She is made from books and butterflies

She is made from things tucked away into fairytales.

Things lost in fables and folklore of long ago.

In sleety forests where in the company of kind dwarves, forest wolves, and mothergoats, winter roses
bowed before the crescent moon to bid their fond farewells.

In a sanctuary of talking animals, the mouse queen, 

and a honored polar bear ice king.

In a place where lovestruck fools, and men with blue beards, would gather beneath a fluttering, winged-horse sky.

A time when a princess would find herself lost in sleep for a hundred years

A time for imperium silver crystals, and dark-sparkled curiosities.

Beyond the black rainbows, to a place of respite, where the spirit is swallowed up in reading books,

and can safely drown in a sea of prose and poetry.

And only the butterfly knows truth and virtue, for her wings are transparent,
as she drinks from the tips of flowers,
and views the world through kaleiodoscopic eyes.

Before long, she'll arise from the lavender dust

with wings of gold to carry her through the hurricane waters.

...and she shall have the steadfastness to know,

the only sounds that can come from a cage of butterflies, are the squawks of sorrow.

all images copyright of Kirsty Mitchell Photography

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Open Girl Scout Season

Yes boys and girls, it's that special time of year again.

The time of year where little girls will suit up in matching green armor to unleash their fierce wit, unassuming smiles, and charm capable of reducing any living, breathing being into a pile of nothingness, rendering one helpless to hand over their wallets and quietly acquiesce to their demands.

Atlanta Magazine now reports that the “new” Girl Scouts run like a Fortune 500 corporation. With $700 million in cookie sales, it is now the nation’s largest female-directed enterprise. These young female entrepreneurs have become a legion of sorts.

...and they're off to the races.

This season, don't be fooled by the warm, cheerful smiles and direct eye contact from these baked cookie-wielding mollies.



You see, these darling little ladies have an eee-vil plan, a vendetta if you will, and that is to 'milk' you for everything you're worth.

From afar, the common Girl Scout species may seen young, innocent and harmless, but be advised, these young women clad in head to toe green are heavily armed with the required skills necessary to sell cookies to anyone, yes anyone.

even this guy

 Those plagued by high blood sugar levels and impaired glucose tolerance should be on high alert throughout the season.

Again, I must warn you that these young tarts are highly specialized professionals outfitted with real life skills such as, how to crotchet, budget money, how to be leaders, and how to otherwise "be prepared".

Of greatest concern, is that they are exceedingly adept with hunting for the weak, vulnerable and sugar-deprived, pushing their overpriced sweet treats onto poor unsuspecting victims throughout the country.

Psst! Hey you!

 Little girl with the freebased-laced baked goods.

Yes, you little girl. 

You in the green sash riddled with shiny buttons and sew-on honor patches.

Stop selling me those delicious, mouthwatering cookies and go home!!!

Is it not enough that you have forever changed our sweet cravings, as well as the face of fashion?

Stop with the unsolicited vending of mouthwatering cookies that I buy in mahoosive amounts,  justifying my impulsive purchases with grandiose visions of storing them in my freezer for the remainder of the year, only for them to never live to see the inside walls of any icebox.

Go now, in peace, before I finish my 17th box and there will be hell to pay.

Good riddance to you and your equally encroaching troop, so that I may walk the streets free from the fear of your undertaking.

Allow me the freedom to live in a world where I no longer have to succumb to the downright assault from my supervisor's daughters knocking on my office door, bearing order forms and leaving me with little option other than emptying my pockets for the sake of your heinous cause.

And as for you girls harrassing me every time I step foot outside my grocery store, I've news for you, I already have a dealer in my neighborhood, a young female aggressor who has taken me (and my wallet) hostage.

I'm doing whatever it takes to avoid the rest of your unwarranted advancements, even if it means I have to use suction cups on all fours to get up and around you, and shimmy my way out from the market via an airduct.

This mean you, just you, little girl.

Those boy scouts never hassle me with such aggresive bewitchery when it comes to popcorn sales. Do you realize you've diminished the capacity for these poor young lads to raise their own funds because they must compete with your crack-cocaine in the form of a street cookie?

Do you even know that the Boy Scouts sell popcorn?!?

...and what on the face of the planet are you doing with the millions you've allocated in funds?

What's that you say? Tough cookies?!?

Oooh, I'll get you my pretties, and your little dogs too, and their unborn puppies. 

Good riddance little lassies, get on with your honorable lives of crafting, roller skating, teamwork, using your cpr skills to rescue frail dying baby kittens, and bandaging infant birds that have fallen from trees.

In the meantime, please excuse me as I indulge in the delicious goodness of crisps that seethe with the perfect chocoloatey crunch and the slight note of mint.

I hate you Thin Mints!

Please pardon my absence as I devour a handful of peanut butter and chocolate heavenly bits.

I don't know how you sleep at night you wretched, assholey Tagalogs

How I loathe and detest the insatiable yearning I have for you Samoas, and the bastard some more ah's, and some more ah hankerings that follow.

Damn you to the deepest place in hell you nasty, buttery Trefoils, the tasty shortbread fit for dipping into my Bailey's and milk AND perfectly suitable for artery obstruction.

...and now in 2013, you have a new variety on the streets, the Mango Creme variety with a questionable 'NutriFusion' Ingredient.

complex.com

Who the hell wants nutrition in our beloved treats?

What's next?!? Girl Scout Salads!

Oh, bloody hell have mercy on our poor souls for we are weak with insatiable cravings for refined carbohydrates and sugared fuel sources. We can not help being additionally crippled with sweetoothy afflictions.

THIS IS AMERICA YOUNG LADIES!

We reserve to have the right to choose what foods we place in our bodies,
if only we had the inner strength to do so.

I surrender!

Uncle!

Mercy!

I'll do anything, anything, just please give me a hit of that chocolatey thin mint goodness. You can have it, you can have it all! The pin code to my atm card, unlimited access to my retirement funds, and every last cent in my pocketbook.

Oh can't you see that "C" is for cookie, and one is just not good enough for me!

It's about to get ugly, folks.
Real ugly.

Buy the damn cookies.

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Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily... Life is but a dream

The wind, now brisk, has led the thoughts to wander off to snugweathered places and row your boat fantasy.

etsy.com

Headspace fully occupied with the sort of thinking that allows the senses no rest.

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Wandering, drifty illusions to places of summer dreams, 

where one can escape to a shiny-weathered habitat.

magic-of-daydreaming.tumblr.com

The kind found in digital-filtered images of places uncovered by travel, 

www.istartedsomething.com

or by nosediving into a sidewalk painting of the Mary Poppins sort, by way of a Dick Van Dyke dismount.

ronaldpratt.com

The seasons change,

and so do we.

www.stumbleupon.com

I hope one winter you'll find the courage to dance with the leaves, as they flurry to the call of the frosty tide.

I hope one spring you'll find a sanctuary stuffed with larger than life dreams.

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I hope one summer you'll find a way to sail home, 

and not get lost along the way.

I hope one fall you'll fall in ridiculous, maddening, can't-stand-a-minute-without-the-other kind of love.

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although I can't guarantee there will be smooth sailing.

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This is your journey,
no one can walk through the seasons for you.

theacidsweatlodge.blogspot.com

So dream on, dreamy rowboat.

One day, you too shall find yourself well-seasoned,

and you'll see that the cold can be just as lovely.

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Music and life

I remember the former days of being incarcerated deep within a cubicle land of government employment while excruciating, souless, music played repetitively above.

It echoed throughout the building, bouncing from the hard-tiled corridors, up onto the walls, and then bled into the hallways, seeping throughout. It trickled into the laboratory examination areas, the far corners of the bathrooms, the conference rooms, the staff kitchen.

Nothing was safe from the perfectly, dreadful festival of plainsong.

The music finally made its way to my sacred desk space, the only refuge I had from my five days a week in the mindlessness of corporate normalcy.

Those were times when I saw my days through the wrong end of a telescope.

I never danced, nor sang to that dreadful music. In all fairness, it wasn't music worth singing or dancing to. Instead, I invested in a pair of noise-cancelling headphones, valued at over $300, to silence it. This allowed me to devour the tonal lushness of my own deskside melodies.

More importantly, I was able to avoid the dreadful noise, the daily mutterings of gossip, and the happenings from last night's television sitcom programming from those who liked to phaff and moan. While wonderstruck beneath my headset, I never gave much consideration to the fact that I was quite likely being monitored by CIA data mining bots in my daydreamy world.

At the age of 36, I found myself with two degrees and stuck with a lifeless, corporate job dictated by politics rather than virtue, nor local needs. That I had climbed to the very tip-top of the ladder of success, only to find that my climbing device was propped against the wrong wall, on the wrong building.

I had abandoned my art.
I had denied my happiness.
I had fallen victim to an appointed life formula.

The life prescribed to us can be a vicious cycle, and walking away from the safety net of convention is no simple feat. 

It will however, teach you to sing and dance to the music again.

Will you sing and dance while the music is being played?

x
         

Deus Brut des Flandres: It's Beer! No wait, Champagne... No Beer?

When is a beer not a beer?

Why, when it's champagne, naturally!

Meet Deus Brut des Flandres, the champagne of beers.

vauclusecellars.com.au

Dressed up in a voluptuous bottle, it's a stunning work of art bearing a striking resemblance to Dom Pérignon.

So similar that the folks over at the (get this) Brouwerij Bosteels Brewery in Buggenhout, Belgium*
were forced to change its label.

*I trust that in addition to making finely-crafted beers, the heavily awarded brewers were equally as fond of alliteration

Original label

geo.uw.edu.pl

Dom label

cellartracker.com

Uncanny, I say!

This crackling brew is a perfectly-fitting selection if you're looking to add a bit of celebratory luster to the beer lover in your life. It's a rather extraordinarily crafted ale, even if it does come with a split personality. 

You see, it undergoes its standard fermentation and conditioning process in Belgium, and is subsequently shipped off to the Champagne region of France where it is then treated very much the same as the fine bubbly using the traditional méthode champenoise.

i.telegraph.co.uk

Additional sugar and yeasty bits are added to the original formula shortly before refermentation, followed by twelve months of pampered aging.

So how does the fancy beer taste?

It starts with hints of spiced ginger, coriander, and almond on the nose, then goes down slightly sweet with light, malty underpinnings, and a wee touch of pepper in its yeasty backdrop.

 It's quite unlike anything you've ever had, and with an overall score of 97 at ratebeer.com, it should send you running to the foothills for a swig of the barley pop.

couriermail.com.au

Deus will serve as an excellent apertif, 

or perhaps a bold cheese pairing.

Cheese tip:

This funktastic ale will play nicely with a well-aged, nutty, tangy variety. Try it with a classic Parmigiano Reggiano, Gruyere, Boerenkaas or any other can't get enough of it Gouda.

edwines.com

So is it a beer or a champagne?

It's far more beer than champagne, but I wouldn't recommend this grown up brew for pizza night.

 Instead, save it for a festive occasion to serve and sip up in a flute, savor the sudsy, and cast those tucked away champagne wishes you've been long hiding.

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Why hello there, 2013!

lovedyoufirst-x.tumblr.com

It's so lovely to meet you!

All pretty and prim with your finest dress on.

Have I told you how smashing you look today?

I hope you don't mind waiting for just a quickymoment while I dust off the confetti, and bounce back from the bubbly blowout of yesteryear.

I can't wait to see what you have in store for us.

Enchanté, my new unforetold friend.

x