Reading Research and Reality

With only a short practice after our game was canceled I arrived home at 5. It has been a while since I've been home before 6:30. I had no idea what to do with myself. After some jubilant time wasted I warmed up a bowl of noodles, poured a glass of milk, grabbed a book on peak oil and headed to the plush green grass--shirt off, tan time.

Reading about oil iss a great time. Who knew that something as boring as thousand year old algae remains could have so much written about it. Acting out of the ordinary I felt inclined to take notes on what I was reading. Many scribbled stats will not go forgotten--
"EROEI of oil in 1930 was 100:1" 
"Europeans use 1/2 the amount of oil per capita of an American."
"resilience vs. sustainability"

the great thing about research is it puts everything back in perspective. It gets you thinking again.

I want to come back and summarize some of the articles I read.
But here they are for now.
Oh ya, and I couldn't help but read a couple of articles on cows/beef-- agriculture is so interesting!

• http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/aug97/livestock.hrs.html
• The Transition Handbook
•  http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/  ---this was quite helpful 
• NY Times "rethinking the meat guzzler"

get the dome piece ready for thoughts on oil!

My main dilemma with reading splurges is passing the info on. Restating  the information seems pointless when I can simply refer you to the article. But of course it helps me think critically when I have to argue an idea on my own. Anyone can read and regurgitate. With such discerning readers as yourself I don't want to disappoint.

Lists-- cause aint nothing wrong with brevity

I'm getting eaten by mosquitoes as we speak. Not trying to dwell at this comp too long. here's what you need to know....

 In the last week I've...

• Attended a lecture on global warming and what our responsible response to it should be
• Interviewed local dairy farmer Cal Snow and son Aaron. Such great people! We should get the football team to make cheese, it's a workout
• Got a couple books out of the library about transportation.
• Started reading the Transition Handbook, about turning cities into zero carbon emitters. It's possible and almost as easy as eating fritters....
• Set up a possible informal tour of a Dacha. Still not really sure what it is--kind of like a commune, and they produce their own food make their straw-bale houses. The lady is really cool. check out the blog http://dachaproject.com/blog/ 
• Contacted Chris about possible problems with movie files. Told me to try on my own first. Haven't tried... think it'll work....
• Contacted Tim Logue. Have yet to set up a time
• Planned out a week of eating local.
• Drove a lot. " I heard that. Wish I hadn't heard that. But I heard that"

As you can see I do a lot of nothing. But at least I'm working towards something.

I am pretty busy now as 8 games have been canceled and rescheduled for the following weeks, (make that 9 it's pouring outside my cozy abode right now),. But still...
In the next two weeks I should do these things:

• Return Fast Food Nation. Great Book.
• Go to garden meeting at Mrs. Clark's house at 6:30 on April 26. Make some food for it if I can
• Go to the Economics of Happiness movie at Cinemapolis on April 27
• Go to other Fleff Movies
• talk to Time Logue
• try out I movie files
• visit Dacha
• cross fingers
• Post on going to the farm
• post on peak oil
• post on failure
• prepare for local eating
• mom interview me. Just DO IT

 

I'm working hard these days people. ohhhhh ya

Gardening thing

Bonjour! Cava? Oui Cava bien. bon!

sorry you caught me at a bad time, just practicing my french.
well I guess you could stay and we could chat a bit....

Last night I had dinner with a small group of people working on getting kids at Caroline outside and into nature. I know, amazing concept. It was a pleasure to feast on quiche and discus with former Caroline teacher (and host)- Janie Clark,  and current graduate student in landscape architecture,Tim Lynch, as well as  John Weissenger, author of many animal books, about incorporating a school garden into their master plan for a wilderness area. I must say it's exciting to be around so many amazing and supportive people. I took some notes, which I will post up later.  In short, we talked about possible 3 possible areas for the garden, compost options, soil testing, community involvement, construction, handicap access, and curriculum ideas.   There is a surprisingly copious amount of school garden sites, with everything from building raised beds to teaching kindergardeners about worms. I know i most likely wont be around to see this idea completely through, but as Mrs. Clark said, we are building a house and our small group is the architect. The biggest dragon we must slay is creating a master plan  to submit to the state. Unfortunately for us you cant take public school grounds and put what ever you want on it.

A elementary school garden, available to the public, filled with radishes, kale, carrots, and everything in between, might not seem like much, but in my mind it would be fantastic- on par with taking a ski trip. As consumers, food is our number one way we vote with our dollars, and we cast our ballot every day. Getting kids, who (if they were anything like me) bug the brain cells out of their parents, involved in this outmost important local, sustainable, food movement.  Its been shown that kids eating habits are influenced at a very young age, and if it begins young enough a kid raised on kale chips and tomatoes will prefer eating said gross food for the rest of his/her life. You've got to start young!

If not now then when

it's 11:38 pm, I just finished a powerpoint on the sustainable business guru Gary Hirshberg and I am tres fatigue. lets make this short and sweet

I have not posted in over a week. I have been doing stuff.
This is a list of things I've done/ am doing.  will articulate upon latter.

• Met with a new member of Energy Independent Caroline about starting a school/community garden, I've  written the budget and there is a lot of hype about making it happen.( The new principal at Caroline somehow knows my name.) I have partnered with an old, recently retired, 5th grade teacher in her efforts to get kids out of the classroom into the real world. what a concept
• Reading Omnivores Dilemma, have a lot to say. Why in the world do we think we can out do nature; you can't take a cyclic system, make it linear and not expect extreme consequences
• Reading Fast Food nation. externalizing costs is the beauty of economics.
• have watched half of The Future of Food. Did you know if a seed of Monsanto's bt corn lands in your field from say a bird, or a passing truck, you can be taken to court. they will win. It's insane
• have felt exceptionally guilty around Miss G, because of my procrastination. (I am busy these days like I wasn't before)
• Read my new 2nd favorite poem by Robert Frost Two Tramps in Mud Time http://www.etymonline.com/poems/tramps.htm 
• Attended a CSA farm festival. Farmers are amazing people. CSAs are brilliant
• Crashed my dads computer because I had too much footage... Fingers crossed I get a laptop soon

later gater,
my disgustingly drool covered pillow has become my sanctuary....

Fun on Day One

Its official, there will be no more English-- no more critical lens essays, no more papers, no more searching for motifs or themes. There was a nice buzz of excitement in the air today because of this liberation.
Let me relish this for a second, hold on.




 Ok
So here is the Plan Stan.

I've been trimming what little footage I have, and I am attempting to get more footage of daily living.
Because I don't have a camera on me at all times, I am missing some quality shots. 
For true (Micheal Moore level) documentaries they take hundreds of hours of film and narrow it down to a little over one hour. 

So Filming is half the battle for me, and  to keep myself on track I am hoping to post mini video updates. 
For all of you who don't want to read these verbose posts-- smile.



Just to recap on today, (ill be quick mama bear says dinner time)...

I met with Mrs. Gergely-- my WISE teacher and mentor for my project

I forgot to get books from the library, but will do so tomorrow

I looked what exactly I have to put into the environmental calculator I am using (its pretty cool. check it out
http://www.lowimpactliving.com/pages/impact-calculator/impact-calculator)

I've realized that I don't have to be so anal as to record everytime I flush a toilet or use the sink, although my sister insists I should....

I met the startling conclusion that I have no clue how to read the electric meter on the side of the house, nor did I know where it was... any help would be much appreciated

and lastly I was informed by Mrs. G that in my last post I forgot to capitalize English, and spelled gauge and probably copious amounts of other words wrong.

Grammer Gods please forgive me.

Time to eat dinner:
Organic pasta. How righteous.