In 1998, I was living in Santa Monica, working for a startup internet company. I was working 18 hours a day, and I wasn't complaining. It was a rush to feel like I was on the vanguard of something huge. I had the standard inordinate amount of power for an early 20-something, and - although I had no real social life outside of work cocktails and conferences - I was enjoying myself.

The thing that was missing was time to get the real things of life done. I could never find time (even in convenience-laden LA) to do the errands and chores that make a life move forward. I don't remember being at a grocery store very much. My apartment was seldom cleaned.

And I never seemed to find time to take in or pick up my dry cleaning.

It became a joke. I had a stash in the corner of my office at work - a pile of clothes that I kept intending to take to the cleaners. I didn't want to leave it in my car (a rusty blue Toyota Corolla with one hubcap, a window that wouldn't roll down, a broken key in the ignition and 150,000 miles on it), because I was afraid a stack of clothing was the one thing in the car that would entice someone to steal it. After all - after a few months of this, all my favorite things were in there. The dress from Jeni that fit just so. The amazing soft black cardigan. The suits that were good for work but could still really work at cocktail parties when the jacket came off... So my dry-cleaning sat there, building up, waiting to be taken in.

One afternoon, in a fit of "I-can't-take-this-anymore-I-deserve-a-life" pique, I took the afternoon off, deciding to go ride my bike on the beach. On the way, I dropped my dry-cleaning off. It felt good to tick it off the list. It would be ready to pick up on Thursday.

Thursday night, I actually left work at a decent hour. I drove down Lincoln Blvd, past the drycleaners. I considered stopping. But I was tired and feeling lazy. I decided to get it over the weekend instead. Saturday came, and I decided that I should go pick up the cleaning. I drove down Lincoln, not sure what block the drycleaners was on, but knowing that I'd know it when I saw it.

I drove back and forth for about 30 minutes (no lie) before I realized that I WAS on the right block, and had been the entire time I was driving.

Well, as would only happen to me - when every nice piece of clothing I had ever had was there - my drycleaners burned down. To the GROUND. On Friday.

I could have picked up the clothes on Thursday.

I took it all as a sign and have tried to buy clothes that do not need cleaning ever since. I wash it all - rayon, silk... you name it. About the only things I get dry-cleaned are my winter coats, and even those go to the eco-cleaners now, because clearly, I have some bad dry-cleaning karma the needs to be cleansed.

-Heather... off to ponder what business suits look good but don't require cleaning for our upcoming meetings with potential funders...

The great things about working out outside are the little mind games you can play with yourself.

For instance: when running, I pick a point - a tree, a fence (or ideally, another person, moving toward me) - where I make a deal with myself that I can stop once I pass that point. "Just run to that tree/fence/person-running-really-quickly-toward-me, and then you can stop, and walk, and buy yourself an ice cream on the way home."

Another game I like to play while working out outside is "Pretend you are Oprah," otherwise known as "Freak Out the People Near You" and/or "Make them Think You are Famous" Now, this game is played to much better results in a city like New York, where you are guaranteed some level of anonymity. In smaller communities where you are more likely to run into lots of people you know, you might want to pass this up. In this game, I like to walk instead of run, pumping my arms like crazy in order to bring my heart rate up (Oprah, a' la 1995). Because it looks really stupid, I prefer to wear sunglasses and a bandana. Funny thing is that - instead of deciding you are an idiot - people who pass you assume you are a celebrity. They then start Oprah-ing their arms as well. Soon, entire swathes of people working out are doing their best to clothesline each other.

Sometimes, I practice the "borrowed landscape" routine - I do some sort of cardio workout outdoors and then on the way home, I "borrow landscape" (this is a landscape design term, but I think it fits) to complete my training. This involves stopping at someone's front steps and using them to do modified push ups and calf stretches, or holding onto a railing for lunges. Note: this tends to scare other people's dogs. They don't like to be scared. You've been warned.

All in all, I have to say - even if you don't do odd little things that make you look like a freak when working out outdoors (whether you walk or run or stroll or pretend to do pushups), there is just something truly more fun about being outside. What end-goal can you make for yourself on a treadmill? ("When you get to 30 minutes, you can stop?" Bah. What is the fun in that?)

Don't get me wrong - the climate here necessitates that I workout indoors sometimes. But by and large, I prefer the Pretend-to-be-Oprah-Walking routine. It gives me hope that I will be mistaken for a celeb and will see myself featured in Gawker Stalker someday.

So if you are a guy, you might not want to read this posting (unless you are titillated by women in sports bras, in which case, read away, freaky boy).

Anyway - what is up with yoga tops? Seriously... how is it that no one out there has figured out that not all female yoga practitioners (or teachers for that matter) have tiny little breasts? I can't tell you the mad envy I have when looking around the studio at all the little spaghetti-strap-clad women in their cute tops. I'm supposed to be sitting there, concentrating on my practice, thinking deep and blissful thoughts, and instead, I'm checking out Briar's latest little yoga top, thinking how much I hate the fact that she can wear that while I am stuck with a running bra and wife-beater tank top from Old Navy.

Now, don't get me wrong, my Old Navy tank and sports bra get the job done (the job being keeping me strapped in while I hold a handstand). And for years, I've had a serious belief that one should never buy workout gear - you should just recycle old summer clothes, because it's not a fashion show, people.

But then I did yoga teacher training. And let me tell you - having the right clothes (when doing yoga 20 hours a week) makes a huge difference as you try to move through poses with aplomb or adjust practitioners without tripping.

And let's fact facts. I want to look cute. Even when sweating like a pig in trikonasana.

So here's the deal - I'm on the hunt for the best yoga top for women who look more like Jane Russell than Gwyneth Paltrow. Please send your suggestions to submitatip@idealbite.com. If we use your tip, I promise to publish a picture of you in your yoga top and to take a picture of myself upside down in a handstand-scorpion in it as well.

In the meantime, for those of you making do with what is out there, here are a few sites that carry my favorite yoga gear (and/or really good sports bras):

http://www.titlenine.com/

http://www.prana.com/

http://www.bepresent.net/bpstore/

http://www.lucy.com/

Check out today's tip for great and green organic cotton gear.

If you read my recent post about why animals rock, you will know it is hard for me to transition to the topic of eating animals. I get it that we are higher up on the food chain, I get it that our bodies need protein, but we have moved so far away from how I believe some of the first cultures of the world treated the animals. Even though they killed them, the hunt was honored, and the slaying, almost a religious experience - with celebrations and ceremonial dances that went on for days after the hunt.

Now we have a gazillion chickens trapped in little hot places without so much the room to spread a wing yet alone avoid getting pecked from other chickens who are pissed and have had it with the awful situation. So what do the factory farming guys do? (These are the hired farms of Tyson's and Purdue and the likes.) They CUT THEIR BEAKS OFF so that the chickens don't mutilate each other.

Same with pigs, but it is worse what they do to them, and it is a known fact that pigs are smarter than dogs. If you are a dog owner, you KNOW that your dog feels pain and has emotions. I feel so strongly about this for one reason: they are helpless, and totally at our mercy, and we are dishonoring the Earth by treating them so poorly.

Looking for the Positive Spin

I wish I could add a positive spin to this, but this very one topic I would devote my life to if I had the resources. I would align with people like Temple Grandin (who is this a special woman who wrote Animals in Translation : Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior) and Native Americans who are born with the intrinsic reverie for all things natural, and through presenting alternatives (ie: not through showing gruesome photos - although that his its place as well) we would try to alter this harmful trajectory we are on. Until then, I am presented with chicken as a meal when I go to people's house as a dinner guest because I am a 'vegetarian.' (I usually correct them and say 'actually I am a pescatarian' and we have a good laugh over the fact that Latin is sometimes useful.) Then, if the atmosphere allows, I explain that even though chicken has 'white meat' it certainly isn't clean, and our bodies and environment would be much better served by eating their all-natural beef which is readily available here.

Just the other day I got tears in my eyes as I drove behind a truckload full of chickens that were squashed in boxes, half-dead, zooming down the hot highway with 70 mile winds whipping many of their feathers off. I thought I maybe was a big sap, but then a girlfriend (who isn't moved by much) called me reporting the same shock and horror of having seen this back East. It was a sign'. I am not alone. But as individuals without many options, we are left shedding little private tears.

I feel like I should apologize - to both you and the chicken I occassionally eat. This blog posting isn't very sassy. However in the eyes of pure environmentalism I am irreverent because I still eat the occasional animal - really only because I am very hungry, my body is crying out for protein, and there aren't many alternatives around. (The word 'veggie burger' is a curse word in Montana.)

Our population growth demands that we find more sustainable ways to feed ourselves. We, as a human race, have accomplished some amazing and magnificent things. I ask: 'why can't alternatives to factory farms be made a global mandate?'

If you are new to this blog discussion, or to this topic, I highly recommend an ALMOST comical cartoon presentation of why factory farming is hurtful to people and planet: www.themeatrix.com.

Off to do a little ceremonial dance for the chicken I ate the other night at Arlene's house '

Jen

Ah, the kitchen. Such a warm, yummy place to be… if you are being cooked for! Somehow now though we woman are in this weird transitionary place with women’s rights… we are expected to work, have the kids, and still do domestic things. Even though I consider my boyfriend sort of highly evolved, I asked him to vacuum (because I was working and he was bored) and he shot back in jest, “that is your job. I will do something more manly instead, like trim the hedges.” Here is my philosophy on that: he never ONCE saw his father touch a vacuum. And then of course society reinforces these male / female roles with things like Barbie Dolls with aprons, etc.

Look, I am not saying that women should stay out of the kitchen. I am just saying that true equality has not been reached, even though we have women CEOs now.

I am also not claiming that we are equal, in the literal sense. We are not. I love when a man opens the door, for example. It shows respect. And I do love cooking the (very) occasional meal when I have the time, to show respect and love for my dinner guests. What I hate is the expectation and assumption that all things related to cooking and cleaning are STILL women’s jobs, on top of the bringing home the bacon bit, too.

How does this relate to Kitchen Appliance Efficiency? It probably doesn’t. Except that efficiency in the truest sense means that people and parts should be assigned to the things they do best, given a certain set of resources. And quite frankly, I can make money better than I can cook. So my idea is to make enough money to hire a chef, since it takes me 3 hours to make a decent meal, whereas it might take the chef 2 hours and it would be twice as good.

And in a last-ditch effort to relate this to the tip, let me just say that I became familiar with the Energy Star program while I was getting a “green” MBA in DC. It is by far one of the government’s greatest accomplishments, in my humble opinion. So next time you are in the market for a microwave, insist on Energy Star, and you will be assured of saving money in your electricity bill.

Off to make some cereal for dinner,

Jen

Note: the leather vs pleather debate is scheduled for later this year since we decided to do a tip about pleather.

So, you are either an animal lover or you�re not. Feel free to stop reading now if you are not, or read on to understand what makes animal lovers so goo-goo-gaa-gaa when it comes to our fine furry friends.

Reasons Animals Rock:

1. Animals are pure. (Think about it.) The exception to that is usually when a human interferes. Just look at what we have done to the pit bull.
2. Animals connect us. They are not human, they are not earth. But they are this living breathing entity that exist, somewhere between humans and earth.
3. Animals don�t hold grudges. (Okay, unless we are talking about cats, skunks, or donkeys. Those three animals are known to hold grudges. I think it makes them more intelligent, but some would disagree - especially when they come home from vacation and their feline friend immediately urinates on the luggage.)
4. Animals can make you laugh. And laughing is oh-so-good. For example, it is pretty hot here now, and so Cricket likes to take an afternoon dip in the small pond out front. She does laps really, with half her face above water, these two big ears acting as sails, and this nub of a rudder that wiggles as she cruises along. Her new name is Crickadile. It is a site to be seen, and of course I will be taking pictures.

Speaking of pictures - w/ digital so prevalent, we hardly print out photos anymore, have you noticed that? That is why today�s tip is so cool - you can pick your favorite and have it done up as real art. Some proceeds go to shelters. I would LOVE your help in deciding what photo to get made into a Cricket Portrait. Pick from Cricket's photo album below (on the right, scroll down), or tell me I need some new picks and as a goo-goo-gaa-gaa animal lover, of course I would be happy to comply.

Off to get the Cricket out of the flowerbeds�oh never mind, she looks too cute there �

Jen

You know that commercial (I think it's for auto insurance or something) where the guy talks about how he's a celebrity and everyone treats him specially because of it?  The point of the commercial is that EVERYONE gets treated the same way - celebrity or not - by that company.  (Sad for the company that I can't remember what it was -not the best branding, eh?)

Well, that guy is me when I stay at hotels.  

 I LOVE hotels.  Even when I'm traveling a ton on business, I still get that silly thrill at checking into a hotel.  I get to my room and look through all the bath products, check out the minibar, explore the in-demand movie options... 

I have no idea why I'm so in love with staying in hotels.  Once you've done a ton of business traveling, you realize it's the same - night in, night out.  But I always show up, put on the big fluffy robe and traipse around as though I owned the place (or at least my little box within the place).  I eat my pillow-chocolates and order the four-hundred-thousand-dollar oatmeal for breakfast. 

And yes, for the past few years, I've actually hung up my towels and requested that housekeeping doesn't change out my sheets.  Just because I'm fabulously famous (in my mind) and HAVE a maid (for a few minutes each morning) doesn't mean that I need to act like I do... 

-Heather... off to plan fantastic travels that I won't be taking for a while...

Have you ever been to Italy? Not the Italy that is featured in Conde Nast's Traveler or other such high end publications, but more the Italy of youth hostels, country vistas seen via public transportation, and saving up all your pretty coins for gelato. That is how I experienced Italy, and loved it. There is something about traveling in "coach" so to speak that allows you to get your finger on the pulse of the culture.

I remember one day walking down some tiny cobblestone side street in Florence when the most beautiful man turned a corner and came striding toward me.... long dark hair, tanned olive skin, chiseled cheekbones, white button down crinkled shirt, faded tight jeans, black boots. I was so moved that I said to him as he brushed by me, "marry me." What a geek I was! Okay, so maybe I still am. Anyway.

I was fortunate enough to study abroad my junior year of undergrad, at the University of Valencia. The Italian trip was my Spring Break. The whole European experience really opened my mind to a whole other world. I realized that not everyone had ice in their diet coke, that other cultures preferred cafes to TV, and most families had carcass contraptions hanging in their kitchen (at least in the southern European countries).

My Spanish host family could have died when I said in my broken Spanish that I was a vegetarian. Eventually it became a joke, especially as I started to turn into this big "tortilla espanola", but then it happened: my first salmon experience. It was actually in Italy on the same trip where I asked a stranger to marry me. My friend and I were in some plaza in Rome, and I was tired of translating Italian for the day. At the caf� we chose for dinner, I guess I accidentally ordered the salmon. And heck, it may have even been sushi-ish, as it was tender and served on top of some small pieces of olive-oil drenched flatbread. I had never eaten fish in my entire life; I was so picky when I was younger, even eschewing orange juice and peanut butter! But that night my friend dared me, and so of course I went for it. And slam-bam-thank-you-sal-mon, it was defishilicious.

So now I call myself a pescatarian. I figure eating lower on the food chain is better than having 3 BigMacs a day, for both my body and the planet. Now wild salmon is making its way into more restaurants and grocery stores, so I don't have to support that salmon farms where they feed these bright pink pellets to the fish trapped in a large net, and all the sea life around them is dead since their high concentration of salmon poo-poo has killed it off.

Let's go back to the image of the man who brushed by... ah yes.

Off to track down some FRESH and WILD salmon in Montana. Will let you know how it goes. Hopefully swimingly. Ha. (See, I am definitely still a geek.)

- Jen

I like the smell of gasoline. And newsprint. And brand new dolls (although to be honest, I haven�t smelled a brand-new doll since I was 11, and even then, I was a bit embarrassed to be getting one, if I remember correctly). I like the way that the scent of permanent markers sort of burns the nose. I like the smell of freshly painted walls.

There, I said it.

OK, so I am well aware that all these things aren�t just bad for me, they are bad for the environment at large. I do know that I am killing brain cells every time I find myself at a gas pump (which is rare, here in NYC), taking extra-deep breaths, wondering why that scent is so insanely addictive. I know all of that.

And I am moving my life more and more toward a world of natural products and ever-greener household items (including cars that will run on water or vegetable oil and house paints made from milk). And this shift to a greener world is a very good thing, as daily, I become more aware that I have fewer and fewer brain cells that I can risk losing due to a deep inhale at the newstand�

But I still love the smell of gasoline. And some deep, dark, inner-child part of me will be tiny bit sad someday � in my brand-new, perfectly green house � that I�ll never again smell the caustic chemical plasticity of freshly painted walls.

-Heather� off to do a crossword puzzle to sharpen up my brain cells�

Warning: this blog has nothing much to do with being green, but everything to do with recycling.

I love hearing stories of high school sweethearts that go their separate ways and some decades later are re-united and marry. It proves that maybe there is some cosmic force at work, or as Phoebe on Friends would put it, “They are each other’s lobsters!” (Her contention is that lobsters mate for life, and she then gave hilarious hand-gestures of two lobsters skimming the ocean floor, holding claws.

So don’t you ever wonder about your high school flames, thinking things like, “If only he didn’t think that I was the one that called his mom to tell her that he was involved in some illegal activities, we might be together today!” ?

What about college flames? Do you maybe wonder things like “What if I hadn’t made that walk of shame across college campus in my party outfit from the night prior, on a weekly basis? Would he have respected me more and treated me better?” (I am not saying whether or not that is a personal story. I think my parents read these blogs from time to time.)

Regardless of what track your own personal stories follow… recycled romance is one of life’s good things on many levels… the ‘what ifs’ can be resolved, a shared history can be enjoyed and laughed at, and there is of course that instant comfort level with the meant-to-be couples… like they had never separated. So if you are currently unattached, reach out to that person swimming around in your head – you never know…

Me? I have recycled a few times because I am a closet romantic and a devoted Leo. However, I am now enjoying recycling lessons learned from the past to make my current relationship stronger.

Do you have any hilarious stories about recycled romance? Any funny “what ifs” that you dare to share? Please do share! We promise to read them and respond. (Note: we didn’t promise to not poke a little fun.) No, we aren’t turning this into a group therapy session, so leave your tears and requests for advice at the door. We want to laugh our recycling heads off.

Off to look at some photo albums since this topic got me thinking…

- Jen

My roses have aphids, my daylilies have rust, my clematis died overnight due to a fungus, and too many of my tomatoes aren't turning from flowers into little green buds, because the bees seem to have left the building. If I started to talk about the weeds that somehow make their way onto my rooftop (industrious little things, to fly up so high), this blog would get really, really long (even more so than usual).

So why won't the bugs and plants that I want show up, when I seem to have plenty of the ones that I'd rather have stay away?

(Oh lord, I could so easily take that as an analogy for so many other things in life, but I will refrain. For the time being, at least.)

It has taken every ounce of willpower I have not to go to my local hardware store, buy every pesticide and herbicide known to humankind, and spray the living daylights out of every square foot of my roof garden. But I guess one has to walk the walk when publicly committed to trying to live a green guru sort of life.

I did, however, make one natural discovery this year that has made the weed thing a bit better for some of my friends and clients - landscape fabric. At UrbanSage (my garden design company), I have gotten to play off of the rooftops a little, doing some work for people who have actual earth in which to plant. And those who put down landscape fabric underneath their mulch are having MUCH less of a weed problem than those who didn't (and who are now spraying nastiness in the form of chemicals). So - if you are trying to combat weeds, consider trying it out - it also retains moisture so that you have to water less often.

As for me and my rooftop woes... I'm taking comfort in the tomatoes that I do have and in the fact that I again have enough mint to support all the NYC restaurants in their mojito-endeavours

Happy gardening to all you gardeners - this is the last landscape/garden tip for a few weeks..

-Heather... off to remove the dead leaves from the rusted daylily...

So if someone could explain to me why it is that - when I find out that the latest actor that I have a crush on has a wife - I feel strangely as if I've been cheated on? It's not like Batman was gonna date me anyway...

But the activities of my brain seldom follow any rhyme or reason.

So to make myself feel better about the fact that Christian Bale is apparently happily married with a kid, I've decided to try to meditate a little more, hanging out in my garden and sniffing flowers. Of course - being on a rooftop in a rented flat in Brooklyn - my garden has certain limitations... I can't make any structural changes or plant anything that isn't in a container.

But last year, I did try to make my garden butterfly friendly - I planted monarda (or bee balm) and made sure I had plenty of flowers and hedges, where butterflies could grow. The best butterfly gardens incorporate great local plants that attract butterflies AND offer places for the butterflies to lay their eggs and hang out in a cocoon. Last year, it worked well. Generally, I have quite a few little winged friends by the end of the summer. But truth be told, I don't really care that much about the butterflies; mainly, I dig the bees that show up more than anything. (They like the butterfly flowers as well, so you've been forewarned).

Bees... there's always something a little great about things that are a bit dangerous and that might sting you if you play too closely.

Sort of like Batman.

Who is apparently cheating on me.

• 10 times the water


• 8.5 times the fossil fuel


• 16 times the fertilizer


• if I ate a pound of grain instead.

Once a big (bossy) sister, always a big sister. I am 32 in August, and my brother is 28, but I still get to tell him what to do. Life is great like that.

He just opened his own cosmetic dentistry practice in Atlanta, our home town. I told him he had to go green because he would get more press, the clients would feel better about their experience, and he would get some good-n-green karma (you know, absolute fluffy stuff that we all love to believe in). So like the good little brother he is, he listened. I pointed him in the direction of bamboo flooring. It is an easy sell, since it is beautiful and cost-neutral to other hardwood (ie: slow growth) options. And then he took it up a step. (The time away from my daily beatings must have been good for our relationship.)

Here is what he did:

-Bamboo flooring
-Digital x-rays, even panoramic x-ray (i.e. no chemicals as used traditionally)
-Chartless office (no paper charts)
-Usage of biocompatible materials in dental work (porcelain, white composite fillings)
-Compact Fluorescent Light Bulbs
-Cloth towels in the bathroom for drying hands

To see a photo of his offices and the bamboo flooring, go here: http://www.atlantadentalspa.com/aesthetic_officetour.asp.

Okay enough nepotism.

Now, about bamboo…. My product du jour is this very stylish bamboo serving tray plate. It makes a great housewarming present. Also, we worked out a deal for all Biters (and seriously have nothing to gain – we get no kickbacks or ad $$$- we just love you). You can get 40% off your entire purchase by entering the code “Ideal Bite” at the checkout.

So, check it out, dude. http://www.beneficialbug.com/?nd=full&key=10245&keywords=bamboo. \

Off to convince my Dad to consider a hybrid SUV for his next vehicular purchase – Jen

Years ago, while running around at the Marin County Fair (in crowns and wands, even though we were in our mid-20s), my best friend and I yelled "HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!" at top volume, much to the annoyance of the guy selling us armfuls of funnel cakes and cotton candy. (The inflection and cadence is really important here...It's HAP-py BIRTH-day, Uh-MER-i-cah...)

Anyway, because there is no way for us to make fireworks appear to be environmentally-friendly (and because we still really think we should all get to enjoy fireworks), the Ideal Bite is on hiatus for a day.

So Jen and I leave you with this:

"Happy BIRTHday, America!"

Happy Biting,

Heather