How to Get Rid of Fruit Flies: the vinegar cup

I'm all for the humane treatment of all animals, including insects, but they have their space and I have mine. I'll catch and release when possible, but catching fruit flies? Just imagining someone trying to catch fruit flies is hilarious.

Of course, part of eliminating fruit flies is eliminating what is attracting them. But after you do that, what to do about all of those pesky remaining flies?

There is a method that works very well: the vinegar cup. It makes perfect sense because fruit flies love ripe or rotting fruit, which ultimately ferments into vinegar! (Fun fact: the word vinegar comes from the French "vin aigre," literally sour wine.)

In a small glass or even shot glass, fill it at least 1/2" deep with vinegar. I have used white vinegar, red wine vinegar, and a raspberry vinegar. Cover the top with plastic wrap and secure it with a rubber band. Poke several holes in the plastic wrap slightly larger than a pin hole but far smaller than a pencil hole. The idea is that the flies go in and don't come out.

Place the glass in a place where the flies are congregating. Within several hours or a day, multitudes of flies will be resting in peace.

The last frontier of green, your pants

For all of the biking, composting, and farmer's market shopping that I do, I have to admit that one green area about which I constantly feel bad is my wardrobe. Do I buy non-organic jeans that fit fantastically? Absolutely. But, each purchase, do I think about how cotton uses more pesticide than any other single agricultural product? Without fail.

The problem has not been my awareness, it is about the lack of choices that are offered. I am a small person, and eco-friendly clothes fit me even worse than they fit a regular-sized person. Not only are they not tailored for women, for me they are also too wide and too long on my arms and legs.

While, of course, wearing clothes until they are worn out, or wearing second-hand or vintage clothes is the best choice (as the Uniform Project proves, re-wear can be exceptionally cute), there is a clear case for improving the choices offered in the regular retail market.

So, I am elated to see an article in Audubon Magazine online by Gretel Schueller addressing how ecologically sustainable fabrics are finally hitting the mainstream.

Here are some of my favorite pieces from the sustainable designers mentioned:

Nau John Patrick
Loomstate Loyale

Gender, Clothes, and Public High School

Very little gets me quite as angry as gendered dress codes in public high school. When we received a flier mandating gendered dress code for graduation in my high school back in the late 90s, I (not surprisingly) protested. After an inquiry to the office about wearing a pant suit (very feminine, btw), I was threatened that I would not graduate by the high school assistant principal, Mr. Jeff Schnur of Butler Area School District, a small man both in size and intellect.

Thankfully, according to an article yesterday in the Times, times they are a-changin'. The more students with gender identities outside of hetero norms come out earlier and earlier, the more that such dress codes will be challenged.

The Times article sheds some light on the issue, but it fails to challenge some of the logical fallacies raised in the article that are frequently made by school administrators.

Fallacy 1: School "is a rigorous academic and social training ground for the world of adults and employment," and therefore students should not be distracted by other students' clothes.

Workplaces, true, are not places to wear bikinis (usually), but as the workplace becomes increasingly tolerant of out LGBT folks, these types of issues are precisely what people in today's world encounter in the "real" world.

Fallacy 2: Preventing kids from dressing in gender-challenging ways makes them safe.

The fewer kids that dress in gender-challenging ways, the more the ones who do become the outlier of the group. In fact, the more kids you permit to dress in gender-challenging ways, the safer the students will become. Safety in numbers.

Fallacy 3: Preventing hetero kids from dressing in gender-challenging ways prevents clothes from becoming a spectacle.

This makes me think it is 1968, "long hair means you're gay!" Hilarious. I thought those folks would have retired by now!

Gender identities and sexual identities are often in flux in high school, which makes it just the time when kids should not be asked to make a leap between one identity and another. Additionally, when gender-challenging dress is normative, particularly among hetero-identifying kids, it makes it a safer space for everyone.

How to Lose Weight: A little hunger never hurt anyone

Image from Smartcar of America

In Wednesday's Times, the consistently excellent Well column covers a recent study in The British Journal of Sports Medicine that covers that modern American conundrum: Why am I working out and not losing weight? The study is interesting, but it fails to adequately hit home what people need to hear.

To lose weight, you have to have a calorie deficit compared to your current weight. When you are working at a calorie deficit (by exercise or reduced food calories), you are going to be slightly hungry until that time that your body adjusts to the deficit.

Nobody wants to face the music that you have to be slightly hungry for a short time to lose any significant weight. Think about everyone benefiting from not telling you this simple truth-- all of the diet companies, the health care industry, agro-business, just to name a few.

I always think about it as putting less gas in a Hummer. If you want to look like a Smart car, you have to eat like a Smart car. If you want to look like a Hummer, eat like a Hummer. Eating less, primarily by reducing calories (gasoline) is like trying to work a Hummer on a Smart car diet-- your Hummer is going to be hungry. But this doesn't last for long because your body gets used to the reduced amount and starts shrinking to fit what you are feeding it.

It is always best to speak to a nutritionist or doctor to figure out what's right for you. It is neither safe nor sustainable to reduce your calories below 1200 per day. Simply reducing your calories to 2000 per day if you are a large person, or 1500 per day if you are a small person, you'll see the pounds fly off. The most effective way to maintain this, I have found, is keeping a journal of everything you put in your mouth and how many calories it contains. Also in the journal, you should track your weight on a daily basis, the first thing in the morning when you are lightest.

Bottom line: slight hunger = weight loss

Meat as love, memory, and finally, history

Your earliest memory at your grandparents' house. The family barbecue on the patio. Sunday morning breakfast. People laughing, enjoying one another's company, your grandparents alive, your parents still married, and no one was fighting. It was lovely.

What did it smell like?

What did it taste like?

There is a good chance that the main food ingredient of this rosy picture in your mind's eye is meat.

How much is our enjoyment of meat as adults is tied to these childhood memories? Our first (and sometimes our last) images of the family together, our family alive even, was often simultaneous with a bite of roasted pork, medium rare cheeseburger, or crispy bacon. Certainly mine are. Just like the smell of your grandmother's house is so closely tied to a feeling of calm comfort, so too are the flavors. Is this part of the reason why it is so hard to shed this thing, this blight on our planet and our bodies? And if meat-eating is so tied to our roots and the histories of those roots, can we change that or forego it without sacrificing what is closest to us?

Jonathan Safran Foer's essay on his becoming fully vegetarian when he had children highlights this overlooked and critical angle and discusses how he is trying to free his children from this added weight of love, memory, and history that may influence them to eat meat.

Things looking up for Syracuse (aside from sports)

Syracuse, despite its snowy Orange charm, site of the Iroquois Confederacy, and proximity to some great central New York beauty, is sadly known mostly as a dirty post-Industrial city where you wouldn't want to go, unless that is you are in college there.

The city, however, may have an opportunity to remake itself with two burgeoning industries. Both health care analysis and electric car production may be making their way into the city in the next several years, according to the news in the last couple of weeks.

Go Orange!

Black Fly Composting

So, apparently black fly maggot composting is being investigated, because black fly maggots eat meat, and redworms don't.

If you really think meat eaters are going to have black fly larvae (maggots) in their house or yard for the environment, you are kidding yourself. (Um, they would have given up meat first, duh!) I'm sure food waste is on the top of their priority list. Ha!

Not to mention that it is unethical to raise thousands of species of animals to die, so that they eat the remains of the animals that you killed for food.

How to Carve a Pumpkin into a Jack o' Lantern

Carving a pumpkin is easy and fun!

- Buy a pumpkin large enough to hold your design
- Prepare your workspace by sitting in the yard or covering the area with a garbage bag
- Choose a sharp serrated paring knife
- Find a bowl for the seeds and goo
- A large soup spoon may also be helpful.

Design
- Draw onto computer paper the design that you want to cut
- Hold it up to the pumpkin to make sure it fits
- Tape your design to the front of the pumpkin
- Using a thumb-tack, poke the design into your pumpkin, making a kind of connect-the dots
- Remove your paper design

Lid
- I prefer to cut a lid (some claim cutting a bottom hole is better)
- Cut a hole around the stem at least large enough to fit a clenched fist through easily. Cut the hole at an angle, with your knife top leaning toward the outside of the pumpkin, so that the lid doesn't fall in.

Seeds and goo
- Remove all of the seeds and goo, first with your hand, and then with a large spoon, scraping the sides. Put all of the stuff into a bowl. This is the longest step.

Pattern
- Carve your pattern that you made with thumb tacks. Keep in mind that the angle in which you cut the pattern will determine the amount of light that passes through.
- For lighting, tea lights in a glass container work great. Also, you could use a Hanukkah candle if you dig a little hole in the bottom of the pumpkin

Annoyed with Facebook-slash-my past

1. Facebook went way downhill when it stopped being affiliated with colleges. All of the losers that I hated in Pennsylvania are on it now, friending me and putting up retarded misspelled status messages. Facebook, go back to being for colleges! Let elitism reign! I don't really mean that, but I really mean that.
   
2. This one isn't about Facebook but my dog just barfed on my comforter. I would describe the color and texture, but I will spare you, dear reader.
3. OK, what is up with all of these dullards that I grew up with fantasizing about traveling to South America and never following through? Apparently, for the mildly retarded Western Pennsylvanian, South America is Mecca, but it is just too complicated to get one of those passport thingys. It is seriously a phenomenon, though, in the pre-marital population that goes to Niagara Falls for their honeymoon. What a freaking bore! Shit or get off the pot!
   
4. If one more loser-turned-roid fiend that I dated in HS friends me I will hang my head in shame! Warning signs: topless profile pic. Ugh.
5. Why am I even letting this get to me? I need to just sign out now.
6. I need to stop using friend as verb. It's just wrong.
   

Let's have a bake fail!

So I got all cocky and decided that I could replicate, with a Mexican twist, the unbelievable chocolate cloud cookies at Red Horse Cafe in Park Slope. Because one time, I asked the dude behind the counter, "These are basically like brownies but made like cookies?" So one assumption leads to the next, and following all of my stupid assumptions, like a little lemming there I went.

So I added all of my brilliant Mexican chocolate spices (cinnamon, and a little nutmeg, allspice, and fresh ginger), to a box mix that I had in the cupboard with the requisite eggs and butter, 350, 10 minutes. . .















As you can tell, I broke apart the Mexican chocolate pancakes before taking the picture. Not that they didn't taste good. I had to do everything in my power from gobbling down the rest of them. Perhaps I can make them into something else, like a layered ice cream cake. . .

And next time I will try something like this. . .

Otoño Mexicano: Squash Blossom Soup

I made this recipe once before in September 2005 after a gastronomically inspirational trip to Mexico. Variations of Crema de Flores de Calabaza abound in Mexico, and it can be made with the flower of any pumpkin or squash. It uses the male part of the squash, the flower without the baby, which you can find at farmer's markets around this time of year and which are incredibly perishable. So if you want to make this recipe the day you see them at the market (or maybe the next day), you are in luck! It is a very hearty and filling vegetarian soup and could be served with a side of some crispy tortillas or beans and rice.

1 Tbs. butter
1 medium-large onion, chopped
3 cups veggie broth
1 small creamer potato, peeled and chopped
20-25 squash blossoms
2 poblano peppers
1 cup milk
1 zucchini, chopped into corn-sized pieces (larger for chunkier soup)
1-3 ears of corn, kernels cut from cob (more for chunkier soup)
1/2 cup light sour cream
Salt

In a soup pot, melt the butter and cook the onion until golden. Remove half of the onion and set aside (for a thicker soup, remove less onion; for a chunkier soup, remove more onion). Add the broth and potato, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, clean the manflowers. This is the fun botany part. (If your initials are SP, you can have AM do this part.) Do you like my drawing?

















Break off the stems, the yellow polleny pistil in the center of the flower, and the sepals, but do not break off the base. It's yummy. Then, you may want to rinse them out, sometimes some little harmless critters are hiding within. Then cut them crosswise into about 1/2 inch to 1 inch slices (each flower into about 4 parts).

Add about 1/3 of the squash blossom parts to the broth. (I chose the parts which were light greenish, because I like the orange swirls later on.) Simmer about 3 minutes, then (carefully) blend the hot broth in a blender. Put it back in the pot.

Next, roast the skins of the poblanos. If you have a gas stovetop, you can simply put them on the flame and watch and listen to them crackle. This is the skin blistering. It is fun to listen to, but you may also get charred skin flying around. You'll need to occassionally turn them with tongs so that all sides get blistered. After both poblanos are blistered, wrap them in a kitchen towel for about 5 minutes. Then, with rubber gloves on, peel off the charred skin, clean out all of the seeds (rinsing under water helps), and chop them into 1/4 to 1/2 inch pieces.

Next, add the poblanos, reserved onion, and milk to the soup, bring it to a simmer and cook it for 10 minutes. Add the zucchini and corn, simmer for about 3 minutes. Add the remaining squash blossoms and simmer about 3 minutes longer. Finally, remove from heat, stir in the sour cream, and season with salt.

Serves 4 as a main course.

Enjoy!

Bunch of hits from the Face

Someone in Ithaca put a link this morning to my Seneca Lake activities on their Facebook page (and Twitter), and I already have about 10 hits from the FB link, including somebody in Santiago, Chile and somebody on a MOMA computer.

Of course, I have no idea who this person is. Just fascinating.

Update: It was the Facebook page of Danos on Seneca!

Cheers & Jeers: Brooklyn transportation news

Cheers

Prospect Park West two-way bike lane is still in the works!

Right now, due to traffic flowing south on PPW and flowing south on the approximately parallel Park Circle road, it is both incredibly dangerous to ride north on either of these roads and a pain in the rear. A lot of cyclists opt to ride north on the sidewalk, which cyclists hate doing and know is incredibly annoying to pedestrians. The only technically proper ways to get north from Bartel-Prichard to Grand Army are to ride the entire way around the park loop or to go down to 8th Avenue.

A buffer parking lane is a more progressive forward-looking and safer way to put in a bike lane, used in a lot of other world cities.

Yay DOT!

Jeers

How did I miss that the Atlantic-Pacific Subway stop is being renamed the Barclays stop for $200,000 per year for the next 20 years? That's right, the British bank Barclays, which also bought naming rights for the controversial Nets stadium, is going to also be the name of a transportation hub in Brooklyn.

I don't care that the bank is British. It is just that it is a bank, buying the name of a national historical landmark, because the MTA can't manage money.

And in 20 years, it will be named for some other entity? Yuck.

Boo MTA.

The American beef industry is a health hazard

If you eat ground beef, or have anyone who you love that does, you have to read this article by Michael Moss for the Times. It is horrifying, but it also provides some pointers on how to make your ground beef experience more safe.

I am not advocating eating ground beef, or any beef for that matter! But for all of you clogged-artery-carcass-eating-greenhouse-gas-creators that I love, here are a few pointers:

1. You can't trust the label on ground beef. It doesn't tell you where the meat comes from, like in every other industrialized country. Don't trust it! It is probably from several countries, all mixed together. When it gets all mixed together like that, food inspectors, and even the companies themselves, can't pinpoint where contaminants originated.
2. Don't buy the beef already ground. Buy it whole and ask the butcher to grind it. It will cost you cents more per pound, and you will be getting beef with far less chance of contaminants, and you will know, at least, that it only came from one cow.
   
3. You have to cook it to 160. If you already bought it ground, you kind of have to assume that the contaminants are already in there. In that case, you have to cook it to 160. Medium, no pink, no juices. And who likes it that way anyway? Revert to #2.
4. Deep clean any surface touched by the raw meat. You have to assume that all surfaces it touches are contaminated. Testers soap washed and dried cutting boards, and found both the cutting surface and the towel used to dry it contaminated. I know it isn't good for the environment, but the article recommends bleach, and I know of no other alternative.

And need I say, when I write "contaminants" I mean deadly poop?

News from that "special" relative, the MTA

Really, the MTA is going to install countdown clocks before the end of next year? It can't be true!

Oh wait, only on the Number 1, 4, and 6, and nothing north of 149th Street/Grand Concourse. It figures. Mommy and Daddy taxpayer won't ever stop bankrolling that special sibling of ours.

And one can only pity the stifled brilliance of Andrew Albert, chairman of the New York City Transit Riders Council. "It would be even more useful if they install a repeater on the street, so people can have time to get a cup of coffee or a newspaper."

Ha!

Oh Mr. Albert, you just earned yourself an invite to my utopian commune, expected to be completed by December 2010.