Breast Pumps, Bananas in Cleveland Park

You have been warned

By JIM IOVINO

Updated 1:01 PM EDT, Tue, Sep 1, 2009

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This one could really be included in the What The? section of So Washington.

While scouring the Cleveland Park listserv on Monday, two postings popped up that caught our attention. We will not publish names in order to protect the innocent, and to protect the rest of us from even thinking about acquiring these items.

Among the usual callouts on the nation's largest neighborhood listserv for gutter cleaning or free furniture was the following post: "For Sale: Breast Pump."

"We are selling a Medela breast pump with carrying bag for $90 (New around $300). "

We're all about recycling and freecycling and whatnot, but a used breast pump? Since you both probably live in the Cleveland Park area, you're bound to run into each other, say at the counter at Firehook Bakery:

"I'd like a cappuccino, a scone and ... oh, hey Barbara! Good to see you! How's my breast pump treating you these days?"

Let's just move on to the second post that caught our attention: "too many frozen bananas."

"We've got a bunch of bananas in our freezer, and don't really know what to do with them. I used to save them to make banana bread, but our kids won't eat banana bread any more. Does anybody either (a) want some of them or (b) have any ideas for what I can do with them?"

Exactly how many bananas do you have in your freezer? We're envisioning a large ice box in a basement overflowing with rock-hard brown, shriveled boomerangs. And why won't your kids eat banana bread? If it's an allergy issue, fine, but otherwise those kids should be happy to chow down on some homemade banana bread each morning.

And finally, you're posting on a listserv, on the Internet. Have you heard of Google? Yahoo!? Bing? A quick search of the Google machine shows plenty of tasty recipes for frozen bananas. Heck, there's even a Wiki entry for frozen bananas.

But please, don't let us stop you. If you really must have the breast pump and the frozen bananas, go for it. It could be worse, right? At least it's not a bag of dog hair that's just begging to be made into a pillow...