McCain Makes his Choice

John McCain picked Governor Sarah Palin (Alaska) to be his VP, in what I believe is a blatant attempt to attract the “angry Clinton supporters.”  Unfortunately, McCain failed to realize that the people who support Hillary Clinton do so because of her politics and not just because of her biological sex.  So… way to pick a VP who shares nothing in common* with Clinton besides the fact that she’s a woman.  Good going, Grampy McCain.

*  seriously, nothing.  Palin is anti-choice, anti-gay, was elected to the position of Governor in 2006 and served as mayor of a town of 8000 before that.  I believe that’s what we call “zero experience.”

Nalgene Ideas

It’s been a while, but I did manage to find a water bottle that I liked. Here it is, my Klean Kanteen (bought a mere month before they introduced the colored versions). I got it from Greenfeet.

So this is all well and good, but what do I do with my trusty Nalgene — or rather, Seth’s trusty Nalgene? We have three of them. One is strictly off-limits, as it survived a hiking trip across Europe and now bears all sorts of neat stickers from foreign countries, but the other two just take up cabinet space, and we’re probably never going to use them again.

Here’s my two cents: I was planning to take the old Nalgenes, fill them with sand or rocks, and submerge one in each toilet tank. That way, we’d be reusing something that would otherwise get recycled, and we’d convert our toilets into low-flush options. These seem like good green options to me.

Unfortunately, as soon as those Nalgenes touch toilet tank water (which, in theory, is as clean as regular water but still…), they’re never going to be fit for normal water bottle usage ever again. So we have to be pretty sure one 40oz. Nalgene bottle is going to convert our toilet into a workable low-flush toilet. You never know — it could be too big and displace too much water to work properly.

Also, I’m not sure this would be the best option because if the Nalgenes start to leach BPA chemicals into the water, then we’re just contaminating the water supply and sending it back into the community. I’m not sure waste treatment plants have the ability to filter out BPA. I suppose I could always wrap the Nalgenes in trash bags or something, and duct tape them closed (which would also solve the toilet tank water issue). I’ll have to look into this.

So are there any other good ideas for reusing old Nalgenes? Or do we just toss them in the recycle bin and forget about them?

Summer Candy

Seth’s boss gave us tomatoes yesterday from her organic garden.  There were so many, I didn’t know what to do with them all.  So I put them in our old-fashioned candy dish and took a few pictures.  Mmmm.

Women’s Equality Day!

Happy Women’s Equality Day! Today is the 88th anniversary of the 19th amendment. If you don’t know, the 19th amendment is the one that allows women to vote. Hurray! In honor of this special day, make sure you’re registered to vote so that this November 4, you can party like it’s 1920 at the ballot box. If you’re feeling really gung-ho, rent the movie Iron Jawed Angels and watch it and pretend that Alice Paul and Lucy Burns are your best friends. This is also a great way to learn about the struggle for women’s right to vote, and what these women went through (unlawful arrest and force-feeing and torture — very graphic).

If you’re already registered to vote and you’ve seen Iron Jawed Angels, then now might be a great time to learn about the still unratified Equal Right Amendment. Happy Women’s Equality Day!

Alice Paul unfurling the ratification banner 88 years ago today

Stuffed Tomatoes from Caroline Quiner

Mmm mm good

My head must’ve been in the clouds this weekend when I went grocery shopping for the week. Despite my grocery list, I bought far less than usual, and nothing seemed to inspire me to create new or exciting meals this week (don’t make fun — cooking anything new can be exciting). So when Seth and I were driving home from work yesterday, we couldn’t satisfactorily answer the question, “what’s for dinner tonight?” We had no answers. I couldn’t remember what meals we had come up with for the week, and what supplies we had on hand.

Then, at the last minute, I remembered that I read The Little House in Brookfield by Maria Wilkes as a fluff book last week. Apparently, the publishers of the Laura Ingalls Wilder’s “Little House” books decided to capitalize on the popularity of her series by writing historical fiction stories about Ms. Wilder’s relatives. Smart, right? I certainly bought into it, because I love the books about Laura’s mother Caroline Quiner. And in the above book, Caroline mentions eating stuffed tomatoes. Bingo! Dinner was born.

We had a few tomatoes, and enough odds and ends for a tasty filling. When paired with a nice pasta salad, the tomatoes filled us right up. I love good, quick vegetarian meals.

Caroline Quiner’s Stuffed Tomatoes

• 2-3 Tbsp. olive oil
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 8 Baby Bella mushrooms, chopped
• 2 tomatoes
• 2 cups (or so) fresh spinach
• 2 slices of Italian bread, cut into cubes (preferably stale, but fresh will work fine too)
• 1/3 cup cottage cheese
• salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven 375° F. Heat the olive oil in a skillet. Add the garlic and sauté until golden. Add the mushrooms and stir to coat with the oil. While those are cooking (give them a stir occasionally so they don’t burn), slice the tops off the tomatoes and scoop out the insides so you have a tomato shell. Toss the tomato seeds out, but chop up the rest of the insides and add them to the skillet. Let that cook for a minute or so, then tear up the spinach and add it to the skillet as well. Stir all that vegetabley goodness up and cook until the spinach is wilted.

In a bowl, mix the bread cubes and vegetable mixture together. Add the cottage cheese, and salt and pepper to taste. Scoop this into the tomato shells and put the tomatoes on a greased baking dish. If you have stuffing mixture left over, just scoop that into the dish so it can bake because it’s really good by itself.

Put the tomatoes in the oven and bake for about 15 minutes, or until the stuffing mixture turns a golden color and the tomatoes look soft. Enjoy!

Now, I used two tomatoes because that was all we had. You could double or triple this recipe very easily and it would work out just fine. Also, I didn’t use onions because we think they might contribute to the migraines, but you’re more than welcome to sauté an onion with the garlic, and that would give it a nice flavor too. That being said, I didn’t feel the stuffing was lacking for anything without the onions, and I use onions in everything. So have fun and make stuffed tomatoes with all your bountiful garden booty.