Be Thankful You Live Elsewhere, If You Do

This time of year, when it is blazingly hot everywhere else in the country, non-Bay-Arears (??) turn westward to vacation and salivate over our perfect 72 degrees, clear as chrystal days. But if you need any reason to appreciate your own humid, nay, fetid, hometown, then look no further.

First of all, check out Rangelife's riff on SF business owner Amanda Cotten. (Thanks Missoula).

Next, follow me over to the Recommendations Wanted posting from the Berkeley Parents Network for these gems:

Eco-friendly Shelf Liner: We just remodeled our kitchen and need shelf liners to protect our newly painted shelves from heavy pots. I've just read that the heavy plastic liners off-gas a lot, so I'm looking for an alternative. Any suggestions? I'd rather have something removable (not contact paper). Thanks!

You live in a toxic stew of Bay Area car emissions and Berkeley patchouli body odor and you are worried about your f***ing shelf liner?? Also, is "off-gas" a f***ing word??

Fresh milk in Berkeley or surrounding area??: We are a vegan family (mostly—we do sometimes eat eggs from a friend’s chickens) with a 20 month old who is soon to be weaned off breast milk. We’re thinking that we may start adding milk to her diet (probably goat or sheep, but we’re open to cow) when we stop feeding her breast milk if we can find a well treated local animal to milk, or to have milked. Does anyone have any suggestions? We live in South Berkeley.

You are going to milk this goat, SHEEP, or cow by HAND????

Sunscreen for seriously rashy baby: My 10 month old is very rashy and every sunscreen I've tried so far is a no-go. I've read what's on the website, and I've tried Banana Boat and also California Baby. I'm sure there's one out there that will work, but they're so expensive, I don't want to spend hundreds of dollars on tubes of things I'll never use. What works for a very rashy baby, other than a hat and an umbrella?

Do you, or do you not, want to your child to get sunburned?? Cheap bastard.

Okay, I will stop with the foul-mouthed Andy Rooney routine and go back to meditating in preparation for my silent water birth.