This is not my... Daily
07/04/07 - Blisters, energy and dogging...?
This Section; Background; The point
07/04/07 - Blisters, energy and dogging.
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It's been an interesting trip... |
Hi hi hi - just got back from my trip to the Sahara running about in sand dunes.
Well - most of me got back. Some of my feet stayed there. Much to my displeasure.
Anyhow - home and super excited about all plotting and planning for the summer now that it is here.
Just got ourselves a Facebook page so that we can invite people to come and play with us ever so often.
Sign up!! It'll be fun.
Shan't bore you with too many tales of the desert but will get some solar power info. up here over the next couple of days. (As well as more adulation for the Solio charger. It was a total lifesaver. Not sure what I would have done without being able to sing along to Eye of the Tiger all the way round.... though the other runners might have been grateful if it hadn't worked quite so well...)
There was one entertaining moment though with a small mishap in the translation of the event sponsors.
After going through the list of them (including Theolia - who make renewable energy) we were delighted to find that the Editor of Dogging - rather than Jogging - International was joining us for the run!
Very funny.
Anyhow - hi and Happy Easter from Ollie, Lara and me.
Have a good'un and see you next week.
Susie x
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I want candy! |
Rats and Cats and boiled Bats
Put a bar of chocolate in front of me, and I will probably eventually eat it but it would definitely kick around for a few days. Put a package of sweets in front of me, and they will be gone in moments. I LOVE jelly beans, chewy candies, humbugs, licorice, you get the picture.
Recently, as I was contently munching on one of my 3 packs of haribo, which my mum brought to me from the UK, someone mentioned that most chewy candies have gelatin in them. I always knew that they did, but pleasantly ignored finding out what was actually in gelatin apart from the what I thought of as an urban myth, horses hooves.
I was bnearly ill when I found out that the primary ingredients are boiled bones, skins and tendons of animals. It makes me ill just reading it and writing it. Susie will attest that I am squeamish (would rather let things grow in the fridge than actually have to touch them). Ew, ew, ew!
As all you chocolate lovers out there have a wealth of organic and fair trade chocolate to chose from now, I have ventured into the world of vegetarian sweets to try and give the sugar toothed an option.
Good luck and for those of you who were also pleasantly living in ignorant bliss, I am sorry if I have forever ruined your fruit chews. Unfortunately there are not to many vegetarian sweet shops out there, but if you know of any, please, please send them my way and in the meantime, they are no twizzlers but below you will find some options to tide you over until I can find some more.
http://www.sweetsforu.co.uk/index.php?cPath=54_47
http://www.sweetbotanicals.com/
http://www.villagesweetshop.com/showprod_BSWT20.htm
Lara x
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Mmmmmmm Spring!!! |
So what is in season this spring?
Opt for broccoli, cauliflower, jersey royal potatoes, purple sprouting broccoli, radishes, rhubarb, rocket, sorrel, spinach, spring onions, watercress, bananas, kiwi fruit, cod, salmon, sea trout, strawberries, wild garlic, mushrooms and sadly spring lamb.
My mouth is already salivating with the thought of pan fried salmon with a creamed sorrel sauce, or lamb roasted with a red wine rosemary jus served with baby new potatoes topped with fresh watercress, butter salt and pepper.
If the thought of cooking scares you like the new Volvo advert, it needn't. There are so many websites out there; simply typing "recipes" into Google provides thousands of results. But, don't get too overwhelmed; here are a few of the good ones.
From Cambridge Organics you can buy your organic meat, and they tell you how to cook it: http://www.cambrianorganics.com/recipes/lamb-burger.htm
Rachel’s Organics don't only make great yoghurt, they cook with it too:
http://www.rachelsorganic.co.uk/recipes/recipe.php?recipe=17
The BBC is a staple place for any recipe, search by meat, fish, vegetable or by season:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/in_season/
And another delivery / cooking site, what more could you
ask for? Riverford's root vegetable crumble sounds divine but I just realized not in season...how about Sorrel Tart?
http://www.riverford.co.uk/recipes/recipe.php?recipeid=36&catid=4
Happy cooking.
Lara x
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Doggystyle!! |
This morning I took my new pup for a walk on the mountain opposite my house. He stayed close, but being the end of winter he managed to not only walk through every puddle on the now soppy cross country ski paths but he also managed to roll in something distinctly smelly.
So, twenty dollars, a stuffed star, blue bone and shampoo (that I am tempted to use on myself) later I arrived at the till and noted on some home made dog treats beside the counter and how good they looked.
The woman behind the till was all too eager to assure me that the homemade organic, spinach and oatmeal biscuits, blt muffin and carob cakes for Easter were not only great for a dog, but also delicious...she had tried them all.
While I am no where nearly on the verge of eating my dog's food, I am concerned about what is going in and or of my furry friend's belly, especially after all the coverage in the press about animal food that has been infected with rat poison and melamine.
Just as human food has taken a turn for the better with the abundance of organic and fairtrade produce available, it has transcended into the pet world as well.
So, if you love your animal like they are a member of the family (as many a pet owners do) I leave you with some options of Easter treats, sweet eats and Organic meats!
http://www.thedogweb.co.uk/catalog/index.php?cPath=30&osCsid=850b5d410214dc95b956c1204d88a068
http://www.thedogbiscuitshop.co.uk/
http://www.pero-petfood.co.uk/
Have a fantastic day!
Lara x
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The Greatest!! |
Woohoooooooo, six days, six marathons, temperatures in the forties, more sand than you can shake a stick at combined with a solid diet of pepperami and our little Susie has finished the Marathon De Sables!
Officially the toughest foot race on Earth so a massive congratulations from us all here back in London!
Susie flies back to us all today for a heroes welcome and a celebratory day out at the beach, ha, ha!
Anyway I hope y’all had a stupendously good weekend and to prepare you for the imminent return of Susie and her beautifully sculptured prose, I thought we would share this site full of celebratory green gossip for you all to sink your teeth into.
Have a great Monday
Ollie : )X
PS. And just to clear up any concerns todays image is the Rocky memorial in China sporting a very fetching pair of Womens underwear, rather fitting I thought!
This section will be a daily, well - Monday to Friday daily, editorial. (Have to keep some time aside to keep up the ritual wine drinking / dancing as if being chased by bees.)
I promise to make it my mission to investigate something each day on exciting forays to find new stuff, fun stuff, ethical stuff and anything involving break dancing men with extremely toned physiques.
Let me know if you think of something I should go and visit or if you have any great ideas or information. (Any dodgy suggestions will be politely declined... or not so politely, depending entirely on what they are!)
For today, though, please just have a look below to find out how this whole thing came about. I hope that you are having a lovely morning.
See you tomorrow,
Susie x
Background to This is not my...
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What is this site all about?
Well, as all good ventures do, it started in the pub with the ominous words "I know, why don't we...?" |
What was different, though, was that it still seemed like a good plan in the morning (and somewhat less injurious than trying out extreme ironing, the other suggestion...)
Anyway - once again we had been supping beers and putting the world to rights when someone mentioned the unmentionable, despite our disaffection with the state of the world, none of us was actually doing anything positive to change it.
Whether this was complacency or apathy, who knows - but we were definitely leaving it to others to make decisions and take action for us on issues about which we felt strongly.
We live in a free society, but often things seem to happen as a fait accompli. The war in Iraq, ID cards, the fact that we will eventually succumb to watching some of Big Brother no matter how hard we try...
And we just go along with it. But that is ok, right? I mean, we aren't exactly encouraging the abuse of others - are we?
Ok - so maybe my new top might have been made under less-than-perfect conditions and I suppose that means I am supporting those conditions, but - I have to buy something to wear, so what other choice do I have?
And that was the problem. What - and where - are the choices?
So we decided to investigate. Surely in this free society we have other options; we just need to know how to find them.
So we went online. There are some great directories already for ethical and/or environmentally friendly products, but for us these didn't go far enough. We were on a bit of a roll and decided that these products deserved more active promotion.
We wanted to make as many people as possible aware of the practical things they can do to live life in a better way.
So on this site we will provide information about easy, positive and ethical consumer choices. These are choices that won’t necessarily cost you more, either.
In our directories you will find environmentally friendly and ethical companies and products across the following categories:
Clothes
Energy
Food and Drink
Health and Beauty
Home and Garden
Office
Recycling
Restaurants
You will also find plenty more to lure you back to the site on a regular basis. So come back to have a wee look.
Plus we will be working on video's, events and curious antics to keep important issues in the public eye – and provide us with much entertainment and amusement at the same time.
Give us a shout if you want to get involved!
Anyhow - take a look. Explore… investigate… probe away.
We hope you like it; we hope you use it.
