#74 Tour A Farm

I've caught a big case of "Green Guilt". I haven't checked to see if my light bulbs are energy efficitent. My Scion, which gets around 34 mpg, is NOT a hybrid. I have compulsions to go into the trash and rescue aluminum cans. Americans are LAST in getting on the green wagon. Naturally, I want to compensate.

I guess around 20% of Americans also feel green guilt. ive days a week, my cable is set on channel 201, the Planet Green channel, where I am addicted to the show about cool green inventions. There is something super alluring about sustainable farming,

about being a good steward .

So I fed my addiction by touring an organic farm last weekend, located about 50 minutes away. There are many organic farms closer to me, but I visited this one because a group of women were gathering together to learn more about writing. So! The two, writing and farming, was too irrestible.

The "tour bus" is an old tractor

(I confess that I was thinking about how ineficient the old engine was that it might be polluting the air and thus the plants...)

My favorite part of the organic farm was the large section of herbs available to pick. A group of women there were selecting carefully in order to make a tea...a tea! AH! maybe that will be my next task...

#72 Try Rockclimbing or Canyoning

Jumping, scrambling, climbing...in a sinking motion, treking down a rocky cliff. It's a drop, and in Costa Rica, canyoning entails rappelling down waterfalls.




Sure, I considered myself a normal, usually logical, rational PhD psychologist. I face my fears. I seek adventure, experience, a new opportunity. I am not prone to fear.




But fear pounded through each tiny capillary waiting to jump down that first waterfall. I chatted annoyingly in minimal spanish with our guides not to better prepare me, but to elicit all my educational skills of distraction to stop my body's fear of impending doom. Afterall, throwing oneself off the side of a waterfall is NOT NORMAL, people!

Here I am!

I LOVED IT! This experience was the first time (and perhaps that the last time) in a while that I peeds my pants....

just a sprinkle, but it counts!

Can't WAIT to try rockclimbing NEXT!

# 63

Lay in a Hammock!

So, the first hammock I spent all of 5 minutes in (in Carribean) but the second one, wow! Look at the view I captured at 5:15 am one morning. I journaled here and it completely sent my heart in a state of awe. Beginning my days in such a fashion, a moment of centering, of reflection, reminded me again of how to feel beautifully free.

The hammock experience, swinging peacefully, reminded me of this quote:

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, "thank you," that would suffice.-Meister Eckhart

Many Items completed!

"WILD" The word erupts from my mouth carefreely when people ask me how my vacation to Costa Rica went. Because "good," "great" and "awesome," just doesn't do it justice. Why WILD? For one thing, I rappelled down flipping waterfalls, zipped in the air through a rainforest, boated through jungle-river canals, watched a 2-hour process of sea turtles laying eggs, hiked through jungle trail by a dormant volcano (with an ill defined path!), sucked coconut sponge and slurped coconut jelly, and capsized in a lake. I broke my sunglasses, misplaced my beloved Sigg Water Ball in a "soda" (a family run small eatery) waterlogged and ruined my digital camera (from the kayak fall on the lake) and sunburned my head through my cornrows. I met cool people from Belgium, Portugal, Canada, France, Holland, talked a police officer (okay, bribed) out of detaining my traveling partner, got a massage from Juan Carlos, and woke up everyday with the sunrise…Not to mention, I chucked A LOT OF LIFE in this trip! Overlooking my list, I experienced 5 of them within the week (and I began training to complete that crossword by March 31 2010 in airports, on buses, amid boats!)

I ate a quail Egg!

Task #9

Eat a Quail Egg

I've always wanted to eat a quail egg...especially because it seems as if all the gourmet cooking shows that I love, like Top Chef and FoodNetwork Star, seem to pull off simple, yet elegant by adding quail eggs to their creations. So, 6 days into my trip to Costa Rica, a salad popped up on a menu in La Fortuna's Don Rufinos. The salad boasted oranges, nuts, a pomegranite dressing, greens, and these eggs. What exactly is a quail egg?

Well, it is smaller than a chicken egg, and when you pop it in your mouth, it tastes a little sweet....but honestly, a little tasteless. funny, because I heard they have a TON more cholesterol than a regular egg. This one was boiled, so perhaps it would taste different fried...