he knows the two of us need help. Really, it could go either way. I do know that our TA has started hovering, too, because one of us always has a question during group work.

To French Teacher's credit, he lied through his teeth and said that I'm not doing bad. Nice guy.

Do you speak French? Do you ever feel guilty about being a poor reflection on a teacher/boss/whoever? What's your theory on why French Teacher is hovering?

The (Not-So-) Magical E-bus

So it turns out that it's not called "NaBloWri Except When I Forget Mo". Dang.

Way back when we first plotted out Have Bus, Will Travel, I shared that there were a few routes that were just too impractical for me to take. Among them was the E-bus, the late evening/early morning service that runs between student housing centers and the downtown entertainment district. Since I neither live in a student area nor do I go downtown at night, I thought I was never going to take that bus.

Whaddya know, I was wrong.

Last Friday evening, I went to a birthday party for one of the really sweet, really tolerant 'normal' students who I've become so fond of over the past year. Sprained Ankle, in fact, is her wildly inaccurate nickname around Cheekyness. She's a lovely person and très fun and it was her 23rd birthday and she kindly invited me to come. So of course, I took 10 seconds to think long and hard about how I don't really do late nights or loud music and before agreeing to go.

Confession: I'd never been to a college party. I've been to parties where college-age people were gathered, but the loud music, bad dancing, crazy talking stereotypes you see on the movies? Not once until last weekend. You know what? It was fun. And there really were impossibly beautiful people there.

Anyway, the bus! As the evening wore on, the group decided to head downtown, so we made our way to an unusually crowded (by my experience) bus stop. And then the bus pulled up, already packed. That made me really nervous, because I so have personal space issues, and also because we were worried that we might not all get on the bus. Despite being rather independent when it comes to transportation, I was not excited at the prospect of having to ride a bus downtown with complete strangers if I got separated from the two people in the group who I knew.

I worried for nothing, since we did all get on, but the driver had to change the sign in front to 'Drop-Off Only' once our group was in, because there was no more room for anyone else. But then he also had to follow his normal route downtown, which strikes me as beyond silly. Why not have a back-up plan to go straight there once the bus is full? Running the complete route just results in a lot of frustrated people standing by the bus stops.

So, I'm on a really packed bus, fortunately standing (more or less) between the two people I know. This turned out to be a good thing, because at one point Sprained Ankle (in front of me) lost her balance and fell into me, so I fell into the guy behind me, who is one of our fellow consultants at the Writing Center. He was paying enough attention to catch us both and get us back on our feet. (God bless the strong young men who work at the Writing Center!)

Overall, what is the E-bus like? Lots of shouting. Since it was so packed, and since everyone was excited about heading downtown, they were all trying to talk over each other. And since it was her birthday and she was extra-giddy, Sprained Ankle led us all in our school song and a cheer. Apparently this is normal E-Bus behaviour, except that it's usually reserved for on the way home (i.e., once everyone is drunk), not the way there.

And when we got off downtown, everyone-- or at least the ones in my earshot-- thanked the driver. They may be rowdy, but they have manners.

And that was me on the E-Bus. I probably won't be repeating the experience anytime soon.

Teaser Tuesday #17

The Help, Kathryn Stockett

But here's the thing: I like telling my stories. It feels like I'm doing something about it. When I leave, the concrete in my chest has loosened, melted down so I can breathe for a few days.

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Nothing to Read Here...

This is how I feel about editing: Lots
of words, all in the wrong order. 

I was going to post another in-class writing sample from my creative writing class today, but unfortunately the revision is going backwards. I'm about to scrap all my edits and start over, I think! BTW, many, many thanks for the encouraging and helpful comments here and on Twitter last week. My initial submission got me a B+.

So, rather than give you something I've written, I'll tell you about an exercise we did. We had a lecture about titles, and then she asked us to jot down 15 possible titles quickly. I wrote 20, and here are my favourites:

Back in Junction
Green Like the Sky
Interpreting for the Idiots
The Line at the Coffee Shop
Reused Life
Always in Reverse
Occasional Light Showers
Blue Stained Glass
One of the Five
One Mad Weekend


And I can give you an explanation on how I thought of all of these, but it's probably more entertaining just to leave it to your imagination! Details available upon request, as ever. ;)

Do you have a fun title with no story attached? Do any of these strike your fancy? (If so, you can grab one and take it home with you; I have nothing in particular in mind for them yet.) Have you ever scrapped edits and gone back to the beginning with something you've written?

From Mane to Wig

Normally, if I post on a Sunday, I like to make it something spiritual or devotional, since Sunday is my day of worship. But today, I'm just going to regale you with the tale of my haircut.

Yesterday, I went from this:

 To this:

Why? Well, it's too hot around here and I probably should have done it four months ago. Also, it was getting problematic for putting on a bike helmet and time-consuming for everything else. I can't leave my long hair down for class or I'll play with it, so up it must go.

Here's a little tip for your future: A Google search is not the best way, at least not in Austin, to find a hair salon that participates in Locks of Love. It's definitely not a good way to find ones that will do it for free. You're better off asking people who have done it where they go. In the end, I went with a local shop that does not cut the hair for free but encourages people to donate their hair. The conversation was something like this:

Stylist: What are we doing today?
Me: Cut it all off.
Stylist: How short?
Me: Oh, about here. *indicate what I'm after*
Stylist: Great! And are you donating your hair today?
Me: Yes, absolutely.
Stylist: Oh, thank goodness! I was thinking, 'Please, God, say yes.'

I think he might have cried if I had said no. Also, stylists seem to love my hair. I guess if you have an hour of time and a bunch of equipment at your disposal, my hair is fun to mess with-- it's thick and very straight. So thick, in fact, that 45 minutes after washing it still needed about 10 minutes of blow drying. (Which, in case you were wondering, is why I don't bother.) He said, "Wow, that's a lot of hair." Yes. Yes, it is.

So, my hair is sitting here in an envelope with a form, waiting for me to take it to the post office tomorrow. In a few weeks' time (I guess-- I don't know how long their turnaround is), a sick kid will have a new wig made of the hair that used to be on my head. Two takeaway thoughts from this: 1) This must be how sheep feel, and 2) If I'm going to donate my hair, I suppose the least I can do is take better care of it while it's still attached to my head.

Anybody else get a haircut this weekend? Have you ever done Locks of Love? Do you think sheep ever wonder where their wool will end up?

It's a Blogversary!!

After the birthday party I was at
last night, I decided against a
party hat.

Seven years ago today, I did a Google search for "free blog" and this is the result! As is my wont, I re-read my first post a couple of days ago and found out that my life has not gotten any more interesting over the course of the last seven years. Good to know!

So, I'll be having another giveaway for my blogversary. Details coming... soon. As in, as soon as I make them up.

Coincidentally enough, my blogversary is also the first day of NaBloWriMo. Today's prompt is: "Why do you blog?" Seriously, could that have worked out any better?

I'm pretty sure I started blogging because I read someone else's blog and thought, "Hey! I want one!" However, since then my posting and reasoning have evolved, through various hot topics and on-again, off-again streaks, to today's nonsense that I post mostly to empty out my brain and share my colossal goofiness with the world. I'm so glad that nearly 300 people have at least a passing interest in what I have to say. And I find it very cool to see what everyone else has to say, too. The blogging community is très fun.

So, that's about it for my Saturday, except that since October is here, and it's only 31 short days until NaNoWriMo begins, I'm concentrating on getting ahead in my homework. Which (of course!) when translated means, I'll be around to your blog to comment in December.

Do you keep track of your blogversary? (I had to get a gadget in the sidebar to remember when mine was.) Are you doing NaBloWriMo? Would you like to help me with my homework?

Unplug, Part 2

So, on the heels of last week's post encouraging you to unplug for the sake of your sanity comes this week's reminder that there are a couple of other reasons to unplug, too.

Source.

Reason #1: Your electricity bill. Basically, anything that has a little light on it is drawing electricity when it's plugged in, whether you have it turned on or not. It really is a good idea to unplug computers and other electronics when you are going to bed, or going out for a few hours, or whatever. Of course, if unplugging your (insert device here) means you'd have to completely reprogram it when you plug it back in, don't put yourself through that kind of madness. Lowering your electricity bill won't do you any good if you've lost all your sanity.

Reason #2: The usual energy-saving stuff.

Do you unplug your electronics? Do you have another reason for doing it or not that I missed? How's your sanity?

In the Darkness

If you come to this blog specifically for my Have Bus, Will Travel posts... I'm very sorry. I'm quite eager to return to the Exploring Austin Almost as Slowly as Possible life, as soon as I get caught up on homework. And once I do, you will all be the first to know. Second. Third. First me, then Chad, then you lot.

Instead, let me tell you a sad tale about my bicycle light. I don't have one anymore. I did have one this morning, and in fact up to about 12:45 this afternoon I had a perfectly functional bike light perched on my handlebars. But as I was locking up the bike before class, I somehow bumped it and knocked it loose. So I picked it up and put it back on its clamp, and went on my merry way.

When I came back out after class, I unlocked the bike and went about half a block before I noticed that my light clamp was empty. So I thought I must have knocked it loose again and decided to look around when I got back (it was a quick errand). I did look around, and walked back and forth between my parking spot and the spot where I noticed the truancy a couple of times, to no avail. I even checked my panniers, all my messenger bag pockets, and my locker. Nope. Not there.

If I had a bike made of light, I
wouldn't need one on my handlebars.

(I got a locker! It is so exciting! There are only about 100 available, so I applied without much hope, but it must have been my lucky day. Whoever thought that college students don't need lockers is cuckoo!)

So here's my problem: It's illegal to ride a bike after dark in Texas with no light. Not to mention that it would be a bloody stupid thing to do. And I don't get off work until 7. So, I have three hours to decide what to do, but I have a sneaky suspicion I'll be taking the bus home today.

What's something important that you've lost lately? Does it make you feel like you might be going prematurely senile? Who else feels neglected in the locker department?

A Place to Forget

In my Fiction Writing class, we usually have 20ish minutes for in-class writing. Here's one I wrote last week, touched up a bit for your reading pleasure. The prompt was, "Describe your least favourite childhood place." (This is my first attempt-- ever-- at writing in the second person.)

This building still depresses you. It depressed you for years without you even knowing it, and now it looms over your consciousness like a dead redwood that should have been cut down long ago.
It's the smell that bothers you. The janitors have a different cleaner for every room, and they all clamor together in a cacophony of antiseptic that clings to your clothes long after you leave. You can taste the smell, even now, just thinking about it.
Or is it the light that you hate so much? The building is unevenly lit: too much florescent glare in one room, not enough in another. It gives you a headache. And the windows don't help. Even during the only three months of the year when the sun bothers to shine on Iowa, any light that might creep into this building is discouraged, turned away by the hideous blue stained-glass windows. You hate those windows, especially the ones with the unrepaired bullet holes that the wind whistles through in the winter. They keep the light out but let the cold in.
Then there are those ugly accordion doors that divide one big room into three small ones. The doors that were installed back when your mother was too young to drive. They're made of glorified paper, but for all that they are still heavy and bulky and they clack when anyone touches them. You wanted them taken down for your wedding, but it was universally announced to be 'too much trouble'. If you ever decide to burn this building down and be done with it, you're starting with those doors.
The attic makes your list of hate, too, with its lack of heat or air conditioning. Up there you trip over junky old speakers that are laying around because no one volunteered to haul them off to the dump. The squeaky cabinets hold the same scissors and crayons and jars of paste that you used when you were a kid here. Reams of musty paper, printed with Sunday School lessons older than you, are stacked on the shelves, still waiting for the children that never materialized to learn them.
But it's none of these that you truly hate, is it? It's the room that you despise. The Sanctuary. Except that you would never call it that, in your plain Protestant way-- 'sanctuary' is too holy a word for a mere man-made room in a man-made building. But the adults you knew treated it as holy, all the same. You and your friends played hide-and-seek here after church, and later used the old ladies' cushions as frisbees, until you got caught. You remember the puke-green carpet with matching curtains that used to be in here, until it was replaced 30 years ago with the depressed red that remains to this day. The hymnals you remember are long gone, now replaced with a version that was last popular when you were a teenager; every other church in town has gone to Powerpoint for their hymns, but in this building a hymnal was good enough for your grandfather and one day will be good enough for your grandchildren and by God, it's good enough for you, too.
When you're in this room can still hear the echo of every off-key note sung in here, bouncing around the rafters looking for some glass to shatter. You remember every heated argument, and every difference of opinion that led to someone leaving in a huff. You remember the friends you never saw again after their parents fell out with your parents.
In this room you were married. In this room you said good-bye to your grandfather and you're back to witness the same ceremony for your grandmother. Any happiness you may have had in this building was long ago washed away, baptized in a flood of tears.

Unplug

This seemed like a reasonably non-stressful
picture.

Happy first day of (insert appropriate season for your hemisphere here)!

At this blogging rate, my 1000th post may well end up being on my 7th blogversary. Sheesh! I have a plan to get all caught up on homework this weekend (seriously, how do I get so behind only a few weeks into every semester?), and then give my poor neglected blog some attention. And possibly apply to grad school. That's kind of important.

So, today's green living tip is probably better for you personally than the impact it will have on the planet, but those are the best kind, yes? It is: Unplug. Turn off your computer, turn off the TV, turn off the lights. Have a little period of peace in your house where nothing distracts you from taking some deep breaths. Even better: grab this time to go out for a walk. It doesn't have to be long-- just a few minutes' break to de-stress and relax is a long way better than continuing to be stressed!

The impact of using less electricity for a few minutes will probably be minuscule for both the planet and your electricity bill, but if you are less stressed, then your interactions with others will likely be more pleasant, and your little corner of the planet may be a happier place as a result.

Do you have a "turn it off" time? What do you do? Or do you have other de-stress ideas?

A Blogversary Giveaway!

No, no, not my blogversary. That is still a couple of weeks away.

I'm playing a happy tune to help
celebrate. And I can't tell you the
source of this pic, because I found
it on the internets many moons ago.

No, it's the amazing blogger JE Fritz who is celebrating her first blogversary, with a giveaway of some great books or a gift card! Yay! All you have to do is run on over and join in the fun.

And you should run on over there anyway, because her blog is très fun. (Yep, now that I'm taking French I totally reserve the right to use French words from time to time.) Especially for word lovers.

What are you waiting for? Go! Enter! And see how fab her blog really is.

Have Some Tea

There's part of me that thinks you can't go too far wrong with tea or coffee made at home. Presumably, you'll be using a reusable mug instead of a single-use disposable cup, it's much much much cheaper than stopping off at a coffee shop, and all the parts are either wash-and-reuse-able or compostable.

So I haven't tried too hard to green up my tea drinking. And then in comes Groupon with two offers in about two weeks for two different loose-leaf tea places: One of them local (Tea Embassy) and the other online (Tea District). So, I armed myself with a tea infuser and got out the cute little teaspoon that the Penciler of Songs gave me a couple of years ago, and made my first foray into loose-leaf-ness. When I ordered a sampler pack from Tea District, they even sent me some reusable cloth bags, useful for brewing tea or for any cooking in my future that requires simmering spices that need to be removed before serving. Result!

My new tea setup: Sampler bags of
yumminess, cloth reusable bag,
teaspoon, stainless steel infuser.
I am ready for all tea-related
emergencies.

As ever, I would encourage going the reusable route whenever possible, so if you're brewing coffee every day, consider a reusable filter instead of paper ones. If you are using the paper ones, go ahead and compost them right along with the grounds. If you have a Keurig or similar fancy contraption, please be sure to recycle the cups (I can't make any recs on reusing them, because I've never tried-- any suggestions?)

If you are a tea drinker like myself but you aren't into the loose-leaf thing, then again I recommend composting the bags. The leaves, whether inside a bag or loose-leaf, are also compostable, or here's a suggestion from Green Is Sexy: Save the tea leaves in a sealed container and rub them on your fingers after you've chopped or otherwise handled something smelly in your kitchen (fish, garlic, onions, etc.). The original post recommends using green tea leaves, but I don't drink green tea, so I've started saving my black tea leaves to see if it works just as well (because I kept forgetting to save the leaves before now). I'll let you know how it turns out.

Now, if you've had a look at that pic above featuring my new set-up, you'll see the snag here: I have nine plastic bags of tea sitting on my counter right now. They are all resealable, so I'm already plotting their reuse capabilities, but in the future I'm definitely going to go for larger packages instead of sampler sizes to avoid such an abundance of packaging. I did ask the guy at the Tea Embassy (the local store) if his bags are recyclable, but he said he didn't think so. I didn't press him at that moment by suggesting that I bring a bag back for refilling, but I will probably email him when my stock of tea gets low to ask if he's cool with refills.

Are you a tea or coffee person? Both? Neither? Do you have a fantastic low-waste suggestion for your beverage of choice?

Teaser Tuesday #16

Bossypants, Tina Fey

I tie my Sauconys.*

*This is a paid endorsement from the Saucony Corporation.

(I totally flipped to my random page and then got engrossed in reading. The great thing about memoirs is that you can do that and not ruin the story. And as a runner, this was the line for me.)

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Live Better

I'm fairly certain that every blogger in America is contractually obligated to write about The Anniversary today. So I shall content myself with saying:

Source.

What unites us is stronger than what divides us.
The things we have in common are greater than the differences.
One word of kindness is better than 1000 words of complaint.

Remember, at home and at work, in our streets and in our schools, at the office, at the game, or at the restaurant: We are better together.

(And if you came here looking for a blog post that will both make you cry and give you hope, I suggest you try this one instead. It's brilliant.)