“Write about how everyone always wants to punch you in the head,” he said.

“What should I call it?” I asked him.

“Call it ‘Everyone always wants to punch me in the head’,” he suggested.
(more…)

Oddly enough, this is pretty close to what originally started the whole idea of “Temple of Sting” many years ago: my friend kept randomly insisting everyone was Sting. I then suddenly began to see the actual Sting everywhere, and would point out, “Now, that is Sting!” Then I began to wonder why Sting seemed to be ubiquitous, then I became obsessed with bees, and you know the rest. Maybe Malkovich’s mom is actually a Temple of Sting reader?! That would be a logical explanation for her comment.

According to the website Celsius, “Clothianidin, made by German chemical company Bayer, was approved by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2003 as a seed treatment. This, despite the fact that the EPA’s own report  acknowledges clothianidin is highly toxic to honeybees.”  In 2003, the EPA called for additional studies on this chemical’s affect on honeybees, but it isn’t clear if these studies were ever completed. The NRDC requested this information and did not receive it, so they have now filed a lawsuit. They believe that the EPA has been willfully hiding information from the public about the connection between neonicotionoids and CCD.

In related news, I started reading a wonderful book called A Spring Without Bees by Michael Schacker, which is all about Colony Collapse Disorder. I saw it in the window of my favorite bookstore and ran in and bought it immediately.  Right now I happen to be reading the chapter about neonicitonoids, and I will post more about this book when I’m finished reading it.

So while flipping through an old issue of InStyle (May 2008 - hey neighbors, you hang on to your magazines for a LONG time), I came across this sentence: “It’s 5:30 PM and Carrie Underwood [for those of you who don’t know who this is, she is an American Idol winner] hasn’t eaten all day. In 90 minutes she’s due at a Grammy Awards rehearsal, and there’s a platter nearby piled with sandwiches. But Underwood sips a diet soda and nibbles on a Weight Watchers bar instead. ‘Everything shows up immediately right here,’ she says, pointing to her flat tummy. ‘So I monitor what I eat.’ ” And what does the author of this illustrious article write in response to this? “The woman has willpower.”

Ugh. The feminist in me recoils at this. That’s not WILLPOWER, that’s called ANOREXIA. I mean, isn’t that about 200 calories for an entire day? On the other hand, at least Carrie Underwood is honest about why she looks as thin as she does, and doesn’t say things like “I don’t count calories! I just try to exercise when I can, I looove walking my dogs and doing yoga!” like half the celebrities (who have clearly had plastic surgery) say in the puff pieces that appear in many publications - even those purportedly dedicated to women’s health and fitness (SELF magazine, I am looking at you).

In other not-really-news, this past weekend I briefly attended the Siren Festival in Coney Island,  where I caught a few Malkmus tunes, breathed some sea air, and got a Siren Festival t-shirt featuring a giant squid and a subway car! I also did some more bee watching. Plus, I gained new insight as to why my local Key Food is so completely, utterly insane: I overheard the manager tersely tell an older gentleman who was asking if the store carried an item advertised in a coupon that NO, they didn’t have any and he would not go look in the stock room, TOO BAD. The same manager then told a cashier that people who “stole $.25 bags of popcorn” were “going to go to hell” (the un-labeled, small bags of popcorn were near the cash registers and looked like free samples). I also finally managed to get some much-needed hardware and software so that I could play music from my laptop wirelessly through my stereo speakers; my life is now 1000% more awesome as a result of this.