2 reviews

Review Number One:  Animal Spirit, pet supplies, 2348 Mass Ave, Cambridge (between Porter Square and Route 16, in the white brick building)

I needed to stock up on Innova Evo ferret kibble, and have been increasingly annoyed by the spammy behavior of my online supplier.  So I went to the Innova site, which has a handy "find a retailer near you" feature.  Lo and behold, there was a retailer not a mile from my house!  I called to make sure they had the ferret kibble in stock, and stopped by on Tuesday to pick it up.  This is really the best kind of pet supply store, all kinds of healthy food options (no cheap grain based foods for carnivores here!), grooming stuff, neat toys, etc., plus a resident kitty and a rather shy rescued dachshund behind the counter.  The staff were friendly; I didn't have any reason to ask questions, but I suspect they would be quite knowledgeable as well.  I am impressed that the only brand of ferret food they seem to carry is by far the best food on the market.  They carry BARF diet as well, which is certainly easier to buy than make, if that's your thing.   So, if you feed your pets high quality food, check out Animal Spirit!

Review Number Two:  Various vendors at Etsy

This holiday season, I have done some of my shopping at Etsy, and I've been having the best experiences.  Each of the vendors I've shopped from has been prompt with shipping, the items have been great, would do business again A++++++!  Seriously, it's been fun.  The thing I ordered has not yet been the only thing in the package.  One person included a hand-colored comic about his creations.  Another person included a mix CD, and another threw in some buttons.  The stuff you can find at Etsy is creative and unique, and runs the price range from dirt cheap to tres cher for the genuine art.  So if you're struggling for gift ideas, check out Etsy!

Oh, and a third review, just because:  recipe for Cauliflower and potato soup, Jane Brody's Good Food Cookbook.  I rate it four potatoes out of five.  The soup is basically cauliflower, potatoes, onion, garlic, soy sauce, a lot of parsley, cardamom, pepper and milk, which sounds a little incomprehensible but is very tasty.  The parsley and cardamom especially go well together.  If I make this soup again, I would use more cardamom than the recipe calls for because I love it very much, and I would add some toasted almonds either as a garnish or perhaps ground up and added to the soup.  The only reason I didn't give this soup five potatoes is that it really screamed for those toasted almonds.  Also, if I'd used another potato it wouldn't have all fit in the pot I was using.

Took the night off from official exercise due to general ouchiness but danced around in the kitchen while cooking.  I swear sometimes I do my best dancing in the kitchen in my fluffy slippers and gothic ass sweatpants.

ugh

I really, really do not Mitt Romney to become president.  It would mark an enormous step backwards for this country.  Excerpt from his speech on religion and tolerance (oh the irony):

There are some who may feel that religion is not a matter to be seriously considered in the context of the weighty threats that face us. If so, they are at odds with the nation's founders, for they, when our nation faced its greatest peril, sought the blessings of the Creator. And further, they discovered the essential connection between the survival of a free land and the protection of religious freedom. In John Adams' words: "We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion... Our constitution was made for a moral and religious people."

Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom. Freedom opens the windows of the soul so that man can discover his most profound beliefs and commune with God. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.

[....]

The founders proscribed the establishment of a state religion, but they did not countenance the elimination of religion from the public square. We are a nation "Under God" and in God, we do indeed trust.

We should acknowledge the Creator as did the Founders -- in ceremony and word. He should remain on our currency, in our pledge, in the teaching of our history, and during the holiday season, nativity scenes and menorahs should be welcome in our public places. Our greatness would not long endure without judges who respect the foundation of faith upon which our constitution rests. I will take care to separate the affairs of government from any religion, but I will not separate us from "the God who gave us liberty."

Whole speech here.

He references JFK's "don't worry about my Catholicism" speech, but here is what JFK said:

Finally, I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end; where all men and all churches are treated as equal; where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice; [emphasis mine]

[...]

I want a Chief Executive whose public acts are responsible to all groups and obligated to none; who can attend any ceremony, service or dinner his office may appropriately require of him; and whose fulfillment of his Presidential Oath is not limited or conditioned by any religious oath, ritual or obligation.

I feel more included by a 47 year old speech by a presidential candidate than I do by one given yesterday.  I am sincerely saddened by Mitt Romney's speech.  To me, the Founding Fathers' "God" and "religious people" are just shorthand for the ideas they wanted to convey about a just and equal society that takes care of its own, not something to be taken literally.  I'm sure there were plenty of atheists and agnostics back then; Benjamin Franklin for one was certainly a questioner of blind faith and sometimes of any faith at all, and a reading of Thomas Jefferson's papers shows he saw the basis for the Constitution in philosophy, not religion, and, most significantly, that he felt the common law upon which natural rights were based came from the pre-Christian Anglo-Saxons.  But in today's climate, literalism is in, nuanced readings are out, and I suspect reading the original sources is out as well.

I would like to think that if Romney doesn't win the Republican nomination, it is because others saw his betrayal of the principles of this country and rejected him for it, but I suspect it will be because of his religion, because most of the rest of America is just as narrow-minded as he is.  In a sense it would serve him right but it would be a hollow thing for those of us who don't happen to be one of the Peoples of the Book.

caloo calay I chortle in my glee!

There is a dishwasher washing dishes in my kitchen!!!  *wild celebratory zaghareeting*  I finally figured out how the sink hook up worked (no thanks to the very uninformative instruction manual, but big thanks to informative user reviews at Amazon) and so far, so good.  It's filled up and drained once without flooding, and in about 20 more minutes there should be clean dishes!  Our largest plates don't fit, but we use mostly the medium ones anyway.  I can hardly convey how much I hate washing dishes just on general principle, and this will do my back a world of good.

Oh I am a happy woman.  I will practice for next Sunday's set with extra joy!