. Spinning .

Which in my life, includes trying to coax the oriole away from the hummingbird feeder by giving him a half of an orange all his very own.

I’ve been talking to him through the open kitchen window and so he doesn’t fly away each time I happen to be at the sink anymore. Maybe I can even get a picture of him. I’ve placed the orange in a cup right beside the hummingbird feeder in the windowbox (no flowers planted yet) to sort of move him away gradually since the hummingbirds aren’t real happy about sharing with each other much less this large orange and black thing that’s five times their size.

Oops, gotta go–the cardinal is chirping at me from an empty seed feeder.

Got a chuckle from Charles Deemer’s post a minute ago; it’s all in the timing:

I come from a world that takes insult at a label inside an oven door that warns you of danger if you or your child stand on the oven door because the oven is liable to tip.

I come from a world where people were taught intelligent reasoning and experience and wouldn’t think of standing on oven doors, or eating lead paint, and having parents who watched over them as best as they could to insure that safety.

I come from a world alien to that in which I am living, where mediocre is special, and it is politically correct to ignore truly special for fear of upsetting everyone else.

I retreat.

Sitting in the doctor’s office yesterday, caught a Calvin Klein ad in Rolling Stone that sort of set my mind ill at ease:

To each his own, and sex is great and all that, but a young woman with three guys is not what I would call a good model to represent to the public as a normal standard. There are more ads at the Calvin Klein site here.

Where do we draw lines? This ad is in a magazine that is available in a doctor’s office. Is this what we want kids to see? In any fine arts museum there are more explicit scenarios to be sure, so it is difficult to decide what is art and what is ‘normal’ and what is porn, etc. Advertising somehow doesn’t seem like the proper medium to be pushing the envelope however. If the government has decided that tobacco is harmful and so doesn’t allow advertising any more, there must be standards set of some sort as to what might be considered a more private decision as to sexual play.

Other questions are raised; if the above is okay, then why are multiple partner marriages considered bigamy and illegal? I can see that one being challenged immediately after the male/female marriage base has been challenged and changed. And how about age? Why isn’t a girl or boy ready to wed at twelve? And more worms in the can: How can you claim that anorexic models and an impossible sense of beauty standards are damaging to self-esteem and unrealistic, and then allow advertising with a multi-partnered sex arrangement as not having an influence on human expectations of what’s real and okay?

I would agree that the image is beautiful, but is it tasteful? Not as an ad for jeans. Maybe for experimental sex.

Haven’t been quite able to produce anything complicated in a couple weeks, but today I’m making stuffed shells. In my semi-conscious state last week I thought I bought a large container of yogurt, but when I looked in the fridge I found a Ricotta Cheese container and figured I’d make lasagne or shells next time I went to the store. Before that trip, I did find the Yogurt, checked the Ricotta container to find it full of homemade soup, and realized that I didn’t need to buy pasta.

But of course, I forgot that when I went to the store and did indeed buy some ground beef (Jim doesn’t like the cheese as much) and a box of shells to stuff. Then I found out I didn’t have any Ricotta. So then I got creative.

With cream cheese, mozarella, parmesan, a couple dollaps of sour cream, egg, garlic, and herbs, I made a cheese filling.

For the meat, I usually add in spinach but because I didn’t have any, I added in a leftover jar of roasted pepper/artichoke bruschetta, garlic, mushrooms, parmesan, mozzarella, and spices.

I love cleaning out the refrigerator and using these leftover items. Sometimes it comes out the best ever; never ever to be replicated again.