Florida Chick Does Her Part

I have been completely offline for the last 7 days. I've basically been ignoring all of my friends, family, and responsibilities in order to completely submerge myself into the incredibly addicting world of Edward and Bella. If you have read Twilight you know what I'm talking about...honestly, I thought it was ridiculous that my friends were into vampire stories...until I read it...and ditched my entire life to become involved in their saga.

I did take one break this week...actually, I only had about 50 pages left in Breaking Dawn and I was trying to make it last as long as possible...so I took that opportunity to do my civil duty and go see the movie Earth. Now, most of you know that I fall fairly close to the tree-hugger range of environmental friendliness. I carry my envirobag with me at all times just in case I need to make an emergency trip to the store and God forbid they offer me plastic, and (to the embarrassment of my family) I've been known to pull recycleables out of public garbage cans to bring them home and put in the recycle bin. (Seriously people, stop throwing Gatorade bottles in the trash!) So you can imagine my excitement about this movie...landscape, animals, nature...disturbing animal death scenes. Yes, that's correct, I had to cover Carson's eyes multiple times to keep him from seeing the elephants being mauled to death by the lions and the gazelle being taken down by the cheetah. Yes, I know it's the circle of life and all of that...but I just wasn't prepared to answer my 5 year old's questions about animals dying...really Disney, prepare a parent ahead of time please.

Regardless of the animal deaths, the movie was beautiful. Amazing shots of gorgeous, lush rainforests and rushing rivers made me even more excited to do my part in protecting the Earth. In fact, I was so anxious to do my civil duty that as we left, my friend Maxine and I noticed the bloodmobile in the parking lot and made a last minute decision to continue with our warm fuzzy feelings of helping others and donate blood. Now you have to realize that we had 5 kids with us as well...which turned out alright since the bloodmobile is heavily stocked with snacks (usually for woozy post-donation volunteers, but apparently also for hungry, bored children of civil-minded mothers.) It wasn't actually until I was laying in the chair with a needle in my arm that I began to wonder about the legitimacy of the operation. I mean, honestly, at what point do you just walk into a glorified RV and let them stick a needle in your arm...oh that's right, it comes right after the high of knowing a tree was planted in your honor for attending an eco-friendly movie.

Oh well, it actually turned out to be a legit operation (I think) and I feel a certain sort of pride in knowing that in one day, I cleared some CO2 out of the atmosphere and helped someone who might need blood...which brings me back to Twilight...which I finished Friday night and I think might have contributed to my slight depression all weekend. But no need to fear, I'll snap out of it...I'm starting the series again tomorrow, like they say - reduce, reuse, recycle!