suburban survival

The Economic of Happiness

2012-01-17T19:36:00.000-08:00

I look forward to getting my copy of the movie The Economics of Happiness

Colbert on gop bread and circus

2012-01-07T19:47:00.000-08:00

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Food storage with David and Judith

2011-11-29T21:01:00.000-08:00

i had the pleasure of videoing the process of putting food into storage in mylar. this is a fantastic method of storage for seeds, grains, nuts and who knows??? it's great for long term storage!

really useful tips about how to do the process, what supplies (including foods)are needed and where to get stuff. thanks for the invite.

raw apple cake in production

2011-11-27T19:30:00.000-08:00

i produced 6 apple cakes and put them up in individual servings (zips)...over 40 servings. great for a meal on the go, snacks and very nutritious. the recipe is here. this time i used i cup of old fashioned whole grain oats for one of the cups of flour called for in original recipe. also seemed the metal pan took 5-7 minutes longer to cook. there was enough ambient heat from the oven at 325 degrees for 3 hours to not need a fire today. it was 53 degrees out today so that's not such a big deal. i would say the second day i had production down to a fairly leisurely 4-5 hours from start till 3 cakes in the freezer and mostly all cleaned up.

raw apple cake in production November 27, 2011

Stand by me....

2011-11-24T20:56:00.000-08:00

just for fun....Brett Dennon

2011-11-23T11:12:00.000-08:00

love it!!!

"Comeback Kid (That's My Dog)" Official Music Video from Brett Dennen on Vimeo.

Walk Away Watch Me Burn from Brett Dennen on Vimeo.

quotes

2011-09-27T13:24:00.000-07:00

"as a senior citizen I have earned the right to refer to all my guilty pleasures as therapy".....me

sunset

2011-09-11T20:02:00.000-07:00

sunset

frogs, girlie, and bees

2011-09-07T12:50:00.000-07:00

frogs, girlie, and bees

Saki and bees

2011-08-26T13:51:00.000-07:00

Saki and bees 8/26/11

sunset

2011-08-22T20:30:00.000-07:00

sunset august 22

Richard sums it up in 300 seconds

2011-06-30T19:34:00.000-07:00

One of my heroes, Richard Heinberg, does a nice job of summing up where we find ourselves.

Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers - I Won't Back Down

2011-06-13T10:11:00.000-07:00

Paul Simon ..... Father & Daughter

2011-06-12T22:18:00.000-07:00

with a nice photo slide show

a cool version with Paul

and the real deal (first half)

Jack Johnson - You And Your Heart

2011-05-21T15:59:00.001-07:00

the garden

2011-04-27T18:07:00.000-07:00

I always like to get the garden on a good day when the beautiful red rhody 'Grace Seabrook' is blooming. This was a great day in the garden with Saki.

the garden april 27

solar

2011-04-07T20:26:00.000-07:00

cool video made by guy in New Jersey who added solar.....

from this post......

How one nerd zeroed out his energy bill with solar panels

BY CHRISTOPHER MIMS
7 APR 2011 2:47 PM
George Musser, a physics editor at Scientific American, has dreamed of powering his home with solar panels ever since he was a little boy. And now he does! In New Jersey, no less.

His story is a part of Beyond the Light Switch, a totally rad documentary filmed by Detroit Public Television that criss-crosses the country to look at the future of energy. More clips from the show, which is airing all over the U.S. throughout the month of April:

passive solar report

2011-02-26T18:25:00.000-08:00

lemons are getting ripe!!

taken yesterday at 3:30 pm....temperature in solarium 80.2 with temp outdoors 32.4....door to house opened.

Jackson Browne...Lives in the Balance

2011-02-23T09:53:00.000-08:00

as Thom Hartmann had a bumper contest with peace songs i thought of Jackson Browne

previous post inspired by this song

the kids

2010-12-13T09:19:00.001-08:00

catching up....had this wonderful evening with the kids.....each tenth shot or so i get Archer's face under hair....big fun!

the solarium and the suburban homestead...

2010-11-29T14:43:00.000-08:00

today is the first day of retirement. i have been telling people my retirement activity plan is to make this place a suburban homestead. today i stepped out into the solarium to water the plants and really enjoyed being there. it's been so cold and i have been working and sleeping so it's been awhile since i ventured out. i am looking forward to the future.

Global Work Party,,,,,,solar coming soon...

2010-10-10T17:24:00.000-07:00

Transition Ferndale met today on my roof for some theatre, lunch, fellowship and enthusiasm as we strive to work to bring awareness and action to getting our atmospheric CO2 back down to 350 parts per million. (currently 392 and climbing)

Oh and we are celebrating the coming solar panels.!! Net Metering by years end.

Last year I had my son paint a very large 350.org on my roof and my frequent air traffic has been enjoying it all year. Before this year's end 350.org will be covered by solar panels and net metering. This is happening on the heels of our Transition Ferndale group inviting Dana Brandt from Ecotech Energy Systems LLC to come and give his excellent presentation to our group. We will be on the roof today with signs and enthusiasm to be part of the important work of getting our CO2 in the atmosphere back to levels that give future living things a chance to enjoy life on our beautiful planet Earth.

10/10/10: The Global Work Party On 10/10/10, people at 7347 events in 188 countries got to work on the climate crisis.

here we are, from our corner of this earth, participating with over 7000 groups around the world......

Roni comes back to tell....

2010-09-26T11:47:00.001-07:00

just for fun ...Merrily

2010-09-24T10:10:00.000-07:00

MERRILY TOMPKINS PROFILE from valerie vozza on Vimeo.

find your farmer....first CSA pick-up farm tour

2010-06-24T13:57:00.000-07:00

Such a pleasure to tour the farm and get the details of where my vegies come from. Walter is using land as well as can be imagined. I appreciate not only the food but the wonderful association with Walter and Toni.
here is the amazing box of food I got....

and here are the most delicious strawberries I remember eating fresh from Cross Line Farm right up the road from F.A. Farm

disclaimer: as I so enjoyed, what I percieved to be farmer speak from Walter, "and this area has gotten out of hand" I will say, as an amateur videographer, there is a few moments in #4 video where "the lens got out of hand" ....audio still good and it never stops me from publishing.

brilliant article Asher.....

2010-05-31T21:55:00.000-07:00

this article is a good example of why I just got off my lazy ass and became a monthly donor and why I am a subscriber to their monthly newsletter...than's the Post Carbon Institute.

An Even Bigger Spill Looming?
Posted May 25, 2010 by Asher Miller

While the nation's eyes are turned towards the oil tipped waves and tar balls washing up on the shores of the Gulf Coast, an altogether different energy disaster looms in California—one that might be even more damaging for the environment and our economy in the long run.

For decades now California has led the country in environmental protection, passing legislation that's often set the benchmark for national policy. But this, like all tides, can flow in two directions. A pair of ballot measures—Props 16 & The California Jobs Initiative—could set California back immeasurably and by extension the entire country, at a time when we can least afford it.

full post

update: Public anger at PG&E helped sink Prop 16

the winner

2010-05-27T13:36:00.000-07:00

yes i agree with Randi, she is the winner and i didn't even watch so thanks for clueing me in....

end barbaric extraction

2010-05-26T15:15:00.001-07:00

go tell that to the Indians......

2010-05-25T10:53:00.000-07:00

love this.....

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

On Topic: In the News - Race in America

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show Full Episodes

Political Humor

Tea Party

in the garden today with the "last cup of Joe"

2010-05-13T15:36:00.000-07:00

it is so great to have Joe on the radio talking to people who live right here!!! and thanks for your excellent advise regarding the pope's recent unholy advice to the masses....

today in the garden

2010-05-06T19:05:00.000-07:00

today starts with the beautiful and fragrant!!! Smilacina racemosa and the Rhody "Blue Peter" the on to the azalea my neighbor and I call "the mother's day azalea" the Photinia (not a hedge here) is getting ready to put on a beautiful display.

today in the garden

2010-04-09T21:24:00.001-07:00

today in the garden

the dickens of doom

2010-03-30T07:27:00.000-07:00

The dickens of doom has managed to lay out our naked symptoms and find his way back to the path as we try to find our way into the future.

"Our Turn?"
By James Howard Kunstler for ClusterFuck Nation

Nations go crazy. It's terrifying when it happens, especially to a major nation with the ability to project its craziness outward. We look back on the psychotic break of Germany in 1933 and still wonder how the then-best-educated population in Europe could fall under the sway of a sociopathic political program. We behold the carnage and devastation left in the wake of that episode, and decades later you still can do little more than shake your head in bewilderment.

full article

barbaric extraction-our symptoms are showing

2010-03-28T02:46:00.000-07:00

I hope this piece on NOW will begin to wake people up to the place we find ourselves. As the gas and oil interest sell the use of people's property for hydralic fracturing gas extraction to people who are facing economic hard times, we must decide if this is the legacy we want to pass on to those who come after. It was telling to me when a landowner was asked, "what if the "fracking"ruins your water or land?" The person responded, "I will have enough money to move." Is this who we are? Are we really that selfish?

thanks TXsharon for this

and from the movie GASLAND

CAN YOU DO THIS WITH YOUR TAP WATER? from JOSHFOX on Vimeo.

Attempts to make natural gas the new "green" is getting play on both sides of the isle as in a previous post I was horrified to hear t boone pickens featured. Until we face the fact that barbaric extraction is never going to be the answer to continuing our current consumption of Earth's resources we are never going to move to live on the planet that support future human life. A short term energy fix at the expense of our water, air and land is suicidal. And it is just passing the bill for our continued overconsumption to our children and grandchildren. That seems to be the epitome of selfishness.

This post by Dave Ewoldt says it very well.... we have truly lost our way.

Alternative Energy Ignores the Problem
........Plus, the Industrial Growth Society is only possible with the embedded energy of fossil fuels, which are post-peak and what's left of them is so environmentally destructive to obtain that only a society that has completely lost its way would attempt doing so. Even 100% LEED building standards, hybrid vehicles (or any other proposal that thinks we can "green" consumption and continued growth) can't overcome that basic ecological fact.
full post

How Many Natural Gas Wells Does Your State Have?
by Abrahm Lustgarten and Krista Kjellman, ProPublica - July 8, 2009

bills have been introduced, in the house and senate, to protect our drinking water

tell your representative to cosponsor the Frac Act

find your farmer...

2010-03-14T23:53:00.000-07:00

here is a great workshop by Walter (my farmer) about Soil and Building Soil put on by Bellingham Urban Garden Syndicate It is so exciting to see this kind of sharing of information going on in our community.

corn casserole

2010-02-26T20:21:00.000-08:00

this casserole seems to continue to please...i once took it to work and announced that all the fat and calorie are still in this. a very health conscious co-worker tested it and announced it was "sinfully delicous"

Corn Casserole

1 green pepper
1 onion
1 cube of butter
dice up vegies and saute in butter. Set aside.

1 pkg Jiffy corn muffin mix
1 can creamed corn
1 can whole kernal corn (drained) I use a serving of frozen corn in my freezer from my CSA
2 eggs

mix and spread in greased 9x13 pan. Top with sauted vegies.

Top with 1 cup sour cream and grated cheese.

Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.

Solarium catch-up

2010-02-26T19:52:00.000-08:00

Today the county signed the final check-off on the solarium....I will be moving in next week. The following albums document the progress since last post.

this is from the middle of January after forms off of walls and sand fill being put in

solarium

here is January 21 as the polycarbonate roof is being installed

the garden and solarium

more after roof in

Solarium feb 6

and here the pavers are going in

Solarium feb 10

and here the day before the final inspection. Mia and I moved the lemons in, washed the windows, brought the snakes in and did some chalk art.

Solarium catch-up

oh and I must post this beautiful sunrise from January

sunrise in peckerheadville

upcoming movie event....HomeGrown

2010-01-14T11:00:00.000-08:00

showing at Whatcom Educational Credit Union February 17th at 6:30pm (optional pot luck at 5:30pm) information at Transition Ferndale Movie night

HOMEGROWN follows the Dervaes family who run a small organic farm in the heart of urban Pasadena, California. While "living off the grid", they harvest over 6,000 pounds of produce on less than a quarter of an acre, make their own bio diesel, power their computers with the help of solar panels, and maintain a website that gets 4,000 hits a day. The film is an intimate human portrait of what it's like to live like "Little House on the Prairie" in the 21st Century.

Running Time: 52 Minutes

more info and trailer at HomeGrown movie site

the dickens of doom is at it again....

2010-01-11T17:51:00.000-08:00

and i wouldn't miss him..... sounds like we are looking at a "brace yourself, effie" period in short order. now you wouldn't know this if you lived in mainstream america....there is no intention of changing our consumption or the "non-negotiable american way of life" the tv marketing continues, the casino parking lots are full, very large mini-mansions on acres or five continue to be built, municipalities continue to argue over mall size, we continue to use the dwindling resources of planet earth to fight over the dwindling resources of planet earth and our symptoms continue unabated.
and since i think the good news is....if we survive, we will all have jobs cuz we will be the cheap labor. and i always love his little snipets of good news scattered in the doom......

"Six Months or Less to Live"

By James Howard Kunstler for ClusterFuck Nation

The economy that is. Especially the part that consists of swapping paper certificates. That's the buzz I've gotten the first two weeks of 2010, and forgive me for not presenting a sheaf of charts and graphs to make the case. Just about everybody else yakking about these thing on the Web provides plenty of statistical analysis: Mish, The Automatic Earth, Chris Martenson, Zero Hedge, The Baseline Scenario.... They're all well worth visiting.
full post

our symptoms are showing...and Happy New Year!

2009-12-29T09:05:00.000-08:00

Our symptoms are showing, our symptoms are showing….
and once again I love to get James Howard Kunstler's take on where we are and where we are going and his 2010 predictions are there for all to see.
The theft of the resources of our beautiful planet goes on…..On steroids. We are, barbarically in many cases, extracting the “raw materials” to fuel the orgy many on this planet see as their right! The pigs are at the trough and the rest of us have been so successfully marketed to that we believe living on earth this way is just fine and dandy. Some of my favorite symptoms include casinos, mansions; homes used as ATM’s, shopping malls and all nature of conspicuous consumption. And to many people also residing on planet earth the lifestyle of most of us Americans would look like conspicuous consumption. And, as Kunstler points out so eloquently, once again, we are livin’ large on the margin and have been for a long time. Oh, and I don’t think my favorite button at the moment will ever make sense to my republican mother. “How’s the cancerous phase of unregulated, crony, casino capitalism working for you?” I think she only heard her two favorite words, casino and capitalism, when I ask her, she declared, very seriously, that it was working just fine for her. There is no chance she will, in any way shape or form, sign on to the notion that we might feel some shame for the legacy we are passing on to those who come after. And not for a minute do I think this has anything to do with her being a republican or me having worked politically as a democrat. It has everything to do with her choice of media and the lack of truthtelling we are all living with.

He sums it up here and I think it of as using the dwindling resources of planet earth to fight over the dwindling resources of planet earth. I see no signs in our culture that we are anywhere near giving up that futile addiction. Our culture is so indoctrinated and dysfunctional and there are barely any openings to suggest reality. And what is really telling to me is that just about everybody I talk to is so glad water is not going to be a problem for them and they could just plant a vegie garden on their lot if they needed to or variations on that theme. There is no sense of how this is all coming to an end even if we completely destroy the planet using ever more barbaric extraction methods and all of the fresh water extracting every last possible means of producing energy.

The only real hope I see is that the collapse may save us. So we are off to the long emergency…..

And I am grateful to the dickens of doom for a great summary of where we are and predictions for the upcoming year. You have not failed to keep up and share your wit and wisdom and I look forward to following you in 2010.

Forecast 2010
By James Howard Kunstler
on December 28, 2009 7:32 AM

The Center does Not Hold...

But Neither Does the Floor

Introduction

There are always disagreements in a society, differences of opinion, and contested ideas, but I don't remember any period in my own longish life, even the Vietnam uproar, when the collective sense of purpose, intent, and self-confidence was so muddled in this country, so detached from reality. Obviously, in saying this I'm assuming that I have some reliable notion of what's real. I admit the possibility that I'm as mistaken as anyone else. But for the purpose of this exercise I'll ask you to regard me as a reliable narrator. Forecasting is a nasty job, usually thankless, often disappointing - but somebody's got to do it. There are so many variables in motion, and so much of that motion is driven by randomness, and the best one can do in forecasting amounts to offering up some guesses for whatever they are worth.
I begin by restating my central theme of recent months: that we're doing a poor job of constructing a coherent consensus about what is happening to us and what we are going to do about it.
There is a great clamor for "solutions" out there. I've noticed that what's being clamored for is a set of rescue remedies - miracles even - that will allow us to keep living exactly the way we're accustomed to in the USA, with all the trappings of comfort and convenience now taken as entitlements. I don't believe that this will be remotely possible, so I avoid the term "solutions" entirely and suggest that we speak instead of "intelligent responses" to our changing circumstances. This implies that our well-being depends on our own behavior and the choices that we make, not on the lucky arrival of just-in-time miracles. It is an active stance, not a passive one. What will we do?

full post

winter is here, Blackie the cat and solariums

2009-12-22T07:03:00.001-08:00

→ browsed some broccoli, kale and parsley.....nice first day of winter!!! got another load of pallet scraps coming....maybe the forms will start coming off soon.....and Blackie the visiting cat seems to be coming in for a bit to eat every day.....he will now let me pet him and he looks pretty healthy this year...last year i saw him every once in a while and he wouldn't let me pet him. he had a very sore looking foot.

it's winter, Blackie the cat and solariums

the solarium is coming

2009-12-20T20:02:00.000-08:00

the weather finally warmed up enough that we could pour the walls....

the solarium is coming

Local Democrat's holiday party

2009-12-15T18:20:00.000-08:00

here are a few photos from our annual Whatcom Democrat's Annual Holiday Party...once again it is so good to be associated with all these good people as we work to have an effect on the policy enacted in our name at all level of our elective representative government. good food, good company and hope going into the new year.

Democrat's Holiday Party 2009

and here are a few of my favorite moments in video....

this one is a scan of the crowd in the beginning, starring Michele and Judy.

and then Council Member Louise Bornjson spoke.She has been a tireless public servant and Bellingham has been so fortunate to have her on the Council. thank you, Louise!

and then Whatcom County Council Member Laurie Caskey-Schreiber spoke.Laurie fought for the people of Whatcom County as a council member and has pledged to keep up the fight. I am honored to be in the fight with her. She is a class act and a real fighter! thank you, Laurie.

and then this moment when John told the story of Henry Cagey coming up to him 2 years ago and announcing his leadership in the Democratic Party. And he has been proving his leadership ever since!!

and then a big thank you to the volunteers in the office for making this thing happen day in and day out. thanks!!!!

and then finally a much needed dose of music and merriment, albeit as Maggie was leaving on the elevator. it's always fun when Maggie's at the party!!!

all video ......

last mutsu, apple cake and solariums

2009-11-29T07:55:00.000-08:00

click on recipe to make it larger

ate the last mutsu a couple of days ago...made the annual apple cake with my oldest granddaughter. (more to come) hmmm i'll get her to help me today when she's here.

the solarium is taking shape. getting ready to pour the walls next week....and looks like the weather is going to be just great.

the new myers lemons (2) patiently wait in their new pots for their home in the solarium. (in the winter)

last mutsu, apple cake and solariums

just for fun Brett Dennon

2009-11-18T05:27:00.000-08:00

good audio...

live video...

our symptoms are showing...

2009-11-17T08:49:00.000-08:00

i love to catch Kunstler's take on where we stand. i find it a profoundly sad time. as i like to say ....we live in a culture that is populated by a far higher percentage of people who know who levi johnston is, than know who represents them at any level of our self government. and i love Kunstlers', dickens of doom that he is, summation which offers a hopeful "who know"......wheeeeeeeee.... and i always get a new word i have never heard before.

Fate of the Yeast People
By James Howard Kunstler for ClusterFuck Nation

..........The cocoon of normality prevents us from appreciating how peculiar and special recent times have been in this country. We suppose, tautologically, that because things have always seemed the way they are, that they always have been the way they seem. The collective human imagination is a treacherous place.
full post

and i can't help adding this from Mark Morford....i knew when i saw his title it was going to be a good one....

Sex tape tips from Carrie Prejean
Hi, I made a sex tape! Eight, actually! And you can too! Praise the lord!
By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

.......Speaking of sounds, here's some advice I keep hearing over and over in a million different ways. Keep your mouth shut! Ha ha! Get it? I keep hearing that! Me! As if!

full story

and then my fav, Jim Hightower, lands on the greedy selfish folks who are the stars of our national personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, with this precious tale....

Hightower: Obscenely Rich Bankers Claim to Do God's Work -- They Can Go to Hell

By Jim Hightower, AlterNet. Posted November 18, 2009.

........Nonetheless, this clueless clique is actually claiming that we commoners should be applauding the return of their multimillion-dollar bonus bonanzas. Why? Because, they aver, the rich payouts allow them to contribute to charity.

Such narcissism reminds me of a story about a selfish, no-good rich man who died and tried to get into heaven. But you can't just walk through the Pearly Gates. An angel reviews your life, then St. Peter decides if you can enter. To counter the angel's negative review, the rich man argued that he had a history of charitable giving. He'd once tossed a nickel into a beggar's cup, he pointed out. Plus, some years later, he had aided a poor woman by giving her a nickel. Then there was the time he put a nickel into the Salvation Army kettle.

Hearing all this, the angel turned to St. Peter and asked, "What in the world should we do with this man?" And St. Peter said, "Give him back his 15 cents, and tell him to go to hell!"

Now that's a story that these big banksters need to hear -- and ponder.

full article

fall, solarium, mutsus and best friends

2009-11-11T19:52:00.000-08:00

Remembering Goofy

Our household just lost our precious dog, Goofy. And especially Steve lost his best friend. Goofy was the best dog ever. He came to Steve when he was a very small puppy in 2000. He was found by the river in a box by our son Chad. He loved to go for a car ride, but would only go if Steve was going. He had a fenced yard and was perfectly capable of leaving it, if he would have wanted to. (lame fences and his jumping over them abilities) He would only leave when he was given the OK. Once when the neighbors were putting in a new fence and there was no fence there, (old fence down) he chased a cat right to the point where the fence should have been and stopped. He was such an important member of this household.

below are a few photos of fall and the harvest today of the 6 mutsu apples of the year. (1 harvested one a few days ago from the new mutsu tree in front) i love this apple. i ate one today and it was as tasty as i remembered. Mmmm.... acquired a load of mill ends from Perry Pallet. a truckload was $20 and very easy to pickup. we will get a good supply while they have them. so far this year we had our 4th or 5th fire. our heat in the house is by ambient heat. mostly from lights, computers, tv's and radios and hot water. i have a labor intensive (milk cartons by my sink) grey water system on my end of the house. i let my dishwashing grey water sit inside until the heat is gone from the water. we have adapted to a much lower temperature and only start to think about a fire when the temperature drops below 60 degrees. wool sock and sweaters do go a long way.
i am looking forward to the passive solarium and seeing how much it can contribute on a sunny day.....we'll see. the footings were poured yesterday..

fall, solarium, mutsus and best friends

fall and solarium (10-20 thru11-2)

2009-11-02T18:27:00.000-08:00

a few photos documenting an ENORMOUS amount of dirt getting moved....i had no idea....so i made great progress on the dike. and we are really underway with the passive solar space....i am getting excited. and ready for a tendon time out!!

... would not have gotten here without Chad and Karlos....you guys are amazing.....

fall and solarium

the garden october 2nd

2009-10-02T17:51:00.000-07:00

today i ate 2 raspberries, Tulameens, and they were the sweetest ever.

the compost area is filled, largely with the mining of Cheryl's yard (next door neighbor who piles it up by the fence and i take it to the compost) and Mikes (ex neighbor who still trucks his yard waste to me and delivers to my compost...it's a total win win)

i spent a great deal of time working on the root flare of the cedar near the fence line....it wasn't too bad but still needed a fair amount of attention.

the tomatoes are still coming on up on the roof deck....very tasty.

the composting toilet and room that contains it in the shed/storage/food preservation/Sunnywood School house should be complete soon...if my son embraces adulthood a bit more than to dabble in it. i'm hopeful.

we await the OK from the county to begin the passive solar enclosed porch...should be green light in a week or two.

finally i am looking forward to the mutsu apple crop again...love that apple....the new one in front has one apple this year. i will be getting a tutoring on pruning from an expert, Walter, in january when he does it. i hope to get a good video series.

oh and finally finally...to note: the squirrels had pretty much finished off the filberts by mid sept so next year better hit it first of sept....

Ed and Tina's Fifth Annual

2009-09-28T11:27:00.000-07:00

it was my first attendance and i thoroughly enjoyed myself...what a great place !! lots of good food, friends, music and good will. i was so taken with the Montana maple that was brought some forty years ago from Montana and planted where it has now grown into a big beautiful tree. WOW! and even more amazing was that i learned this information from Joy, who was sitting next to me, and was the one who brought the Montana maple to the property. WOW!

350.org

2009-09-23T11:39:00.000-07:00

24 October 2009
INTERNATIONAL DAY OF CLIMATE ACTION

For all of human history until about 200 years ago, our atmosphere contained 275 parts per million of carbon dioxide. About 200 years ago we started burning ancient sunlight (coal, oil, and gas) and began increasing this number until we are now looking at 400 parts per million. (we're at about 390 now) We need to get back to 350 part per million or under to have a chance of maintaining planet earth as a hospitable home. the science here......

With a day of action coming up october 24, (happy birthday mom) I will work on this post till then....

Here is the start of my action.... I get alot of air traffic taking off and landing from the local airport so I decided to put my message where all could see from the air.....

a g-zillionth wake up call from Kunstler

2009-09-19T21:25:00.000-07:00

I always enjoy reading this righteous pessimist, with keen observational skills, a quest for knowledge and a very sharp intellect. He levels the g-zillionth wake up call, hoping we will be our best selves and go optimistically in search of a new way of living that offers future generations a home on planet earth. Oh, did I say quick wit!

Reality Receding
By James Howard Kunstler
on September 14, 2009 6:33 AM

........American perestroika really boils down to this: we have to rescale the activities of daily life to a level consistent with the mandates of the future, especially the ones having to do with available energy and capital. We have to dismantle things that have no future and rebuild things that will allow daily life to function. We have to say goodbye to big box shopping and rebuild Main Street. More people will be needed to work in farming and fewer in tourism, public relations, gambling, and party planning. We have to make some basic useful products in this country again. We have to systematically decommission suburbia and reactivate our small towns and small cities. We have to prepare for the contraction of our large cities. We have to let the sun set on Happy Motoring and rebuild our trains, transit systems, harbors, and inland waterways. We have to reorganize schooling at a much more modest level. We have to close down most of the overseas military bases we're operating and conclude our wars in Asia. Mostly, we have to recover a national sense of common purpose and common decency. There is obviously a lot of work to do in the list above, which could translate into paychecks and careers -- but not if we direct all our resources into propping up the failing structures of yesterday.

full article

well said Toni

2009-09-17T11:07:00.001-07:00

i went to this town hall meeting pretty uninformed on the issue of the new police station and library and the debt, funding and all opinions and emotions surrounding. i admire members of my community who are charged with making decisions about Ferndale and the folks who are asking questions. Toni spoke for me. i do not believe we can make decisions based on what has happened before now. we must change how we are doing things and the growth model is obsolete. the resources of planet earth are being stripped at breakneck speed in barbaric ways and, if we don't change our ways, the planet will be lost as a home for humans. there is no planet B.

thanks Toni....

wasps, bees and sedum

2009-09-08T20:19:00.000-07:00

i love this time of year...the bees are just getting started on the sedums. as they come into full bloom they are covered with bees.....looking forward.

and i got a good shot of the wasp (yellow jacket) nest just above my chair on the porch. when i first noticed it i thought i should get rid of it but it turns out we have coexisted nicely and i will just put the nest out in the weather for the winter although wiki says the rarely use them again.

and i have been noticing the dieoff, described in wiki piece, starting to happen.

seed saving with Celt

2009-09-08T15:06:00.000-07:00

had the pleasure of visiting Celt's place in Fairhaven...WOW...so much going on and i learned so much. here is a playlist of videos covering tomatoes, lettuce, leeks, beets, kale, and processing to save. i came home with some lavender seeds and put them in next to a new trail out my back door.

i love bees !

2009-08-26T10:02:00.000-07:00

this is a great story....i love the idea of promoting the Pollinator Pathway and will be looking for ways to do this....hmmmm and of course i will be sitting in my garden watching and photographing bees.........

Native bees play bigger role as honeybees decline
Native pollinators such as bumblebees are gaining new appreciation as European honeybees, the pollination mainstay of commercial agriculture, continue to struggle.
By Linda V. Mapes
Seattle Times staff reporter

.........In recognition of the pollinator problem, Congress in the 2008 farm bill included cost sharing to encourage farmers to plant some of their land just for bugs, to diversify the nation's pollinator portfolio with more native bees and other beneficial insects.

The adage proves true: Build it, and they will come. Sarah Bergmann got a $6,000 grant from the city of Seattle last year to transform the parking strip in her Central District neighborhood into what she dubs a Pollinator Pathway, planted with the help of 50 neighbors last November.

Once a desert of grass with a few maples, the 108-foot-long, 12-foot-wide strip today blooms with plants selected to attract pollinators. It's buzzing with life that has spilled over to plantings all around the neighborhood. An orange trumpet vine festooning a fence out back is mobbed with bees too busy to bother anyone, some stacked two to a flower.

full article

today in the garden

2009-08-24T21:14:00.000-07:00

the question "will this pieris survive?"....the answer is no. but there is a birdhouse ready to recieve tenants in the spring and a new pieris will go in where i can watch the bee show in early spring. also almost ready to start actual construction on the solarium aka covered porch. i am also concentrating on opening up harvest..ie narrower beds, more room under trees. also planting more harvest on the side where neighbors took out all their trees, giving me morning sun.

a must see movie...A River Of Waste

2009-08-22T16:18:00.000-07:00

not for the faint-hearted ....this movie shocked, angered, and had me sobbing in my swivel rocker. i was left with our report card on our industrial food chain and deep shame for the legacy we are passing to those who come after. i will urge our congress critters to immediately adopt European standards for our industrial food production. shitting in the air, land and water is no way to leave planet earth for our kids and their kids and their kids....hope the Cree Prophecy is not our destiny.

wake up america....

A River Of Waste - Laurels - Synopsis - Trailer

SYNOPSIS A heart-stopping new documentary, A River Of Waste exposes a huge health and environmental scandal in our modern industrial system of meat and poultry production. The damage documented in today's factory farms far exceeds the damage that was depicted in Upton Sinclair's novel, The Jungle, a book written over 100 years ago. Some scientists have gone so far as to call the condemned current factory farm practices as "mini Chernobyls."
The European Union stands virtually alone in establishing strong health and environmental standards for the industry. In the U.S and elsewhere, the meat and poultry industry is dominated by dangerous uses of arsenic, antibiotics, growth hormones and by the dumping of massive amounts of sewage in fragile waterways and environments. The film documents the vast catastrophic impact on the environment and public health as well as focuses on individual lives damaged and destroyed.
As one observer noted, if terrorists did this, we would be up in arms, but when it is a fortune 500 company, it is just "business as usual."
In 1906, public outrage at the scandal exposed by Sinclair led to major reforms thatcleaned up a corrupt and dangerous system. It is the hope of the filmmakers to mobilize a similar public outcry for reform.

Moving Forward as the Majority: AM 1090 forum

2009-08-10T16:06:00.000-07:00

The panel is Thom Hartmann, Mike Malloy, Stephanie Miller, Bill Press, and Ron Reagan (most of them were at last year's forum). Former Seattle Times chief political reporter David Postman is moderating.

We had a great time. I have been listening to many of these folks since 2004. My sister was kind enough to come along and she doesn't usually listen to progressive talkers. It's always fun to be with like minded folks.

Including one who remembered her birth certificate.

Llandover Woods in Seattle

2009-08-10T11:59:00.000-07:00

i had the pleasure of walking the trail in this amazing open space that came a silly milimeter close to high end development and instead it now remains a pristine legacy for those who come after...wow!

liveearth.org

2009-08-07T14:35:00.000-07:00

powerful video.....

and many more here...

find your farmer...FA Farm

2009-07-30T21:12:00.000-07:00

i had the pleasure of learning about wheat today with Walter and Toni on the farm...amazing as usual!!! 20 minutes for a pound of wheat ...not bad indeed!

find your farmer or FA Farm

2009-07-13T14:58:00.000-07:00

i had the pleasure of a farm tour with my farmer, Walter, and Toni, yesterday. what a treat to enjoy your hospitality and another great farm tour. i learn so much each time out and it's so fun to see what can be done by one farmer in my community.

F.A. Farm - Food With Full Attention"Fresh, Absolutely!"

5 minutes in West Virginia

2009-07-07T11:31:00.000-07:00

or can this planet be saved??? mountain top removal of the 2nd most diverse forest on our planet, largely responsible for some of the best news following the last ice age. along with the rainforest protection, what we do now will determine the future for those who come after......it matters....ATTENTION CONGRESS !!!!!!!!

STOP MOUNTAIN TOP REMOVAL!!!!!!!

home and the cherries and raspberries are coming

2009-07-06T20:01:00.000-07:00

got home from my annual exposure to eastern washington and idaho.......great fun!! and i am glad to be home.....so much to do!!

sister retreat 2009........
we had another great year...what a treat to enjoy time with Lucy....she is amazing and so good natured ...she charmed everyone she met. they loved her at Bud's in St Marys i spent a good deal of time opening up the old orchard trail again....(3rd year)...and have made a new path in on the driveway side each year and then improved existing trails with in the old orchard and up to yurt site #1... oh and site of new orchard and vegie garden......not to mention view extrodinaire....the interior decorators, sistas b (Linda) and d (Kathy), and Te worked their magic and Kathy will be composting food waste.....yah!!!!!!!! i almost read a book, WORLD MADE BY HAND and listened to the first few chapters of THE OMNIVORE’S DILEMMA i will be asking my friend Bill the farmer if his ruminants are grass feed. i may, at least for the short term, consider a new energy star freezer and the eating of some beef. Chad has shown interest in producing some beef jerky. oh and sista d here is the dehydrator operation i spoke of.......
back to books.....i'm old enough to draw social security and still working on following thru...we'll see......oh and had the pleasure of some awesome baseball by my Mariners and some talk by my peeps

what a great week. thanks Mary and Steve (great guitar and songs...) and i look forward to seeing your new house next year and can't wait to see the gardens.....the neighborhood was so great and the trees!!!!!

and what a great couple of days with Mom and Dad in Leavenworth, Cashmere (dinner) Wenatchee for Star Anna and the Laughing Dogs great big fun!!!! thanks sista c

i also had the pleasure of a cougar hunt on the golf course with Chooch (video coming) and another chat with Papa Teen and his now, 2 years later, not so new best friend... (2yrs ago) .....checked in with Chooch on this one again too.

Te's photos some great ones!! thanks Te

i'm eating the glacier cherries now...a pretty good young tree crop and very tasty. the vans will not be far behing and the montmorencys are coming fast too. the raspberries are full speed ahead and i better get those grandkids over for a foragefest. they love the "jungle food" as they call it.

add on 7-8 the native wild blackberries are coming on....maybe a pie one of these years...... oh and i'm still fairly tuned into my root flare....

just for fun....stand by me

2009-07-05T23:29:00.000-07:00

just heard about this on Nicole Sandler's radio program....

F. A. Farm ,,,1st CSA pickup ....!!!

2009-06-10T21:20:00.000-07:00

a beautiful day at the farm and i asked for and got the 10 minutes farm tour from Walter. as usual, he is non stop amazing info. what a great day on planet earth !

free the trees.....

2009-05-17T10:29:00.000-07:00

this week all started with a message on a video i had posted on you tube from TheBrassHole where he gave me encouragement on my root flare...this lead me, through him to The Dirt Doctor and a wondraful video on root flare.....

so i have spent the past few days recovering the root flare on the trees i live with.....i did have some good ones but i also had some trees whose root flare needed liberating. i have a large douglas fir i fear may be a goner. i'm not sure it was the covering of the root flare to blame but it sure could be......

i have been obsessed with the root flare...(video here)..and working so hard i fall into bed, wake up a bit sore, and go back at it.....but hey i'm not complaining.....the garden show is becoming magnificent......

and a minute in my new favorite chair....

shifting paradigms

2009-05-05T15:14:00.000-07:00

just finished reading a piece over at Life After the Oil Crash by James Howard Kunstler, who always gets my attention with his work. he runs thru a short checklist of where we are and then eloquently sums up our psyche and sends me off in the pursuit of our new future.

...........All these epochal discontinuities present themselves, for the moment, as a season of muted "hope" and general apathy. The days are suddenly mild. We've resumed old and happy habits of grilling meat outdoors and motoring to those remaining places that were not blanketed with franchised food huts and discount malls. We have a new, charming president with an appealing family. Newly-minted dollars are flowing to the "shovel-ready." The new bad news is less bad than the old bad news (or seems to be). And the year just past has been such a bummer that our hard-wired human nature tells us that good things must be just around the corner.

Personally, I think a lot of good things await us, but not the ones we're expecting -- not a return to buying slurpees on credit cards. It will be very salutary to leave behind the junk empire we've accumulated and move into an epoch of quality and purpose. For the moment, though, our hopes reside elsewhere.
full post

yeah spring!!!!

2009-05-05T10:21:00.000-07:00

a beautiful spring day in the garden....the montmorency cherry looks promising...Mmmmm...and the mutsu apple is blooming..love that apple!! ..and every year i try to capture the beauty of the "grace seebrook" rhody.

President Obama's first 100 days

2009-04-28T21:05:00.000-07:00

i appreciated this 100 day report over at Great Lakes Law. the urgency of this planetary emergency can sometimes feel like no one gets it. and it's good to have a feeling the really smart person we elected is in fact really smart and is bringing the fight. thanks to Noah Hall, author of Great Lakes Law blog

April 28, 2009
Environmental law and policy highlights of Obama’s first 100 days
George W. Bush spent 8 years in the White House undermining environmental protection, eventually leaving office with the worst environmental record of any modern president. His regulatory rollbacks and refusal to enforce environmental laws were most immediately apparent, but history will judge him even more harshly for his total lack of leadership in meeting the national and global clean energy / climate change challenge. President Obama could have come into office and done nothing more than put in a few LED lights around the White House and been a huge improvement. But simply being better than Bush II would not be enough – our environmental problems demand immediate and strong presidential leadership. Overall, this is exactly what Obama has delivered in his first 100 days. Here are my three highlights:
1. A commitment to open and accountable government. As Obama said soon after taking office, “a democracy requires accountability, and accountability requires transparency.” Open government is the foundation for good environmental policy, and Obama and the new EPA leadership made a strong commitment to the letter and spirit of the Freedom of Information Act and public participation in their first week after taking office.
2. Highly qualified appointees with scientific and legal integrity to lead the federal government. Some of Obama’s high profile appointees are already well known for their scientific and legal credentials, such as Dr. Steven Chu, the Nobel Prize winner appointed as Secretary of Energy. But in every key agency, Obama has made excellent appointments with superbly qualified individuals. Two deserve special mention. Dr. Jane Lubchenco, one of the most highly cited marine ecologists, an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, and recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship (the “genius” award), was appointed Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, responsible for a range of scientific and regulatory functions from climate monitoring to fisheries management. Professor Lisa Heinzerling, lead author of the brief in Massachusetts v. EPA that persuaded the Supreme Court that the EPA has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions pursuant to the Clean Air Act (and co-author of our casebook Environmental Law and Policy: Nature, Law, and Society) was appointed as a special advisor to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson on climate change issues.
3. Presidential leadership and comprehensive solutions to meet the clean energy / climate change challenge. President Obama appears to be well ahead of most of Washington DC in moving forward a clean energy / climate change agenda. Most recently, his EPA issued a proposed endangerment finding for greenhouse gas pollution that would trigger a new regulatory process for carbon dioxide emissions and other climate change pollutants. In addition to new regulation, Obama has also shown in his first 100 days a total commitment to transforming the American energy, transportation, and building sectors, investing in smart-grid technologies, high speed rail, and home weatherization programs.
President Obama and his administration have been understandably focused on these major issues in their first 100 days, but let’s not forget some items still on Team Obama’s to-do list for the Great Lakes:
1. Direct the EPA to regulate ballast water discharges and stop the spread of invasive species immediately (fulfilling a key Great Lakes campaign promise).
2. Repeal the EPA’s recent rule exempting water transfers and interbasin diversions from Clean Water Act regulation (if the rule isn’t stuck down in federal court first).
3. Drop the U.S. Army Corps’ ridiculous interpretation of the Clean Water Act that allows tons of mining waste to be dumped into lakes and rivers as “fill” (even if the Supreme Court would allow such an interpretation).
I expect President Obama will take care of these lower profile issues in due time, while keeping his focus on the big picture issues of clean energy and climate change. Based on what he has already accomplished in the first 100 days, the next 1,000 days should produce the type of transformative changes in environmental law and policy that his campaign promised.
blog post here

Star Anna and the Laughing Dogs

2009-04-16T19:33:00.000-07:00

"a master crafter of songs and her great band"

congratulations you guys..!!!!! a great review at Twang Nation

MUSIC REVIEW - Star Anna and the Laughing Dogs - The Only Thing That Matters (self-released)
Remember that girl you met at the bowling alley? The one that chews gum, drinks several pitchers of beer, wears painted on jeans and tells you about French philosophy then winks at you as she gets strike after strike? She later on she goes and breaks your heart but you don’t care, you’re just glade to have been there to enjoy the time you had with her. No? Well Star Anna reminds me of that girl.
Well maybe not Star Anna personally but her music. It’s equal parts trashy Americana-laced rock mixed with sophisticated storytelling and charm that raises Anna and her band, The Laughing Dogs, to the a gritty level of greatness. It’s a gazing at the starts from the gutter kind of thing…

......As heartbreaking as many of the songs are this is not a sad album, and though there is an element of moving on it’s not a chick therapy album. It’s a cathartic jubulation that stands as another exceptional release from a master crafter of songs and her great band.
full review

and one of my favs....

just for fun...Lucinda

2009-04-16T08:56:00.000-07:00

yikes!!

will this pieris survive?

2009-04-15T21:29:00.000-07:00

this pieris (probably at least 30 years old) will be moved this year for the solarium.... i went to Kents Garden and Nursery today to get a good sized pieris so i would not be without next year. this bee show is too great! i got a nice new pieris and some good advice from the team. so we shall see......

pictures and video taken april 4 th

susan

2009-04-13T18:11:00.001-07:00

unbelievable !!!!

Susan Boyle - Singer - Britains Got Talent 2009 (With Lyrics) "no one's laughing now."

an evening with David Suzuki

2009-04-07T13:15:00.000-07:00

i had the pleasure last evening of attending the evening with David Suzuki and a very large, enthusiastic crowd at the Mount Baker Theatre. He read from the chapters of his new book co-authored with David Robert Taylor and then delighted, informed and rallied us all to work as if our lives depended on it to save our beautiful home, planet earth.

Village Books Presents AN EVENING WITH DAVID SUZUKI
David Suzuki points the direction we must take as a society if we hope to meet the
environmental challenges we face in our still-young century. The Big Picture not only identifies the problems we face but proposes solid, science-based solutions, and examines the forces that are preventing real change. These essays tell the story of a species struggling to come to grips with its own biological nature, a nature we must ultimately embrace to live in balance with the systems that sustain us. David Suzuki is an award-winning scientist, environmentalist, and broadcaster, who has written 42 books, and received countless degrees and honors. He is renowned for his radio and television programs that explain the complexities of the natural sciences in a compelling, easily understood way.
Proceeds will benefit Sustainable Connections.

MBT

a couple of my favorite moments from the Q & A.....

and a call to action on October 24th (happy birthday mom ..i wish you could appreciate and participate)

24 October 2009
INTERNATIONAL DAY OF CLIMATE ACTION

check it out

and this very funny moment..

full Q & A

it's still election fraud, not voter fraud

2009-03-20T21:22:00.000-07:00

thanks to Mike Malloy for bringing Brad on to talk about this story. more reasons to cease and desist the privatization of our vote using these machines with their proprietary software. ENOUGH!!!!

Blogged by Brad Friedman on 3/19/2009 4:59PM
KY Election Officials Arrested, Charged With 'Changing Votes at E-Voting
Machines'
Circuit court judge, county clerk, and election officials among eight indicted for gaming elections in 2002, 2004, 2006
Used popular, unverifiable ES&S touch-screens to flip votes...

Those of us who have demanded transparent voting systems because we understand that only the ability for complete citizen oversight and transparency can effectively counter those who would game elections, have been disingenuously criticized over the years as somehow questioning the integrity of the hard-working, honest election officials out there.
The fact is, those who know anything about computer security understand that it is the insiders who are, by far, the greatest threat to security on such systems, as even the phony, GOP-operative-created Baker/Carter National Election Reform Commission determined in its final report: "There is no reason to trust insiders in the election industry any more than in other industries."
FULL POST

great news....!

2009-03-19T22:59:00.000-07:00

this will be fun to watch and hopefully we will do more planting in our own community.

White House to Plant Organic Vegetable Garden
Written by Elizabeth Balkan Published on March 18th, 2009

Following a 60 Minutes interview with Chez Panisse chef, renowned slow foodist and activist for improved national eating habits in the US, AliceWaters, on Sunday March 15th, wherein she called with continued clarion for an organic garden at the White House, First lady Michelle Obama talked of her plans for the garden in an interview for OprahWinfrey’s O Magazinethat will feature in its April issue.

full article

addendum...
thanks to Sherry for sending this...i say keep your crop production products away from our planet earth......

Organic White House Garden Puts Some Conventional Panties in a Twist
by: Jill Richardson
Sat Mar 28, 2009 at 12:47:36 PM PDT
In the aftermath of breaking ground on the new, 1100 square foot White House garden, Michelle Obama named chef Sam Kass to head the White House Food Initiative. And we know how Kass feels about food... he agrees with us!
All of this positive PR for organics feels very threatening to Big Ag. So one group, the Mid America CropLife Association, has sent an email defending chemical ag to Mrs. Obama. See the letter reprinted below.

full post with letter....

jez it's time to take this planet back and live with the natural world on our side

solarium and daylight savings time

2009-03-09T15:29:00.000-07:00

this was taken today a little after 1 pm (a little after noon a couple of days ago) the outside temp was 30degrees, in front porch 44 degrees, in my room 56 degrees (no heat since brief fire last eve...ambient heat only) yesterday porch was over 60 degrees. we are having a cold snap..overnight low 20's to upper teens. porch (mostly closed but not at all weather tight.)

4:15pm...porch temp 70 degrees!!...warming the house.

Mark nails it again....

2009-03-04T10:03:00.000-08:00

i love Mark....he is brilliant and articulate and he makes me laugh and i usually learn a new word....

Ode to the unhappy
Conservatism let you down? Obama nothing more than Bush II? Oh, you poor thing
By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Wednesday, March 4, 2009

……….Ah, Limbaugh. It is worth positing: How low hath the GOP sunk when the head of the Republican party, Michael Steele, drops to his knees and kisses the fat ring of this tumescent blowhard? The serene young black president calmly reinvents the American experiment, while the rival party sniffs around the armpits of ... extremist talk radio? What a thing.

full piece well worth reading!!

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/tumescent

Beyond peak oil

2009-03-01T03:02:00.000-08:00

Eat the Suburbs: Gardening for the End of the Oil Age

Marc and Sam

2009-02-10T18:35:00.000-08:00

just for fun....stones

2009-02-09T08:29:00.000-08:00

The Rolling Stones - Rough Justice Live

Supernatural ~ Laugh, I Nearly Died ~ Rolling Stones

and this one...

spring is right around the corner !!!!

2009-02-07T14:09:00.000-08:00

just renewed my membership in Ecology Action

and made my annual seeds order from BountifulGardens....had the pleasure of sitting in my favorite chair thumbing thru the catalog and then ordering on line. their site is fantastic....easy and user friendly...wow!

so thanks to the wondraful folks in Willits, California and all our fine friends around the world for another year of good work!!

Stand by me....

2009-02-06T16:23:00.000-08:00

this does happen to be one of my all time favorite songs and the version from Playing for Change is just a little bit of heaven! i go there frequently.... the saxophone is always so seductive and haunting...love it.

and today i got this email ... so exciting

Dear Friends,

We are thrilled to announce that TODAY, Playing For Change has been given the incredible honor of debuting our next 'Song Around the World' on Bob Marley's website, www.bobmarley.com. Click HERE to see and hear "One Love" now!!

February 6th is Bob Marley's Birthday, and let us all celebrate his music and legacy with the Playing For Change rendition of his classic anthem, "One Love," featuring over 35 performances by musicians from around the world! We hope that you enjoy it!

"It's time for the world to unite as a human race."

Peace,
Mark Johnson & Whitney Burditt
Co-Founders, Playing For Change

this show was recommended by my friend Bill and boy was he right!!

October 24, 2008Bill Moyers sits down with Mark Johnson, the producer of a remarkable documentary about the simple but transformative power of music: PLAYING FOR CHANGE: PEACE THROUGH MUSIC. The film brings together musicians from around the world — blues singers in a waterlogged New Orleans, chamber groups in Moscow, a South African choir — to collaborate on songs familiar and new, in the effort to foster a new, greater understanding of our commonality.
watch here

Mark is brilliant!!

2009-02-04T10:56:00.000-08:00

this piece by Mark was amazing.....it was a call to sanity as we go forward living with each other.
Urge Congress to Permanently Protect the Arctic Refuge!

Kiss my Boy Scout
Gays! Buddha! Stemware! Time to reinvent the Scouts for the new world
By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Wednesday, February 4, 2009

For me, it was all about the knives. And the archery. You know, sharp things. Reasonably dangerous things. Things that make you want to live in the woods and carve your own furniture and eat fresh venison with your bare hands every morning, despite how you lived in a whitebread middle-class American suburb and the closest you ever came to raw deer meat was the roadkill your parents accidentally ran over on the freeway in summer.

Nevertheless, those dual delights were, if I recall correctly, the absolute highlights, the two things I loved most of all about Boy Scout camp as a kid. Fondly do I remember the singular thrill that comes with launching a very sharp stick through the air at 200 feet per second, and then, later, spending hours either ogling the fancy Swiss Army pocketknives in the Scout store, or playing with the small blade I did own, slicing leather, carving blocks of wood and fashioning crude little totem poles. You know, as it were.

Yes, I was a Boy Scout, back in the late '70s, when the boys were categorically straight (sure they were) and more than a few of the mustachioed scoutmasters were deep in the closet and a stern 'n' manly God ruled all, and no one gave a second thought to crazy hippie concepts
like diversity or tolerance or which Sauv Blanc went best with your fresh-caught river trout. Ah, what a time it was.

(Bonus factoid: My very own scoutmaster at the time was the late, infamous Jim West himself, a kind but deeply troubled man who went on to become a powerful Washington state senator, then local mayor who, it was revealed by way of a massive scandal just a few years back, had been
using City Hall computers for years to troll for young gay lovers. His wretched tale is the stuff of classic GOP-hypocrisy legend. West died in 2006 of cancer, following a relentless investigation and brutal, career ending exposé by the Spokesman-Review).

And now, well, we all know what the Boy Scouts are -- or rather, what they're not. They are not tolerant. They are not sympathetic to alternative viewpoints, religions, ideas of love and gender. They are deeply afraid of gays and atheists and probably people with tattoos and curious haircuts, people who would doubtlessly like nothing more than to force nubile American boys to sing show tunes and worship the Great God Pan while dancing around a giant flaming pentagram deep in the woods, before heading off to pitch their tents. You know, as it were.

And oh yes, one more thing: the Scouts also apparently very much hate those damnable trees.

Did you hear? Have you read all the fine and fast-multiplying tales of how Boy Scout councils nationwide, in a desperate scramble for cash brought on, not at all ironically, by their famously bigoted policies, are now clear-cutting forestlands that were kindly donated to them, on the assumption said lands would be well tended and preserved? Mmm, environmental hypocrisy. It's the new eco merit badge.

But despite the fresh scandal and the pathetic homophobia and the sad fact that the Scouts have apparently been taken over by Bush-era Republicans, I am not one to call for the end of the Boy Scouts. They are, after all, a private organization. They are free to champion ignorance and fear and insincerity all they like, and pity the boys -- and the parents -- who still hold such stifling values to be all-American and good. Really, the Scouts are doing a fine enough job racing toward oblivion all on their own.

Let us, instead, champion a new version of modern youth. A new kind of well-rounded kid, and new kind of boys-only organization to compete with the withering BSA, and let the Scouts homophobe themselves to utter and well-deserved irrelevance.

We'll take the best of what the Scouts have to offer -- and I happily acknowledge, they do offer a wealth of valuable, time-honored "boy skills" -- and modify, overhaul, inject some life and color and funky multiplicity. You think?

Because the truth is, all that classic Boy Scout handbook stuff, the bits about knives and arrows and sharp things, plant identification and good citizenry and how to navigate a trail by moonlight? That's good stuff. Essential and practical indeed, especially as we prepare for a return to agrarian society defined by violent water shortages and global food riots and increased difficulty finding a decent Wi-Fi signal in the bunker. I'm honing my archery skills already.
What's more, I am certainly not one for the elimination of gender distinctions, for turning boys into emasculated emo-lumps and girls into asexual hairballs. And I'm guessing, neither are you. Just look at the wild success of two recent books, "The Dangerous Book for Boys" and "The Daring Book for Girls," basically clever rewrites of the Boy Scout/Girl Scout handbooks, but with far more range and humor and far less fear of rainbow flags and poetry.

So then. Our new group's manifesto Ð- let's call them "Danger Lads" or "Sons of Dionysus" or maybe just "Kid Rock" Ð- it shall include all the best of the old Scouts, essential concepts of honor, good stewardship, loyalty, how to start a campfire using only dried moss and a shoelace and the cracked screen of a broken iPod Nano.

And then, more. Better. Richer. A fluidity of ideology, an open-minded, fearless spirituality, a fundamental reverence and respect not just for nature and animals and cool handmade leather belts, but also for the boys'
own bodies, and the bodies of others, and all the fascinating parts that make them go.

There will be shelter building. There will be emergency first aid techniques. But there will also be meditation. Yoga. Breathwork. Text message etiquette. Tall tales of Pocohontas and Jesus and the ghost of Chief
Eaglefeather told around the campfire? Sure. But also Buddha and the Banyan tree. Hanuman and the Great War. Persephone in the Underworld. Pope Alexander VI and his 500 Beloved Whores. And so on.

By the way, our handbook, it shall teach not a single thing about homosexuality, per se, but will merely advocate the obvious notion that loving any person deeply and wholly, no matter their genital makeup or what deity they believe in, is absolutely the right path to health and bliss and the making of a happy campground. Imagine.

And of course, it shall all be underscored by a very brave understanding that God does not wave just an American flag, or eat only beek beef jerky, or harbor a deep mistrust of foreigners. Nor, of course, does She secretly clear-cut pristine forests for profit, and call it good stewardship. But you already knew that.
article

solarium sun

2009-01-26T18:29:00.000-08:00

a series of photos from 9am to 3pm. the solar gain is probably fairly minimal on one of the shortest days of the year. we are picking up in the morning and evening so things should improve from here as the move up our way.....

the solarium starts

2009-01-23T16:00:00.000-08:00

as i was talking to Lloyd at Frank N Stein and mentioned i had to think about heating for my house for the declining years. right now i use wood i collect when people want to have it removed. i have salvaged enough to stay warm for the past few years. i don't want to burn wood and i don't know how much i will be able to salvage in the future. (i would only burn it when someone would otherwise burn it up in a big pile out in their yard for no good reason)

so Lloyd (still in charge of dreamland security!) starts talking about passive solar and asking me questions about my house and drawing it on paper and that was it!
i went home and started planning this space. i have taken out the tree that needed to come out. the plans are being made. Steve is researching the design and has come up with some great ideas. we will dig down so the space will continue the roof line and be down a couple of feet. is that passive geothermal...hmmmm. anyway looks like something in the 200 square feet range is where we are now. the orientation is not perfect. we will be looking for ways to maximize what we have....here are some photos of the site, the sun situation (mostly midday) and the winter garden (taken jan 15th-23rd)

and there will be plants growing thruout the winter.......this is going to be FUN!!!!!

school of assasins

2009-01-05T22:46:00.000-08:00

you can rebrand it but if it quacks like a duck....

wake up america!!

.........The School of the Americas (SOA), in 2001 renamed the “Western Hemisphere
Institute for Security Cooperation,” is a combat training school for Latin American soldiers, located at Fort Benning, Georgia.
Initially established in Panama in 1946, it was kicked out of that country in 1984 under the terms of the Panama Canal Treaty. Former Panamanian President, Jorge Illueca, stated that the School of the Americas was the “biggest base for destabilization in Latin America.” The SOA, frequently dubbed the “School of Assassins,” has left a trail of blood and suffering in every country where its graduates have returned.

Over its 59 years, the SOA has trained over 60,000 Latin American soldiers in counterinsurgency techniques, sniper training, commando and psychological warfare, military intelligence and interrogation tactics. These graduates have consistently used their skills to wage a war against their own people. Among those targeted by SOA graduates are educators, union organizers, religious workers, student leaders, and others who work for the rights of the poor. Hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans have been tortured, raped, assassinated, “disappeared,” massacred, and forced into refugee by those trained at the School of Assassins.
full post

just for fun...catch up What geeks eat.....

2009-01-05T22:26:00.000-08:00

i just caught up with this post and i enjoyed it so much!!!!

Jubilation, sleep and a celebratory dinner

The last few weeks have been a blur. Working full time at a new job, knocking on doors for Obama, calling people in swing states, reading 538, Huff, and RCP with an obsessive zeal and all the while trying to avoid the hype. The 2000 and 2004 elections were sore spots on my psyche and I didn’t trust any of the polls that came out near the end. On election night I was prepared to stay up all night…no sleep until a winner was called or at least until we knew how bad the outcome was going to be. When the Pennsylvania returns came in I was comfortably numb. ...

......full post

raw apple cake

2009-01-05T11:37:00.000-08:00

this is a great recipe...the photos were take over a couple of batches... this recipe is quick mix and bake and lots of variety in ingredients always come out good

Raw apple cake

apples
1 cup sugar
1 ½ cups chopped nuts (can also use part seeds, my favorite unsalted sunflower)
2 ½ cups flour (any combination of types)
2 tsp soda
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp salt

mix dry ingredients…

blend together:
¾ cup oil
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla

and add to dry ingredients (sometimes I add ½ cups of raisins or such and will add
another egg and a little more oil to mix easier)

in a greased 9 x 13 pan bake for 1 hour in a 350 degree oven

christmas day with birds and snow....

2008-12-25T09:54:00.001-08:00

".....if you want to arrange it, this world you can change it.."

Trans-Siberian Orchestra

yes we can !!!!

Robin Williams on Obama’s Election

2008-12-18T08:52:00.000-08:00

imagine

2008-12-09T00:04:00.000-08:00

9 October 1940 – 8 December 1980

350.org: Because the world needs to know

2008-11-24T02:00:00.001-08:00

Mutsu apple harvest today

2008-11-17T19:36:00.000-08:00

i've been watching the apples on the mutsu and when i saw a squirrel had started in on one of them i decided i better harvest today....i ate the one the squirrel had started and once again..."i love this apple!!!" so i have 9 or so left and will savor them over the next few days......

the past couple days in the garden.....

2008-11-16T18:07:00.000-08:00

such a beautiful fall.....cleaned the roof and gleaned several buckets of needles to the side yard trail....mike's recent load from his fall clean up had a beautiful bouquet....so wondraful....mike lived across the street (several years ago) and when he was preparing to burn a big pile one day i went and asked if, instead, i could have his waste. he was very agreeable and asked if i wanted his lawn clippings as well. it was a win-win.....then he moved away...after he was gone a couple of years he came back to see if i still wanted yard waste. now he delivers when he has a truck load and dumps it in my compost area. it's still a win-win!!!!!!!

just for fun ....Bonnie Raitt

2008-11-13T15:51:00.000-08:00

Bonnie Raitt - I Will Not Be Broken (live)

For Hillary and the Pumas!
Heads up Pumas! You make a difference everyday!

more just for fun,,,,the stones nailed it

2008-11-13T15:38:00.000-08:00

My Sweet Neo Con

just for fun...Chuck Brodsky

2008-11-13T15:07:00.000-08:00

Liar Liar Pants On Fire