It’s that magical time of year — the Solstice is upon us! The Solstice always harkens the zodiac sign of Cancer, which means that my birthday is just around the corner, gang! And even though I will somehow be turning 55 (!!!) for some hard-to-fathom reason –since I always feel about 12— I never get tired of birthday cake!!

So, Happy Solstice, folks! I don’t even care that it’s going to rain the whole darn weekend, I am digging it!

Oh, and another thing I’m digging is GreenBeanDelivery.com. It’s a group of local, organic farmers. Every week, I now get a ton of fresh, organic fruits and vegetables delivered right to my wee bonnie door. I even get Hartzler’s milk delivered straight from the farm in the old-fashioned bottles! I love it. The milk is a little pricey, but the rest of it is comparable to buying organic produce in the grocery store, but doing it this way directly supports local farmers.

If you’re a fan of organic food, you probably already know how great it tastes. It reminds me of when I was little (over 50 years ago), when food in this country actually had flavor. Even though I must admit that, back then, I was super excited by things like Space Food Sticks, Jello 1-2-3, and Shake-a-Pudd’n,  none of which, although we ate them eagerly, qualifies as food…

Okay…Here’s something else I am planning to do once I finally relocate and can settle down again:  WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms).  You have to join the organization first, then you get yourself there (requires a passport & visa if you’re going overseas), but then the farmers provide your room and meals for free. In exchange, you work/study 4 hours on the farm each day, and then have the rest of your days/nights free. And you can go anywhere in the world where there are organic farms.

I’m actually more interested in staying on a farm that’s local/regional, and learning about organic farming. I’m more interested in that part than in the traveling part, but it’s a pretty cool way to see the world, too, if you’re into ecological-agricultural things. (For instance, wouldn’t it be awesome to stay on an organic farm in Provence?) (Assuming you ever wanted to step foot in France again, that is. The jury is still out on that for me because I had such a horrible, horrible, HORRIBLE time the last time I was in Paris….)  Anyway, I think it is such a cool organization.

I think it’s safe to say that in my biological family, I’m probably the first generation in a thousand years that has not lived on or worked on a farm at any point in my entire life. However, it still seems to be in my genes, since my life is sort of “farmer-ish.” I go to sleep at 9 PM every night and am up at 5 AM. Then I spend an hour taking care of the many domestic animals around here, although they provide absolutely  nothing but cat hair…

Ha ha ha.

Okay, well, through some sort of SNAFU in both the weather and the AC in my car, my weekend trip was canceled and I now have almost 3 complete days to myself (except for 2 hours of teaching on Monday morning). I am in awe of this development! I have a short paper to write for school, which will take maybe an hour, and the rest of this weekend, I’m going to spend feeling sort of like a human being.  I cannot wait!

So, enjoy the Solstice, gang, wherever you are and whatever the wonderful world throws at you. Thanks for visiting, folks! See ya!