Monthly Archives: March 2024

a day for flying monkeys

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It’s flying monkey day today.


🙈 🙊🙉🐵

I am a mostly lapsed Catholic because I have my faith but I don’t have faith in the American Catholic Church a lot of the time, but there are things that I observe like the quiet hours on Good Friday. Noon until 3 PM are known to Catholics as the hours of agony when Jesus was on the cross. During this time you are supposed to hold silence in your home. This is just one of those things I remember from being a kid because my mother did it.

So a little while ago, I started playing catch-up with emails and other things I had missed during my time out, and I have found myself nailed to the Internet cross of social media once again. I know I’m not particularly upset, it just kind of “is” at this point.

So now I am sitting here on Good Friday wondering out of curiosity as to why these random women feel it’s there place to judge me for my opinions on my blog or blog’s Facebook page?

The funny thing is the flying monkey squad used to be mainly Klanned Karenhood and their enuchs, but apparently blanket female disapproval is branching out.

Look I could sit here and internet psychoanalyze why adult women can’t support differences in each other’s opinions, but why bother?

I did, however, find some helpful YouTube videos about what flying monkeys are, that are out there courtesy of licensed psychologists. Here’s one video:

We live in a world where if your opinion or my opinion or anyone else’s opinion differs from someone else’s comfort level, you are a bad person.

Well guess what? Having an opposite opinion doesn’t make someone else bad, it just makes them different.

Do these women like being flying monkeys? Are they really that ignorant?

My mental health which was thrown into the verbal salsa of Facebook disapproval today, is also rather good. I am not ever going to claim perfection, because who is perfect? But bless their hearts for asking and ironically sticking their noses in (their words), but if I am such a horrible person why are they on my blog’s Facebook page? Why do they care about what I think? Is it because anyone who doesn’t share their limited world view makes them uncomfortable? Or is it because they think gaslighting me will ingratiate them with someone they are desperate to impress?

I don’t know what makes these women tick and after pondering the subject, I don’t really care, but the reality is the curiosity of why are they show up just to tell me how horrible I am when they can live happily in their own bubble elsewhere?

I may never know the answer. But I do not actually need to know the answer. But I do know that I will never be a flying monkey.

Happy Easter.

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.

Matthew 7:7

my inner foodie awakens…

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My husband is always finding cool food things for me to try. And I am very excited about the package that arrived today from American Vinegar Works in Massachusetts!

Here is their story:

Modern vinegar production has come a long way. In our opinion, it has come a little too far. Even ‘premium’ labeled vinegars are often produced at an industrial scale that short-cuts the fermentation process to hours instead of the needed months or years. While the bottle may be pretty, often the end result is a one-note vinegar lacking depth of flavor and overwhelmingly acidic.

We have gone a different way. We have embraced the value of time and revived a production method from the early 1800s to create vinegars that are naturally fermented and deliver complex flavors. All of our vinegars are produced, aged and bottled by us in our vinegar works here in the Bay State. No outsourcing, no co-packing, no short cuts. It takes more effort, it takes more time… but the results are brilliant.

How We Make Our Vinegar

Our process is really unique and we believe it produces the best small-batch American vinegars you will find.

We know we are unique because we literally had to custom rebuild the machines we use by consulting historical records and partnering with local universities. The old academic etching you see at the top of this page is a graphic of how our machines looked when they were invented.

Our fermentation process dates from the early 1800s and this was how many quality vinegars were made centuries ago. The problem is that there was a wave of ‘innovation’ in vinegar manufacturing in the 1900s and this led to faster and cheaper vinegar. You will notice that I did not say it led to better tasting vinegar—in fact quality and flavor both suffered materially and this is how vinegar became the one-note acid bomb we now find in most supermarkets.

Our vinegars are fermented in small-batches and take two to three months just to ferment. After fermentation we age our vinegars for up to one year. Our aging process varies depending on the flavor profile we are looking to achieve. The vast majority of our vinegars are aged in 25-gallon American oak barrels previously used to make rye whiskey and bourbon. Aging in old barrels gives our vinegars complexity but does not add a woody or whiskey flavor. We source all these barrels directly from a craft distillery from our neighbors in New York.

What about ingredients? We only use quality American beers, wines, ciders, and sakes as our alcohol base to ferment our vinegars at our vinegar works in New England. Why? Because the taste of the underlying alcohol used directly impacts the flavor of the vinegar. Beyond that we are focused on creating great vinegars with a sense of place. We do not think there is something better or worse about an American wine or beer versus one from Europe for instance. We do, however, think it is important for real food like our vinegars to reflect where it comes from. In this way American Vinegar Works is building great vinegars on the shoulders of the craftspeople that are creating great and uniquely American wines, beers, sakes, and ciders. We are immeasurably grateful to them.

To find the right beer or wine for our vinegars we go through an extensive taste and test process to ensure it has the best taste profile. 

~ American Vinegar Works

I’m very excited to try these. I will let you know what I think.

Another thing in this independent company’s favor? They sent a thank you note with the order. A little hand written note. Little touches like that make all the difference when you’re dealing with a company.

And here I thought The most exciting food part of my day was making dinner with Vadouvan French Masala Curry!

New York Times review

neighbors file suit against philadelphia to try to keep f.d.r. park a natural space.

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I had not been to FDR Park before the Philadelphia Flower Show self-located there a couple of years ago now. And I have to be honest, that park made it a better flower show. After all, it was outdoors the way flower shows are supposed to be. I found the park to be amazing and interesting and home to quite the array of flora and fauna.

But of course, the City of Philadelphia seems to not be able to get out of their own way and want to create a turf field paradise there….which obviously would destroy the nature of it all. Turf fields are toxic in my humble opinion. Apparently some neighbors and Philadelphia residents also have that opinion because they have retained West Chester Attorney Sam Stretton and filed suit yesterday.

FDR-Park-suitDownload

Here is what I have seen about this:

Ban turf fields in Philadelphia parks | Editorial Philadelphia Inquirer

by The Editorial Board

Published Mar. 21, 2024, 5:30 a.m. ET

Philadelphia Inquirer: City officials believed a new South Philly turf field was PFAS-free. Not true, experts say.

by David Gambacorta and Barbara Laker
Updated Feb. 23, 2024, 11:52 a.m. ET
Published Feb. 23, 2024, 5:00 a.m. ET

Here’s a novel idea for Filthadelphia: clean up the streets. That means trash, potholes, broken sidewalks, the smell of human urine. Clean up crime. Clean up Fairmount Park and other parks and let them be parks. It’s not a greenspace Madam Mayor if it’s artificial turf. It’s just colored green and smells like plastic. I have to be honest that I am shocked that even from a fiscal aspect that the City of Philadelphia would even think of spending crazy money to in effect, destroy a park, can’t you agree?

almost inconceivable: francis scott key bridge collapses in baltimore

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Woke up to the news of a major bridge collapse: the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse in Baltimore which spans the Patapsco River. I thought I misheard when I turned on the news.

Found this on Facebook- this view no longer exists.

You don’t think of a disaster like this happening today. And that bridge was opened in 1977. I remember when it was opened because we had family friends that lived in Bethesda Maryland and we would go down there often. We didn’t take this bridge, but I remember when it opened.

Click here for Washington Post coverage.

A giant container ship hit it. If you watch the video, it crumbled like it was made of Legos or some kid’s building set.

I will close with the history of the bridge posted by the Thomas Stone National Historic Site this morning on Facebook :

Note: On Tuesday, March 26, 2024, which was 2 1/2 days after this post was first made, the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed after being struck by a cargo ship. Below is the original post.

On March 23, 1977, the four-lane Francis Scott Key Bridge opened to traffic and is named for the author of the Star-Spangled Banner. The 1.6-mile bridge extended across the Baltimore Harbor and connected Sollers Point in Baltimore County with Hawkins Point in Baltimore City. This was also the final link in establishing the 52-mile Baltimore Beltway (Interstate 695).

By the early 1960s, the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel (Interstate 895), the first crossing of Baltimore’s Harbor, had reached its traffic capacity, and motorists encountered heavy congestion and delays almost daily during rush hours. The State Roads Commission, predecessor of the Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA), concluded there was a need for a second harbor crossing.

Construction on the Francis Scott Key Bridge began in 1972. Including its connecting approaches, the bridge project was 10.9 miles in length. Other structures along the thruway include a .64-mile dual-span drawbridge over Curtis Creek and two .74-mile parallel bridge structures that carry traffic over Bear Creek, near Bethlehem Steel’s Sparrows Point plant.

Image description: Aerial color photograph of a large bridge over water.
Image text: Maryland’s Historic Bridges: Francis Scott Key Bridge

Image source: Maryland Transportation Authority, #FSK_Deck_Construction_Aerial1, Photo taken in 1976 or 1977.

Thomas Stone National Historic Site

  • 6655 Rose Hill Road, Port Tobacco, MD, 20677
  • As of Sunday, December 24, 2023, Thomas Stone National Historic Site is closed for the season, and it will tentatively reopen in the spring of 2024.
  • 804-227-1732, extension 227
  • GEWA_THST_Information@nps.gov
MDArchitecutre #MarylandArchitecture #MDHistory #MarylandHistory #CentralMD #CentralMaryland #OTD #OnThisDay #TodayinHistory #OnThisDate

litterbug landscaper

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It’s bad enough when it says no solicitation at the edge of your driveway and you get solicited anyway. And passive aggressive leaving crap on your driveway is still solicitation.

So this landscaper doesn’t want to pay for stamps to send out a mailing, or take the time to put flyers in mailboxes, so he is filling little baggies with rocks and putting a flyer in it and just tossing them out a car or truck window. I picked up three that were just in the middle of our street.

Littering drives me crazy. It’s bad enough that I see it regularly blowing through that I have to clean up, but to have someone essentially litter as a form of solicitation? Makes me really irritated.

Don’t be like these people.

Please.

more deterioration at joseph price house

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Someone sent me a photo today that I have cropped in so you can see the additional damage going on to the poor historic Joseph Price house located on South Whitford and Clover Mill Road in Exton, West Whiteland.

I don’t understand the absentee landlords of this historic property because I know there has been interest in people buying it for restoration and they just keep hanging onto it and letting it fall apart.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got I just wanted people to see that it’s continuing to be a demolition by neglect situation.

joseph price house in west whiteland 2024

face palm moment potential?

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$657,000 for FarmerJawn and Friends Foundation Fund to revitalize a barn and create a hydroponic agriculture facility for innovative agricultural practices 

I wrote about this a few days ago and I don’t think anybody paid attention to it. But then the email came out today and as a constituent of Congresswoman Houlahan, I received an email announcing who got grants in the area.

funding? no funding? who keeps tabs on funding if granted?

So she has gotten over $650,000 in a grant on a farm where she technically really can’t farm yet because it’s not lain fallow enough to be organic, right? And she doesn’t own the barn she’s getting the grant for The Westtown School does, so that makes it technically their property, so why didn’t they fill out the grant forms? After all, they are a nonprofit with a track record and form 990s etc. aren’t they? Does she now have organic status?

Please note the address in the letter above for the Farmer Jawn Friends and Foundation Fund. 6730 Germantown Avenue Philadelphia, PA 19119.

What is the problem with that address? She doesn’t rent that location anymore it’s a spa. Not affiliated with her because I called and asked. And the lady who answered the phone, remarked that she had returned mail addressed to that entity to the senders.

How can a person who has yet to truly farm on land that is leased or rented but has to lie fallow for a couple of more years in order to get organic certification get this kind of coin now? That is life changing money for a farmer. But this woman doesn’t have a track record although she has loads of media sound bytes , so how can she get such a large amount of money?

She has gotten other money before.

Look if she ends up being the real deal, I will apologize. But now all I see are lots of questions and my big thing is, how can someone who hasn’t actually farmed yet where they are, and doesn’t own the land, and the land is owned actually by another nonprofit apply for such a big grant and get it?

And at the end of the day, the address and stuff used for the grant application and for this nonprofit arm of her concept, goes to an address where she no longer has a lease, so how does that work?

I will note again that you don’t have to like my questions or my opinion but it’s not illegal. As taxpayers ultimately we pay for these government grants, so I think we deserve to have answers.

So many questions, so many questions.

‘The aggregate of it all is amazing’: FarmerJawn’s Christa Barfield on growing an urban farming business

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/03/20/pennsylvania-young-farmers-00147753

wake up tredyffrin, wake up.

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985 Mount Pleasant Ave in Tredyffrin Township, Chester County is far away from Tredyffrin’s Township administration building that Township Manager Bill Martin needs reminding that Tredyffrin has a responsibility to not only the 24/7/365 residents but in fact also to the college students living there, right?

So answer me this Tredyffrin: when is the last time this house now known as Villa Blue Tarp was inspected?

Why do I ask about this? Simple, once upon a time there was a big old yellow Victorian house on the corner of Booth Lane and Old Lancaster Road in Haverford in Lower Merion Township that was an off campus house even when I was in high school.

Originally the house was an off-campus house for rugby players. Then flash forward to late 90s/early 2000s and it became a duplex. We were never really sure if the duplex was done legally but it was done and it was two living units and still student slumlord housing.

It was a really tough party house to live in a neighborhood with. You would wake up and they would have 20 cars on their lawn plus additional cars on surrounding lawns. Trash, beer bottles and cans, etc. and they would keep you up until all hours, and they would sleep it off the next day. We all had to get up and go to work, get the kids to school, etc.

The police would come often enough, and truthfully, Lower Merion Township did not ignore calls from neighbors when the parties were too loud. But it was still a grandfathered off campus student rental.

Then, one day in November, right before Thanksgiving, the then slumlord landlord of that house at 20 Booth Lane called in an inexpensive roofer for some sort of repairs. It was a breezy/windy day and the roof caught fire. In a very short amount of time the upper floors of the house were completely engulfed.

I still remember the photo that was front and center in Main Line Media News. It is an amazing photo and was taken by Pete Bannan. A firefighter in the middle of the flames. Neighbors were so scared that day as firefighters battled flames because we were afraid embers would jump to neighboring roofs.

All of the college students from Villanova who lived in both halves of the duplex were absolutely obnoxious to residents but they lost everything that day. They were mostly seniors and they lost all of their belongings and college memories.

So it makes you wonder about the condition of off campus college rentals, doesn’t it?

If you have ever had a kid in college and you have had to pay for off-campus student housing, you know how these landlords gouge. For what they charge in rent it should be the Taj Mahal but it’s not. Maybe to a college student it’s the Taj Mahal because it’s their place, but usually pretty much overpriced dumps.

Bill Martin who is the manager of Tredyffrin, came from Radnor Township where he was an assistant manager, right? So he was familiar with how municipalities should keep an eye on off-campus student housing, right? But Mr. Martin came to this area from New York via Villanova University correct? So does he have a soft spot for Villanova off-campus student housing? It’s a valid concern, isn’t it?

MAIN LINE BANTER: Meet Tredyffrin Township Manager Bill Martin

Now Mr. Martin loves Tredyffrin and apparently lives in Tredyffrin, so I would find it hard to believe that he is not aware of the problems, faced by the residents of Mount Pleasant when it comes to off-campus student housing. and that includes when he was at Radnor Township, which tightened up the student housing ordinance around 2010, and he didn’t go to Bridgeport Borough until 2011, and then to Tredyffrin in 2012.

Housing issue resolved in Tredyffrin

Tredyffrin didn’t have a student housing ordinance until 2010. I remember because I had friends in more than one area of that township plagued by off campus student houses. It wasn’t just Mount Pleasant. I remember a couple of neighborhoods off of Old Eagle School Road, for example.

Tredyffrin board hears college-housing concerns

There were a lot of meetings packed to the gills about this issue, because true different was initially so reticent to add a student housing ordinance. One of the people affected by an off-campus student house, popping up with someone I’ve known since I was a kid. And pretty much after the student housing ordinance was passed they sold their house and moved out of Tredyffrin. Upscale neighborhood with lovely gardens and backyard pools, but they wanted to be someplace on the Main Line where their investment in their home mattered.

Mt. Pleasant Neighborhood. . . How Can We Help?

Bill Martin and the Supervisors in Tredyffrin? It’s well past time to wake up and stop pretending there’s not a problem with this house and other off-campus student rentals. If you were elected or hired, it doesn’t really matter, Tredyffrin owes her residents more.

Do residents need to start packing meetings again? Probably. Especially from Mount Pleasant which although incredibly historic an area, has been utterly disenfranchised by Tredyffrin for more years than not.

We are Standing With the Volunteer Firefighters, Can We Show Support for the Mt. Pleasant Community?

How many years do people have to ask for Tredyffrin to take off the blinders?

Oh and back to 985 Mount Pleasant. It went from individual to entity holding but is it really a new owner?

Wake up Bill Martin and Tredyffrin Supervisors, just wake up and remember WHY you are all there.

dear residents of mount pleasant in tredyffrin’s panhandle

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Dear beleaguered 24/7/365 residents of Mount Pleasant in the panhandle of Tredyffrin Township,

We all know how much you have to put up with year after with Villa Blue Tarp at 985 Mount Pleasant Avenue in Wayne, PA.

With the onset of more pleasant weather comes another busy kegger season, right? You need to keep calling Tredyffrin Township Police Department. They might not like responding but it is their job right? When you call them please start to document with whom you spoke, the date, the time, and what they say.

Neighbors DO have a legal right to a reasonable expectation of quiet enjoyment that does NOT include male and female public urination and intoxication and vomiting, ridiculous noise etc. you have a right to not worry every time a child is outside playing in the neighborhood when these events occur.

When you call the police, you also need to contact Tredyffrin in writing.

Here are helpful email addresses:

BOS@tredyffrin.org

tredyffrin@tredyffrin.org

police@tredyffrin.org

You will note that Tredyffrin wants NO ONE to have individual email addresses.

You can also file right to know requests on these party house problems. Tredyffrin probably has a form, but here is the email address:

RTK@tredyffrin.org

Anonymous Tip Form

Tredyffrin Township Website

Call Tredyffrin Township at 610-644-1400

Police Dispatch Number:
610-647-1440

Also you sadly need to return to Tredyffrin Township Supervisor Meetings. Even if they have an online and in person option, your best option is going in person and speaking politely at public comment.

You have a legal right to be heard.

You have a legal right to ask questions.

You have a legal right to ask these supervisors to quit contemplating their navels and help you.

And politicians HATE packed board rooms.

And if these supervisors don’t start to help you, every election you vote them out until it’s a new board. But choose your elected officials by their ability to be good on the most local of levels. At this level, it’s less about political party and more about they live among you and should be able to help.

These are your supervisors:

Anyway, I hope this information is helpful to residents.

spelling is key…on township signs

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I figured everybody could use a giggle. I’m sorry if it’s at Willistown‘s expense but it is pretty funny.

You will note with this sign that, although people in Willistown know how to spell the word rooster at the township, they don’t know how to spell recycling.

It’s not RECYCLEING!

That gets a FFS dear old Willistown. But hey, it’s a busy time.

But there are things that Willistown needs to do in order to come up with the times.

Like take for example, whatever the work is being done in the boardroom and right now meetings are being held elsewhere off site, and no meetings are being recorded. That is not sunshine friendly. They could have someone recording the meetings and uploading them free to a YouTube channel but instead, Willistown wants to revert to form and make people think they have something to hide.

Please note, I am not specifically saying they are hiding anything, but I am saying they are taking full advantage of not having to record meetings.

Now we’re going to go back to ordinances that haven’t happened and zoning where the cuffs don’t ever match the collar so to speak.

One of the biggest flaws that Willistown has other than the sewer rats, who are incredibly rude at meetings, is the fact that they leave themselves as a township wide open to so many things, because there are problems with their zoning. If zoning doesn’t align with the Municipalities Planning Code of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania it can and will get overturned if challenged.

Or take for example, if there is no ordinance for something like noisy roosters in 100% residential neighborhoods. Even if a judge said in the past that someone shouldn’t get another rooster, it doesn’t really matter a hill of stinky goat manure, because the zoning and ordinances, in Willistown say nothing.

If you go to one Willistown neighborhood, there are a lot of unhappy neighbors who avoid one neighbor in particular. And that neighbor has who knows how many goats at this point, two donkeys that should NOT be grandfathered to anything, countless chickens, and a rooster as loud and obnoxious as their owner. And an absolutely beauteous manure pile. It’s Fred Sanford designing for the Clampetts. Basically it’s like farm animal hoarding. And yes, that is an opinion, and it is allowed under the first amendment.

Willistown is a beautiful township, but there are neighborhoods that are definitely agricultural-centric and others more residential-centric. Please note flower farms and great agricultural uses like actually growing beautiful crops are so amazing to see. And I love those belted cows, AKA Belted Galloways, and the horses. And I really like goats, but not when they are jammed up in a small space in a residential neighborhood. They aren’t living their best lives and that is grossly unfair.

But all of these things actually occur on farms NOT on residential streets that are all residential houses under 3 acres, in most cases 2 acres. And a conglomeration of shoddy sheds does not a barn make.

Willistown’s zoning guy knows all this. Yet…problems persist. And not just with the eternal circle jerk of roosters. As a matter of fact, one of Willistown‘s greatest flaws is they never quite have really good zoning people. You have seen this historically over the years.

There are two supervisors, whom I think are very nice gentleman. I actually really liked both of them, but I do think (and I say this with respect), that they do need to deal with things like the rooster of it all. And ensuring that meetings are recorded, even when offsite from the township building.

And then there is this whole growing thing about sidewalks again. Willistown has a lot of roads that are not made for sidewalks, and I know there are people who are going to disagree with me and I don’t really give a damn. For example, sidewalks on Sugartown Road and some of the windy and hilly roads like Providence Road are pretty much the dumbest places in the world for sidewalks. And to put sidewalks in front of active farms presents a unique set of liabilities that these farms have to deal with, and I don’t think that’s fair.

And as we have all seen in East Goshen, sidewalk conversations can and have led to eminent domain attempts. Eminent domain does not breed a sense of community. It only breeds a sense of divisiveness.

The other thing about sidewalks that proponents of sidewalks don’t get in Willistown is that once the sidewalks are put in place, the property owner, who has the sidewalk on their property becomes responsible. There is nothing that will change that it’s the basic law of the land. You might be able to dig up grants to put sidewalks in, but once they are in, maintenance on other people and it’s not the municipality unless the sidewalks are in front of the municipal building or police station or fire house.

However, in the meantime, we’ll start with correct spelling on the township sign 🤣