Brown Eyes

Sometimes, I just have to look at myself.

Most of the time, I just don't look because I'm afraid to. I have a traumatic past with myself.

But today, I got a new dress, and so I took this picture, and here is what I see.

It looks like I'm wearing lipstick, but I'm not. They just look like that. My mom used to say I had "rosebud lips," and now my daughter has them, and here, in this picture, I still have them, except they're grown up. Not a rosebud anymore, I guess. Over the course of my life, people have loved me enough to want to kiss them. And kissing - isn't that something? Mashing your mouths together to demonstrate affection for one another? I always think about that. Always. You think I'm kidding. Every time I've ever kissed someone, this special person living inside me for the sole purpose of dampening nice moments has to come out and say, "THINK ABOUT IT, of ALL the ways in the entire universe that humans could possibly choose to show affection for one another, THIS is what we've settled on."

But people have wanted to kiss them, and that's cool with me.

There's a little mole between my lower lip and chin that seems to get more prominent with age. I don't think it was there in photos I see of myself from high school or even early college. My dad constantly tells me I can have it removed, and I constantly tell him that I like it there. When he tells me that, I get upset, inside, and I usually have to say to someone, "You'll never believe what my dad told me," and then they're like, "That's terrible," and I'm like, "I know," and I get that sense of validation I've craved since childhood.

I see that I'm getting older. I think it took me a long time to look like a woman. A real, bona fide, grown up woman. You wanna know how much I weigh? Here. Here's how much I weigh.

I weigh 138.4 pounds. I'm five-foot-four, and I weigh 138.4 pounds.

Take that, old self. Take that, putrid American societal standards of beauty.

I'm not sure I've ever done that before.

But you know what? 138.4 is a good weight for me, myself, a woman. Maybe not in general, but for me. It wasn't a good weight for me as a teenager, not when all my friends were only about 110. But now, I'm a woman. Even if I'm not really taller, I seem taller, and leaner, somehow, maybe because my hips changed a bit after having a baby. I have no idea what it is, but it works, now. It didn't before, and now it does.

I used to wear green contacts, too. I wouldn't leave the house without them. I'd sleep in them, sometimes for a month at a time. I didn't want to believe that I didn't really have green eyes. And very few people could tell that they weren't real, either.

My ex-boyfriend used to practically revere them. If I took them out for any reason, he'd just look at me and sigh and say, "Brown eyes." Just that. Just, "Brown eyes."

And I was horrible and unappreciative (still am), so I'd write him off as not knowing what beautiful was and hurriedly put them back in. Yes, even if I was laying down to bed.

"Brown eyes."

Crappy insurance and the cost effectiveness of glasses changed that.

I got married and started wearing glasses and chose to get over my negative obsession with my eyes because ... well, it wasn't like I had anyone to impress anymore. Right? My husband found me attractive first thing in the morning when I was at my absolute worst. It was like I didn't even have to try for this dude. I just had to exist and he fell all over me.

Falls ... all over me. I should say. I'm a lucky girl. Woman. Girl.

Anyway, now I love my eyes.

I had no idea how dark and penetrating they can be. I don't know many people up here, up north, with eyes that dark. I appreciate them now. I wish my vision was better so that I didn't have to wear glasses at all, so that I could enjoy them more, and so my husband could enjoy them more, too.

Behind me, there's the fridge.

I can sit and look at myself in Photobooth and try to be pretty all day long -- we can't deny that there's a refrigerator behind me. Super glamorous.

This is significant, though.

My life is reflected on that fridge.

There's a stark contrast between the woman I'm looking at in the photo and the reflection of her life on that fridge.

A calendar indicating that my daughter's last vaccinations are coming up next week. Invitations to childrens' birthdays. Family photos. Coupons for recycling bags.

I can't even define what is means to be "grown up" right now.

Which part of this photo that I'm looking at really says "grown up?"

Confidence? Obligations? A new, more perfunctory view of ... what, my face?

What is the value of "grown up" anyway? Personally, I don't see any real value in the notion of "grown up" that I've maintained my whole life.

This was a deliberate experiment in self-awareness, particularly in the department of self-esteem and self-validation. Lots of self in there. It was necessary.

I have a very traumatic past with myself.

Fruit Lasagna is Not Italian

Something weird is definitely happening in my body right now. I'm simultaneously headachey and excited and sleepy. I either need to go to bed or to the hospital. Yes, it was worth it.

Tonight, our friend Jason had an idea for fruit lasagna. A quick Google revealed that it's not a new thing, but all the recipes I found were either weird (like, fruit and ricotta cheese ... no) or convoluted or in Spanish. So, armed with bits and pieces of recipes I found online that seemed to work, and Jason's insistence that graham crackers be incorporated somehow, I threw together this heinous concoction of sugar-coma-inducing awesomeness.

The photos are crappy. Yeah, I know I'm a photographer, which means I take photos all the time, which means sometimes I just want to take a photo with my iPhone and call it day, and so I did! Take that, Pioneer Woman. 

  

The "lasagna" is just crepes, AKA French tortillas. The "sauce" is fruit dip. Now that you know that, here's what I did.

CREPES:

• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 1 cup flour
• 2 eggs
• 1 TB veg oil
• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract
• 2 TB sugar

Toss it all in a bowl and whisk it up until you have a nice little batter. To make them, use a nice-size frying pan on medium heat. The recipe I used says to put it in the pan 2 tablespoons at a time. I just poured mine in right out of the bowl until I had a "pancake" about 4 inches around. Then, you need to twist and turn the pan all over to "thin" out your pancake. The idea is to make really thin little pancakes (seriously, they'll look like tortillas) so don't think you can go too thin. Just roll that pan around until the cake is really thin. Let it cook until the top of the cake looks pretty matte, rather than shiney, and then carefully flip it and cook it up on the other side! Pretty easy! Here's what mine looked like.

 

THE SAUCE:

I got this "sauce" here, but adapted it a little bit. Please note that Austin picked up regular blueberry cream cheese at the store, and it ended up working out pretty well. However, I'm going to post the actual recipe, and if you wanna try it with blueberry cream cheese, you go right on ahead, homie.

• 1 cup marshmallow cream <---this stuff is ridiculously sticky.
• 1 cup cream cheese (try to get it to at least room temp if you can.)
• 2 TB frozen orange juice concentrate
• 1/4 cup milk (or more, if you want the sauce less thick)

Put the marshmallow cream in a bowl first and pop it in the microwave for about 20 seconds to melt it up some. Then, add the cream cheese and juice concentrate. Mix that up rull gud. Add the milk slowly so you don't add too much, and feel free to add a little more milk if you want it to be a little more saucy, like me.

 

ASSEMBLY! 
Let it be known that you can seriously use whatever fruit you want, because between the crepes and the sauce, you could slice up a log of dog doo and everyone would still think they were eating unicorn star fairy sprinkle hearts. It's that yummy. While Austin and Jason were eating it they were like, "This would be good with kiwi!" "This would be awesome with grapes!" "Next time we have to use more bananas!" "I'm going to take this home and spread the sauce all over my body!" <--Jason

Here's what I used: 

• Blueberries (one small box, not sure if that's 1/2 lb or not)
• 3 bananas
• 1 lb strawberries
• Graham crackers <--Jason's requirement

Slice the strawberries and bananas up and set those aside with the blueberries. Now, lay some crepes down (to the sound of a little Barry White) in the bottom of a glass dish. Spoon half the "sauce" onto the crepes and spread that around a bit. Put about half the fruit mixture on top of that. Now, crush up at least one or two full graham crackers and sprinkle that all over the fruit. Add another layer of crepes, the rest of the sauce, the rest of the fruit, and some more graham cracker crumbles.

Now, you can either stick all this in the fridge for a half hour or so, OR, you can do what I did - when I made the crepes, I layed them all on a baking sheet and put that in the fridge while I sliced fruit and made the sauce. Then, when I assembled everything, it was already pretty chilled!

Enjoy, dudes!

Keep Calm and Stop Citing NaturalNews.com - Some Casual Tips for Evaluating Health Claims on the Internet

Literally only put this here so I'd have a better thumbnail image to choose from on Facebook.

If you know me, it's really unlikely that you'd call me crunchy. I take acetaminophen when I have a headache and I give it to my daughter when she has a terrible fever at night. I'm a vegetarian for health and environmental reasons, but if I thought I could get away with eating pasta and drinking soda every day for the rest of my life, I would. But I also swear that a few cloves of raw garlic taken throughout the day has killed every cold I've had since I learned the trick. (1)

Oh - what's the little number right there? Nothing. Just a citation back to an article that, based on the SEER (Source Educational Evaluation Rubric) method of evaluating resources, checks out.

Evaluating Sources
SEER is awesome. It changed everything for me. It's a rubric used to help you determine whether or not a resource you're reading is reputable or reliable (2). Basically, you're supposed to consider:

• Authority: Is the site well regarded, cited, and written by experts in the field?
• Educational Value: Does the site content help advance educational goals?
• Intent: Is the site a well-respected source of content intended to inform users?
• Originality: Is the site a source of original content and viewpoints?
• Quality: Is the site highly vetted with good coverage of the topical area? 

(SOURCE OF TEXT: Turnitin.com White Paper) 

After reading this blog post, you'll probably want to consider whether or not my blog checks out using the SEER method of evaluation. I'll tell you right now, it probably won't. Even with two years of library and information science graduate school under my belt, I wouldn't consider myself an expert. Educational value of my site? Yeah, no. Intent? I guess so. Originality? Probably not. Quality? Yeah, definitely not.

But I do care. A lot. Which means nothing in the academic world.

Still, I hope some of my friends will take what I have to say to heart.

IT'S ALL A CONSPIRACYYY
First, know that the debate is rampant. Take Dr. Joseph Mercola, for example. From my experience, people either love him or they hate him. Personally, I try to stay away from anything he's associated with given that hyperbolic language gives me hives and makes me feel like the marketing strategists are trying to use psychological warfare on me.

Thing is, lots of what he says makes sense on a surface level. Plants, raw food, antioxidants. That stuff is good for you. That stuff changes your body chemistry for the better. Duh. I don't need a medical degree to tell me that.

Then you think - well - if that's the case, why is the FDA riding his #$% so much? (3)

Oh, probably because the FDA and The Corporate Lobbyists are in cahoots, right? I mean, They Don't Want You to Know that garlic can cure colds because then you won't run out and spend your hard earned money on Nyquil and Alkaseltzer anymore, or whatever. So, better shut it down, Mercola, or you'll terk-er-jerbs.

This is mostly here for my husband's amusement.

Maybe. That kind of makes sense to any intelligent person, too. I don't need a PhD in Political Science or an MBA from Harvard to know that there is waaaay, way more going on inside these government agencies than any of us are aware of, and I don't have to be a complete and total cynic to know that a disgusting ton of it is probably pretty corrupt and definitely not for the benefit of the American people. That's just human nature, sadly, and I accept that.

So, just by being alert and aware, I can gather that:

• Fresh, organic plants are good for me and keep me healthy and help me heal
• The FDA isn't perfect, and to trust in anything wholeheartedly just because someone I don't even know tells me it's safe to goes against my intuition.

So why am I writing this?
I'm friends with a ton of different kinds of people. I'm friends with people who eat McDonald's three times a day, and people who homebirth. I'm friends with people who eat white bread and people who make their own multi-grain bread at home from grains they grow in their backyard.

On my newsfeed, I often see postings from my more "activist-y" friends linking back to articles about how sugar is the devil incarnate or that all the OB-GYNs in the country hate women or something.

One website that I see pop up often on my newsfeed is NaturalNews.com.
 
The first time I went there, it was because I had followed a link entitled Nine Foods You Should Never Eat Again.

I had to follow it.

Nine foods I should literally never, ever eat again?
I figured it would list things like tire rubber or laundry detergent, since I honestly couldn't think of any single food that someone should literally never eat again.

When I got to the microwaveable popcorn, I was totally bummed out. I love popcorn. I know the "buttery" ones are loaded with sodium and MSG, which isn't that great and well, really kind of heinous. But otherwise, I think it's totally yummy, and for a salty, crunchy snack food, it doesn't usually leave me feeling like a fat blob of crap afterward if I happen to eat an entire bag of it.

Then I read this sentence:

"Practically every component of microwaveable popcorn, from the genetically-modified (GM) corn kernels to the processed salt and preservative chemicals used to enhance its flavor, is unhealthy and disease-promoting." (Source.)

Disease-promoting.

Wait ...

... disease-promoting?

What the $%&* does that even mean?

I said it over and over again. Disease...promoting.

What kind of diseases? There's, like, literally an infinite number of diseases, I mean, I would assume that the list compounds every day, in some regard, with cell mutations and whatever. And this writer seems to think that my favorite bag of Orville Redenbacher Movie-Theatre Butter (represent, Valparaiso) is going to ... what? Promote ... diseases in my body?

Okay, maybe if I decided that I was going to quit eating all other foods ever and ONLY eat microwave popcorn for the rest of my life. Or if we created, like, a microwaveable popcorn concentrate, all the artificial flavors and everything, all mashed up, liquified, and then delivered intravenously so it was like eating 9000 bags of microwaveable popcorn a day. That'll uff anyone up pretty quick.

But, that phrase - "disease promoting" - was enough to convince me that I wasn't reading a very reputable source, but clearly it didn't (and doesn't) phase many people who are still reading the article and circulating it every which way and freaking out.

I'm Not Saying Ponzi Scheme, But...
I want to point something else out to you about this website, though, and others like it.

I've circled an ad there, in red.

These ads are a lot different than some Google AdSense ads, or ads linking to other websites.

These ads link to sites selling very specific products and supplements. (You can learn more about why this matters here - note that this links back to someone's blog. This person has clearly done some research, and the findings are pretty common sense and easily verified, but generally speaking blogs wouldn't normally be a source I'd consider reputable. That aside, I do take this guy and his easily verifiable facts at his word, as much as I can. You can't really make much of that stuff up.)

Anyone with their eyes open can see that there's a not-so-innocent, kind of weird connection between the hyperbolic (DISEASE-PROMOTING) language and the cheap (CURE DISEASES) ads.

Then there are the citations to that article ...

... or, rather the lack of one.

Citations, Citations, CITATIONS! Something Better Than Reader's Digest, Too, Please.
Citations matter. Next time you read an article, scroll down and see what sources the writer drew from to come to the conclusions that inspired the information that he or she wrote about. Once you look at those, look at their citations, and their citations, and so on.

This article does have one citation. To Reader's Digest. The article on Reader's Digest, however, was lacking in citations. And Reader's Digest in and of itself isn't a terrible source - but when you're advising people in the matters of health, medicine, and nutrition ... are you really going to cite ... Reader's Digest?

Are you really going to say, "I'm an expert in my field. Check out this article I wrote based on another article I found in Reader's Digest."

Here's one I saw a few times today. The article was called A Work About Sweeteners, and again, we're looking at some fairly serious claims: "A diet high in fructose has been linked to obesity and metabolic syndrome."

Everyone Calm Down - Was it Linked To? Or Proven?
"Has been linked to" is a phrase that I've been trained to be wary of.

In this case, the conclusion that I believe we're supposed to arrive at upon reading that sentence is that "it's been found that some overweight people with metabolic syndrome also happen to have diets high in fructose, therefore we believe that fructose is a probable cause of their condition, therefore it would be wise to avoid fructose."

The problem with that phrase - "has been linked to" - and furthermore, the problem with taking that phrase and letting it freak you out, is the fact that that phrase incites the well-know fallacy (and I want this to stick with you, friends):

Correlation does not (always) equal causation. (This is actually a pretty flawed cliche, but it's important to note that we can still draw at least some logic from the idea. Bad for hard science, not-so-bad when you're just trying to get a grip on an idea like we might be trying to do right now.)

Just because a possible link has been identified, doesn't mean it's time to freak out yet. More importantly, if you're going to use the "has been linked to" argument when making what I'm assuming you'd want others to believe are verified health claims, then at the very least you could have some consideration for your readers by noting that there is a difference between a linkage and a hard, proven, medical fact. 

Be Wary of Content Farms
Let's continue and look at the citations on this article too. Some of them happen to be links in the text, like the one on the sugar alcohol erythritol. The author says, "Hey, I know this fact is true because it says so here in this article on Livestrong.com." 

Really?

Because Livestrong.com is content farm. It's associated with Demand Media, the same amazing people who brought us such research gems as eHow.com and answers.com, those websites burgeoning freelance writers get paid $15 an article to write for while they build up their writing portfolio. (Name in the byline look familiar?)

Maybe I'm not giving this article on Livestrong enough credit. Let's check the citations.

Just Because it's on PubMed Doesn't Mean it Matters
Oh, nice. This one goes back to PubMed. PubMed is a pretty great medical research database. Let's take a look at the article that was cited on PubMed.   

So, we should definitely freak out and avoid erythritol because, according to the literature, we have ONE SINGLE recorded case of a woman getting a nasty rash after drinking a beverage that contained erythritol.

One.

The article also cites our friend, NaturalNews.com, as well as a website called the Global Healing Center. 

Nice little ad on the Global Healing Center's website.

Check the Date, Dude
What about this article, the one on Global Healing Network that the author of the sugar article is citing? What is that article citing? (Because again, remember, it matters.)

Copyright ... 1975 ...

Really?

The information in this article is nearly forty years old.

Really?!

One basic reference course was all it took to teach me that, when citing sources, in most cases it's important that these sources are current.  

According to this great article on Caregiver.org:

Sites should be reviewed and updated on a regular basis. It is particularly important that medical information be current, and that the most recent update or review date be posted. Even if the information has not changed, it is helpful to know that the site owners have reviewed it recently to ensure that the information is still valid.

 Now, sure, we may be dealing with information about sugar that was discovered in the seventies and hasn't changed. According to the citation, the information was even re-released in 1993, which means that just twenty years ago, the information was still good enough to be published by someone at least decently important (Warner Books.)

But the bottom line is that, if I'm going to make a medical or health claim, I'd want to do it right, and make sure that I could prove that the information I was drawing my research from was high quality and highly verifiable.


Some Things Just Make Sense, Though
I want it to be known that I am in no way criticizing anyone for their beliefs or for making the health choices that they make. I'm not even directly critiquing the information in these articles or trying to make anyone feel stupid for buying into certain claims they make.

I also want to make it known that I'm not naive enough to believe that it's all either black or white. I believe in a lot of naturopathic/homeopathic stuff. It makes sense to me. But there's also a lot of stuff in modern medicine that makes sense to me.

The people who are writing articles and publishing books claiming that homeopathy is 100% the way to go have as much to gain from the market as does the FDA and those Evil Corporate Lobbyists. No one is innocent here.

What I am trying to say, however, is that we have to be careful and we have to be aware. 

Furthermore, we have to calm down, at least a little bit.

This one documentary I really liked - How to Live Forever - showcases the lives of some really, really old people who drink and smoke and who otherwise put to shame the hyperbolic health claims of people like Dr. Mercola. What I noticed they all have in common, though?

They're just ... happy.

Okay, some are a little cantankerous.

But for the most part, they're just people who have made common sense choices with the foods they eat and the activities they partake in.

Look -

I think we can all agree that the food industry is crap. So here's what you do:

• Buy local produce from farmers whenever humanly possible, or grow your own. Without reading a ton of scary articles with poor citations, any idiot can plainly see that these are good, pure foods that nourish your body without introducing a bunch of spliced, franken-genes or pesticide-y chemicals into your blood stream. It also helps farmers maintain a living, which is nice, and keeps the need to transport plants that grow in the dirt, like what's in your yard (think about it, it's just stupid) all over creation, which is even nicer. (Buying local-organic or growing your own food is just a nice, considerate thing to do, anyway, period.)

• Look at the back of the dad-gum box. Just look at it. Yeah, I know it says "all-natural" on the front, but look at the back. Yeah, I know you can't pronounce half of what's in it. So put it down. You wouldn't go to the pharmacy and start drinking a bottle of shampoo, right? So don't eat that. Try making your own, so you know exactly what's in it. Oh, wait, you really want some Oreos right now? Well, screw it. Eat some Oreos. Ain't gonna kill you. Just wait a few weeks or so before you eat Oreos or chips or drink a soda again, ya fatty. It's that simple. 

That's common sense health, to me. 

So, next time, before you share that article about saccharine giving lab mice cancer (so we should all stay away from it or risk certain death):

• Use the SEER evaluation method. 
• Scroll down, check those citations. 
• Then check those citation's citations. 
• Make sure the information isn't coming from a content farm. 
• Make sure the information is current. 
• Consider whether or not someone might be benefiting from these claims financially, at the very least on a grandiose scale. 
• Make sure the information is coming from a .edu, .gov, or .org domain name (I know for a fact you can only obtain the former two suffixes with proper credentials.)
• Understand that none of it will be perfect because everyone has something to gain from everything
• Calm down, eat one Pop-Tart, but don't make it a part of your daily routine or encourage your kids to eat it as part of a "balanced breakfast," and don't tell your kids that Pop-Tarts cause cancer or kidney failure or something stupid, because based on the research, no one knows that for sure. However, given that Pop-Tarts are full of chemicals and eating chemicals is generally considered not-good-for-you, you should probably only have the one and not have another one for a pretty long time. Then, go eat a plant, preferably something organic, because that makes sense and is smart.

And use your head!

P.S. I wasn't trying to come off professionally, so if any formatting on the citations is weird or anything like that, just know that my only goal here was to present an opinion in conjunction with some reputable Internet resources (and my forthcoming Master's in Library and Information Science.) And to enlighten people I care about.

-------------------------

1. Lissiman, E., A. Bhasale, and M. Cohen. "Garlic for the Common Cold." Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (2009): n. pag. Print.

2. Turnitin.com White Paper: Evaluating Sources (link to .pdf)

3. Walker, Susan J. "Warning Letter." Letter to Joseph Mercola. 16 Feb. 2005. MS.

If I Don't, I'm Not Me

I seriously still can't believe that a university is going to pay me to get a master's degree in creative writing while teaching their students stuff. Whenever I think about it, I'm still kind of in shock -- mainly because I had resigned myself, many years ago, to the idea that art was just a hobby, and you were a fool to actively pursue it as a career. And then I ended up miserable doing everything else, while simultaneously being terrified of creating art at all, partially because I loved it so much and even trying it would be like going on a date with an exboyfriend that I never got over, and partially because I always had a sneaking suspicion that I sucked, so why?

Then, after three horrible, miserable years trying out teaching and banking and counseling, I had run out of "do what you love" options. So I applied to a program doing something that was just as horrifying to me as it was exciting and fulfilling and ...

... they actually wanted me. They read my statement, they looked at my writing, and they said, "This girl should teach classes and study with us." ...

Really?

I know it's "just Ball State" (to some), but I'm still just like ... wow ... I mean, now I literally CAN'T go back to full-time 9-5 work because of this.

Oh, why can't you work a full-time 9-5, again?

Because I'm in a graduate program for creative writing and I teach freshmen/remedial writing courses (I'm assuming). And they pay me. I make money doing something I love and know and long to do and hate to do sometimes but I have to do it because if I don't do it, I'm not me and I don't know me.

That's so amazing.

I guess I should clarify that "full-time 9-5" just means "one of those jobs where you work for an hour and push paper for the other eight." Or any job that you hate.

And I guess I should clarify that I've technically been working more than 40 hours a week out of my house anyway so it's not like I have an aversion to work.

And I guess I should clarify that I need to go to bed.

Just happy.

It's about time.

There's nothing inherently wrong with consumerism - but planned obsolescence is gross. Austin and I often talk about how easy it is for companies to create products that can stand the test of time - the way they used to - except they won't. My number one issue with American capitalism isn't the nature of capitalism itself, since I genuinely believe that American capitalism really can be the stuff dreams are made of. My issue lies in the way that corporations and manufacturers seem to take great pride in the fact that, if they can just make us their [expletive deleted], they can make more money. Manufacture a product that is not MEANT to stand the test of time, and we'll run out and buy more of it to replace what we just purchased that has gone out of style, been updated, or just plain broke for no reason (and there are no parts available to purchase and fix it.) There's no reason for it. I enjoy Apple products, and again - there's nothing inherently wrong with using them. I think I just wish people would hang on to what they have for a few years before upgrading. No one needs every single version of the iPhone. What we need is to take some of that money that we're spending on every new version of the product and invest it back into our communities. I think if we could learn to quit over-consuming, we could easily find a way for everyone to "have their cake and eat it too" - not only can you have that iPad, but perhaps instead of spending $600 on the newest version when the old version works just fine, we could all pitch in that $600 to update the technology in a school in an economically disadvantaged neighborhood.

Just a thought.

"According to Brazil’s Jornal do Comerciao, IBDI believes that Apple could have implemented the technological updates of the iPad 4 into the iPad 3. By not doing so, they believe that Apple took part in unfair business practices. Were Apple to lose in court, iPad 3 users in Brazil could receive some compensation.

'Consumers thought [they were] buying high-end equipment not knowing [it] was already an obsolete version,' says IBDI attorney Sergio Palomares."

http://mashable.com/2013/02/21/apple-sued-ipad-3-brazil/

A Kind of Love

I go to a lot of weddings. I photograph them, so, I kind of have to.

I photograph weddings, and I photograph engaged couples before I photograph their wedding much later. And when you photograph engaged couples and newlyweds, obviously, the look you're going for is love.

Whatever that means.

I mean, when you're there, in the midst of the job, you know what love means. Love is pretty. Love is adorable. Sometimes, love makes you cry, to see two people who enjoy each others' company so much they're willing to sacrifice life and limb in order to bind themselves to this other person legally and spiritually and, let's face it, domestically until they're dead.

Seriously, that's it. Game's over. I found you, and now I'm done. 

Love is a sinking feeling. Love is having a partner, an invested partner, someone who has made a commitment to obligate themselves to you, to take time out of their busy schedule to comfort you and encourage you. And why?

I don't know. Because you like the same things. You're attracted to each other. You make each other laugh.

Love is being willing to cross town, states, countries ... just to spend a few hours with that person who, for whatever reason, probably one you can just barely articulate, you want to spend time with.

See? Isn't it sweet? It's cute. I know.

I see this engagement video, and I love it. It's charming. I watched it all the way through and pondered it, compared what I saw there to what I see in my own marriage.

I thought about the couple being portrayed here - and I know they're real people, I know there are probably dozens of layers to their relationship and I'm sure they aren't all unicorns and glitter-hearts. But that's not the point of the video.  The point is portray this idea of love. Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy.

Can you imagine that idea of love in five years? Ten years? Fifty?

I see her in white apron with tiny red hearts on it, pulling a roast out of the oven right when he walks in the door, simultaneously loosening his tie while ...

... no, actually. I can't.

I can't picture that idea of love in ten or fifty years ... just like I can't picture a cute girl like that getting fat after giving birth to three kids, or a sweet, forehead-kissing dude like that feeling like he just needs at least three days alone somewhere playing Max Payne without interruption for once can't he just have that?

I see videos like that ... and I go to all these weddings and I take all these pictures ...

... and I come home and I think ... my marriage looks nothing like that.

I mean, it's not dull and uneventful or sad. We don't fight. We don't really even have any problems. He's my best friend, and I know I'm his.

But we aren't sitting on the couch nuzzling each other or playing Scrabble by the fire (that actually sounds kind of fun) or sipping wine at a picnic and giggling. And half the time, we're thinking of stuff we could do with other people rather than stuff we could do with each other. And I don't always cook for him and he doesn't bring me flowers every week and really ... we aren't much to photograph.

Two years and one child later ... it's really nothing like I anticipated it would be.

At the risk of sounding sappy ... it's probably better.

Which is why it was the couple slow dancing that had been married over 60 years tonight that got me all misty-eyed tonight, not the newlyweds.

As usual, I feel like my writing has just taken a nosedive off a cliff into a sea of no real point.

Let me know if you figured out the point I started out trying to make.

Elliot. Or, My Husband the Sociopath

This is a trailer for a film my husband made with a friend of ours in 2010.
Still digging it.