ColumnNeed to look good on Facebook? Ask an editor.

Presenting yourself as the envy of everyone’s Facebook wall comes down to editing (that we’d want to do this is a foregone conclusion). As a colleague said recently, “Editing is the skill of the century.” Your digital life, unedited? So MySpace. This is Facebook, where the savvy Eye of social discernment is a requisite. You’ve got walls. Subscriptions. Integrated tweets. Photo albums. Friends tagging god-knows-what (probably your arm from the fat side). It’s a borg on there, and you’ll need to practice some serious curation of your life to be perceived like-ably. You want the highs to be high, the lows to be slightly less high, and the ex to know your arms are still skinny. As every good editor knows, the product is all in the packaging. Present your life from the most pleasing angle, and don’t forget the witty caption! Here’s how.

Lolcats

IRL: You’ve got guests in town. Your cat cannot handle the den of estrogen that your flat has become and meows – bleats, really – all night long, keeping both you and your guests in the other room miserably half-asleep well into sunrise. The cat settles in for slumber, of course, right at the time you all have to wake up for work on Monday morning. You find yourself wondering if your cat would even notice if you gave it away.

How to Facebook it: Cheezburger it up and put a caption on it. Lol all the way to the likes. Cats are hilarious, always! Suggested captions:

IM IN UR SLEEP, DISRUPTIN UR ZZZ

MEOWS-ON-REPEAT: EVEN MORE ANNOYING THAN DUBSTEP

HOSTESS KITTEH: TEH GUESTS HAZ OVERSTAYED TEH WELCOMEZ

Workaday Wonderful

IRL: You’re stuck in the worst-of-the-worst conference on earth, the kind for corporate types in need of the downlow, or lowdown, on how to do the Twitter. You sneak out of the “You Need a Social Media Strategy!” session with the Arial Powerpoint slides about engagement and channels delivered by the woman decked in menopausal jewelry wearing highwater gabardine trousers. You race to catch the de Kooning exhibit at MoMA for 30 life-giving minutes before heading back in for the rest of the sessions. At the break, you’re fed stale grocery store bagels slathered in Kraft cream cheese, and hi, you are allergic to gluten and also really prefer organic dairy. You’ll have to catch up on all your work that night where you’ll eat string cheese, also not organic, and alternate cans of Illy and Freixenet from the corner deli because you don’t have time to go to dinner. And, you did not bring enough pairs of underwear, because it’s suddenly your time of the month.

How to Facebook it: Snap and post a shot of the de Kooning sign in the lobby (angle: casually askew; interest point: allow single corner pop of color). Prepare for the “You have such a fabulous jet-setting life!” comments. You’ll need that validation to retain consciousness through “Is Your Website Sticky?”

Being Informed

IRL: Your teetering stack of unread New Yorkers threatens to knock a tooth out in your sleep any night now, you’re only halfway into the novel your best friend gave you for Christmas (and neither one of you even celebrates the holidays!), your bookmarks are so clogged you’re getting warning emails from Xmarks, and you still haven’t finished the latest Seth Godin bestseller.

How to Facebook it: Post the Portlandia “Did You Read?” clip below and caption as follows: “Funny because it’s so true!” You need to outsource your reading at this point. You just need to look like you read, except not so much that it looks like your career isn’t on fire.

Dining Out

IRL: The bread is a burnt offering, the hipster waiters do not approve of your lack of facial hair and you’re pretty sure there was just a shooting outside the vintage Ray Ban and ski sweater shop.

How to Facebook it: Just post a picture of the mussels and Cava, cropping out the bread and beards. Appropriate caption: “Just another night of foodie fun in the Mission!” #nofilter (#liar #andyouliveinPacificHeights #byachurch #notthecoolchurch #becausethatsintheMission)

Being Popular and Successful

IRL: No one shows up to your event except your staff and that one weird guy who always comes to your events. Your dad.

How to Facebook it: The bartender and most attractive bar patrons will never notice you’re taking pictures of them and claiming them as your own. Jen, right? She looks like a Jen.

Your Love Life

IRL: You’re being pestered by no less than six suitors you could care less about and the one you want (the cute one, of course) is totes noncommits. Or, you haven’t had sex in over a year and you’re 28 and even your mother who waited until marriage thinks there is something unhealthy about this. Or you’re using Facebook to stalk your ex. When he finally blocks you, you resort to pleading with your friends to let you comb his photos for signs of a new girlfriend via their accounts. So, you’re still stalking your ex. Any way you work it, the picture isn’t pretty. Or is it? No need for the cutting room floor: we can so save this content!

How to Facebook: Go out to dinner every night with a string of your 100%-just-friends male friends and check in to the restaurants anyway. “Lisa has checked into Gary Danko with Joe.” That’ll learn those pestering suitors, all right. To alleviate Mom’s concerns, post updates like “Yet another crazy night! Can’t wait to get some sleep tonight!” and let her find relief in her own conclusions. For everything else, post a humble brag about the neighbor spotting you naked through the kitchen window, tee-hee! Leave out the part about him being 99. Or gay. Or blind.

Family Fun

IRL: Your grandmother dies on Christmas Day, a cousin reveals the Alice-in-Wonderland extent of his mental illness to you over too many eggnogs, your aunt announces she is getting divorced because she’s actually lesbian and your uncle is also out – of work (again). You develop a raging yeast infection. On your face. Probably from all the bourbon you’re drinking to cope.

How to Facebook it: “Feeling so grateful despite life’s challenges this holiday season!” and bask in the approving likes.

Simply leave off the “to be alive…I guess” part.

Conclusion to Column

IRL: Love, loss, hipsters, hashtags. We’ve covered it all.

How I’ll Facebook it: As if I’d post this to Facebook!

This is the latest installment in your editor’s column, The Insider’s Guide to Life.

Image: Francisco Vargas

ColumnWhen trolls invade real life.

Last week, I answered my cell phone while pulling up to a stop sign in my car. I will be the second or third to admit using your cell phone while driving is irresponsible; that’s why I don’t do it. I use a hands-free set. But I hadn’t even had the chance to reach for my set when two cyclists pulled in front of my car and began berating me. It took me a moment to realize this was what was happening, because one was taking a photograph of me with his camera. Flash-blinded, I slowly registered that the other cyclist was actually yelling with a level of smug approaching orgasmic: “What you are doing is ILLEGAL and DISTRACTING! You are BREAKING THE LAW! Do you understand how dangerous this is?” I appreciated the careful enunciation, but it was that last dollop of condescension I found the most delicious. It’s just one more reason to date a cyclist! So I can run him over.

It was true. I’d driven all of one block in a residential neighborhood – mine, and this is important – at the feckless speed of 20 miles per hour whilst on my phone. Even though I hung up the phone (more out of incredulity than guilt), the two cyclists continued behind me for two more blocks, deeply enjoying their special mission. Which is why I can report firsthand that being yelled at for nothing much in particular for two blocks is DISTRACTING. So distracting, I temporarily got disoriented in my own neighborhood and drove blindly for several minutes, pedestrians be damned.

Trolling happens all day online. It’s par for the virtual course. The internet is just full of uptight cyclists with cameras ready to reprimand naughty girls in shiny cars on cell phones. You never know what That Guy from High School will attempt on Facebook, or what angry email may come seething into your inbox ranting about some post of which the sender of said angry clearly missed the entire topic, not to mention point. A lot of times, they don’t even have the right site.

No big deal. But trolling in real life, by which I mean the one that doesn’t give you carpal tunnel? People, it’s time to get on down out of each others’ grills. I am concerned to find that trolling is finding its way even into the social habits of our noble cycling brethren. Perhaps they are an indicator species for the rest of humanity. The weak link, if you will.

I don’t think I’m the only one experiencing this. Our managing editor’s daughter was recently lectured by her school principal – this is elementary school – for having the nonconformist audacity to sport a single feather in her hair. It’s distracting! says the principal. No, it’s personality, and you don’t have to like it, but it’s none of your business.

The world is not out to offend us. Sadly, it is indifferent to us. And it turns out, other people are not just figments of our reality. They move and stuff. Unexpectedly, even!

Continuing in the automotive theme of trolling, because we couldn’t be more American right now: Last week I was at a dinner. I came out to find my car had quite literally been sandwiched bumper to bumper between two cars. Har, har. I marched into the corner cafe and asked around for the owners of both vehicles. No dice, just lattes. Forty minutes later, I was beginning to get annoyed. I called the police, and together we knocked on doors. At last, one hipster came darting out to move the geriatric green sedan backed up against my car’s nose. As he passed me, he preemptively put up his hands in such exaggerated fashion I thought he was crunking and was jealous because I don’t know how to. But no, he was just manning the defense. You’d think I had plans to eat his face. Now, maybe this kid has a habit of blocking other motorists and has developed this defensive mechanism to deflect violence to his person, but I’m going to venture he expected a big can of bitching out.

And then there’s the woman in the minivan who gave me the bird when I actually saved her from a fender-bender today. No good deed goes unflipped.

There have been enough of these incidents lately to give me pause before I go tweet and like some more. I started thinking about all the times I’ve snorted in derision at that one SUV that is the first on the hill to sign up for a crooked parking job. The times I’ve barely held my tongue, wanting to chide a child at the market for acting, unoriginally, childish. The moments where I have raised a fist, imagining what it might feel like to lift just the one finger. Pity it requires lifting a finger.

Maybe that woman on her cell phone needs to be on her cell phone. Maybe the guy who turned like an idiot isn’t such an idiot, just having an idiot moment. Maybe one day you need to be the idiot, and that’s okay. We actually don’t know why people are doing the stupid things they’re doing, and unless they’re putting us in harm’s way, we could care less so we should care less. People are limited, like furniture. Stupidity is as reliable as death and taxes, and more so in some places. Live and let live and live some more before perfection freaks us all out and we need plastic slipcovers.

By the way, the proper retort to all this is not, “But people really are that dumb and selfish. This is why I hate them.” The proper retort is: “I can’t believe you are knocking cycling, Sara. So not green. You obviously hate the planet.”

Let’s keep the trolling online where it belongs. This is practically what the internet was made for. Take that world, I have a blog!

tl;dr Be nice.

This is the latest installment in your editor’s column, The Insider’s Guide to Life.

Image: cinnamon_girl

ColumnArmed with an iPad. And dangerous?

After a weekend in New York for eco fashion, it was off to Cape Cod with our managing editor, Amy DuFault, who makes her home here with her family: a musician-designer husband, two children and a cockapoo named Mick. They live in a classic New England cottage flanked by two ponds and woods. It’s April, but it’s still quite cold, and the winds whip through the bare trees and howl around the house. Inside, it’s warm and cozy, and Amy and I work on spring plans from the dining room instead of the office downstairs, where we can catch glimpses of house wrens and ospreys in the branches of the oaks and fat gray squirrels scurrying across the decks.

In between calls and ticking off to-do lists after dinner last night, Amy looked up from her laptop: “Sara? Let me just read you this email.” I know that tone of voice well. It’s the tone that comes with sharing a query from a hopeful writer wanting to cover the healing properties of crystals on a passionate case of eczema or the story about how slathering oneself in essential oil of Dalmation sage mixed with powdered placenta can cure the depression. It’s the tone that asks if we’d like to advertise cat psychics. Or perhaps we’d like to attend and cover the trade event in San Pedro about new 1.3763% more efficient copper conductors in industrial incinerators? It’s a dynamic industry.

This proposal was from one Clyle Reed, who suggested we introduce an eco-spirit section led (obviously) by him, and named for him. It was written in English, but appeared to have been improved upon by either a spambot or a drunk Scot. We really couldn’t decide. Topics would include his mother, his childhood, and his expertise in – among other gifts – spirit gathering.

We’ll blame the time of day; Amy responded. “Tell me more, Clyle.” This unleashed a flurry of emails from the Lord’s minion (his actual email address). We fell into an earnest – and loud – discussion about culture and psychology, or more accurately, online oddballs and insanity, forgetting that Amy’s young teenage son was nearby. As we read email after email from Clyle, aghast at what we’d semi-wittingly unleashed, her son ignored us, engrossed in whatever he was doing on his iPad. A few more minutes of our noisy analysis, and he sauntered into the kitchen. “Sometimes I really worry about what the world is coming to,” Amy said, shaking her head. And then we heard it. A snicker from the kitchen.

We looked at each other. We looked at the kitchen, graced by one immensely puffed up child, grinning ear to ear. He croaked “Clyle!” before collapsing into a fit of laughter as we shrunk in horror. The query, so strangely and brilliantly written. The succession of increasingly eerie ramblings, the insanity of which would have impressed John Updike; the perfectly crafted personal blog; the fresh gmail address. We’d been had by a thirteen-year-old, and he’d been audience to the entire progression of his macabre puppet show. Needless to say, he was thrilled by our total mortification. After we managed to make eye contact with him, we explained why the joke – while ingenious – was inappropriate. We sent him to bed post haste, so that we could laugh until we cried.

Kids these days. I remember rolling my eyes in frustration for months at trying to teach my mother how to use email (“You don’t use caps, Mom!”); this child had created an entire supporting ecosystem in mere minutes for his prank. He knew how, he accessed the services and tools, and he did it all in moments for a lark – for free. The internet is now home to one more blog which will never be used again, and Cape Cod is currently host to two embarrassed adults who, while fast themselves, are clearly no match for a seventh grade boy.

My own “kid” brother, who is 25, can text on his smartphone without looking at it. In fact most of the time it’s in his pocket. I’m not so much older than he is, but the rapid iteration of technology savvy – not just from generation to generation but between siblings and a year or few – is remarkable. He’d be an easy victim for Clyle, too.

The unreserved integration of technology by “the youth” scares many people, who fear for the innocence and safety of our children. I’m not one of them. While I don’t hole up in my house fervently watching for signs of the Singularity, I believe the fact that kids use technology without thinking about it – while we are still muttering and marveling over the details of the transition – is a positive thing.

Yes, there are predators on the internet, but there are predators IRL (that’s “in real life”), too, and what today’s kids intuitively grasp is that living online and off seamlessly is a productive, useful way to make life better because they can. They know this well enough to be wry about it, if last night’s missives from Clyle are any indication.

They’ll have to grapple with text thumb and their brains will be studied for changed learning patterns – consequences of change we are only beginning to understand and won’t be able to dismiss. But we should look at this cultural shift another way. One thing these children will not do is waste time. They will have grown up used to living in the present, all the time, and there will be little pause for regret, much less the gridlock and analysis paralysis of our social and political fabric. Jenny McCarthy’s inane babbling about indigo children has it all wrong; these are kids who simply have horse sense with no patience for horse shit. Their brains have been trained to look at reality and now, not myth and belief and maybe, and they’re used to witnessing the results of their actions in real time. We played Telephone with cans and strings and grew up to spin messaging with publicists. They’ve grown up with the iPhone and Android and Google cache, and they’re going to be kicking livid at what we’ve done.

So I doubt the results of this “tech stuff” will be anywhere near as apocalyptic as the cynics fear; I doubt things will even fray. Shame and love and altruism are still effective social motivators, and unless these suddenly evolve out of us thanks to “the Twitter,” will continue to be. Belonging is everything to humans, and our children will wonder why we cared so little about this, and why we did everything so stupidly. While we whine without ceasing about “their” infatuation with instant gratification – texting, Facebook, games – they’re soon going to ask what the kettle has to be so shrill about.

It’s a truly useless cynic who sees a dystopian future instead of a hopeful one. If we can manage to hand them the world without destroying it first, they may just be able to save it.

This is the latest installment in your editor’s column, The Insider’s Guide to Life, exploring topics such as media, culture, sex, politics, and anything else. Cheers and spellcheck!

Image: Zawezome

ColumnSurfin’ USA.

They say the internet is a radical tool for changing the world. Often cited in this lofty claim are Wikileaks and Twitter. The Internet-capitalized is also a scapegoat for the people with excess ear hair to blame the Websites for all that is wrong with The Youth, a disappointing step up from sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll. For the inexperienced and Glenn Beck, the internet is a scapegoat for assigning blame for pretty much everything in general. For real journalists working in print media, the internet is a cesspool of aggregation and amateurs in pajamas – but then, we’ve already touched on the people with excess ear hair.

For everyone else, the internet is a sparkling tool of infinite practicality. It’s just not a sparkling tool of infinite practicality for the things you would assume, like online banking or changing your seat assignment. Useful is nice, but, like mayonnaise on a cheese sandwich, pointless is better. The internet serves only one purpose that truly matters, and that is that it is the most effective way in the world to avoid working while at work.

People like me who make internet for a living know that this is why the pageview exists and also why you get the most of them between 9 and 5. You have to entertain all the people manning the companies that don’t have the money to advertise on your website. Far from being the glamorous racket my friends in more respected professions like law and investment banking are convinced it is, media is really kind of a thankless gig.

In between their conferences and hearings, lurking behind their Powerpoint decks, the truth comes out: cute puppy pictures on Tumblr; ex-stalking on Facebook; browser-window shopping on Jcrew.com. They do not make the connection that while they are tremendously busy at work forwarding chain emails exposing the truth about that dangerous chemical compound that develops when cheese is placed on a saltine cracker in certain states during the months of August and September only, I am slaving over their next viral time-waster. Like this column, for example. But have they thanked me even once?

In a fit of jealous rage after my third sugar-free Hazelnut Vanilla cream latte yesterday afternoon, for which I’m sure there’s a chain email, I decamped for the other side of the screen. Wasting your day on the internet seems to be working for everyone, in the sense that no one’s working. (Which should anger no one. I cite the much-Facebook-liked fact that we are the most productive people on earth as argument. Google it.) It was time for me to give it a go. But where was I?

Oh yes! Here are the things I did on the internet instead of writing my column. I was careful to take scrupulous notes so you can experience the experience for yourself.

7:30 a.m. As the French press steeps my coffee, I stare bleary-eyed at my Facebook wall. A friend’s status update incoming! Something about his cat. Task put off for another time: checking work email.

7:35 a.m. Today I decide I’ll actually open all the email newsletters I subscribe to, and read them.

10:03 a.m. Amazed at the amount of time wasted, I sign up for 17 more daily deal newsletter services. There are more, but I decide I only need one yoga group discount offer a day. Taking a break after the first nine for a bit of aimless scrolling through The Sartorialist and Desire to Inspire, I am inspired to reorganize all my bookmarks into boards on Pinterest, but then I lose interest and decide to check out Facebook again.

10:40 a.m. After updating my Netflix queue and friending three new friends in the Flickr group Bacon Porn, I settle in for an hour of tearing through 30 tabs at the Huffington Post. I feel dirty and liberal afterward.

Noon. I check Facebook again. I am rapt to see my friend has posted three more updates about his cat.

12:03 p.m. Have deleted my first Reddit account after getting into a flame war about doughnut holes. Intense. Going to caption lolcats now. My submission: Kitteh Litter.

3:30 p.m. Facebook. Again with the cat. Of course. It all makes sense now.

3:36 p.m. Phone in to conference call with writers late, blame slow internet. Omit the part about it being slow because of the three browsers, 78 tabs, two streaming episodes of 30 Rock and (what else?) cat video I am watching. I hear the words “Find your own hyperlinks for a change,” which I say out loud in real life. While pretending to listen, I post my scrupulous day-of-surfing notes to the anonymous WordPress blog I built and launched during lunch.

3:49 p.m. My kid brother instant messages me a video about a guy with a bike, which I post on Twitter, where I learn that Jackie Chan has died.

4:00 p.m. The day has simply flown. With an hour left in the workaday, I tuck in for some more Huffington Post but am interrupted by a text from our managing editor: “What the hell was that tweet?”

4:20 p.m. Perusing Reddit, this time under the name surfinusatoday, I notice a reference to 4:20. I look up the meaning on Urban Dictionary.

4:47 p.m. An email from a physician friend who has just saved two people’s lives with her afternoon and wants to grab dinner. “What did you get done today?” she writes. “Oh, you know, the usual,” I reply.

This is the latest (quasi-fictional) installment in your editor’s column, The Insider’s Guide to Life, exploring topics such as media, culture, sex, politics, and anything else. Cheers and spellcheck!

Image: Aine D

ColumnA new website lets you scope out new restaurants…and friends.

Running short on foodie friends? Not to worry, there’s always the internet.

Dating sites have gone from fringe to norm, but in the social media age, the internet isn’t just being used for finding soul mates; it’s the perfect spot to track down your new FBFF (foodie best friend forever), as well. Enter Grubwithus, a new website devoted to “social meals.” Combine food rating website with personal friend search and you get the idea.

The site works with select restaurants to coordinate family-style meals for the Grubwithus community. Users then make reservations for a particular meal, and once they have done so, can see who else is attending. Which means, you can probably get in a bit of Google stalking before your dinner ensues. Residents of Chicago and San Francisco can get in on the action, and New Yorkers will soon join the list.

It’s an interesting concept, particularly for those in the “40-hour a week and over” crowd where time is of the essence, not just for dating but simply for socializing. And although Grubwithus might be the first of its kind to organize this kind of thing virtually, prix-fixe group dinners aren’t new. For example, in Portland, the owners of Detour Cafe and Ford Food and Drink offer two dinners a month, where $35 scores you a four-course meal with other like-minded folks.

Whether it’s online or not, getting taking part in these type of events might just be because of our inherent need to connect with people, and food is the perfect vehicle for doing so.

Once you’ve gained a culinary crush or two, just make sure you don’t become a stereotypical poster child for the Foodie series. “This is my new friend, Kate, and she loves roasted beets with fresh chevre and rosemary just as much as I do!” Word to the wise, foodie.

This is the latest installment of Anna Brones’s column at EcoSalon, Foodie Underground, taking a conscious look at what’s bubbling in the underground food movement, from supper clubs to mini markets to the culinary avant garde.

Image: vanz, Grubwithus

Pretty images are like crack. I can’t look away. I can’t stop clicking on page after page, link after link, saving many of them to peek at later, surreptitiously, like something forbidden. The thing is, they kind of are. Because seeing all of these beautiful things on a daily basis – dresses, jewelry, lanterns, pillowcases, even stupid things like paperweights – make me want to collect. To spend. To accumulate. Groan. Am I once again buying things I don’t need?

I blame the internet.

For example, something wonderful arrived in my inbox yesterday: an invitation to join Pinterest. Not only is Pinterest a personal online ‘inspiration wall’, a place to digitally ‘pin up’ things you love, whether items of clothing, pretty hairstyles or simply images that strike a chord – it’s a feast for the eyes. A dangerous one. Take a look and tell me you don’t sigh and ooh and covet.

Having just recently joined Polyvore, the site that lets you arrange items from practically any store on the internet into lovely little ensembles, and inevitably falling into hour after hour (oh man, I really just revealed something about myself there, didn’t I?) of browsing the images created by others, I feel myself wanting. Me, a woman who just sold or donated three-quarters of her possessions to be free of the burden of too much stuff. A woman with a somewhat austere, carefully edited closet of matching items that can be worn in as many seasons as possible.

The last time I brutally culled a dozen blouses, skirts and dresses I told myself that from then on, each individual item I added to my wardrobe would have to earn its place.

But… look at that perfect little black dress… oh, and the way it’s complemented by those vintage mustard-yellow heels… and wouldn’t they both be set off to utter perfection by that eggplant wristlet? A simple pendant of rough violet-hued quartz on a long brass chain would pull it all together… Sigh. Just. Stop. Already.

And then there are all the other sources of sartorial temptation. My browser bookmarks are packed with blogs curated by enviably stylish people, like Kathleen and Hannah and Tamera (whose musings on digitally-induced desire inspired this post). Street style blogs like Lookbook.nu give me all sorts of ideas for possible additions to my closet.

It’s not just clothes. I have folder after folder on my Macbook of beautiful interiors, and get caught up in online shelter mags that make me want to get rid of everything I own and start from scratch with a newly acquired aesthetic that will change again in a few months, thanks to all of these pictures.

Help, I’m drowning in beauty, and I just clicked Add to Cart.

Of course, it’s possible to still feel this nagging sense of want without the internet. For centuries we have walked down main streets in cities all over the world and peered into store windows and wished or perhaps purchased. And we are surrounded by advertisements that are designed to provoke a lust for material things.

But the internet has opened up a whole new world of temptation. It exposes us to objects and styles that we might never have seen otherwise. And it makes it so damn easy to track those things down, to have them in a cardboard box on the doorstep within days.

Does this promote the problem of overconsumption, or pave the way for more considerate purchasing? It certainly has the curious effect of lowering that all-important number on my bank statements. There’s a reason I’ve become a clothes nazi: I’m planning to build and live in a tiny house (a plan that has been delayed but is nonetheless still on). Piles of possessions are out, edited is in.

The solution? Self-control, of course – which is not as easy as it sounds. In this digital age of imagery overload it’s easy to feel unfashionable. Plus, I work online all day, so the exposure never ends.

Temptation is tough. I will still save all of those pretty pictures, if only because I so enjoy looking at them, and because inspiration is a precious thing. But rather than treating it like a buffet of goods beckoning me to buy, buy, buy, I hope I can learn to value them more consciously.

No matter what your personal opinions are on the foodie trend, you can’t deny that an increased appreciation for good food has lead to an increased support of DIY gastronomy. In the beginning stages of the column earlier this year, we covered the growing trend of amateur involvement in culinary culture. Independent food markets and home-run bakeries are just the beginning of a whole group of people that celebrate their love of food on a daily basis. The amateur food movement is like bake sales on steroids, so to say.

And that’s a good thing if you’re a food lover, because not only can you perfect your own craft, you can also take advantage of those around you. In fact, thanks (once again) to the internet, it’s becoming easier and easier to spread the DIY food love.

Let’s say you live on a food centric block; you’re probably constantly sharing recipes and popping a new recipe test run in a tupperware so your neighbor can try it out. Add social networking to that equation and you’re primed to reap the benefits of an amateur foodie culture gone wild.

The beta version of a food focused network called Super Marmite was recently launched in France. The location-based service allows cooks to post what they’ve got in the works, how many extra servings they’ll have and how much it will cost to get you a taste of the fare. For someone who often makes too much of one thing, or simply doesn’t have enough room in her freezer to keep the latest culinary endeavors, a site like this sounds intriguing. For the consumer, it also provides an alternative to fast food and restaurants.

In the U.S you can opt for a similar service, Book of Cooks. The site allows professional and amateur chefs to set up online restaurants or bakeries to showcase their goods, and exploring them is as simple as clicking the region where you want to find food and diving right on in.

Of course you quickly get into the legal questions related to selling food for consumption by others, but the concept of regional sites that focus on food sharing is not only one that promotes community, but maybe even smarter, healthier food choices.

Editor’s note: This is the latest installment of Anna Brones’s column at EcoSalon, Foodie Underground. Each week, Anna will be taking a look at something new and different that’s taking place in the underground food movement, from supper clubs to mini markets to culinary avant garde.

Image: Book of Cooks

“A week without your computer, are you going to be okay?”

I raised my eyebrows and shook my head; sometimes people just don’t get it. Yes, I was about to take off and leave my computer sitting right where it deserved to sit: on my desk. No, I was not going to live-tweet about my trip or post pictures on Facebook. I was going to take six whole days off from the technical world, not even my cell phone was going to get turned on, and I was going to be just fine.

A New York Times article that I read almost a year ago has stuck with me, and I’ve cited it in several conversations regarding our inability to truly disconnect. Titled “On Vacation and Looking For WiFi,” the central topic hits a little too close to home, but raises an important point: we have created a society where we are so connected that we have practically made it impossible to ever truly pull ourselves away.

Five years ago, in Barbados, none of us consulted a computer. Three years ago, in Costa Rica, a few family members walked to an Internet cafe and checked our e-mail one afternoon just for the novelty of being online in a faraway place.

This year I stood in a long line in the lobby of this resort in the Dominican Republic, to wait my turn to sign up for 25 hours of Internet service for $25. Several family members brought laptops and we checked our work email daily.

It’s not about keeping in touch with what’s going on; no matter where you are in the world you probably have access to a newspaper, even if it’s a few days old. The fear of disconnecting stems from our need to be in control. What if an important email comes in while we’re out and we don’t get to it? What if the person needs an immediate response?

Well, what if? We’ve somehow traded our ability to trust that other people can handle themselves, answer their own questions, and even learn to wait if they can’t get an immediate response for the false sense of security that comes from thinking that we can always be in control.

Two days into a week-long stay in Mexico and those questions seemed very far away. Insignificant even.

Little did I know that while I was contemplating how unimportant all the stuff I had left really was, the document I had diligently prepared for my business partner and emailed to her at 1 a.m. – a document which included all that needed to be done while I was out – was in fact the wrong one. An attempt at making myself feel in control, yet slightly failing in the process. But, like any sound, intelligent human being, she called my neighbor, got let into my apartment and sent the document to herself from my computer. Smart woman.

Meanwhile – my everyday virtual duties switched for overlooking the ocean – I wrote in my journal:

Disconnecting. A whole week of it. And what does it remind me? That most of what we do isn’t that important. The constant updates, the information overload. In the end, we can turn it all off. In fact, it’s easier than we lead ourselves to believe.

So what can’t we turn off? Feelings, emotions, creativity… those the the things that are always there, often impended by our everyday routine that we deem necessary.

It’s easy to overlook the things that make us feel alive, to quickly get out of balance. But in taking time to slow down, we remember how to find that balance.

We can’t give up our jobs and we can’t give up email. To be an active citizen, we have to be educated, so we can’t give up consuming information. I would never argue for any of the above. But we can take time to assess how much of all of these things is healthy.

We can take time to focus on the slower activities that cultivate our friendships, our emotions and our creativity. Drawing, writing, traveling, walking, cooking, talking, sitting, thinking – all those good things that we often put into the “quality of life” category.

And as for that creative inspiration that only comes when I myself truly disconnect? Here are some Mexico photos.

Images: Anna Brones

I admit it, I have cravings. Not just for dark chocolate, but for tweets.

It starts when I wake up and notice I need a Twitter fix – or a twix. Getting tweeted is now more important to me than my mother complementing my shoes – pretty shoes with bows or ankle straps that I purchase with her in mind. (Mom really likes these kind of shoes).

But tweets are the new approval. Sorry, Mom. I’m looking at the birdie for love, and smiling. It’s a gratifying picture. Except, of course, when the tweets don’t add up. If Twitter is over capacity, it is not because of me. The approval ratings can be disappointing. My tweet tooth feels a hole, a void, a cavity if you will. It can hurt something awful.

For this reason, I’m convinced, therapists will soon be healing a generation of Twitter followers with complexes from not receiving enough tweets in their formative years when they actively sought reassurance from countless strangers in the great abyss.

I look to strangers, too, in the tweets of San Francisco, to form a Twitter bond – strangers like Mayor Gavin Newsom, the 4th most followed politician on the service. See, most of my social contemporaries who aren’t web writers or famous Hollywood stars aren’t quite sure what kind of animal tweeting actually is, or what social networking means, or why some among us feel the need to sign in daily with mundane accounts of their comings and goings or to write witty and  pointless haiku – or twaiku, NPR observes.

I explain it is all about professional networking and exposure, not to be confused with Facebook, which is for sharing, too, but much more of a social animal. I’m drawn to Twitter to connect with other eco web entities, allow my own posts to gain visibility, and of course, to be part of  that club; The tech savvy one.

While the opposite of exclusive, it is an impressive club, so much so that any marketing executive connected with any university, magazine, business, grass roots cause or retail store must be equipped to set up an account and work it. By working it, I mean, spend part of the day following the Twitter trail that leads to the sort of club members you would want to take to lunch. The members you would want to be following you. And so you tweet them half way.

Getting re-tweeted is an art of sorts. For example, my colleagues are also Twitter hounds who crave tweets, and we share a reciprocal relationship, in which you tweet my link and I tweet yours. If I forget, a colleague might guilt me about being remiss and say “a little bird told me you forgot to tweet!” They might enjoy their tweet revenge and not scratch my back for a whole week, and then I have to rely on some stranger to do it.

I suppose all of this pop cultural blither is intended to send a message to followers and readers and colleagues, and even Facebook friends from junior high who see my links and posts on the social site.

Listen up, tweety pie. Tweet if you love me; tweet if you are horny; tweet if you are very small (a baby tweeter); tweet if you are large (a meaty tweety). If you don’t, I will just assume you don’t like me.

You can find Luanne on Twitter at @inthegreenlane or follow this list for all EcoSalon writers.

Images: Productive Dreams; Lawrence Borel; Dewaldp; Thoughtpick; Twitrounds

The key to a green lifestyle? Variety. Every day there’s something new you could be doing, keeping your enthusiasm fresh and raring to go. But…what? How do you find those all-important new ways to make a difference? You’ll need green living tips, designed to read in a glance. Here are ten sites that brim with them. Get clicking!

1. Green Living Tips

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

Brainchild of green businessman Michael Bloch, Green Living Tips is highly focused. Get past the somewhat unprepossessing homepage and you’re in for a lots of great information: hidden behind the categories in the left sidebar is tons of useful info, from the environmental difference between brown and white rice to ways to recycle or upcycle styrofoam. You could spend days here. We warned you!

2. The Green Guide (National Geographic)

(On Twitter)

While National Geographic needs no introduction, you might not know about its Green Guide. If that’s the case, you’re missing out on stunning presentation and, in the main site or the accompanying blog, the kind of content you’d expect from one of the most reliably excellent magazines in the world.

3. National Resources Defense Council Green Tips

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

New to the NRDC? It’s a grassroots environmental action group (founded in 1970) with over 1.3 million members – and their resident experts have set up a page loaded with good, green advice.

4. Green Living Ideas

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

Helmed by Sean Daily (GreenTalk Radio Podcasts) and part of the Simple Earth Media Network, Green Living Ideas (and its close neighbor Blue Living Ideas) is a green tips resource that doesn’t quit. Click on “topics” on the homepage and go exploring the 200+ categories of archived posts – as long as your next few hours are free, of course.

5. Organic Authority

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

A specific tips site, this one. For all you foodies, a site featured on Oprah Magazine that’s a wealth of vegetarian and healthy food tips laid out thusly. It even has its own web TV show. Tuck in!

6. The Daily Green

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

Does The Daily Green need any introduction? Nope, but here’s one anyway. Often featured in mainstream media (the Today show, for example), this green consumer darling is built around a core of tips and advice not only from staff members but also from its readers.

7. GreenUPGRADER

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

Longtime friends of EcoSalon, the team at GreenUPGRADER is here to spread the word about nifty improvements around the home, whether in the form of new innovations or natty tricks you can apply yourself. Warning: Reading this website may result in recurring attacks of DIY.

8. Mother Nature Network

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

The tips over at the brilliant Mother Nature Network aren’t neatly categorized as at the other sites listed here. In other words, a game of “hunt the tip” beckons. But when the writing is this good, that’s far from burdensome – there are some truly terrific articles to discover. For example, were you aware of all of these uses for salt?

9. Planet Green (Discovery)

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

Like MNN, Planet Green – backed by Discovery, like its sister site Treehugger – is a place that surrenders its tips a little reluctantly (read: prepare for some reading). But what tips they are! From ways to teach kids the value of real food to growing Gandhi’s favorite food … and don’t forget each section’s “How To Go Green” roundup (here’s the Home & Garden one).

10. Treehugger (Discovery)

(On Twitter)

(On Facebook)

No self-respecting green tips list would be complete without mentioning Treehugger – they’ve earned their spot with years of good quality (but rather loosely categorized) green tips. Yes, they have a “How To Go Green” section – but it links to the one at their sister site, Planet Green. You’ll have to go explore through the archives, but if you’re willing to invest the time, Treehugger has the goods!

Photo credits: Arria Belli, pacomexico, Ed.ward, Mickey.!, *clairity*, Stephen Korecky, Lauren Manning, Niffty.., Bruce Tuten, alexbartok and miyukiutada. All photos from Flickr, licensed for commercial use under Creative Commons.