Twitter's got my tongue

I started using Twitter a few weeks back, just as a lark (ha, ha). I'm surprised how much I enjoy it. On vacation, I sent tweets via text messages from my cell phone. I love the form of very very short missives. Somewhere I read that this is called "microblogging", and it provides the satisfaction of blogging in an even more instant way. Plus it's fun to "follow" people.

So that's a big reason I haven't written much in my regular blogs (now seeming a little faded?). Also we've been on vacation and had no internet access for most of the time. Kind of a relief in a way. Before I left, I'd agreed to blog for work while on our trip. Although it was a fun idea, I soon realized that even if my posts were really short, sent from a cell phone with modest-quality photos, it meant I had to be thinking about what I'd blog about while I was on vacation. Sort of like having a mild headache that you're trying to ignore while you're at a party. So when we got out of cell phone range (had to go to an island off the coast of Maine, sort of like early on in the first Harry Potter book...), I was a little relieved to be off the hook.

So now we're back home, and so far that vacation feeling still lingers. I'm sitting on the back deck with a cuppa tea and the laptop. It's still early enough to hear quite a few birds. I see the neighbors' Damned Mulberry Tree is laying its branches on our garage roof. Already the ripe berries are showing up in the driveway, and soon there will be colorful bird droppings all over. Yay. Next come the two sizeable cherry trees. I'm not sure if the fruit is nice to eat, but it too winds up on the driveway, and for weeks there's a sound like small firecrackers every time we back the car out. I suppose I could sweep the cherry pits away, but that never seems to happen.

Inside we're undertaking some renovation. Which is another way of saying that we came home to a new window over the kitchen sink (yay!) but an upstairs bathroom devoid of all plumbing fixtures. The toilet is temporarily living in the guest bedroom. We can see down into the living room through holes in the bathroom floor. Am I alone in my secret temptation to drop things from above? (Ask me about France and the omelette.)

But even though it's Saturday, I think these things will have to wait. There's class this morning, and before that study, and before that maybe please the farmer's market, just for the blueberries I promise, and there's a household hazardous waste collection too, and returning the guitar to our friends, but then after class we shall hie oursel's o'er to the Highland Games, which we miss every year. It's promising thunderstorms throughout the day, so we'll see how that works out.

Definitely not a day to mow the lawn. (Maybe it never is.)

So sentimental

Have you encountered the musical greeting cards that are available now? The recordings are surprisingly high quality, and quite audible. While shopping (late) for Mother's Day cards, I found this (the red one):

Now there's a lovely sentiment, don't you think?

Earth Day comes but once a year

"Earth Day every day!"

Uh, sounds great, yeah. I mean, really, it's a good thing to be aware of your impact on the environment. I believe conservation of energy and natural resources.

I also work at a place where Earth Day brings out some of the same feelings as Christmas if you work at a shopping mall. Yes, it's great, and it brings you lots of attention, but it's also crazy busy and you feel a distinct relief when it's over.

I got to write a post about this for our blog at work. I wrote a straight version and a rhyming version, and I'm pleased to say that they published the latter.

I have mixed feelings as we approach Earth Day each year. I wish we started planning further in advance so that it wouldn't feel so flurried. I prefer events that accomplish something tangible to ones where people make speeches. This year was better than most; we had a clear theme of recycling electronics and medications that was easy to embrace. (Actually, recycling is not something our agency regulates, but everyone thinks we do. We encourage the heck out of it, though.)

We organized a number of events and I think it went well. Our booth at Daley Plaza got many visitors and we gave away lots of publications. It really is heartening to see so many people thinking about protecting the environment. I never thought I'd hear the phase "carbon footprint" anywhere outside our office, but now it's in all the mainstream media. (I sometimes wonder what it's like farther away from urban media epicenters like Chicago. Do I just think that people are excited/upset about the environment because our local media are saturated with those themes? What do people in the rest of the country think?)

Our band performed again for one of the events. We call ourselves the Earth Tones and play environmentally themed songs plus my favorite Irish and American fiddle tunes. :^)

Earth Day is also a personal anniversary; my better half and I had our first date on Earth Day. (My friend Al used to suggest celebrating by practicing running in slow motion toward each other across a flowery meadow. It's usually too cold or too damp on April 22nd for that.)

I hope your Earth Day brought something you can use the rest of the year.

P.S. - The Earth Tones are booking for 2009... ;^)