• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 clove garlic, pressed
• 1/4 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1/4 teaspoon dried rosemary, crushed
• 1/4 teaspoon dried parsley
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon pepper
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 15-oz can white beans, drained
• ¼ cup roasted red peppers, finely diced

Using a food processor or blender, puree all the ingredients except the red peppers. Add water if necessary, 1 tablespoon at a time, until the bean puree is completely smooth. Stir in the red peppers and serve.

Easy, peasy.

1st of all, my ♥ for PDX can hardly be contained. Eric & I want to raise kiddies in this awesome, progressive city/town. I mean, it's where Eric & I spent our honeymoon, so I am so stoked that my bags will have a home there!

2nd of all, Herbivore deals only in 100% vegan items from vegan/vegetarian designers. AND, as if that wasn't enough, their brick and mortar store is located in a vegan strip mall. A vegan strip mall!

I shipped the bags a few days ago so I imagine they will be available very soon. If you live in the area, be sure to help spread the word that Pansy Maiden is living in the Herbivore house!

This is a short one packed with awesomeness.

Andy Hobsbawn: Do The Green Thing

From TED:

Andy Hobsbawm shares a fresh ad campaign about going green -- and some of the fringe benefits.

Internet advertising pioneer Andy Hobsbawm is the European chair of Agency.com. He founded the first international Internet agency in 1994, and was a founder of Online Magic, a firm that merged with Agency.com in 1997. 

Merging his passions for ads and the environment, he's a cofounder of the website Green Thing, which shares seven fun, punchy little (and big) ways to go green, using clever video and graphics to get across a message of accessible greening. He also keeps an interesting, if a bit sleepy, blog around a book project called Small Is the Next Big Thing.

From Joan Ganz Cooney's Biography.com Entry:

Television producer and executive. Born Joan Ganz on November 30, 1929, in Phoenix, Arizona. A pioneer in children’s television programming, she began her career in media as a newspaper reporter. In the mid-1950s, she moved to New York City and worked as a publicist for several years. She got her first opportunity to create television programming as a documentary producer for public television in 1962. Cooney won an Emmy Award for a show entitled Poverty, Anti-Poverty, and the Poor.

While she enjoyed her work, Cooney wanted to be able to make more of a difference in people’s lives. With a degree in education from the University of Arizona, she began to think about television as a teaching medium. Cooney conducted a formal study on the subject. She used her findings to help convince others of television’s potential for children. To this end, she founded the Children’s Television Workshop (CTW) in 1968.
Cooney saw the CTW’s first television series, Sesame Street, as a learning opportunity for all preschool children. Taking inspiration from the style of commercial television, the show has a quick pace, showing a variety of educational segments in each episode. Along with its multiracial cast of actors, the series features a number of puppet characters, known as the Muppets, which were created by the late Jim Henson. Sesame Street began in November 1969 and has remained on the air for nearly forty years. During its run, Cooney and the CTW have won numerous awards for the series, including more than 60 Emmy Awards.

Tom Waits: One of the coolest human beings alive.