A funny thing happened on the way to this Monday… Which is greener, a meat or a veggie burger? Theory on politically-influenced baby names

-o- Happy day after Mother’s Day -o-

I have an absolutely wonderful mother. I got to spend Saturday evening with her and the rest of my family at a gala supporting Single Carrot Theater in Baltimore. We also had a wonderful brunch Sunday morning. My mom is a beautiful, kind, patient, capable, sweet, intelligent, and endlessly forgiving woman. I hope she and all the other mothers in the world had a lovely weekend.

Bonues: Nature’s toughest mothers from BBC.

-o- Which is greener: a steak or a veggie burger? -o-

If you love the planet, you love veggies… right? Conventional wisdom holds that beef – factory raised, hormone injected, delicious delicious beef – is terrible for the planet and you’re terrible for eating each raw tasty morsel. However, people are beginning to realize that its the overproduction of food that destroys its ‘green-ness.’

Raw veggies are of course the best for the energy-in energy-out ratio, but veggie burgers and all of the processes required to make them taste like beef could be worse that grass-fed beef people are trying to replace it with.

Experts weigh in on a Mother Jones forum.

-o- Top 10 Twitter pics of the week from Mashable’s Charlie White -o-

These are always so fun. Love Beyonce’s dress. Check them out: Slideshow.

-o- According to The Washington Post, graduates are facing a better markets this year -o-

Finally some good news on the employment front. While the recession has been relatively easy on those with higher degrees, matriculating students still didn’t have it easy. Now, students graduating have better chances of finding jobs than those who have graduated in the last three years. Here’s the article from The Washington Post.

-o- Van Halen’s “No Brown M&Ms backstage rule” -o-

Turns out he had a really good reason: Over-sexed over drugged rockstars try to get away with whatever they can. While that may regularly be the case, Van Halen’s brown M&Ms were really an ingenuous idea to detect venue neglect. If you haven’t heard the rumors and reasons… check out the NPR piece and video.

-o- Partisan divide in baby-naming? -o-

This is really kind of funny. Is nothing off limits? It’s not that people are consciously giving their kids  political names like Bill O’Rights, Ellie Phants, or Don Q. Kong (hmmm…). However political divides apparently influence parents and the names they give their kids. To find out how and to determine if you agree, see the NPR article.

-o- Cooking this week: Pasta Salad -o-

Here’s a Pasta Pomodoro salad from The Parsley Thief; we plan to add some shredded rotisserie chicken. Mmmmm. Doesn’t this look incredible?

(Image credit: The Parsley Thief)

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Thanks to Brian for helping me out this week… and happy four-year anniversary to my perfect man.

A funny thing happened on the way to this Monday… Classic April Fool’s Day pranks on YouTube (and more), New trend: dyeing chicks instead of eggs?

-o- Happy day after April Fool’s Day! -o-

– History of April Fool’s Day from The Washington Post.

– NPR‘s list of headlines, products of several members of the staff, that could have made it as the April Fool’s Day headline. The winner? “NPR Source: Tweets Will Shrink to 133 Characters.”

– Google News picked up a prank news item and ran it as a legitimate piece, according to Mashable. Here’s the article and the screenshot from Gawker.

– The most serious literary figures, such as Virginia Woolf and Edgar Allen Poe, came up with some pretty playful pranks. Check out “April foolery of the literary heavyweights” by John Dugdale of The Guardian.

– Also: Classic April Fool’s Day pranks on YouTube, from Mashable.

-o- Longest kickball game EVER -o-

Seriously. A game of football in Connecticut with players from several parts of the United States set the Guinness World Record for the longest kickball marathon. Why the epic game? To support cancer research. Here’s the article from the AP. Pretty cool, huh?

-o- Hiring slump at an end? -o-

According to this Reuters article, the time of long, tough job searches riddled with rejection and disinterest is coming to an end… at least for recent college graduates.

Here’s an excerpt from the leading paragraph of the piece:

“Sean Chua expected the hunt for his first job after college to be tough. After all, he watched his brother struggle to find a position when he graduated back in 2008. But his fears were unwarranted. The 21-year-old justice major at American University sent out only seven resumes before getting an offer earlier this month from IBM for an IT consulting job, making him a beneficiary of a turnaround in the labor market for U.S. graduates.” – Jilian Mincer and Jennifer Merritt, Reuters

-o- What came first, the dyed chick or the dyed egg? -o-

Anyone have a problem with coloring chicks for Easter? Here’s a New York Times article discussing the controversy over these dyed baby birds.

(Image Source: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg News)

-o- What to do with all those leftover Easter eggs? -o-

– Here are some cooking ideas for leftover eggs from Epicurious. Among them? Scotch eggs.

(Image source: Zach DeSart, Epicurious.com)

-o- Recipes of the Week -o-

My friend Lindsey is coming over tonight and we are making Parmesan Chicken with Caesar Roasted Romaine and a side with goat cheese, red peppers and maybe baby spinach. Currently I’m ogling these Goat Cheese Stuffed Peppers from FoodieMob and these Mini Cheese Stuffed Peppers from The Simple Skillet. How does one decide between goat cheese and the winning mozzarella-ricotta combination? I also love the look of this simple spinach sauté from Beantown Baker.

(Photo credit: Romulo Yanes, Epicurious.com)