I am an artificial friend.

Plank Pulling is a little thing we do every Thursday around here. The one day a week that we strongly resolve to ignore the multitude of specks and sawdust around us and pull one bona fide plank from our own eye. Matthew 7:3-5 style.  It’s intimidating and it’s embarrassing and it’s humbling and it’s therapeutic all rolled into one.

I'm kinda amazed at my group of friends.  They are some amazing women!  But it is amazing that they count me a friend at all.

See - I'm artificial.

And they know it.

Let me explain; most of my closest  friends are nature loving, tree hugging, organic,  home making, from-scratching, kombucha drinking friends.

And I have at least one set of "America sucks and so does the American church" dreads wearing hippies. (Hi! Hippy friends!*wave*)

And I'm not.

And I'm patriotic.  I tear up at 4th of July parades.  At patriotic songs, too.  (again, Hi, Hippy friends! Love you!)

Now, I appreciate nature, beauty, and doing good for the the ecosystem - Nevertheless, I prefer nature walks with trails, Camp sites with hot showers, indoor plumbing (LOVE indoor plumbing) foods made with fresh/organic ingredients that *someone else* grew.  I like my chickens already plucked  and packaged.

And I like hot dogs.  No matter the ingredients, what is ground up and in a hot dog never tasted so good.  And Twinkies.  I like Twinkies.

A few days ago I went to visit one of said friends who has here own chickens, and they were going to . . I don't know, *Something* with the chickens and the kids were telling me how much it stank.  "But, OH!" my friend said "You get fresh eggs every.day!" . .

To me the pay off is not worth it.  Not with cows, not with chickens, not with a major garden.

I might try growing a small herb garden.

As for environmentally healthy living - again, I can appreciate it.  But I really don't hold much hope of anything getting better.  I *do* believe that Jesus is coming back soon, and maybe the elimination of the ozone would be one of the major things that is spoken of in the Bible when the end is upon us.  So I won't say that all the disaster senarios environmentalist are dreading wont happen.  . .

Don't worry world, I don't just throw plastic bags out our car window while driving.  When at the beach I make sure to gather all my garbage and place it in it's proper receptacle, and I will buy "green" stuff if it's there at a good price.  But if it cost more to live better, I'll just die. Thankyouverymuch.

An optimistic cynic.  That's me.

When my friends talk to me about organic food, I can't jump on the bandwagon to believe it's better - Pesticides were created for a reason, and I am not buying that it was for population control.

That's what lick-able stamps were for.

If it's canned, packaged, instant, or boxed, it's OK by me.  I like preservatives that help the food I buy not spoil so fast and I'm willing to live with the consequences of hormones in my oranges that make them HUGE!

And with that last paragraph I'll probably have to go into witness protection program . . . .

Really - I love my peeps!  I can appreciate all they do and why.  Amazed they tolerate me.

But I only got the urge to drink kombucha *once*