Swagriculture

Red Dot or Feather...sigh

2009-06-17T18:09:00.000-07:00

I spent my entire childhood growing up in VA trying to teach people the difference between Native American and East Indian. In middle school, Virginia state history was our primary history class. The flood gates opened with Columbus and then Lewis and Clark. At first, I didn't really pay attention - I knew the difference between those Indians and my Indians. However, that shit started to get annoying with a quickness. I was annoyed that my teachers referred to them as Indians, knowing good and well there's a REAL mf'in Indian up in your classroom (although they probably just thought I spent a lot of time in the sun). I managed to spread the gospel of Nina on the topic of Native American vs. Real Indian to most of my class. By the end of junior high, I felt good about myself. Everyone knew the difference. I was an educator, I made an impact in these people's lives and taught them an important lesson in racial knowledge.

Enter the high school years. During my first month or two I met a Black American girl who I ended up being really tight with who said "oh yeah I have Indian in my family". I was thoroughly excited. Finally I met someone like me or even a little bit like me, there was a connection to my roots. I was wrong. So very wrong. It took me more than a few minutes of conversation about the Indians in her family due to my overconfidence in people's knowledge of my race (red flags were Cherokee and tribe) before I realized she was speaking of the Native People. That's when I realized I'd come across a whole new group that required my teachings - the southern Black American who doesn't understand the difference between East Indian and Native American. Now I'm not saying this girl was ignorant, she, in particular was confident that Native Americans refer to themselves as Indians. I couldn't dispute that since I hadn't met any Native Ppl and she had Cherokee or Apache or what have you in her faaaaamily. There was a character on the Real World who was Native American and she definitely referred to herself as Indian. Again, angering me, overturning all my teachings and preachings. And after tons of times receiving the question "what tribe are you" after answering the initial question of "what are you" and responding with "indian", I threw my hands up in the air and just gave up. But, in retrospect, it's crazy to see how far America has come in the last 15 years. 15 years ago I'd get that tribe question a few times a year or more. I can't remember the last time I (seriously) heard that question.

Basically, I need to meet a Native American, Aboriginal American, etc. I mean I'd say overall, they've been through worse shit than most races so they do have the right to call themselves whatever, but I just want to know what they'd prefer to be referred to as and why. Maybe they really do want to be called Indian - perhaps they were oppressed so much that they'd prefer to associate with some other race/nationality, I don't know.

Inventions (b/c I'm creative like that)

2009-05-08T19:11:00.001-07:00

I am full of ideas. None of them ever come into fruition but I figured I'd share my numero uno ingenious invention on here and on the off chance that a billionaire investor reads this and wants to get down, then he/she will know how to get in touch with me :-)

The Adult Stroller: I thought this one up when my boy Ker had knee surgery and every time we went anywhere, it would take us 5 minutes to get down a flight of stairs, 10 minutes to get up - granny style for real, son. So bein that my boy is not geriatric, not disabled (just injured), a wheelchair seemed inappropriate.

Enter the Adult Stroller (insert little "r" or "tm" trademark symbol here). The Adult Stroller would be equipped with a cupholder for your soda, mojito, corona or what have you. The "lean" on it would be quite similar to the reclined position on a stroller. You can accessorize, put some spinners on your stroller or be a bit more conservative and go with the standard chrome stroller rims.
*the 1 drawback: gotta always have someone pushing you around. But, if you're a g, you'll always have ppl wanting to take you places.

** So as to not offend the disabled, I'm leaving off a graphic for this post. You understand right? Thanks.

How Riff Raff Influences Us...

2009-04-27T15:24:00.001-07:00

So my friend Crystal has gotten me thinking about Riff Raff lately - who they are, where they come from, what's riffish behavior, the nature/nurture debate of the Riffish/Raffish, etc. She's detailed much about the concept on her blog at http://forthepeoplenotofthepeople.com/ along with other compelling posts.

Now given the fact that I don't deal with Riff Raff as much - Riff Raff being trifling people basically, for those who don't know the definition. Oh, trifling being "troublesome, low-class, those who seem to constantly display inappropriate behaviors", for those who don't know that definition. Anyways, since I drive around in my car and don't spend as much time in the city, my contact has been limited lately.

However, this weekend I returned to my old home, NYC, quite possibly the biggest stomping ground for all those Riffish. One question that's come up to me is the sense of entitlement that Riff Raff have. For instance, a lady sat down on a park bench next to me and asked every other person who walked by with their dogs to stop so she could take a picture. And keep in mind, there was a ton of pedestrian traffic on what was probably the first weekend of great weather this year. I would never think to do that unless I was maybe drunk. One, it's annoying, two, it's just weird. She's like "okay now just the dog please, can you move your baby and the stroller out of the picture, thanks".

When I was younger growing up in small city, VA, I was immersed in Riff Raff. At first, I was really friendly until I realized the sense of entitlement they showed towards me as if they were better than me. Pretty soon, I was mirroring that entitlement right back to them, because Riff Raff was not gonna get one over on me.

And I got to thinking (especially about the dog photographer raff), don't we all have a little bit of Riff Raff in us, when we let our inhibitions go? Is it that Riff Raff just have no inhibitions? Granted they probably have no ambition either but can Riff Raff be trained? Can the right amount of Riff Raff be a sign of confidence and part of one's uniqueness? Maybe not. But I do see the Riffishness in all of us...

For instance, I'm riffish in the sense that I might take a drink with me to go from a bar/club if no one's looking and I'm just not done with it. However, I'd never wear something and return it. Ever. And I'm sure people less riffish than me have done that at least once.

Fish-Induced Mercury Poisoning: Fact or Myth

2009-04-15T15:21:00.000-07:00

For the last 3 months, I've been eating about 6 oz. of fish at least 5 times a week. I'd heard that pregnant women and children weren't supposed to eat more than 6 oz. of fish per week, in particular swordfish or albacore tuna. My fish guy at Balducci's insisted that this was a myth and threw out a bunch of numbers to prove it. I'm like okay, guy just wrap up my swordfish and lets keep it movin.

Then I decided to do some research. It all seems pretty inconclusive. If I were to eat sushi twice a day, would I get mercury poisoning like Jeremy Piven (Ari from Entourage) got? Was he lying? Am I at risk?

I figure I should eat fish because it's brain food, they say. Plus the omega-3 fatty acids are good for my heart. So far, I've read that tuna is the only at-risk fish in large quantities. But if eating fish more than once a week is detrimental to the pregnant and young, then how is it okay for everyone else to just eat however much they want?

Ugh, its time like these when I wish moderation was one of my strengths. I am ON sushi-grade white tuna, salmon, snapper and yellowtail, and cooked sea bass, tilapia and swordfish right now and I'm not quitting until I feel some mercury poisoning symptoms

* Impairment of the peripheral vision
* Disturbances in sensations ("pins and needles" feelings, numbness) usually in the hands feet and sometimes around the mouth

* Lack of coordination of movements, such as writing
* Impairment of speech, hearing, walking;
* Muscle weakness
* Skin rashes
* Mood swing
* Memory loss
* Mental disturbance

Grüner Veltliner Wines

2009-04-14T15:46:00.000-07:00

I'm currently obsessed with Grüner Veltiner wines. I thought this excerpt from Wikipedia was interesting since all I knew about Grüner was that it was Austrian and good:

Grüner Veltliner is a a varitey of white wine grape widely grown primarily in Austria and widely also in the Czech Republic, but almost nowhere else. It has a reputation of being a particularly food-friendly wine – notably, it is the classic pairing for the otherwise hard-to-pair asparagus

Of course, I love asparagus so I will definitely try to prepare a swordfish/seabass and asparagus dinner in the near future.

I like them because of the few that I've tried, they're not sweet, they're dry and medium bodied and have nice acidities. I'm not sure how different these are from winery to winery, however, most are in a pretty affordable price range ($10 to $13) each. Look for the Austrian flag on the bottle cap (pictured above).

What Peeves Me

2009-04-09T20:57:00.000-07:00

The quickest ways to annoy me, delete you, or simply curse you out:

1) Road etiquette: I hate hate hate when I let someone pull out onto the street/road in front of me and they don't wave in gratitude. First of all, if you're from up north, you may say this is preposterous. That's b/c you fend for yourselves up there and you'll never experience what common courtesy that I consider mandatory. Mostly I begrudgingly let ppl out in front of me and if they thank me, then all is well and even. And sometimes if I'm in a good mood, it may not even be begrudgingly. Anyways, when I do let a person in who doesn't wave in gratitude, I wonder what kind of person they can be? Who does that?

2) Playing the victim: You all know ppl who do this. Self-explanatory. Though most are quite skilled at it, making it so frustrating to out one of these ppl.

3) People who try to have full-blown text conversations. I've been texting since 2000. I'm over it. Only text me if it has to do with evening plans, money you owe me, or going to get sushi for lunch/snack/dinner.

4) Office cube environments: This place is just brewing with annoying situations. You get mad at yourself for minimizing when a person who's not senior walks by, but you do it out of habit and then think that it incriminates you as if you're always surfing. Then you get paranoid when the boss walks by and you don't get a chance to minimize while you're surfing. *sigh* I miss my office with a door.

(s)wag more. bark less.

2009-04-07T15:38:00.000-07:00

Awwww Labradoodles..

I am an avid dog lover. Big dogs, small dogs, ugly dogs, cute dogs, I love them all! But I have narrowed it down to my top 2 faves: Labradoodle/Goldendoodle. Because anything mixed with Poodle has a good chance of not shedding and being hypoallergenic, the Doodles are a great choice.

Mixing in the poodle also helps with a better smelling dog - I've been around some stinky Labs/Goldens. Also, full Poodles are super smart - so I figure mixing in the Lab and Golden would dumb it down some so it wouldn't try to trick me since Poodles can be a little conniving I've heard. And full Poodles tend to act a little snobbish. I don't want my dog acting more elite than me.

The Golden Doodle is on the come up I'm sure (saw one in DC the other day) and ridiculously adorable (see pic below) but I haven't heard much about them yet..

Owners of Labradoodles: Tiger Woods, Joe Biden, Jennifer Anison and next up, me! (like 20 years from now...)

Golden-Doodle

Random Thought: VW Bugs & Their Stupid Flowers

2009-04-04T21:01:00.000-07:00

Why is it that every VW Bug still has that stupid flower arrangement in the dash? I mean on the off chance that my swag would utterly and completely escape me and I got a VW Bug, there is NO chance I'd roll around with some plastic flower arrangement that I could get at a Tuesday Morning or Marshalls. I can understand maybe keepin it for a year but that's it.

VW - come up with something else if you want to have some "innovative" obnoxious new sh*t b/c this is just old at this stage and in fact, it's lame. Perhaps it was cool 5 yrs ago but if there is such a thing as an upgrade in these troubled economic times, go ahead and make a move and change. Get with the program..

Hip-Hop Hiatus

2009-04-02T17:54:00.000-07:00

So, everyone who knows me knows I am a hip-hop head. Or was. Lately I've been thinking about hip-hop (& R&B) music, where it's headed, how far it's come, and how I'm just done with it...for the time being.

How did the demise start and who's to blame, you ask? I start with the widely diverse hip-hop stations of the DMV. How many times daily do I have to hear Ne-Yo "Mad at You", Soulja Boy "Kiss me through the Phone" and Beyonce"Halo"? You get my point - where's the hip-hop (I guess R&B is around but it's obviously sub-par, who can deny it)?

Second contributor to the demise (but bridge to discovery of new music), my Pandora station. Created Pandora stations with all my fave hip-hop artists, Kanye, Nas, Jay, Jeezy, Lupe Fiasco, etc. I get a little bit of Tribe thrown in, some classic Wu and Jay-Z but it all eventually returns to the usual heavy rotation radio riff raff (thanks to Crys for my new favorite word).

So on a whim, I created some stations and came across new genres I'd never considered - Electronica, Alternative. Artists like Santogold, Lykke Li, MGMT, hell even Lady Gaga, if you want to call that pop, then fine, pop too. It's all really refreshing right now.

There is sooo much out there besides Hip-Hop. And this stuff is the future of hip-hop as far as I'm concerned. All the latest alternative and electronica has hip-hop peppered into the production anyways.

Furthermore, it's hip-hop artists that are enabling the segue into other genres anyways. Listen to Toronto rapper Drake's debut album, So Far So Gone and you'll understand. Kanye's 808's and Heartbreak is another one. This IS the future of hip-hop at this stage. It all started with the collaborations and ended with a complete genre switch (at least for me and for now). I wouldn't be mad if some classic-ish hip-hop breaks out on the scene right now, in fact I'd love for it to, but until then, who's to put hip-hop in a box anyways, classic, new-age, whatever?? I'm good with my new music for now...

Indians and Spelling

2008-07-15T14:08:00.000-07:00

Sooo, having applied to grad school more than once over the last 7 years or so, the useless GRE vocabulary words that I studied actually have stuck with me and now I can attempt to utilize them for the sole purpose of establishing a sense of eliteness through my bloggery. Feel like you're at a loss for words? Watch Akeelah and the Bee.

But seriously, how about my people and their undeniable talent for spelling. I mean damn, case in point is me. Two time local spelling bee champ. Except unlike the nerds that you see on the Scripps Spelling Bee on television every year, I'm a g.

Ultimately it does have to do with the parents. Education was the number one focus in the household I grew up in, but my parents were also liberal and supportive. Sometimes I wonder what the level of pressure is for the young Indian-Americans who win the Scripps Bee every year. Although I never at any point felt pressured by my parents to make good grades, I had the inherent desire to be successful academically. I have a feeling most Indian parents are fairly chill although for the future, i.e. me as a mother, it's gonna be tough for me. Groundings, spankings, all of that, most likely. Kids are riff raff these days.

How can any kid be extremely successful academically without the overall inherent desire? It's just not possible. I suppose, for these kids, this extreme academic prowess is their swag. And I'm not mad, for a prize similar to something like your whole 4 yrs tuition paid to whichever college your smart ass chooses to attend, yeah, they're a g for that...Social skills can be learned. Swag is optional (for most).