That did not work out at all as I had planned.

I went out back to feed Max-Zoats and ended up in a conversation about justice with Pastor Paul.

Then one of the hippies from across the street showed up with her dog, and the conversation turned more general.

Now I have a vegan chocolate cake baking, and I'm preparing to go watch other people eat marinated portabello mushrooms and vegan risotto and salad, and probably devour said vegan chocolate cake.

Variety is not the spice of life. It is the meat and bread of life.

I'm twenty years older than most of the trust-fund hippies. This doesn't imbue me with any particular wisdom, unless it's wisdom about which cookbooks suck and which don't. It does, though, give me a certain gravitas (can you use that word with hippies?) when I show up with a loaf of fresh-baked bread or a bowl of freshly-picked, steamed garden veggies.

"You're Mother Earth!" said the young man who's been doing naked-but-for-a-loincloth yoga in the front yard.

"Oh, god!" exclaimed a random girl, "I love chile peppers!"

"How do you do that?" asked the primary TFH, on being told that the marinade was one I made out of my own basil (organically grown, 'cause that's how I was raised, thanks, Mom), natural vinegar, and sea salt.

At last: boys who appreciate my belly. I was over there earlier, before I came back to wash off the bug spray and put the cake in the oven, and they were rubbing my midsection like I was a lucky Buddha, and talking about how marvelously round and fecund I looked. They seem to appreciate excesses of flesh after being around sprout-eating dancer types all day. I am, apparently, the embodiment of the full moon. Make of that what you will.

I managed not to be snarky. The people who deal with me regularly in real life will be proud of me. I also managed not to feel like a pedophile, though it's difficult when you're surrounded by 23-year-old guys who are in awe of your ability to, you know, ovulate.

Even though they're hippies, and not-having-to-work hippies at that (though they all have odd jobs), they do show some modern sensibilities. This week begins the remodeling of the band bus, an ancient Bluebird without electricity, into a liveable space, complete with chemical toilet and storage cubbies, thanks to yours truly. I'm going to supervise to make sure they don't attach the neutral to the red, but the rest of the scutwork is theirs to do. The Bluebird of Hippiness will be outfitted with things from the IKEA as-is section, hammocks, and swings: all the things I wanted as a teenager/young adult to prove how cool I was.

It's my first job as designer. I'm thinking I might need a blog just for that.

In the meantime, the timer just went off for the cake. And I need to find an ankle-length skirt and tank-top to wear over there, in honor of the days when Sam used to draw on the sidewalk and Jim's used to be a real diner.