Bitter to Sweet

Big A lovingly linked me to that lovely Washington Post article about the horrific child labor in the chocolate industry globally, and killed my lifelong devotion to drugstore chocolate. The Cadbury's, Hershey's, Mars I grew up eating, the chocolate in my office, at home, everywhere I spent more than an hour...

It was easy to swear off those products of pain and child slavery. But none of the Fairtrade chocolate bars I began buying were to my taste. I mean I still like sweet and fat in my chocolate. I began melting down all the too-bitter bars and adding coconut oil and sugar.





But it still tasted pretty nope.

Then out of a grocery store that's not our regular place, some sweet news: The Green and Black and Divine MILK chocolates work!








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I think I've found my song for the rest of the summer...

Ben Gibbard (Death Cab for Cutie) sings the hook on Chance's "Do You Remember."

"Do you remember how when you were younger
the summers all lasted forever?
Days disappeared into months, into years
Hold that feeling forever."

Happy August, all of us!



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Nuclei

My heart pulses like a womb
mind races like a detective
mouth is full of seeds
and leftovers

A cardinal in a tree like a flag
I'm in tears nearby fleeing
the hardscrabble of lies
and kisses

What if the compass is my face
slowing the world with sighs
say flowers are our saints
fierce, fearsome.


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Nu was cleaning out At's car (it cost him 5$$$), and I was keeping her company, walking the driveway with music and marveling at how green everything looks. At then went to see Chapo Trap House up in Traverse City with his friends.










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Them Dems

At a debate watch party today, they seated us on the dais because they'd run out of space.  Peek Big A and Nu at the back of the picture!

I joked to Big A that it reminded me of High Table practice...  When I was at Oxford, I attended Wolfson, which prides itself on its egalitarian hall and an absence of hierarchical seating, but back when I was at Exeter, high table was indeed a thing.

Anyway, Nu paid careful attention to everything, since L has generously said she will vote for whomever Nu suggests. This is the lovely L's way of offering a voice to Nu's generation who will--after all--be the ones dealing with the climate change policies of the next administration.

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Greece Love

Picked up Madeline Miller's Song of Achilles at Sam and Eddie's last week and it's giving me pleasurable nostalgia about my trip to Greece earlier this year. Especially that first day in Athens climbing the Acropolis all windblown, stumbling upon the completely deserted woods to the north of the temple, feeling I had slipped back through millennia, and then a late and leisurely lunch at the museum within view of the Parthenon and still swooning.

I'm so glad for that trip--I'm reading now without that pang that previously accompanied any mention of Greece.

(And yes, the Miller really does remind me of those Mary Renaults I used to devour and mid-century Mary Stewart must bear responsibility for my Greece love too.)



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I Did This! (2)

The groomers couldn't get them in until late August (how is it almost August, anyway?!), so Nu and I headed to Target for some clippers and... Now the puppy babies look less like lion-bearcubs. 

My first time using clippers (if you forget that time 19 years ago when I tried to cut At's hair; please do forget that time!).

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On a Road Trip for Two

Big A and At are both working tonight, and Nu and I didn't see the point of rushing home. 

So we took a few detours: First the Dayton Art Institute (DAI) with its impressive collection of contemporary work with Grandma S and Grandpa J, and then a stop at the Neil Armstrong Museum (NAM), to appreciate that giant leap for humankind. 

Nu loved the DAI, of course and my phone is full of pictures of artwork she means to revisit; but I suspect she was a bit underwhelmed with the NAM. I am such a sucker for soaring music and emotional biographical details, but I'll admit it was a bit dated despite its inclusion of the "Hidden Figures" mathematicians in the timeline. At one point, I was going to dig out my Aldi quarter so we could feed the machine that would tell us our weight on earth, the moon, and Saturn--when Nu stopped me--"Mama, it's ok, I'm sure we can google it" quoth she, and truer words were never spoken.

But look what a good sport my love is!

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